Friday, February 23, 2007

Bernstein M8

OK, look, maybe this is not everybody's bag, but this is great stuff. Bernstein doing Part I of Mahler's 8th. Unfortunately, these are not continuous or complete clips, just excerpts. Additional unfortunateness: I tried to do a YouTube embed on this but got stymied at one step of the process.

Part 1 of Mahler's 8th is the "Veni, Creator" put to music.

Excerpt 1

Excerpt 2

As an added bonus, same performance, the very end (the "Chorus Mysticus," which has been linked ad nauseum by me before):

Excerpt 3

Extra super special bonus: an excerpt from a documentary on Bernstein, Mahler and the Vienna Symphony.
Excerpt 4

5 comments:

Athos said...

It really is great stuff, Porthos. File under "Truth, BEAUTY, and goodness." At its best, orchestra and chorus work is symbolic of what is best about human cooperation (this side of the Church, of course).

At my age, I can't dig up enough motivation to play in an orchestra full time anymore. It just isn't "ultimate" enough to give so much time and effort to practicing.

Porthos said...

Yeah, I hear that. I was arm-twisted into playing at the Christmas concert/worship service at my institution, but that's the only thing I do now string-wise.

Do you have Mahler's 8th complete?!? I'd like to hear your take on the whole, glorious, integrated thing.

Porthos said...

Ath, it's an advantage of our declining years. Rehearsing and playing is hard work. Listening is pure pleasure.

Let them young scamps do all the work!

That's what I say.

Athos said...

I may have it on vinyl, but the player is in moth balls at the moment ... for the past five years. Blimey!

I've seen a turntable for converting to MP3 format. It's kind of sad seeing all those forlorn records standing at attention and not being listened to.

Porthos said...

Dust off the ole turntable. You're probably a man (unlike me) who took good care of his records.
Many East Asian guys are serious music collectors, and they still use their turntables. Don't let all that beauty just sit there! You must have a marvelous record collection.