![MacOnchy, E.: Sofa (The) / The Departure [Opera] (Independent Opera, Wheeler)](http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51TkE0DwvnL._SL500_AA280_.jpg)
- Two MP3 Albums for £10. Buy this and 1 other MP3 Album from a great selection for no more than £10. Here's how (terms and conditions apply)
 |
| ||
Album Savings: £11.20 compared to buying all songs
- Original Release Date: 24 Feb 2009
- Format - Music: MP3
- Compatible with MP3 Players (including with iPod®), iTunes, Windows Media Player
- Also available in CD Format
Buy this MP3 album with any other MP3 album under £8 and pay no more than £10 for both (terms and conditions apply). Just look for any album with this message, put it in your basket with another eligible title and the discount will be applied at checkout. |
MP3 Songs
Previous
Play all
Next
Play all samples
MP3
Paused
Loading ...
Unavailable
Loading ...
Volume slider
Mute/Unmute
To view this content, download Flash player (version 9.0.0 or higher)
| Song Title | Artist | Time | Price | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Play | 1. The Sofa: Ah, my sweet consolation! (Dominic, Monique) | Nicholas Sharratt | 2:15 | £0.89 | ||
| Play | 2. The Sofa: How light the grace (Dominic, Monique) | Nicholas Sharratt | 3:07 | £0.89 | ||
| Play | 3. The Sofa: Dominic, Casimir, Marie-Joseph, St. Just, Balthasar (Grandmother) | Nicholas Sharratt | 2:29 | £0.89 | ||
| Play | 4. The Sofa: This time my patience cannot still endure (Grandmother, Dominic) | Nicholas Sharratt | 4:36 | £0.89 | ||
| Play | 5. The Sofa: My mother says all girls grow sad and languish for love (Lucille, Yolande, Laura, 2 Young Men) | Nicholas Sharratt | 4:14 | £0.89 | ||
| Play | 6. The Sofa: Lucille. Ah, Lucille? Stay I beg, I implore you! (Suitor, Lucille, Sofa) | Nicholas Sharratt | 3:24 | £0.89 | ||
| Play | 7. The Sofa: Ha, ha, ha! Where's Dominic? ? (Girls, Men, A Man, Chorus, Solo, A Prig, Baritone, A Guest, Dominic's Voice, Another Guest) | Nicholas Sharratt | 4:38 | £0.89 | ||
| Play | 8. The Sofa: Come and dance! (Chorus, Edward, Monique) | Nicholas Sharratt | 6:01 | £0.89 | ||
| Play | 9. The Sofa: What's happened? What's happened? (Chorus, Solo, Dominic, Edward) | Nicholas Sharratt | 1:55 | £0.89 | ||
| Play | 10. The Sofa: Oh, what an intriguing, fascinating situation! (Chorus, Edward, Lucille, Laura, Yolande, Dominic, Monique) | Nicholas Sharratt | 3:05 | £0.89 | ||
| Play | 11. The Sofa: Have they all gone now? (Dominic, Monique) | Nicholas Sharratt | 3:20 | £0.89 | ||
| Play | 12. The Departure: I shall never be ready in time (Julia, Chorus) | Simon Lobelson | 3:20 | £0.89 | ||
| Play | 13. The Departure: Weightless beyond the burning margin of our air (Julia, Chorus) | Simon Lobelson | 5:03 | £0.89 | ||
| Play | 14. The Departure: But what has happened? (Julia) | Simon Lobelson | 3:41 | £0.89 | ||
| Play | 15. The Departure: Julia, are you trying to speak to me? (Mark, Julia) | Simon Lobelson | 2:53 | £0.89 | ||
| Play | 16. The Departure: Where is that Death they paint with the grinning skull and gaping eye holes (Julia, Chorus) | Simon Lobelson | 0:47 | £0.89 | ||
| Play | 17. The Departure: Oh why did we leave the house that day? (Mark, Julia) | Simon Lobelson | 1:33 | £0.89 | ||
| Play | 18. The Departure: Don't leave me! (Mark, Julia) | Simon Lobelson | 1:39 | £0.89 | ||
| Play | 19. The Departure: But our child lives still (Mark, Julia) | Simon Lobelson | 2:09 | £0.89 | ||
| Play | 20. The Departure: Then do not leave me (Mark, Julia, Chorus) | Simon Lobelson | 6:14 | £0.89 | ||
| Play | 21. The Departure: But I hear nothing! (Mark, Julia, Chorus) | Simon Lobelson | 3:39 | £0.89 |
Sold by Amazon Media EU S.à r.l. By placing your order, you agree to our Terms of Use.
