If there's a lesson to be learnt then learn it from me; At Christmas time I bought a whole load of Naxos CDs for school when I realised whilst passing by the Classic FM boxes that their CD's have a much wider scope of more modern recordings of classic favourites!! Although I was paid for the Naxos CDs I bought, immediately returned to the shop the next day and bought some Classic FM series instead!!

Can't say I would sign that 100%, but then again there are no Classic FM boxes around here I'm aware of. I have to admit I don't buy that many Naxos CDs these days (or really classical music CDs as opposed to film scores), but they do often have a nice selection of rare pieces that basically nobody else is offering (like the original Night on Bare Mountain off the top of my head). And usually I'm very pleased about the quality of the recordings, retaining of course that each recording will be subject to plenty of variation regardless of label.

My recent Naxos purchase of Alfvén's Fourth Symphony sure is quite nice, and thankfully broken into sections unlike my earlier BIS version with 50 minutes on one track! And the introduction of Heinrich Wilhelm Ernst was a fun experience.

Oh YEAH!!! A live concert is always something great to attend. And with an all-romantic program, that's like heaven for me. And to have some international stars performing is just something alltogether even more engaging.

Yingdi Sun sure handled Liszt's First Piano Concerto through very well, with a mix of great restraint and virtuosity that perfectly complimented the symphonic structure of the work, and the Overture from Smetana's Bartered Bride was a great way to begin, vibrant and engaging. But I have to say the highlight for me was the extremely brilliant performance of Dvorak's Eight Symphony under Muhai Tang. Particularly the finale delirium flourishes were simply awe inspiring.

Now I will be anxiously expecting April and the performance of: Berlioz's SYMPHONIE FANTASTIQUE!!! (Those in the know will probably appreciate how excited I am about that one)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yK5Qq5hl1Y8

Check out this one -

So here's the question - Lang Lang, amazing talent or complete show off?

(and the I prefer Evagny kissin arguement is too easy an answer)

Well, if anything he certainly is a showman! Certainly not a pure performance by any stretch of the imagination (some of those impurities were actually more amusing than they were probably ment to be), but I guess with Liszt you can get away with much too. I'm sure the audience was entertained at least. Just loved the wild jumping around, lucky he didn't break the piano!

I love watching Lang Lang, he does do the slow sensitive stuff really well as well, I saw him playing the largo from Beethovens piano concerto no 3 and it was amazing. He also opened the proms a couple of years back with the Tchaik piano concerto 1

I can play that Liszt piece, at about 10% of the speed and with several 5 second gaps in between chords!

Send me a recording!

Okay, here hot from the press my concert thoughts. Tonight John Storgårds conducted the Tampere Philharmonic with the German clarinettist Sabine Meyer making a soloist appearance.

The concert opened with Aaron Copland's Clarinet Concerto that was written to Benny Goodman. On the whole I was pleasantly surprised as I had never heard it. Perhaps the second movement was not quite what I personally enjoy with it's more modernistic and sharp turns of phrase, but the first movement was something I enjoyed immensely, being ever so more sentimental.

Continuing with Ernest Bloch's Printemps movement from Hiver-Printemps was fetching, scene colouring and pleasant enough, though maybe I would like to hear the rest of the work to put the movement in proper context before saying anything else. Nice though.

Unfortunately, I was also cursed with a piece of "modern" classical music, namely Toru Takemitsu's Fantasma/Cantos for clarinet and orchestra. To put it plainly, it was an incoherent, dissonant mess of noise that had nothing to cling on to and not an ounce of enjoyability. Really, who actually enjoys this stuff? Certainly not me and as far as I'm concerned, music is supposed to be enjoyable. I guess it was really nothing more than agony stretched to something like 15 minutes. It should have ended a lot sooner. I think the good modern classical died with Shostakovich.

But wait, the reason I even went to that concert had nothing to do with those opening numbers. For the concluding work was none other than:

Berlioz's Symphonie Fantastique!!!

Now that has been something I've longed to hear live a long time. If you don't know yet (how could you not?) it is one of my absolute favourite compositions ever and will likely stay in my top 10 for just as long. One word: Fantastic! It is so great to hear it live. It also opened several little details that I have never noticed before like what the french horn is doing under the strings before the exposition, and the thunder rumbling in the third movement is so much better this way that on a recording. The two final movements of the execution scene and nightmare funeral just pumped my heart to 500 and made me actually sweat (never happened before). If you see a concert that says Berlioz: Symphonie fantastique, go hear it. It is worth it. I command thee!!!

The playing itself was top notch and well executed. The opening half's less stellar piece selections were somewhat of a let down, but the Fantastique was well worth it. Sabine Meyer was a doll though, despite playing mainly stuff I wasn't too interested in. They should have just picked some Mozart in there as that is what Ms. Meyer is well known from.

Okay, I'm continuing my gripping concert commentary again.

Tonight I heard Beethoven's Emperor Concerto as performed by Marc-André Hamelin (yes, THAT Marc-André Hamelin) with Moshe Atzmon conducting, and secondly Tchaikovsky's Fifth Symphony.

The Beethoven was pretty good, and I was really looking forward to hearing Hamelin, but there was just something that didn't quite gel completely. It seemed slightly lazy and not as powerful as I was expecting (which may be due to the smaller orchestral ensemble or the slightly off-hand position of my seat), but it didn't quite excite me as I was expecting.

The exact contrary was the Tchaikovsky, which left me absolutely breathless (and no acoustics problems this time). There really is no beating heady über-Romanticism and Tchaikovsky sure is full of that. The first movement was exciting, the second was exciting and destructively emotive, the third was as melancholically nonchalant as it is supposed to be and the rollercoaster ride of the Finale was a perfect way to finish. And I could hear the rest of the audience thought the same as well. I mean who could not get excited when the brass section really lets rip and the strings really swell?

All in all, a very good experience, and if only the Beethoven had been slightly more forward thrusting as it's follower, it could have been really unbelievable.

i don't know if you would really class this as classical, but they are definitely worth a listen to.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W7ACCDQwfIc

Ok, may be a bit 'common' but the best classical live concert I have ever been to was in Bath's Victoria Park in 2003 (I think) to see Pavarotti.

I am not a huge Pavarotti fan but when he did nessun dorma I was speachless, it was just fantastic.

But my best ever classical piece without any doubt has to be Pachelbel's Canon.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J09a-buFd0g

Well, if we're mentioning favourites, check out Berlioz's March to the Scaffold from the Symphonie fantastique. Incidentally, also pay attention to the little girl in a light coloured shirt right behind the conductor. She's really into this stuff (I think she even passes out at one point).

Also the Rákóczy March is great fun.

The final track on "Favourite Worst Nightmare" by the Arctic Monkeys called "505" uses a sample of Ennio Marricone's organ from the movie "The Good, The Bad and The Ugly". I thought you should know this, Jani.

There is no organ in GBU. There is one in For a Few Dollars More though (if you mean a direct lift and not just "performed with").