Ligeti: Le Grand Macabre

Amazon.com
An essential disc. Ligeti's 1978 Le Grand Macabre is in many ways a summation of the great Hungarian composer's work up to this time. From the opening sounds of car horns blasting a parody of Monteverdi overtures, Ligeti recycles everything: from Gregorian chant through the history of opera to Ligeti's own musical discoveries. The subject of the libretto is nothing less than the apocalypse, but Ligeti's talent allows him to treat the material in surprising, manifold ways--tender, ribald, grotesque, heartrending. A vital work. --Joshua Cody

Ligeti: Le Grand Macabre,Ligeti,Weller,Howarth,Orf So,Wergo,Classical,Classical Composers

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Average customer rating: Great Project, great CD. A Brilliant Recording of Some of Ligeti's Finest Works Current Favorite A collection of excellent chamber works A good mixture of Ligeti works

The Ligeti Project I: Melodien / Chamber Concerto / Piano Concerto / Mysteries of the Macabre - Schönberg Ensemble / ASKO Ensemble / Reinbert de Leeuw Reinbert De Leeuw , and Schonberg Ensemble Manufacturer: Teldec ProductGroup: Music Binding: Audio CD General | Ligeti, György | ( L ) | Featured Composers, A-Z | Classical | Styles | Music General | Concertos | Forms & Genres | Classical | Styles | Music Symphonies | Forms & Genres | Modern, 20th, & 21st Century | Historical Periods | Classical | Styles | Music Piano | Keyboard | Instruments | Classical | Styles | Music General | Symphonies | Classical | Styles | Music General | Classical | Styles | Music Similar Items: The Ligeti Project II: Lontano / Atmosphères / Apparitions / San Francisco Polyphony / Concert Românesc - Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra / Jonathan Nott The Ligeti Project III: Cello Concerto / Clocks & Clouds / Violin Concerto / Síppal, Dobbal, Nádihegedüvel The Ligeti Project IV: Hamburg Concerto (Horn Concerto) / Double Concerto / Ramifications / Requiem György Ligeti Edition 3: Works for Piano (Etudes, Musica Ricercata) - Pierre-Laurent Aimard György Ligeti Edition 1: String Quartets and Duets - Arditti String Quartet ASIN: B000059QW8 Release Date: 2001-06-19

Tracks:

1. Melodien - Schonberg Ens/Reinbert De Leeuw
2. Chm Con: I. Corrente (Fliessend) - Schonberg Ens/Reinbert De Leeuw
3. Chm Con: II. Calmo, Sostenuto - Schonberg Ens/Reinbert De Leeuw
4. Chm Con: III. Movimento Preciso E Meccanico - Schonberg Ens/Reinbert De Leeuw
5. Chm Con: IV. Presto - Schonberg Ens/Reinbert De Leeuw
6. Pno Con: I. Vivace Molto Ritmico E Preciso - Pierre-Laurent Aimard
7. Pno Con: II. Lento E Deserto - Pierre-Laurent Aimard
8. Pno Con: III. Vivace Cantabile - Pierre-Laurent Aimard
9. Pno Con: IV. Allegro Risoluto, Molto Ritmico - Pierre-Laurent Aimard
10. Pno Con: V. Presto Luminoso - Pierre-Laurent Aimard
11. Mysteries Of The Macabre - Peter Masseurs

Amazon.com's Best of 2001

This first of a projected five-disc series of Ligeti's music is a perfect introduction to the sound-world of the man who is arguably our greatest living composer. It opens with Melodien, a one-movement, 13-minute piece that begins with swirling, high-pitched winds whose sinuous lines turn into a flowing stream of iridescent instrumental colors. The Chamber Concerto, completed a year earlier, is for 13 instrumentalists treated as virtuosic soloists. Each of its four movements has a distinct profile, from the polyphonic first movement, where the instruments play at different speed, to the chorale-like second, hammering third, and the final presto that builds from a menacing ostinato to the siren squeal of the clarinet at the close. Aimard is the superb soloist in the Piano Concerto. He just about owns this piece, having recorded it with Boulez and Eotvos a decade ago. It's in five movements of endless inventiveness, particularly the second, which moves from desolate quietude to energetic outbursts and peters out with a quiet wind phrase. Mysteries of the Macabre is a reworking for solo trumpet and chamber orchestra of arias from Ligeti's opera, Le Grand Macabre. An essential disc of indispensable music, brilliantly performed and recorded. --Dan Davis

