Tuesday 27 October 2009

PQP Bach


This classical music malarky's a very confusing and complicated business.
First off, like I said before there's nothing like TotallyFuzzy to help you find what you're looking for. You end up having to find "a" classical blog and then working through the band of borthers that forms the links to the other classical blogs(and they are, indeed, the same links on every blog!). This is one of the ways in which I have found myself AWOL for nearly 2 months.
Secondly, if you were looking for music by a modern artist you wouldn't be looking for music by, say, Dylan as sung by someone else. You'd be looking for Dylan, mostly, right? In El Mundo Dos Classico this is impossible much of the time, thr music being well over a century old for the most part. So, you have to find the recorded interpretations and this is a MINEFIELD!!! There is a vast difference between the very many recordings of each piece, both in terms of quality of recording and quality of playing.
What I've found is that the best bet, if you haven't been recommended a specific recording (as Seb Hunter often does) is simply to plump for a good blog and find what you can there. This is where PQP Bach comes in.
Despite being in Portuguese (I think), PQP Bach is yer very own one-stop-shop for classical music. What he hasn't got isn't worth listening to, from 141 recordings of the work of J S Bach himself to 3 by Zelenka (whoever he is/was). There's even a bit of Zappa (3 to be precise).
Whilst unless you're fluent in Portuguese it's very difficult to read, if you're looking for, for example, Brahm's 4th Symphony, it'll be there. As will pretty much everything you want of a classical bent.
I have no doubt we'll be back with PQP Bach before I'm done but meanwhile, I recommend you go have a look.

2 comments:

  1. Glad to see you're back Rich, and even more glad to see you're sampling some classical stuff. Coincidentally, Ive been easing myself into it slowly over the last few weeks, and have loved most of what I've heard.

    Two composers I would recommend, if you don't already know them: Krzysztof Penderecki - He's a Polish composer who's done a lot of weird, angular, abstract stuff, a lot of it about war.

    But by far my favourite so far is Henryk Gorecki. His third symphony is one of the most gorgeous things I've heard in a long while. If you don't have it let me know and I'll have to run you off a copy :)

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  2. CHeers, G&R; good to be back.

    Never heard of Penderecki - will check him out!

    Re: Gorecki, ooh yes please!

    Rich

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