Double-checking, the Ancerl recording is from a CBC LP. And you’re probably right about its being surprising (to be fair I was very surprised to read that Dorati premiered Sessions’ 4th symphony - a rather different if also impassioned work.)
I only wish that your words were as clear to me as you profess - I think - to find mine.
Nevertheless , many thanks for the information on the Willan works. Very surprised to find that Ancerl, who seemed only to step outside the standard repertoire when music of his own compatriots was concerned, should have conducted it.
I can only go by your words- the contention is clear from them. The telepaths are -next- door.
I thought I’d heard Willan’s 2nd symphony on Euroclassic Notturno, but guess not. Stevenson’s description at Allmusic is notable if only for considerable unintentional humor. The second symphony and piano concerto can be heard on YouTube (the symphony conducted by Ancerl, I believe) but, as they are substantial 45-minute works, I mention this for people more generally.
Well, if I'd put forward the contention that the value of a musical work was in any way dependant upon who the composer had as students I would have said so and would, therefore, have been able to understand your question.
Having only met Healey Willan - whose piano concerto I did not make an attempt to assess on the basis of those he counted among his students - as the arranger for piano of the Londonderry Air (Horrible tune!) it interested me that he had as his student Cecil Gray who was quite an influential writer in his day and a noted authority on the music of Sibelius. In a thread where people are noting their choices as "The Best Piano Concertos" works of often well-merited obscurity, seemingly oblivious of the existence of those by Beethoven and Mozart, I thought a passage taken from Gray's writings might be of general interest to readers of the board as well as showing that even a noted critic can get things completely wrong at times. I could well be wrong about The Londonderry Air !
If a student were a reason to listen or not listen to a work by the teacher, then by -that- reasoning if you enjoy Stephen Sondheim you should enjoy Milton Babbitt. (I enjoy both, but still, you take my reasoning.) I.e., what (deleted!) does Cecil Gray have to do with Healey Willan's piano concerto? At all?
I'm not surprised that you include Medtner 3 in a list that also has a work by Bax in it; the last part of the Medtner concerto , to my mind, could easily be mistaken for Bax.
I don't know the Healey Willan work; apparently he was the teacher of the critic/composer Cecil Gray who wrote, amongst many other contentious statements, in "A Survey of Contemporary Music" (1924) "...but the monstrous and unholy hybrid, begotten upon music by drama, which is the opera of Strauss, Puccini, and most other writers of to-day, is not a form at all. It is neither drama, music, nor anything whatsoever. So now let it dash its head on a rock and trouble us no more ! "
It appears that Cecil Gray's own operas, together with the rest of his music, long ago were dashed against a rock and have scarcely troubled anybody since they were written !
To each his own Rob, but I'm surprised that of the five piano concertos of Saint-Saens you choose no 2 as the best. Saint-Saens himself, rather piqued that only nos 2 & 4 of his concertos were ever played put a hand up with fingers splayed to a pianist who was about to perform the second concerto and said "You know I've written FIVE piano concertos? "
A lovely work that I don't think has been mentioned in these lists, and better than many that have, is the Debussy Fantaisie. And I'm surprised that the Delius Concerto (which Moiseiwitsch rated as one of the loveliest of 20c. piano concertos) hasn't figured much either.
Belatedly I now come up with my own list of favourites:-
Brahms PC 2 - have always been averse to Gilels / Jochum but take you choice of other versions - own favourite is CBS Serkin/Ormandy (I think)
Shostakovich PC 2 - Yes - I was conquered in this by the classic CBS LP - Bernstein and NYPO
Medtner PC 3
Schumann
Rachmaninov 1 and 4
Ireland: Legend for Piano and Orchestra
Saint-Saens: PC No.2
Scriabin - such a moving work - the old Melodiya performance has not yet been trounced.
Kabalevsky 2
Tchaikovsky 2
Bax Winter Legends (magnificently imaginative and dramatic) - not at all Celtic twilight
Mozart 22 24
Arensky
Bortkiewicz 2 3
Scharwenka 1-4
Moeran Rhapsody No 3
Harty PC - romantic, wild and woolly - Tchaikovskian yet ....
Goossens Phantasy Concerto
Jacob Rhapsody for piano and brass band - a surprisingly eager and romantic work.
Joseph Marx PC 1 (Romantic) and 2 (Castelli Romani)
Malcolm Williamson 2
Stanford PC2
Healey Willan - Brit-Canadian - work comes over as akin to Rachamninov
Rob
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