Customer Reviews:

Great Project, great CD........2006-06-15

It's not easy to write about György Ligeti today, as he has just passed away last Monday, so this is the first review I write about his works with Ligeti death... We know it could happen because of his very weak health, but it hurts when finally it's confirmed that he is not with us... We have his works and that's the most direct way to the immortality, that one Ligeti is living now in our memory and in our ears, those that were filled so many times with his extraordinary music, one of the best I know in the XXth Century, that finally will be Ligeti's century, as his work is quite complete written in that period.

Teldec continued some years ago Sony series of Ligeti music, a break that didn't suffer too much of that change, adding enormous artists like those you can listen in this CD. All the series is an outstanding thing, an some performances are really the best. This was the first CD they launched and it was a really surprise because of the very good performances we can listen, the great recording and the marvellous presentation. Anyway, it was a broken way, because, although Ligeti's series continued till the end, with the 5 volumes, New Line is a project that didn't work very well, with a few CDs released only.

Melodien has the best performance I know in this CD. We had a very interesting one on Atherton hands with the London Sinfonietta, in a very hard to find CD in Decca label, now re-released on DG 20 21 Echo, but I really think this one is much more better, with the enormous precision the Schoenberg Ensemble use to have, and with the taste of the contemporary groups, that really have this works as they basic language. Very good performance of an interesting work, that is not between my favourites of Ligeti.

Kammerkonzert is a piece I really love, from I time in which the Hungarian master was composing some of his most impressive compositions, like his Requiem or the Cello Concert. This Chamber Concerto tries to explore different sound combinations, densities, instruments research, tone limits, mechanical rhythms, etc; in a way very close to his Second String Quartet. The performance we listen here is fluid, technical and beautiful, probably a bit more natural than Ensemble Modern one, that is more sharp and direct, but still my favourite. My rank for this concert nowadays would be: 1. Ensemble Modern / Peter Eötvös (Sony). 2. Schoenberg Ensemble / de Leeuw (Teldec). 3. Ensemble InterContemporain / Pierre Boulez (DG).

The Piano Concerto (1988) is a work from Ligeti's final period (now we finally know it's the final one), a part of his catalogue I really don't like so much like the `50s, `60s and `70s one. Influenced by Nancarrow and the piano studies of the American, Ligeti works again with reminiscences of the folk tunes and the popular rhythms, researching poly-rhythms and breaking the lines he was following during many years, reinventing himself in some way, something that received critics from other composers, like Lachenmann's words on this `turning back' of Ligeti. Anyway, this Concert has very interesting moments, even terrifying, like the second movement, which really seems a walk on the night through the Transylvanian paths, with the sound of the wolves around us. The performance by Aimard and the ASKO Ensemble is superb, outstanding; Aimard do it so well like he did with Boulez (DG), and the ensemble playing is marvellous in all the senses. The colours, the instruments, the atmosphere... all is perfect.
Mysteries of the macabre is a work I don't like really very much compared with other works by Ligeti. There's a very good recording on DG, with Boulez, but this one, with the outstanding player Peter Masseurs is really wonderful.

Perfect recordings, really natural, clear and precise, in an outstanding CD you should buy, like the complete series on Sony and Teldec, if you want to know deeply Ligeti. He is lucky of having those two marvellous series, together with some other marvellous CDs by Eötvös, Boulez, Atherton, etc.

A Brilliant Recording of Some of Ligeti's Finest Works.......2006-01-19

The music of György Ligeti is enjoying much performance success these days as works by the master are appearing more often on the season repertoires of the major orchestra. This superb recording, the first in the excellent survey series of Ligeti's music, opens the cycle with some of the most accessible and most beautiful of the composer's works.

Beginning with the ethereal 'Melodien' the Schönberg Ensemble as conducted by Reinbert de Leeuw plays with such transparent clarity that it feels as though the listener is in the midst of the orchestra. The 'Chamber Concerto for 13 Instrumentalists' is aptly titled as Ligeti gives utterly equal importance to each of the 13 players in their solo portions: keyboards include harpsichord, organ, piano and celesta; strings - two violins, double bass, viola and cello; trombone, horn, bass clarinet, clarinet, oboe/English horn/oboe d'amore; flute/piccolo. The four movements evolve naturally and inventively. Seeing this work performed is half the glory, and a recent performance by the LA Philharmonic New Music Group conducted by Alexander Mickelthwate was a revelation.

