10 ESSENTIAL ORCHESTRAL SONG CYCLES for BEGINNERS
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 27 เม.ย. 2024
- Songs with orchestra fall into a special category in the world of classical music. Here are ten of the very best song cycles, perfect for introducing yourself to what we call "the classical art song," a rather pretentious term that has far less significance than you might at first believe.
Berlioz: Les Nuits d’été
Mahler: Songs of a Wayfarer
Vaughan Williams: On Wenlock Edge
Szymanowski: Love Songs of Hafiz
Elgar: Sea Pictures
Ravel: Schéhérazade
Copland: Eight Poems of Emily Dickinson
Hindemith: Das Marienleben
Britten: Serenade for Tenor, Horn and Strings
Martin: Der Cornet - เพลง
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Whenever I lose my shoes I play Allan Pettersson's Barefoot Songs. I'm not sure how, but they do seem to help me find them.
Thank you! Lipovsek's Der Cornet is one of my Desert Island disks, THE perfect marriage of poetry and music. It's one of those works - Mahler 6, Shostakovich 4, Sibelius 4 are others - that I play rarely these days, there has to be a break from all music after listening to it. It can leave you stunned. Sadly, I'm still struggling to get anything like the same degree of enjoyment out of another of Martin's acclaimed vocal works, Le Vin Herbé. There's a monochrome texture to Martin's music that strikes me as profoundly beautiful at times, a touch dull at others.
And thumbs up to your comments about all song cycles, classical or otherwise. For me, Sgt. Pepper is at least a match for most of them.
Cool video. I was thinking Canteloube would be on but I guess it is sprawling, performed in small selections, and maybe isn’t thematically unified. But I think beginners would love the lush orchestration and melodies
Excellent choices, and it's so pleasing to see Das Marienleben getting a shout-out; it's such a lovely work. The Frank Martin "Cornet" is a new one on me, so I'll have to give it a whirl.
Really happy that you give a shoutout to Der Cornet, such an amazing piece, with such an amazing text. I was quite surprised to find it here on this list, because I have never thought of it as a song cycle, but rather a kind of modern solo cantata. Probably because it is not really a sequence of poems (I wouldn't call Rilke's "Cornet" a poem either, it is clearly a longer prose text, interspersed with sequences where the whole thing suddenly falls into verse mode), but the setting of one coherent text, divided into smaller portions. Which really differentiates it from all the other entries here.
This was a great list. Thanks, Dave.
Glad you liked it! Thank you very much for your kindness!
I daresay orchestral songs are my FAVORITE genre. Something about a solo voice with a full orchestra pushes my buttons. I have to admit I'm not familiar with a couple of these cycles, I'll have to look them up! Sea Pictures (recording of Janet Baker with Barbirolli), Les Nuits d'ete, and the Britten Serenade are absolute favorites. Mahler wrote several, I do love Kindertotenleider as well as Songs of a Wayfarer. Copland's Old American Songs are also wonderful.
You just quoted my favorite Emily Dickenson poem!
What a shame that Martin is nearly forgotten now. "The Cornet" is one of the few 12-tone-works , which demonstrate that the technique does work, when used by a gifted composer, who dominates the material rather than to be dominated by it. In fact, one wouldn't believe at all that it's 12-tone-music, so beautiful it is. For me, "Sie haben sich ja gefunden einander ein neues Geschlecht zu sein" is one of the greatest moments in the music of the 20th century. This is pure ecstasy in beauty. I guess that even beginners are able to understand this music, because of its emotional impact and the intensity of the colours.
Very interesting. It happens that I passed by the Martin setting of Rilke (though I love Frank Martin), whereas I am fond of Klenau's setting (very same title, quite well recorded on Da Capo). Really worth the try, for everybody interested in post-roantic orchestral songs fot soloists, coir and large orchestra.
Excellent. I am not familiar with Love Songs of Hafiz and will need to check them out.
