Bartók: Essential Works for Beginners
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 29 ส.ค. 2023
- Bartók: Essential Works for Beginners
Music for Strings, Percussion and Celesta
The Miraculous Mandarin
Piano Concerto No. 2
Sonata for Two Pianos and Percussion
String Quartet No. 4
Concerto for Orchestra
Find reviews and recommendations for all of the above at ClassicsToday.com: www.classicstoday.com - เพลง
I was hooked when I first heard "Music for Strings, Percussion and Celesta" when I was 16.
I remember reading a remark of Bartók's to the effect that the simpler the melody, the more complex harmony it can take.
For me it was the Violin Concerto #2 as the place to start because of the melodic elements. The second theme is like a 12 tone row arranged as a folk melody with a certain implied simplicity despite the complex theory behind how it's written.
I read about Bartok in a Time magazine article. My grandfather had an extensive collection of classical music and my introduction to Bartok is Violin concerto No. 2 with Bernstein and Stern. It took a few listens but I learned to enjoy Bartok's music.
My Bartok story is that when I went to Hong Kong prior to the handover, I found small hole in the wall CD store and the owner was a classical music nut. When I asked for some Bartok recommendations, she said, "Ewww you like Bartok?" We became friends because of our mutual love for Mahler but I suggested she listen to Violin concerto No. 2. The next time I went to her store, the owner said, "I like Bartok now."
My introduction to Bartok was music I played on the piano: the Bagatelles. Loved them. The 2nd piano concerto and the sonata for two pianos and percussion were next. I did not play them!
Hello, Dave! This is a great, very persuasive and sensible introduction to my favorite composer of all time! Let me just point a tiny imprecision regarding dates: the Music for Strings, Percussion and Celesta is from 1936, right before the Sonata (both his most incredible masterpieces for me). Thank you and thank you again for what you do and share!
Oops. Thanks.
Actually Dave the music heard in the Elevator of Blood scene in The Shining is from Penderecki's Utrenja. The Bartok is heard in the Maze scene and again in the Jack/Danny scene in which Jack says: "I wish we could stay here forever, and ever..." (I've only seen the film about 50 times!) It took me a long time to get next to Bartok, but the Dorati/Detroit Miraculous Mandarin did it for me. Genius!
Oh well. It all sounds the same anyway...
@@DavesClassicalGuide😂
@@DavesClassicalGuide 👍
I can't wait to hear the Miraculous Mandarin with the Minnesota Orchestra next spring! Paired with the Brahms Violin Concerto - talk about contrast!
It was the second piano concerto that got me hooked. I sonehow came across a video of it on TH-cam, actually it was a rehearsal with Zoltán Kocsis and conductor Yuri Simonov. Blew me away.
I swear to God that I wanted a guide to Bartók yesterday (literally) and today you upload this❤
This series is going to be amazing🔥
Nice idea. Bartok's sound world takes a bit of getting used to. For me it was definitely the Concerto for Orchestra that first helped me to appreciate his music, his later works were maybe more accessible. From there I was gradually able to move on to the other orchestral works, but still got stuck on the string quartets until I heard several of them live last year (in the Wigmore Hall International String Quartet Competition) and they finally clicked for me. Another piece I liked at first hearing was the Dance Suite, and the 6 Romanian Folk Dances are nice easy snippets.
A Magnificent video helping listeners understand Bela Bartok. I was blown away by his piano 🎹 concertos and the virtuosity of his piano playing techniques. Then I became addicted to his music and to me Bela Bartok is as magnificent a composer as Igor Stravinsky. Just imagine recording all the Balkan countries gypsy music 🎶 on vax cylinders together with Zoltan Kodaly for more than a decade which amounted to the staggering number of 16,000. Then writing ✍️ all their notes 🎶 and using all these harmonies and rhythms intensely in his masterpieces. Difficult to digest his music 🎵. It has to grow on you. Once you get his music 🎶; you are a different breed of music lover. Thank you 🙏🏼 Dave Hurwitz 🫵✨💎🎶
LOL... I actually replied to that comment a few days ago thinking, "I hope this doesn't deter Dave from weighing in", and lo and behold we get an entire series! Great idea since we all have great composers we somehow just aren't that familiar with.
What hooked me on Bartok was playing his Romanian Folk Dances and Allegro Barbero as a piano student and Emerson Lake and Palmer’s version on their first album The Barberian.
The Dance Suites would be a good one for beginners as it embraces his folk music style without some of his more harsher elements: Bartok Lite.
Also the Divertimento for Strings written for a chamber ensemble is a good introduction to Bartok’s mature style.
Great beginning to a new series. Further installments will be much anticipated.
While I am no where near being a beginner to Bartok, I think this is an excellent list...and a great idea for a series as well. It's important that beginners get a comprehensive overview without being intimidated
As a kid I discovered _The Miraculous Mandarin_ before I discovered Bartók 🙂 I played the LP to death (Side 2 was _Háry János,_ also loved it). The other fav. records were Bach's organ music and Linguaphone's Spanish lessons.
Dear Dave,
Your channel and ClassicsToday are one of the great public services in the world today. In a recent comment I mentioned that it’s hard to know what the “essential” works to hear by prolific composers (in particular) are, so one can hear the great stuff first. This fills that niche perfectly. Thank you!
You are very welcome!
Great inauguration to an interesting new series. Looking forward to more of them.
Thank you ! I had myself a "coup de foudre" for the Music for strings, percussion and celesta. I read some here that Messiaen, on first hearing the piece, told, à propos the entrance of the celesta in the first movement : "it sounds like silk being torn".