Special Offers and Product Promotions
Product details
|
Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
Format:Audio CD
McConchy has a reputation for stern and principled dissonance, so it comes as something of a surprise to hear these accessible and tuneful miniatures. They were commissioned as two-thirds of a trilogy for Sadler's Wells in the 1960s, so it's appropriate that they should get their premiere recording by a local ensemble.
"The Sofa" is a comedy, libretto by Vaughan Williams widow Ursula from a satiric French text of the 1700s. In it the hero Dominic is turned into a sofa by his grandmother for his immoral behaviour; her curse will only be lifted when a couple make love on him. The rest of the piece concerns his attempts to egg on various amorous encounters to fruition, only to be thwarted several times. (It seems to me that there is a plot inconsdistency here, since no curse could ber devised more likely to encourage immorality, but no matter.) McConchy has huge fun with this, including parodies of Beethoven, Puccini, Strauss and Offenbach. There's plenty of light-hearted sleaze and a lovely "laughing" aria. Witty and tuneful, very redolent of the 1960s in its approach to free love, but also full of wisdom, as befits a work of two women in their 50s.
"The Departure" is sad and haunting, a complete contrast. A woman listens to the sound of a funeral offstage, and watches it out of her window. She sees her husband at the funeral, and gradually comes to realise that this is her funeral, and she is dead. She remembers the good times together with him, and mourns the fact she will never be with him again. This is a piece about the bereavement process, and coming to accept loss, and packs a huge punch in its 35-minute span.
Both pieces use a small orchestra, deployed with great variety and dramatic emphasis; always the music is at the service of the very tight and effective librettos (libretti?), which is as it should be.
This CD proves that there is life in English opera after Benjamin Britten, and you want to hear "The Three STrangers", the third part of the trilogy, based on a Thomas Hardy story.
"The Sofa" is a comedy, libretto by Vaughan Williams widow Ursula from a satiric French text of the 1700s. In it the hero Dominic is turned into a sofa by his grandmother for his immoral behaviour; her curse will only be lifted when a couple make love on him. The rest of the piece concerns his attempts to egg on various amorous encounters to fruition, only to be thwarted several times. (It seems to me that there is a plot inconsdistency here, since no curse could ber devised more likely to encourage immorality, but no matter.) McConchy has huge fun with this, including parodies of Beethoven, Puccini, Strauss and Offenbach. There's plenty of light-hearted sleaze and a lovely "laughing" aria. Witty and tuneful, very redolent of the 1960s in its approach to free love, but also full of wisdom, as befits a work of two women in their 50s.
"The Departure" is sad and haunting, a complete contrast. A woman listens to the sound of a funeral offstage, and watches it out of her window. She sees her husband at the funeral, and gradually comes to realise that this is her funeral, and she is dead. She remembers the good times together with him, and mourns the fact she will never be with him again. This is a piece about the bereavement process, and coming to accept loss, and packs a huge punch in its 35-minute span.
Both pieces use a small orchestra, deployed with great variety and dramatic emphasis; always the music is at the service of the very tight and effective librettos (libretti?), which is as it should be.
This CD proves that there is life in English opera after Benjamin Britten, and you want to hear "The Three STrangers", the third part of the trilogy, based on a Thomas Hardy story.
Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta)
Amazon.com:
1 review
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful
NEWW MUSIC BUT NOT HARD ON THE EARS
27 Mar 2010
Format:Audio CD|Amazon Verified Purchase
Acknowledgment: I am cribbing from the liner notes.
