Looking for recommendations for happy upbeat classical and cello music..

IGBT

Lifer
Jul 16, 2001
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So much of it is depressing and down beat...I like the sounds of the instruments especially the cello but the content is depressed..
 

Torn Mind

Lifer
Nov 25, 2012
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What kind of style, because "classical" spans hundreds of years of shifts in the "pop" of the day. Most of the endearing tunes come from the Romantic era.

But, I'll recommend the top charter equivalent of his day, the "Baby One More Time" of his oeuvre, Beethoven's Septet, Op. 20.


Also, the stuffiness is because the community is still stuck in the 19th century. The Historically Informed Movement, though an imperfect stuck-in-academia-movement, nevertheless did contribute a substantial shift in performance practice of many works(generally faster, but not always). Thus, Roger Norrington's take one Beethoven's 3rd and 5th Symphony are worth a listen.

Haydn has two Cello Concertos.
 
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Torn Mind

Lifer
Nov 25, 2012
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To illustrate the matter of "tempo drag", I will present two performances of Mozart's Haffner Serenade. Once is conducted by Sir Neville Mariner. The other is apparently influence by the HIP movement. The HIP has a far livelier opening. A bit of history, the Haffner Serenade was written for a wedding, and one can reverse engineer that the first two movements were a matter of undivided attention and the rest was more generic party music. There was a world before Mendelssohn stole weddings indefinitely with his Wedding March, and this was Mozart's music for Siegmund Haffer. The second vid is clearly more appropriate and engaging than the first.


Classical music performance is always going to be the equivalent of a cover artist performing the original, except the original sound is lost to time. The trend was always to "make Beethoven more epic" and make everyone else more "epic and slooow Beethoven" at the expense of losing all sense of melisma in that music.

Classical musicians only deserve respect as players, but their ability to understand music will be deficient compared to modern makers of music regardless of walk. I'll trust a rock band to understand composition more than someone with a conservatory education. In terms of composition, a classical musician is trashbin-grade. Although some are no good even if not classical trained(Keith Jarrett has no sense of motion)
 
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pete6032

Diamond Member
Dec 3, 2010
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So much of it is depressing and down beat...I like the sounds of the instruments especially the cello but the content is depressed..
How about Bach's Unaccompanied Cello Suites? Here is one of them.
 
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Muse

Lifer
Jul 11, 2001
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So much of it is depressing and down beat...I like the sounds of the instruments especially the cello but the content is depressed..
There's 2Cellos stuff, have you checked them out at Youtube? Mind blowing and they are athletic, daring, ultra-talented, out to amaze.

The have a ton of stuff on Youtube.


This YT video alone has 250,000,000 views (a few of which are MINE!)!


Word is this is their last tour and they are breaking up because they have "totally different life styles." :oops:
 
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MrSquished

Lifer
Jan 14, 2013
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How about Bach's Unaccompanied Cello Suites? Here is one of them.

There are some really beautiful pieces in there. The third piece is my absolute favorite. I've heard the suites by other cello musicians but I like Yo Yo Ma's interpretation the best. Some do that third movement so fast it kills the beauty of the piece of me. It's too frantic. Ma's playing of that one is just sublime and more thoughtful, while still being uplifting and emotive.

Listening to the cello suites on the LCD-X headphones has made Yo Yo Ma's strokes come to life for me all over again. It's mind blowing.
 
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Muse

Lifer
Jul 11, 2001
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I got into Bach's cello suites by virtue of Ingmar Bergman's Through a Glass Darkly movie from the 1960s, in which the 2nd suite is featured. The movie is, however, on the depressing side and the piece is introspective, contemplative, anything but upbeat. :) I love the piece though.
 

Torn Mind

Lifer
Nov 25, 2012
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Symphony No. 2, by Beethoven, which he arranged for piano trio(I prefer the piano trio over the actual symphony)
 

Torn Mind

Lifer
Nov 25, 2012
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The two best performances I know of so far of Mozart's K. 333's last movement.
 

IGBT

Lifer
Jul 16, 2001
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All great recommendations...I've placed a few orders on Amazon...thanx a ton!!
 

Torn Mind

Lifer
Nov 25, 2012
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All great recommendations...I've placed a few orders on Amazon...thanx a ton!!
Another work that is clearly upbeat is the Mozart Piano Concerto No. 21. The cadenzas were not written down because Mozart did not need to do so. So, there will be sections where the "gap is filled" by a lesser musician and the break in "flow and transition" is rather obvious.

Of the performances I've heard, I have two that have latched on to me.

One is by Pollini. Probably the biggest insight I got from this was a part of the development section basically does away with the distinction of one hand having the melody and the other the accompaniment. The whole interaction is the "melody" starting at 7:53.

The other performances involve Ronald Brautigam. Brautigam is part of the "HIP" school, which is the aforesaid academic movement within classical circles(other proponents being the likes of Roger Norrington and Robert Levin) which adopt certain rules for performance practice. Though as necessary movement, it being more academic rule than just "play the music" can result in unmusical idiosyncrasies. The fast movements are usually enhanced but slow movements can sometimes feel a bit "rushed".

This recording has the features of no vibrato in the orchestra and a speedier tempo for the Andante. But because it is the instruments from Mozart's time, there is more balance and audibility from all instruments involved.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zXHc5sxUMBQ

He does things a bit different live and on a modern grand; the Andante is slowed down to a more conventional pace.

In addition, Geza Anda's version is worth a listen simply because he has a lot of musicality.
 

Muse

Lifer
Jul 11, 2001
39,962
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From memory, my favorite Mozart piano concertos are 19, 20, 21 and 27, with 20 my favorite.
 

IGBT

Lifer
Jul 16, 2001
17,965
140
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I like this and bought their first album / CD...I like it but it would be much more listenable if the drums were subdued and miked differently...at times the drummer just isn't satisfactory..any thoughts on the drummer / drumming??
 

sdifox

No Lifer
Sep 30, 2005
98,846
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Check out The Piano Guys, they are pretty good with their arrengements.


 

lxskllr

No Lifer
Nov 30, 2004
59,104
9,536
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like this and bought their first album / CD...I like it but it would be much more listenable if the drums were subdued and miked differently...at times the drummer just isn't satisfactory..any thoughts on the drummer / drumming??
'Plays Metallica' album? That doesn't have any drums at all. The stuff with drums I don't mind. They're pretty much a metal band. A different kind of metal band, but a metal band none the less. I think the drums fit with that style
 

Torn Mind

Lifer
Nov 25, 2012
12,004
2,748
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David Zinman conducting Beethoven's Creatures of Prometheus has a movement where the cello is featured.