Nice list, with some surprises! I enjoyed listening to you describe the beauties of the Ravel and the Hindemith. The only recording of the latter I'm familiar with is the one with Roxalana Roslak, accompanied by Glenn Gould, and I can't imagine it being done much better.
That's the piano version, obviously.
@@DavesClassicalGuide Oops! that didn't even occur to me. I definitely need to check out an orchestral version.
It is always with a sense of trepidation that I approach your essential lists when vocals are present. I have yet to find solo female classical vocals that I enjoyed and some of these were the worst to my ears yet. Having said that, the Berlioz was fine but doubt I will ever listen to it again. I found Der Cornet way too dramatic for my tastes. I liked the Britten and I loved the Vaughan Williams. I tried several recordings of On Wenlock Edge and I liked one I found with Ian Patridge singing the best. As for the Ravel, I think I listened to the wrong thing because it was 45 min and there were no vocals but I really enjoyed it. I do think after these Essential lists are done I will probably be done with classical music with solo vocals b/c life is short and there is too much great music to hear.
I needed this list because I haven't really listened to classical songs. Is there a list of essential band pieces coming soon?
Soon, I don't know, but I will do one, for sure.
Why are Frank Martin’s songs so hard to find?! I spent a long time looking for Unter Des Linden on cd. I’ll be checking out Cornet Rilke, as well as the Hindemith. And thanks for your kind words on popular song. Lots of greatness there. For example, I have always felt that some of Roy Orbison’s songs were actually arias. Listen to ‘It’s Over’.
There should be available three recordings of Martin's cycle: The one Dave mentioned is in print (but Orfeo is a problem, even in Austria, it takes a long time, when you order it); and then, there are two other recordings, one on MDG, sung by Christianne Stotijn, and one on philharmonia.rec, sung by Okka von der Damerau, which I prefer. But the best is without any question the one with Lipovsek.
The Hindemith you get on CPO with Ruth Ziesak, then there is a historic on Aldila with Agnes Giebel, conducted by Keilberth (two discs with interesting stuff from Karl Höller, Reinhard Schwarz-Schilling and Heinrich Kaminski, sort of neoclassicists); but the most interestig recording isn't available any more, it seems: it was on Finlandia with Karita Mattila, wwho also sang works by Aulis Sallinen and Aare Merikanto.
@@edwinbaumgartner5045 Thanks so much, Edwin! I'll start searching for one of these right away.
Could you do a video about the best of these classical songs that are not Lieder?
(because I personally know the Lieder-culture very well but would desperately like to get to know the rest of the classical songs you mentioned 😇)
I share your views on lieder, so all too often song cycles for me are just too much of the same phenomenon, even with the backing of a full orchestra. For this reason, Astral Weeks by Van Morrison is the closest thing there is to an essential song cycle for me. All that said, great to see Martin pop up with Der Cornet. Time to keep on listening, I’ve heard that piece once at most.
I hope somewhere in future chats you will find a place for Reger's orchestration of Schubert's Erlkőnig.(Best music by Reger?)
I prefer Berlioz.
Classical songs are inspired by a text. It's often a composer deciding to set a poem that he/she responds to and attempting to reflect the emotions evoked by that poem in music. In general people who have no interest on poetry fail to "get" lieder in particular. Composers choose texts to set. It's a completely different process from popular songs, which (by necessity) require a catchy tune to words that are often of secondary importance (and often inane). Hugo Wolf isn't less "good" than McCartney because he's less popular - and always will be. It's nothing to do with snobbery. It's a recognition that the genres are attempting to do completely different things.
That is completely incorrect. Many pop music composers are equally inspired by texts, and the notion that "art" songs set great(er) poetry as a rule is nonsense. Many of the greatest songs set texts that by any standard would be considered to be lousy poetry, and the reality is that great poetry does not always lend itself to the best musical settings. In fact, great poetry does not need or benefit from the addition of music at all. It is damaged by it.
There is still the problem that songs are usually sung in opera style.