The Piano Concerto is brilliant as a work and here played with total authority and style by Pierre-Laurent Aimard with the ASKO Orchestra. It would be difficult to imagine a more perfect reading. The 'Mysteries of the Macabre' is an interesting transcription of arias form Ligeti's opera, here performed by trumpeter Peter Masseurs and the ASKO Orchestra. The opera succeeds on every level: the transcriptions, while of great interest, don't maintain the impact of the voice as focal point.

In all, this is a very important CD and one that encourages us to continue with the entire cycle. Highly Recommended. Grady Harp, January 06

Current Favorite.......2005-06-15

Even though I've listened to this since it came out, I never tire of it. The Piano Concerto is truly a wonderful work, both "masterpiece" and joke, and why not? Well, maybe not a joke; though, if you listen carefully, you're bound to chuckle at some point. Beethoven, the classical composer Ligeti reminds me most of, had a sense of humor combined with a taste for complexity also.

In fact, I feel as though I am hearing quotations of Beethoven in the cadenza right near the end of the Concerto, but I just can't place them.

The rest of the disc is just as good. These pieces have all been recorded before; even though "Mysteries of the Macabre" is a orchestral premiere, I've got a Roland Pontinen/Hakan Hardenberger version for piano/trumpet I might prefer. But the other performances are the best I've ever heard of these works. Well-recorded too.

A collection of excellent chamber works.......2004-06-24

"The Ligeti Project" released by Warner Classic seeks to continue Sony's inexplicably halted "Gyorgy Ligeti Edition" collecting the composer's complete works. This first installment brings together four chamber pieces.

The opening "Melodien" is an ironic piece. While early Ligeti works, such as "Musica Ricercata" resisted the creative vacuity of Hungary's Stalin-imposed socialist realism, this 1971 piece rebels against the excesses of his own avant-garde fellows. While many contemporary composers where eschewing melody, Ligeti gives us here over 10 minutes of pure melodies, with a beautiful colour which Ligeti has called "iridescent and metalic". The highs get higher and the lows get lower, and the work eventually diffuses into nothingness. I find this performance by the Schoenberg Ensemble slightly unimpressive, preferring the superb 1970's London Sinfonietta performance recently rereleased in DG's Echo 20/21 series.

The "Chamber Concerto" was written at the end of the 1960's, and is clearly linked to the bulk of Ligeti's micropolyphonic work of that decade, especially his "Atmospheres". The opening is aggressive, with stewing melodies and a hammering outburst. The third movement is rhythmic like clockwork, and extremely reminiscent of Ligeti's second string quartet. Ultimately the work doesn't hold my interest as much as other pieces from the same time.

The "Piano Concerto" of 1988 is probably the high point of the disc. Throughout the 1980's Ligeti was fascinated by new means of rhythmic expression, an outgrowth of his studies of African music and jazz piano. Stylistically this concerto is related to his "Trio for Horn, Violin, and Piano" and first book of Piano Etudes, but it is far more frenetic than both. The playing of Pierre-Laurent Aimard, Ligeti's favourite pianist, is what strikes the listener first. However, repeated listenings have made be very appreciative of the players of the ASKO Ensemlble, especially their trumpet player Peter Masseurs.

Finally, "Mysteries of the Macabre" is a light-hearted excerpt from Ligeti's bizzare opera "Le Grande Macabre", set for chamber orchestra. The version here uses a trumpet and piano, though there also exists a thrilling setting for coloratura soprano. At first I thought the trumpet version lackluster, having fond memories of Sybille Ehlert's vocal performance on Gyorgy Ligeti Edition 4: "Vocal Works". The more I listen to the trumpet, though, the more I find I like it, and am beginning to see it as prototypical of Peter Eotvos' recent jazz-like compositions. The performance here can be considered definitive, and is much more captivating than a performance recently rereleased by DG in its Echo 20/21 series.

The liner notes are generally excellent, featuring some words from Ligeti himself on the origin of the pieces, and also an enlightening commentary by Aimard on approaching the Piano Concerto, which Aimard calls the composer's masterpiece.

