 The Clarinet BBoard
|
Author: maskedridersean
Date: 2009-10-19 23:45
Whose recording do you prefer?
Stanley Drucker?
Martin Frost?
Paul Meyer?
Sabine Meyer?
David Shiffrin?
Benny Goodman's original?
Somebody I did not list?
EDIT: The above names were the ones on Amazon. There is no intention of slighting any ones work.
Post Edited (2009-10-20 20:46)
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: cigleris
Date: 2009-10-19 23:50
Somebody you did not list. Richard Hosford and the Chanber Orchestra of Europe.
Peter Cigleris
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: clarinetist04
Date: 2009-10-20 03:00
I think Stoltzman's recording matches the style of the piece nicely. Might be the only piece his vibrato doesn't bother me on.
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: mrn
Date: 2009-10-20 05:40
I like this piece a lot, own several recordings of it, and have heard a few more. I hesitate to call any of them definitive--especially since I have a number of my own ideas about how to interpret this piece--but each of them has their merits. So here's my take on Copland recordings:
Benny Goodman: This recording was made with Copland conducting and it's really sort of the model for all the recordings that have been made of this piece since (at least all the ones I've heard). Some of the good things about this recording are the fact that Goodman doesn't try to jazz up the piece with swing rhythms, extra glisses, and the like. He plays it straight, as it was meant to be played. This recording has its flaws, too, though. For one, Goodman's performance in the first movement is a little shaky as he seems to have some trouble negotiating the big leaps smoothly and his intonation seems a little off to me at times, especially in the throat register. In general, Goodman tends to have some trouble with control in this recording, especially in the altissimo register. Another problem (which is not unique to this recording) is that Goodman tends to misplace accents and misreads the score in other quirky ways that find their way into subsequent recordings by others (because everyone else imitates Benny Goodman's recording).
Richard Stoltzman: Stoltzman's recording is, from a purely technical standpoint, clearly superior to Goodman's, especially in the first movement, where Stoltzman exhibits a masterful control over the instrument. Stoltzman's performance of the first movement is beautiful to listen to, as well. Where I find fault with Stoltzman's recording is in the cadenza and last movement, where he tries too hard to make the music sound like jazz by adding swing rhythms, additional smears, and other jazz effects that weren't in the score. It isn't jazz, and whatever jazz influences Copland had weren't swing (as Copland once said himself)--but Stoltzman tries to make the piece about swing (and by so doing misses much of the rhythmic flavor of the original writing).
Gary Gray: This recording is less overtly jazzed up than Stoltzman's, although Gray does indulge in a little swinging here and there. Gray abandons a few (but not all) of Goodman's quirky accents and rhythms (this is particularly noticeable in the cadenza). Overall it's a decent performance, but there are some things I don't like about it. For one thing, the first movement sounds a little rushed to me--it may not be rushed tempowise, but it FEELS like the notes just kind of go by (compared to other recordings I've heard). And while the first part sounds rushed, the rest of the concerto sounds like it drags a little.
Martin Fröst: I really like this recording. The first movement is beautifully done. Fröst also manages to avoid the accenting/articulation quirks of the Goodman recording in the cadenza (he plays the long accents long and the staccato notes short, just as Copland notated it). The final movement is played straight, as written by Copland, and is full of energy (as you might expect from Fröst). On top of that, Fröst plays without vibrato, which I think is really more appropriate for this music. (Yeah, I know, it was written for Benny Goodman, who used vibrato, but I think playing with a pure, vibratoless tone is more appropriate to the Copland sound. I think it's more important to sound like Copland in this piece than Goodman--and apparently Goodman thought so, too.) The thing I probably like least about this recording is that it is almost a bit too virtuosic at times, especially during the cadenza, where he starts and stops with flashes of fiery technique. I think if I were performing this piece, I would make the cadenza a little bit steadier in terms of rhythm and slow it down a little. Also, as good as Fröst is about following the score, he still duplicates some of the accent quirkiness of the Goodman recording in the final movement.
Charles Neidich: I've only heard the final movement of the Neidich recording, but I was a bit disppointed. The claim to fame of this recording was that Neidich "put back" the notes from the last movement that Copland took out because they were too difficult for Benny Goodman to play. I have to say that I don't think the extra altissimo notes really add anything to the piece--in fact, I really think the revisions made for Benny Goodman's benefit to make the piece more playable actually improved the piece from a musical standpoint. Neidich doesn't really fully succeed in playing the unplayable parts anyway because his intonation is off on the highest notes and he seems to have trouble controlling his upper altissimo notes. Also, this recording suffers from being overly jazzed-up in places. It's like he tried to make his Copland bigger and better than the rest, with more jazzy techniques, more altissimo, and more feats of superhuman virtuosity. Problem is that none of that really does anything for the music, and, even if it did, Neidich doesn't manage to pull it off all that well--I hate to be blunt about it, but it sounds kind of gimmicky to me. I have the same complaint of the live recording of Jonathan Cohler playing this piece on his website, which is similar to Neidich's interpretation, although less ambitious. I really don't think adding jazz smears, swing rhythms, and stratospheric notes to this piece makes the piece any better--I think it's much better in the final version Copland published, but played *as written* by Copland in that final, published version, without all the extra jazziness so many players try to throw into this piece. Still, it was a little interesting to see what was so hard about this piece in its original draft (and the kinds of misconceptions Copland apparently had about the technical capabilities of the clarinet).
Anyway, that's my 2 cents. :-)
Post Edited (2009-10-20 16:02)
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: kdolan01
Date: 2009-10-20 06:29
jon manasse...always top notch. orchestra not as hot, but jon makes up for it.
this is the cd with 3 concertos, mozart, copland, and nielsen
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: John J. Moses
Date: 2009-10-20 15:20
Hi:
All very enjoyable recordings of the Copland Concerto, thanks for the list.
If you consider a movie soundtrack a "recording", then try to find my playing of the Copland with Aaron Copland conducting on a movie called, "Love and Money". It's a bit chopped-up to fit the action of the film, but the credits are neat!
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0084274/fullcredits#cast
JJM
Légère Artist
Clark W. Fobes Artist
Post Edited (2009-10-20 15:21)
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: John Peacock
Date: 2009-10-20 18:50
The best performance I've ever heard was de Peyer's. It's a great shame that it has never been reissued on CD. Part 1 is slower than average, but never drags. The cadendza has an incredible feeling of cumulative excitement: he never lets the tension relax, unlike many players who keep stopping and starting. It really sounds like a single-take performance, and its an edge-of-the-seat experience. Hosford is similar in some ways, and won a recent BBC library vote, but I think de Peyer beats him at all the key points.
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: Ken Shaw ★2017
Date: 2009-10-20 20:19
My favorite performances are by players with a jazz background.
For me, Goodman's first, monaural recording with Copland conducting the Columbia String Orchestra is the best. BG was in superb form, which made up for some scrappy orchestral playing. Unfortunately, it was on a never-reissued Columbia LP, ML 4421, and is impossible to find. His second recording with Copland is also excellent and has been reissued on CD.
For a modern performance, I prefer Bill Blount with the St. Luke's Chamber Orchestra http://www.amazon.com/Aaron-Copland-Theatre-Clarinet-Concerto/dp/B000000FMT, followed by Gary Gray and Richard Stoltzman. Bill is one of those unknown great players, with a perfect, seamless technique, excellent musicality and an effortless tonal production, rather like Goodman's.
Ken Shaw
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
The Clarinet Pages
|
 |
.jpg){kind=small}
.jpg){kind=small}
.jpg){kind=small}
.jpg){kind=small}
.jpg){kind=small}
.jpg){kind=small}
