Re: What Have You Been Listening To?
Posted: Sun Jun 21, 2026 7:07 pm
I'm not really autistic about conductors too. It is just that I have listened to too much Boulez and I cannot come back. His conduct sounds in my mind even when I listen to others. It eventually became a matter of Boulez vs non-Boulez in my mind sometimes. So you should filter my words a bit out. Though I'm totally fine for music not conducted by him.AsaFromNasa wrote: Sun Jun 21, 2026 6:08 pmI think it might be kinda hard to not use a score with the rite of spring haha. I usually don't get too autistic about the recording and just stick to the big names (Karajan, Solti, etc.) or go with what our bald gay jew anthony fantano (dave hurwitz) says. Sometimes ill hate a piece and then switch recordings and find out that i love it, which is probably a sign that i should proactively explore different recordings. Attentively sitting through multiple multiple recordings of the same thing is kinda a big task for my zoomer brain, but maybe ill start doing it for some of my favorite pieces. The only recording im set in stone on is the igor levit beethoven piano sonata cycle. I've listened to the whole thing probably a few hundred times and no other recording sounds right now. Do you have a favorite conductor/performer/recording that you would recommend i check out?Thricegreat wrote: Sun Jun 21, 2026 5:18 amBoulez's conduct of Stravinsky is always autistic and good. It is laughable that he just looks at the score. :) Though it is far better to close the eyes and focus on the sounds, if you don't read the score.
I've been listening to a lot of Wagner recently and have grown to love him a lot. I got my hands on the book The Wagner Operas by Ernst Newman and im looking forward to reading it. I've just been listening to the music but I feel like im missing out on half of his appeal by not experiencing the gesamtkunstwerk. Do any of you have recommendations for full productions (preferably not ones that change to story to be about gay aliens from mars)?
What's weird about Boulez is that I don't necessarily think it's good when I first listen to it. It usually feels like the Taklamakan desert. But when I listen to others after that, it feels so lukewarm. Especially it is almost only Boulez who made every note on the scores clearly hearable. That is the peak autism.
By the way his conduct of Beethoven's 9th symphony has totally corrupted me:
To talk about other big names, well... One thing I want to say is that I quite enjoy Karajan's "Performances". :) It is the total opposite of Boulez.
About Wagner, although I have listened to him because of the importance like the famous Tristan chord, I do not deeply know about him. I like him being a Schopenhauerian, but I don't like things like German mythology. These "Aryan" mythologies like German or Nordic are almost the only mythologies I rarely don't like. But I think Boulez's Wagner was ridiculously autistic and cool. That was truly the work of a person who said "Schoenberg is too conservative".
I'm inclined to Mahler more. Partially because I like Webern the most among composers. And he was influenced by Mahler in addition to Schoenberg who was his teacher. Or Debussy recently because of his influence on Bartok. This unironically leads to Boulez. Maybe because he studied math before music?
But again, please filter my words out. Considering the posts you wrote, I think our tastes are still a bit different. Also consider that maybe I like music, but still I'm not a musician myself.
