Desert Island Discs
on Sheila Ash (India), 17/Feb/2016 06:26, 34 days ago
Halesworth U3A Music Approeciation Group discovered the Desert Island Discs of some more of its memebers.(1) First up, LynetteCesar Frank’s Symphony D Minor played by the Philhramonic Orchestra conducted by Otto Kempler. I couldn’t find this particular recording available online but here is Orchestre National de France, conducted by Leonard Bernstein playing the piece.“God Bless the Child” byBillie Holliday. Lynette played the 1941 version from a compilation CD Jazz Greats which features Holliday at her best vocally before her downward spiral. “Morales Officium” played byHilliard Ensemblefeat.Jan Gaberek.Not having any awareness of early music and not being a lover of choral pieces, but being a saxaphone fan, this took me totally be surprise and blew me away with its beautiful melding of the vocal and sax harmonies.Cristóbal de Morales(c. 1500 -1553) was a Spanish composer of the Renaissance period (2) Vanessa’s choices wereWidor’s ToccataSymphony 5Simon LindleyGerald Hoffung’s TheBricklayer’s LamentSketch from a CD entitled 17 Comedy Classics. I found this recording of most of his 1958Oxford Union addresswhich includes this tale and thistranscriptof the tale if you prefer to read or read along.Beethoven’s Pastoral by the Berlin Philharmonic conducted by Von Karajan….here’s a taster (3) Next up was Sue with her selectionRostropovichand Britten on Cello and piano playingSchubert’sArpeggione Sonata. Not a piece I knew prior to hearing Sue’s extract but I do love the sound of the cello and I liked this very much I have been listening to it a lot since then and to his Complete Decca Recordings  John Playford’s 17th Century dances was unfortunately not able to be played on the day on our equipment. Thewiki pagehas several media links to excerpts, there isinstructions for the dancesavailable from his book“The English Dancing Master”,YouTube has a great manyrecordingsavailable.Chopin’sNocturnesB Flat Minor played byDaniel Barenboim(4) Finally we had Richard’s choicesUnder Milk WoodbyDylan Thomasread (of course) by Richard Burton can be streamed in 2 parts onSpotifyTasmin Littleplaying theBrahm’sViolin Concertowith the Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Vernon Handley again available onSpotifyJohn Coltrane’sThe Acknowledgementfrom hisA Love SupremeCD for which YouTube has a live recording of part of it!Maurice Gendronplaying Bach’sCello Suite  No. 6which can be listened to on YouTubeand finally more cello but with a very different touch -Pablo Casalsplaying Schubert’s"Cello Quintet" , String Quintet in C major (D. 956, Op. posth. 163)in C MajorII Adagioashramblings