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Track Listings
| 1. I. Naive and Sentimental Music |
| 2. II. Mother of the Man |
| 3. III. Chain to the Rhythm |
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
7 of 7 people found the following review helpful
Format:Audio CD|Amazon Verified Purchase
In order to express adequately and succinctly what is important about the work and why I think it is crucial to the repertoire (and, therefore, why all you fellow Amazon-ians should immediately acquire a copy!), I am going to ignore the peripheral issues of its complex source of inspiration, including its apparently overtly provocative title. I want to focus on the work's expressive content, which is what leads me to rate it as highly as I do.
Firstly, let me say that I think Adams surpassed himself with this one: it's music of hitherto unguessed-at grandeur, breadth, narrative power and expressive richness. His mastery of musical architecture is superlative and we know from the very first note that this is going to be an epic journey.
Secondly, its overall structure in more detail: the first movement is an extended essay on a repeated melody which sets out on a vast journey through ever more inspiring landscapes. The second, inspired by Busoni's famous Berceuse Elegiaque written in memory of his mother, possesses an Olympian calm interrupted only by a visionary central section featuring powerful major triads in crescendo from the strings and awesome, cavernous sonorities from the brass (including 2 tubas!). The third movement is a typical Adamsian finale in texture and structure, but not in tone: the surface exuberence barely conceals the extremely dark, nostalgic emotional vein that runs through the entire work. The ending, in particular, is extremely effective in its ambiguity: unison F#s on horns in crescendo.
I can't immediately think of any other work by a composer still living possessed of this kind of emotional "grip": in fact, I think we have to go back to the masterpieces of Messiaen to find anything comparable. In an age when much contemporary classical music seems to have reduced itself to a sort of shallow parade of the composer's obsessions, more of a manifesto for music than music itself, this work restores my faith in music as something able to encompass the world and express something truly universal.
Firstly, let me say that I think Adams surpassed himself with this one: it's music of hitherto unguessed-at grandeur, breadth, narrative power and expressive richness. His mastery of musical architecture is superlative and we know from the very first note that this is going to be an epic journey.
Secondly, its overall structure in more detail: the first movement is an extended essay on a repeated melody which sets out on a vast journey through ever more inspiring landscapes. The second, inspired by Busoni's famous Berceuse Elegiaque written in memory of his mother, possesses an Olympian calm interrupted only by a visionary central section featuring powerful major triads in crescendo from the strings and awesome, cavernous sonorities from the brass (including 2 tubas!). The third movement is a typical Adamsian finale in texture and structure, but not in tone: the surface exuberence barely conceals the extremely dark, nostalgic emotional vein that runs through the entire work. The ending, in particular, is extremely effective in its ambiguity: unison F#s on horns in crescendo.
I can't immediately think of any other work by a composer still living possessed of this kind of emotional "grip": in fact, I think we have to go back to the masterpieces of Messiaen to find anything comparable. In an age when much contemporary classical music seems to have reduced itself to a sort of shallow parade of the composer's obsessions, more of a manifesto for music than music itself, this work restores my faith in music as something able to encompass the world and express something truly universal.
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful
Format:Audio CD
Never mind its title; this is a big boned symphony. It follows on from his earlier "Harmonlehre" in its mixture of the late romantic, modern and minimalist. Its scope and epic landscape recalls Copland's third symphony while the hurtling towards home in the finale reminds me of Sibelius's Lemminkainen's Return.
The refereneces to the naive and sentimental are not too helpful though the opening and recurrent guitar strumming theme is meant to symbolise the naive confronted by the huge forces of the sentimental, "thinking" music that follows. There is a great sense of epic and shifting landscape in the outer movements with both unleashing huge forces, not unlike Birtwhistle's "Earth Dances", of which there appears to be a conscious reference in the opening movement.
The three movements contain some of Adams' most harmonically challenging music and dissonance but amounts to a satisfying and cohesive symphonic whole. It is not the place to visit if you prefer the lighter dance works of John Admas, this is very serious music indeed.
