Posted by Anon-y-mus on July 14, 2000 at 02:56:54:
In Reply to: Re: American brass playing and ethnocentrism posted by Dan N on July 13, 2000 at 22:15:53:
To comment on your post I think many people should buy recordings of Brahms, Mahler, Berlioz and listen to them played by German and French orchestras etc....but one of the reasons I think a lot of brass players in paticular by American recordings is because they know what they're getting. they're familiar with the testerone levels in N.Y., Chicago, San Fran, and lets face it...brass wise they bulldoze a lot of European orchestras, maybe at the expense of music, but that's my point, people aren't buying the CD's to listen to AMAZING interpretations, but to listen to amazing brass playing or certain excperts...no I'm sure I'll get burned here, but be honest with yourself as to why you buy certain recordings. I was listening to the radio the other day the finale of Tchaik 4 came on, performed by some European orchestra I've never heard of...I didn't think the wind playing was as top notch as I would have liked to hear, but the conductor did some things I'd never heard done, and that's what kept me listening, and not the decibal level of the t-bone section.
another good point, sort of touched on above, is that people know what they're buying when they buy American orchestras, So many of us aren't familiar with 90% of the European orchestras doing recordings (granted Vienna, Berlin, Concertbouw (sp?)) but despite the famous 5 or 6 europeans I don't know beans about anyone else over there, and frankly am afraid to spend my money on something that could be crap, comments???