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[mlr]

Sitting at the Starbucks on I40 watching the traffic go by and the fireworks in the distance. A thunderstorm is coming in from the east. Israel just left Santa Fe and will be in late. I'm reading John Berendt's 2nd book The City of Falling Angels and listening to the Hilliard Ensemble sing Josquin.

Today I played Ives' Variations on America and it went flawlessly. I'll try to make a vid for YouTube sometime this month.

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Comments

[dewittar.livejournal.com]

I think most of it is a bear, though I do love it. I've loved it since the first time I played the orchestral version in high school. I worked for years and years to get it into my organ repertoire. My piano training (one of my primary instruments) really helped with the organ transcription.

[mlr.livejournal.com]

For me it's kind of fun to play (mainly! if it goes OK). This is the third time I've tried to play it. The first time (3 yrs ago), it did not go well - but it still felt like an accomplishment just to get through it. But I don't know if I can say I love it. I have always heard of the W. Schuman orchestration - but have never heard that work.

I played parts of the 1st piano sonata in college - and I do love that piece. And I accompanied lots of songs with an old friend who was a great interpreter of the Ives' songs. In my college years, Ives was an important figure for lots of people I knew. There were the wonderful Bernstein recordings of the orchestral pieces, and this old recording of the violin sonatas with Paul Zukofsky and Gilbert Kalish. I often listened to that late at night, one of them (3rd?? or 4th??) was so beautifully melancholy. Just writing this makes me yearn to go to Amazon and see if there's a download, but I think I hit my summer limit sometime in June :-).

It's nice to have a person on my friends list who can comment on my (few) organ posts - THanks & Cheers

[dewittar.livejournal.com]

I was just listening to the Sonata for Violin and Piano No. 4 in C minor this afternoon. Then I went on a search for a digital recording of all the Sonatas. I finally settled on a recording by Mela Tenenbaum & Richard Kapp. Really nice.

I really enjoy your YouTube videos of you playing.

[mlr.livejournal.com]

serendipitous :-)

That sounds like a good choice - the newer recordings are probably better. Paul Zukofsky was the son of Louis Zukofsky who was a fairly arcane poet. For me though this made him a romantic figure, so I sought him out. On this particular recording, his violin sound was very lovely.