Professor Larry

[colterphoto1]

I just wanted to thank LarryC for his classical presentation on the Heritage Home Theatre yesterday. I'm glad we took the time to muscle our way in and that Steve P was kind enough to help us with our listening/viewing session. That was one of the highlights of my day yesterday- to just be totally immersed in music. At about 2 pm several of us gathered for what I quickly deemed our 'Tchaikovsky Anyone?' meeting. I hope you all got as much from this session as I did.

Larry presented us with several carefully selected DVD portions of classical music, giving a preface before playing each so that we understood the piece of music being played. Having a history of the piece, the composer, or how it was recorded added to the enjoyment of the piece. Tchaikovsky's 6th Symphony (Pathetique) was the main selection and I recall that the composer had foregone the usual order of the movements and brought the climactic cresendo forward in the running order, with the last movement being less uplifting. (thanks for thinking of the day and not bringing us down) The video selection featured some excellent camera work that displayed the extraordinary accuracy of unison playing. It also gave me a more accurate feel for the masses of instruments needed, either for volume or timbral depth. The edits in the film were splendid and added dimension to the power and majesty of the piece. As Larry stated at the onset, it was important to view the orchestra to gain a full appreciation for the music. I understand why he was so adamant about having a concentrated listening session with video available.

I'm REALLY looking forward to my trip to the symphony this fall with LarryC. He is an exellent instructor.

Now if I could only get this Thorens up and running properly.... Larry call me at 946-2044 if you're around Indy today.

Michael

[meagain]

Ah! I REALLY liked LarryC and would have liked to talk to him more. For sure. I would like to know what that CD was he was talking about at the table set up by the A/B test room.

[Bill H.]

Michael,

Thanks for starting this Thread...........I was blown away with the Music, and watching the Video! Prof. Larry thanks for your insight and the selections..............It brought a whole new appreciation to watching a Video..................It also was a nice experience listening to the Music thru the Cornwalls!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[meagain]

You guys listened to something in the Cornwall Room?

I gotta say, I thought that room sounded bad. Something wasn't right in there for sure. Cornwalls didn't sound good. I have Cornwalls. I wanted to go back in there to have my way with the system but didn't. I think I didn't hear them without the center and/or subs. That must've been nuking the sound from them.

[Bill H.]

Meagain,

With the Classical music, the CW's sounded great. I have to agree with you that the Music that was playing eariler, did NOT sound good. To many standing sound waves and almost an echo effect, drove me out of the room along with many others. It just Plain Hurt my ears trying to listen!

[colterphoto1]

That is a very dead room. Behind the wall covering is carved stryrofoam. I'll get with Gavin and try to post the type, amount, and placement of acoustical treatments in each of the rooms you heard. That might help. Also intend to publish a map of the listening rooms so we have a point of reference.

I sat against the wall on the floor so was in difficult listening position, but enjoyed the presentation nonetheless.

It's difficult to get the acoustics right and then change it all by plopping 12 bodies in the rooms (sorry about the heat too).

[customsteve01]

Caroline and I both enjoyed the presintation put on by Prof. Larry. He always does such a wonderful job at explaining what you are listening to. I do believe he truely loves doing those explinations to those of us that are classical knownothings like me.

Steve

[dtel's wife]

Professor Larry is one of my very favorite people![] What a gentleman he is![Y]

[Coytee]

I'm going to be sending Larry a PM tomorrow when I'm at work. I'm going to apologize to him.

Unbeknown to anyone at that specific point in time, I was feeling terribly ill. I was fighting the urge all freaking day to toss my cookies. The focus and strain I had on myself to keep my stomach under control was really getting in my way of simply trying to enjoy myself.

I was in this room just prior to Larry's "audition" if I may call it that. We were listening to a variety of things and then Larry's crowd came in. I personally was tickled because I wanted to hear this. How sucky for me that about 30 seconds into the actual beginning of the content I finally had an "urge" that I could NOT control and I felt I must leave & make a beeline to the nearest bathroom and just pray the stall is not occupied.

To give you an idea of just how bad I was feeling, I had previoulsy gone back to the cafeteria and talked to a guy cleaning up in there. Told him how I was feeling and I was looking for a "second plan" in case I did NOT make it to the mens room. I did NOT want to blow up in the engineering department...I would have never heard the end of that. He gave me one of those plastic grocery type bags as a backup plan. That bag was in my pocket all day and during this moment of Larry's show starting, I had to leave. As I was walking towards the mens room I was very subtly getting the bag out of my pocket and finding the opening for it. To anyone that might have seen me it probably looked like I was searching for a receipt in the bag or something simple like that.