Let me introduce Elizabeth Maconchy (1907-94). Started composing at 6; entered Royal College of Music at 16; among teachers she impressed was Vaughan Williams. Later in Prague she met Josef Suk; Erwin Schulhoff (the fine Czech composer later to die in a concentration camp) conducted her piano concertino. Sir Henry Wood premiered her THE LAND at a 1930 Promenade Concert. Maconchy received numerous commissions and was performed in many places. She wrote all forms of music except opera until 1956 (THE SOFA; - THE DEPARTURE came a bit later). - Sexism kept her repute down but seems not to have discouraged her. However, British opera before PETER GRIMES was generally not valued.
V'n Wms inspired her to write THE SOFA, for which she chose his wife as librettist. Maconchy's music had become fashionably dissonant but now she parodied Beethoven, Puccini, Johann Strauss, etc.,and Offenbach gestured in the wings. - She used a very small orchestra, with piano, in this satire that staged carefree bedding by the young.
THE DEPARTURE, also employing a small orchestra, is serious stuff. It starts with a funeral and deals with the feelings of people close to the departed Julia. The liner notes suggest this qu'n: what underlies mourning? Basically our fantasies about our experiences?
When I first heard this CD I was not greatly impressed but I did find spots I liked. Repeated hearings much increased my enjoyment. There really are tunes although I remember none. (Maybe because my att'n often wanders - not only here.) I like the orchestral writing a lot - sparse, inventive. The singing is good and often fine. Each opera lasts about 1/2 hour.
The music is nothing to be afraid of (I say to those averse to modern stuff) but it requires a willingness to let what we are used to not determine our receptivity - admittedly a difficult, maybe impossible thing to achieve totally, but absolute success is not needed or maybe not even a wise thing to aim for.
Why 4 stars only? Frankly because I don't thrill to the music as I do, say, to PETER GRIMES. But I DO like it and find it often intriguing.
Let me introduce Elizabeth Maconchy (1907-94). Started composing at 6; entered Royal College of Music at 16; among teachers she impressed was Vaughan Williams. Later in Prague she met Josef Suk; Erwin Schulhoff (the fine Czech composer later to die in a concentration camp) conducted her piano concertino. Sir Henry Wood premiered her THE LAND at a 1930 Promenade Concert. Maconchy received numerous commissions and was performed in many places. She wrote all forms of music except opera until 1956 (THE SOFA; - THE DEPARTURE came a bit later). - Sexism kept her repute down but seems not to have discouraged her. However, British opera before PETER GRIMES was generally not valued.
V'n Wms inspired her to write THE SOFA, for which she chose his wife as librettist. Maconchy's music had become fashionably dissonant but now she parodied Beethoven, Puccini, Johann Strauss, etc.,and Offenbach gestured in the wings. - She used a very small orchestra, with piano, in this satire that staged carefree bedding by the young.
THE DEPARTURE, also employing a small orchestra, is serious stuff. It starts with a funeral and deals with the feelings of people close to the departed Julia. The liner notes suggest this qu'n: what underlies mourning? Basically our fantasies about our experiences?
When I first heard this CD I was not greatly impressed but I did find spots I liked. Repeated hearings much increased my enjoyment. There really are tunes although I remember none. (Maybe because my att'n often wanders - not only here.) I like the orchestral writing a lot - sparse, inventive. The singing is good and often fine. Each opera lasts about 1/2 hour.
The music is nothing to be afraid of (I say to those averse to modern stuff) but it requires a willingness to let what we are used to not determine our receptivity - admittedly a difficult, maybe impossible thing to achieve totally, but absolute success is not needed or maybe not even a wise thing to aim for.
Why 4 stars only? Frankly because I don't thrill to the music as I do, say, to PETER GRIMES. But I DO like it and find it often intriguing.
Was this review helpful?
Let us know
Customer Discussions
|
This product's forum
Active discussions in related forums
Search Customer Discussions
|
Related forums
|
Look for similar items by category