Hello Dave!
I would like to ask you to consider to include Allan Pettersson in this series.
Best wishes Fred from Kristianstad.
I just got the Mandarin on the Salonen disc with the Rite of Spring & Bald Mountain
Great stuff!
One of the most memorable concerts I ever attended was Salonen/Philharmonia performing Mandarin and Rite, with Shostakovich's 2nd piano concerto sandwiched in between. Brilliant performances of three wonderful works.
@@ftumschk I bet. I like Esa-Pekka a lot
@@Warp75 He's a nice man, too. Before the concert, which was in Cardiff (Wales), he chatted with the audience in the bar before getting changed into his concert clothes. He even spoke to the group I was with, sipping a Coke and light-heartedly lamenting that his son was more into rock music than classical!
@@ftumschk Nice to hear ☝🏻
Bartok is like Britten for me: there isn't a single piece of his which I didn't much hate on first listening, and didn't very much love after about the 10th listening. Exactly as you describe, in fact :)
Having to 'work' at a composer makes for a life-long appreciation, I think: brain and heart both engaged, I suppose.
Nice series, Dave. Would love to hear (and keenly anticipate hearing) your beginner's guide to Britten, Vaughan Williams and Bach!
What a great channel! Thank you for all your work.
Great! Thank you!
Mr. Hurwitz, have you ever taught? You would be an amazing appreciation teacher.
Yes, I taught European history as a grad student at Stanford University.
Wonderful! It must have been a great class to take if even this cynical DMA in composition can find new and fun things to learn from you.
Good idea!
This is going to be awesome series!
Great new series
Dave, I laughed out loud when you mentioned "The Wonderful Tangerine." I had that very recording. I took it to class as my show-and-tell seminar hour discussing the importance of reading original texts. That one is a classic. I would also say that Bartok stands in relatively splendid isolation. There were no legions of followers, no Les Six, or a generation of Hindemith imitators or 12-tone followers. Maybe touches here and there but no "school."
Great idea for a series that should be a ton of fun. I think your choices were perfect.
This was the kind of games/conversations me and the other members of the quintet would have on the road between gigs...Good Times 👍
Bartok’s quartets are very cool and my personal favourite 20th century set. I have an admission that may bring ostracism. Albeit the string quartet oeuvre encompasses many of the masterpieces of music, I’m not a massive fan of the sound of 4 string instruments over a protracted time. The exception for me is masters of beautiful timbre, like Dvorak and Ravel. Beethoven invented some uniquely beautiful sonorities in his late quartets too. The other exception is the opposite, when a composer leans into the lean, scratchy, unrelenting quartet sound, like Bartok’s quartets or the Grosse Fugue.
Dave, many thanks as always, and a great start to this new series! (I would have added the fantastic Violin Concerto #2 - I've been enjoying the excellent Shaham/Boulez/ on DG).
I have enjoyed watching so many of your videos over the past several years, but this may have been the best and most helpful yet: ...THANK YOU Dave....as a retired professor (of Biology), I just want to say that you are a GREAT teacher!
Wow, thank you!
I know I’m going to love this series. It has already pointed out a gaping void in my Bartok collection, which I will fill forthwith. BTW, I’m still not quite ready for the 4th quartet - and it makes my cat glare at me and flee the room- but I do love nos, 2 and 6 especially. Looking forward to the rest of the series. Thanks!
Yes the 4th quartet can sometimes be nails on a chalkboard, especially the last movement.
I got into the 3rd & 4th quartets as a teenager (I think that was how I felt about life at the time 😀). Love the comment re the cat! The chord in the upper strings that opens the last movement of the 4th is actually lifted straight out the Rite of Spring: Dance of the Earth at the end of Part 1.
Yes David! Please do continue with this series. You're doing public service, really.
Thanks, Dave. An excellent selection indeed. The Miraculous Mandarin Suite was the first work of Bartók's that I got to know (Antal Dorati and the Chicago SO) and I did find the quartets difficult to get into initially (I still have difficulty with No. 3). I suppose you could have included "Bluebeard's Castle" too.
No, beginners don't need to hear an hour of screaming in Hungarian, marvelous thought it is.
I loved it from the very beginning but perhaps, having already heard and got to know the Miraculous Mandarin, I had some idea about what to expect and the writing for the two voices has never troubled me. There's much worse in a lot of Wagner!!
A most enjoyable talk on Bartok, especially your description of the music for strings, percussion and celesta. It is a spooky piece. I’m going to dig out my Bartok Decca box and listen to it. Now I have to find my Bartok Decca box.Could you possibly go back to using music examples during talks?not that I don’t like your singing.
I'm tired to getting stuck with copyright claims even when I have permission to use samples. I'm sorry, but I don't have the energy to fight every time I use musical examples.
Yes. Some might say it’s a bit hardcore, your list, but life is short, his music has been around a long long time, and certainly « screening off » the real deal from beginners is a bad (and maybe patronising) idea. All exciting and absolutely time-worthy selections :)
I really enjoy the Takcas Quartet recordings of Bartok (and Beethoven)! Do you have any alternative recommendations?
I've made videos for you to explore.
@@DavesClassicalGuide Thank you
Regarding the images that this music provokes, the first time I heard it, I felt that a firm hand was taking me through something like hell
Prepare for THE REAL ESSENTIAL BEETHOVEN!!!
Haha yes. It’s going to get a lot more tricky with many pre 20th century composers.