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I want to thank you for your continuing series of posts concerning Mr. Herrmann's concert works. This is a terrific ongoing project!
I am a little surprised that more folks don't join in and comment. Frankly, it has taken a while for this Symphony to resonate with me on any level at all -- although I had an immediate and lasting connection to Moby Dick, Wuthering Heights, and most of the other concert works released on Unicorn.
I am honestly not sure why this work has taken so long to engage me -- but for many years I became impatient with its musical development -- I think I was thrown out of the music by what struck me as thematic incongruities and mood swings. During more recent listenings, however, the piece has ceased to have those problems for me -- it seems more of a unified whole. Perhaps I am just older... I prefer the older Herrmann version of this work -- the sound is a bit low key on it -- but the Phoenix recording seems a bit ragged in playing around the edges at times. But these are my strictly amateur opinions of course. It is wonderful to have two recordings of Herrmann's Symphony -- wish there were more.
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Posted: |
Mar 10, 2011 - 11:08 AM
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By: |
Mark Ford
(Member)
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John, thank you for your support in the series!
One thing I've noticed about blogs is that they rarely generate many comments. A lot of that has to do with the fact that many people don't read the blogs, they come straight to the boards so the number of blog readers is much smaller than message board readers. I was able to verify on the Moby Dick blog that scarcely 50 people might have read the blog since that was how many views the first section of the cantata got on YouTube.
Joan Hue suggested I post my blogs in a thread on the message board, but I've noticed when people post a long article styled entry, there are always comments saying the post is too long to read all of it and it should be a blog. So it's damned if you do, damned if you don't!
And I suspect threads that are generated from a blog comments get little attention as can be seen by the lower number of views. The fact that "Blog Post" is in the title of the thread seems to make it of little interest to most. Perhaps it's because it's not one of the gazillion polls, lists or speculation threads that have overtaken the boards in recent years which is what many seem to be more interested in rather than discussions of the music itself (although I've noticed just recently that there does seem to be a small swing back to more posts about the music). Who knows why really. In this case it can't be because Herrmann is not of interest to the demographics of the board as he came in 5th place in a poll thread a few months ago of who were the top 5 favorite film composers of board members.
Anyway, I'm glad you're enjoying the series which I did for 2 reasons in celebrating the Herrmann centennial: 1) To introduce Herrmann's concert works to those who may not have heard them or may be interested in learning more about them, and 2) To present excerpts from "A Heart at Fire's Center", a terrific book on Herrmann. Although the excerpts I use from the book are focused on the musical selection, the parts of the book about Herrmann the man are the most fascinating in trying to understand this tempestuous genius. Perhaps posting these excerpts may get some interested in reading the book.
Stay tuned in about 2 weeks for THE FANTASTICKS...
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Posted: |
Mar 10, 2011 - 3:48 PM
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By: |
Mark Ford
(Member)
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Mark, I don't believe your article mentions that Herrmann might have had more success with this work if he had agreed at the time to trim its length, which I recall a major conductor or two requested before agreeing to conduct it themselves (much like with WUTHERING HEIGHTS). But when Herrmann revisited his Symphony for the 1970s Unicorn recording, he did end up making cuts. I would like to hear the longer version!
Zoragoth, you're right, I did neglect to mention the different versions. According to the book, Eugene Ormandy intended to conduct it in Philadelphia, New York, Washington and Baltimore if Herrmann agreed to about 15 minutes of cuts. Of course being Herrmann he wouldn't agree to it. Too bad, because at least in its shorter form it might have found an audience and perhaps a place in the concert repertoire if someone of the stature of Ormandy programmed it a number of times. Instead it wasn't heard after its first couple of performances until 1974 when Herrmann recorded the shorter version you mentioned. I think I'll add this info to the blog. It does finish the story!
I'm with you on the Sedares pairing. I think FOR THE FALLEN or something not yet recorded would have made a better pairing, at least for us film score guys!
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I'm glad to see Herrmann's hard-to-find recording of his Symphony is up on YouTube. I'd never heard this performance before, but it definitely sounds a lot more "Herrmann" to me than the Sedares version on the Koch label. Sedares just aimlessly blows through the entire piece at one ridiculous tempo, and the orchestra sounds like they'd rather be playing something else through most of it. The needed "bleak oppressiveness" just isn't there.
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