Well.. I felt it was kind of rude of me how I simply got up & left the demonstration... as though I had no interest in it when in fact it was one of the things I was looking forward to. By the time I made it back (it was a false alarm when I got to mens room... just a single dry heave... (not that you wanted to know [6]) the show was over and I missed it all.

If it makes anyone feel better... I never did blow up during the day although I felt terrible. If however, you recall someone leaving (me) during the panels introducing of themselves (why did I sit in the front table?) I finally had the urge to splurge that could not be and was not denied.

I did feel pretty good afterwards...until 1:00 a.m. when I did it again... then 2:00 and the final episode at 3:30. [+o(]

so Larry, if you read this... I want to know what that disk was. I'll pm you Monday.

[Daddy Dee]

not to worry. Larry is a gentleman and a scholar.

[meagain]

I am beyond upset that we missed this LarryC thing. I want the disc.

[LarryC]

I want the disc.

This session wasn't advertised and word didn't get around a whole lot. I want to thank Michael Colter for talking it up after lunch, else it wouldn't have happened. Michael also added especially insightful and incisive comments during the discussion following each piece. There is a lot of classical knowledge hidden away among forum members, some of it coming out during the discussions.

Below are the three items I played. Note that the value of this session was SEEING as well as HEARING what the orchestral players were doing. A LOT goes on in symphonic music, and there's no way anyone except the most exquisitely trained can pick up on everything if they are only hearing it and not seeing it happen. So, the following are three DVDs, each with outstanding camera work as Colter says. I only played brief selections from each, as identified below:

Tchaikovsky, THIRD movement (Allegro molto vivace), Symphony No. 6. Vienna Philharmonic, Herbert von Karajan, cond. A powerhouse of excitement and climax as only Tchaikovsky could write it. Sony Classical DVD, SVD 48311. Unfortunately, this appears to be no longer available. This has concerned me because classical DVD sales seem to be very slow.

Carl Orff, Carmina Burana, Section "In taberna". Berlin Philharmonic, Seiji Ozawa conducting, recorded in Japan with a Japanese Chorus and world-famous soloists including Kathleen Battle. This brief section of the amazing 20th-century percussion-laden work features a paean to loose living, the mournful song of a roasting goose (sung in a high tenor falsetto), an Abbot who sings of drunkeness, and a chorus to drinking. This is a fine performance conducted by a youthful Seiji Ozawa. The DVD also contains a fine Beethoven's 9th symphony conducted by a shockingly aged Ozawa. Phillips DVD B0002505-09.

J.S. Bach, Suites for Solo Cello; Prelude, Suite No. 1. Mstislav Rostropovich, cello. EMI DVD 7243 5 99156-9-2. Towering works that sound like a full string group that you'll never believe comes from one solitary cello. I am currently convinced that Rostropovich was THE cellist of the 20th century, and watching this is a gripping revelation.

Lisa -- the CD I mentioned and wanted to play for you on the Cornwalls was Joaquin Rodrodrigo's Concierto de Aranjuez for Guitar and Orchestra. The disc I have also includes his other fine guitar concerto, Fantasia para un Gentilhombre. Both are played by Pepe Romero on Phillips 438-016-2. I thought all these works sounded very good on the Cornwalls, BTW.

Larry

[j-malotky]

Michael

For the record its Dr Larry. As he did earn an MD.

I got to the room late, looked in the window and saw it was standing room only... My loss...[] So I hung out an chamber surfed a bit with Roy[]... Like kids at the department store.

Next year get Larry in a larger room and make it part of the agenda.

I have been lucky to call Larry my friend since I met him at the 2003 pilgrimage. My favorite part of the pilgrimage is meeting up with old friends and making new ones.

JM

[colterphoto1]

"For the record its Dr Larry. As he did earn an MD."

Thanks for pointing out my omission. My apologies, I was unaware. Dr. Larry it is.

And thank you for the other pieces and details as well. I really enjoyed your preface comments, they added greatly to my enjoyment of the pieces.

Michael

[Marvel]

Steve P. said that the eq was messed up in that room. after the session with Larry, we had some other music there, and the whole presentation changed. At first I was not impressed with the Cornies at all, but they were better after some adjustments.