As Mr Kimber pointed out, the slow movement refers to Busoni's Berceuse, a work, he also provided an orchestrated version of. I am not sure I agree about the link to Messiaen though wouldn't deny its huge expressive power. I do not think there is anything of the mystic and religious grandeur that you would expect from Messiaen. This work belongs with Copland, Sibelius, Bruckner and, eys, the birtwhistle of "Earth Dances" and Stravinsky's Rite of Spring. I mention all these as reference points but this is easily distinguished as the music of John Adams and no one else. As passionate as the music gets, I think there is a post modern narrative stting behind it: ie like some of Alfred Schnittke's work (for example, his 5th Symphony), this is not the expression of personal feeling but a commentary on the expressive musical languages of the past - ie late romantic, early modern etc. Whether the expression is direct or indirect it still has enormous impact.
the recording under Esa-Pekka Salonen is first class and you can get no greater compliment to the work than that from Salonen himself, a highly accomplished composer for orchestra himself, has written several works heavily influenced by this one piece. Check out his works "Foreign Bodies" and "Wing on Wing" on Deutsche Grammaphon; if you like "Naive and Sentimental Music" then these will be right up your street.
why then did I drop one star. Sorry, being a mean Yorkshireman, I don't like being charged full price for less than 45 minutes music. there's almost enough room to fit his other large scale orchestral work "Harmonielehre". that would make a great coupling because that too feels like a big symphony referring to late romanticism. If that doesn't fit then there is still plenty of room for some substantial music. even so, I saw this, and thought it was worth the risk of purchase in spite of its brevity. I've certainly not been disappointed. At its premiere this seemed to be one of Adams's greatest orchestral achievements and time hasn't changed that view. There are no alternative recordings - a pity, but faced with that choice, this is a highly recommended recording.
The refereneces to the naive and sentimental are not too helpful though the opening and recurrent guitar strumming theme is meant to symbolise the naive confronted by the huge forces of the sentimental, "thinking" music that follows. There is a great sense of epic and shifting landscape in the outer movements with both unleashing huge forces, not unlike Birtwhistle's "Earth Dances", of which there appears to be a conscious reference in the opening movement.
The three movements contain some of Adams' most harmonically challenging music and dissonance but amounts to a satisfying and cohesive symphonic whole. It is not the place to visit if you prefer the lighter dance works of John Admas, this is very serious music indeed.
As Mr Kimber pointed out, the slow movement refers to Busoni's Berceuse, a work, he also provided an orchestrated version of. I am not sure I agree about the link to Messiaen though wouldn't deny its huge expressive power. I do not think there is anything of the mystic and religious grandeur that you would expect from Messiaen. This work belongs with Copland, Sibelius, Bruckner and, eys, the birtwhistle of "Earth Dances" and Stravinsky's Rite of Spring. I mention all these as reference points but this is easily distinguished as the music of John Adams and no one else. As passionate as the music gets, I think there is a post modern narrative stting behind it: ie like some of Alfred Schnittke's work (for example, his 5th Symphony), this is not the expression of personal feeling but a commentary on the expressive musical languages of the past - ie late romantic, early modern etc. Whether the expression is direct or indirect it still has enormous impact.
the recording under Esa-Pekka Salonen is first class and you can get no greater compliment to the work than that from Salonen himself, a highly accomplished composer for orchestra himself, has written several works heavily influenced by this one piece. Check out his works "Foreign Bodies" and "Wing on Wing" on Deutsche Grammaphon; if you like "Naive and Sentimental Music" then these will be right up your street.
why then did I drop one star. Sorry, being a mean Yorkshireman, I don't like being charged full price for less than 45 minutes music. there's almost enough room to fit his other large scale orchestral work "Harmonielehre". that would make a great coupling because that too feels like a big symphony referring to late romanticism. If that doesn't fit then there is still plenty of room for some substantial music. even so, I saw this, and thought it was worth the risk of purchase in spite of its brevity. I've certainly not been disappointed. At its premiere this seemed to be one of Adams's greatest orchestral achievements and time hasn't changed that view. There are no alternative recordings - a pity, but faced with that choice, this is a highly recommended recording.
Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta)
Amazon.com:
16 reviews
25 of 26 people found the following review helpful
The Definitive Recording of a Major Masterpiece
26 Aug 2002
Format:Audio CD|Amazon Verified Purchase
John Adams has been gathering increasing audiences since his earliest works which were applauded more because of their originality than because of their innate musicality. Early works like 'Shaker Loops' led to the Opera 'Nixon in China' and while that opera drew large appreciative audiences because of the topic, it still was up to Adams to prove himself a durable, growing composer of lasting classical music. In this remarkable recording of NAIVE AND SENTIMENTAL MUSIC, commissioned by the orchestra and conductor who perform it here (Esa-Pekka Salonen and the LA Phil), we finally have a symphonic work that stands very tall as pure music. No need for a chorus or vocal soloists( as in the magnificent 'Harmonium' based on the poetry of Emily Dickenson, or 'El Nino', his oratorio for the Christmas season or 'The Wound Dresser' which is perhaps the most brilliant setting of Walt Whitman ever conceived): this is simply grand orchestral work. The opening measures draw us into the cradling effect of folk tunes, but that effect blossoms into a complex and colorful flight of fancy. The second movement is an elegy of quiet beauty and the last movement restates some of Adams earlier writing motifs but gradually binds these together into a electrifying explosion of blatantly romantic sound. Salonen and the LA Phil play this score as if to the music born - which in this case is reality! Excellent sonics and depth of range on the recording make the entire experience of getting to know this masterpiece a complete joy.
17 of 17 people found the following review helpful
Why am I reminded of Jarmush's Dead Man atmosphere ?
23 Feb 2003
Format:Audio CD
I guess I might be alone in my perception of John Adams' Naive and Sentimental music, but I shall say more about that later.
I heard this extraordinary music on the radio (only some 4 minutes of the first part's middle section) and I was instantly hooked. I searched the radio station's website the next day to discover what they were playing and I discovered an artist I never heard of before, but who is actually a very important figure in contemporary classical music as I learned soon. When I got the CD I discovered a whole new musical world, somewhere between tonal romanticism, minimalistic "repetitive" building layers of music and "atonal" (I don't belive there is such thing)contemporary composition.
Postmodern modernism could be the word.
So, back to the title of this review. The massive, "alienated" music, that reminds at times of "american" film-score classics, with strong dark tones, powerful outbursts of energy and sparkling, floating parts of music with "elvish" (since we're in the age of Lord of the Rings histeria - which I approve somehow)
undernotes. So, what is the artist trying to say? He moved me to some other state of counciousness and inspired visual worlds coherent with the design of the CD, which somehow transport me to some endless, dreamy "Americana" dream(land)scape similar to Jarmush's Dead Man movie setting and atmosphere.
Great work by Esa Pekka Salonen and LA Philly.
I wish Adams would venture even further into those "twilight" realms and maybe abandon the "layering principle" in favour of more rhytmically and sylistically diverse principles as exemplified by Stravinsky and other greats of symphonic invention. But I deeply admire his melodic invention and orchestration ideas. Go beyond, if you read this Mr.Adams.
16 of 17 people found the following review helpful
Rock Solid
7 Aug 2002
Format:Audio CD
This is the finest orchestral writing of John Adams' career. I have to agree with the newspaper critic who commented that while there are no real departures here from the familiar Adams voice (as heard in Harmonielehre, Nixon in China, the Violin Concerto, etc.), all of the expected tricks of melody, rhythm, harmony, and orchestration are delivered with an unprecedented mastery and assuredness, and on a grand new scale.
The performance is perfect as well. Salonen brings out the sharp, modern edges of the piece without sacrificing grace, subtlety, or tenderness of feeling. I know this must seem over-the-top, but I think I can recommend this recording to anyone interested in the symphony orchestra, without reservation.
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