I loved the Carmina Burana, and the Bach always does me in. I also have a different recording of the Rodrigo, but am anxious to hear the recording Larry mentioned.

What a great time.

Bruce

[BLSamuel]

I agree with whoever posted to make Dr Larry's presentation part of the official agenda. I really wish I'd have made it in. Must've been going on when I wondered back to the CW room and it appeared packed. I added Dr Larry's post as a favorite hoping I'll come back and do some DVD shopping later.

[Bill H.]

I found all Larry's selections on Naxos.com except the Joaquin Rodrodrigo, which can be found on Arkiv.com

http://naxosdirect.com/cart.php

[LarryC]

I found all Larry's selections on Naxos.com except the Joaquin Rodrodrigo, which can be found on Arkiv.com

I hope I'm not misunderstanding you here, but this is just a caution: I specifically picked what I knew were outstanding performances and performers (to the best of my ability/knowledge), and this is very important in classical music (jazz, too, as we all know). I suspect that only Rostropovich plays Bach cello sonatas as well as he does, and similarly with the other two recordings I played. The Rodrigo is performed by Pepe Romero, one of the world's great classical guitar players who makes Rodrigo a specialty.

That said, the Naxos library is very impressive, and I know has very fine recordings of some works. I recall a really nice pairing of the Chopin piano concertos, for example, by an obscure (to me) Polish pianist and orchestra.

[Jay481985]

I'm going to be sending Larry a PM tomorrow when I'm at work. I'm going to apologize to him.

Unbeknown to anyone at that specific point in time, I was feeling terribly ill. I was fighting the urge all freaking day to toss my cookies. The focus and strain I had on myself to keep my stomach under control was really getting in my way of simply trying to enjoy myself.

I was in this room just prior to Larry's "audition" if I may call it that. We were listening to a variety of things and then Larry's crowd came in. I personally was tickled because I wanted to hear this. How sucky for me that about 30 seconds into the actual beginning of the content I finally had an "urge" that I could NOT control and I felt I must leave & make a beeline to the nearest bathroom and just pray the stall is not occupied.

To give you an idea of just how bad I was feeling, I had previoulsy gone back to the cafeteria and talked to a guy cleaning up in there. Told him how I was feeling and I was looking for a "second plan" in case I did NOT make it to the mens room. I did NOT want to blow up in the engineering department...I would have never heard the end of that. He gave me one of those plastic grocery type bags as a backup plan. That bag was in my pocket all day and during this moment of Larry's show starting, I had to leave. As I was walking towards the mens room I was very subtly getting the bag out of my pocket and finding the opening for it. To anyone that might have seen me it probably looked like I was searching for a receipt in the bag or something simple like that.

Well.. I felt it was kind of rude of me how I simply got up & left the demonstration... as though I had no interest in it when in fact it was one of the things I was looking forward to. By the time I made it back (it was a false alarm when I got to mens room... just a single dry heave... (not that you wanted to know [6]) the show was over and I missed it all.

If it makes anyone feel better... I never did blow up during the day although I felt terrible. If however, you recall someone leaving (me) during the panels introducing of themselves (why did I sit in the front table?) I finally had the urge to splurge that could not be and was not denied.

I did feel pretty good afterwards...until 1:00 a.m. when I did it again... then 2:00 and the final episode at 3:30. [+o(]

so Larry, if you read this... I want to know what that disk was. I'll pm you Monday.

I have to admit I left the room because there was about 25 people, the heat and humidity was about to reach condensation, and I was all the way back at the door without a clear direct view of the cornwalls.

Also, Coytee were you alright when I met you at the reference room, I too felt montezuma's revenge during my trip.

[Jay481985]

Carl Orff, Carmina Burana, Section "In taberna". Berlin Philharmonic, Seiji Ozawa conducting, recorded in Japan with a Japanese Chorus and world-famous soloists including Kathleen Battle. This brief section of the amazing 20th-century percussion-laden work features a paean to loose living, the mournful song of a roasting goose (sung in a high tenor falsetto), an Abbot who sings of drunkeness, and a chorus to drinking. This is a fine performance conducted by a youthful Seiji Ozawa. The DVD also contains a fine Beethoven's 9th symphony conducted by a shockingly aged Ozawa. Phillips DVD B0002505-09.

Larry C if you remember I have asked you for the name of the dvd that you played prior to the arranged auditioning. I believe this is the dvd if I am not mistaken? Thank you for posting it up before I even had to remember to ask.