This is a great coverage of some of Ligeti's larger chamber works, and is highly recommended. This is perhaps not the ideal place to start, one might try instead The Ligeti Project IV with his famous "Requiem" or Gyorgy Ligeti Edition 1: String Quartets and Duets. However, this is all essential music, and worth getting early in one's acquaintance with Ligeti's music.

A good mixture of Ligeti works.......2003-11-21

In this disc, Teldec take up where Sony's Ligeti edition left off, recording a group of four works for chamber orchestra--two with soloists.

Melodien is one of the finest of Ligeti's mid-period works. The musical material is--as the title would suggest--a collection of melodies, which are contrapuntally set against each other in a dense weave. Ligeti then starts to clarify the harmonic material until at the midpoint of the work it clears into wide open octaves. Following this, the process is reversed and the music becomes more and more complex again. The performance here is very good, but Atherton's 1970s recording--recently reissued in DG's 20/21 series--is slightly preferable.

The Chamber Concerto is one of Ligeti's most popular works. It is in four movements, the first of which burbles up melodies as if from underwater; in contrast, the second, slower movement is more focused on harmony. The third movement is a hilarious sequence of clockwork rhythms and melodies, some of which go horribly wrong, while the finale takes the ideas of the first movement to insane levels of virtuosity. The disc here is in direct competition with Boulez's recording on DG--I prefer Boulez's interpretation which (despite generally faster speeds) gives the work more space to breathe: on the other hand, the sound is greatly superior here and the playing is marginally more accurate.

The Piano Concerto seems to be one of Ligeti's most popular pieces. I've never totally agreed with this view--though I know I'm in the minority--finding the odd-numbered, faster movements to be slightly routine, containing similar material to the Etudes without quite the same aural imagination or harmonic interest. I've got no complaints about the second and fourth movements, though--the second is an astonishing, bleak, powerful elegy and the fourth is a remarkable exercise in near-fractal orchestral writing. This is Pierre-Laurent Aimard's second recording of the work--if you already have his DG recording you probably don't need this one, even if it is fractionally cleaner and more lucid.

The disc ends with a minor out-take from Ligeti's opera Le Grand Macabre. Mysteries of the Macabre is an arrangement by Elgar Howarth (who premiered the opera and was the first to record it) of the three coloratura arias from it. Peter Masseurs is an excellent trumpet soloist, but this arrangement does not add anything to the original work.

A good collection, then, but with good rival recordings available of all of the major works on the disc, it is not an essential buy in the way that later volumes in the series are.

Average customer rating: An important modern composer for voice. Another Entry into the Ligeti Library Contains some good mature writing with some frankly dull early works where's the dead weight? Excellent in parts, but lumbered with much dead weight

György Ligeti Edition 4: Vocal Works (Madrigals, Mysteries, Aventures, Songs) - The King's Singers / Philharmonia Orchestra / Esa-Pekka Salonen Gyorgy Ligeti , Esa-Pekka Salonen , Rosemary Hardy , Christiane Oelze , The King's Singers , Philharmonia Orchestra , Philip Lawson , Bruce Russell , Sibylle Ehlert , Phyllis Bryn-Julson , Omar Ebrahim , Irina Kataeva , David Hurley , Pierre-Laurent Aimard , Stephen Connolly , Malena Ernman , Eva Wedin , and Robert Chilcott Manufacturer: Sony ProductGroup: Music Binding: Audio CD General | Ligeti, György | ( L ) | Featured Composers, A-Z | Classical | Styles | Music Chamber Music | Forms & Genres | Modern, 20th, & 21st Century | Historical Periods | Classical | Styles | Music Vocal & Song | Modern, 20th, & 21st Century | Historical Periods | Classical | Styles | Music General | Classical | Styles | Music General | Opera & Vocal | Styles | Music Choruses | Vocal Non-Opera | Opera & Vocal | Styles | Music Madrigals | Songs & Lieder | Vocal Non-Opera | Opera & Vocal | Styles | Music A Cappella | Folk | Styles | Music Opera & Vocal | The Sony BMG Masterworks Store | Amazon.com Label Stores | Stores | Music Similar Items: György Ligeti Edition 2: A Cappella Choral Works - London Sinfonietta Voices György Ligeti Edition 6: Keyboard Works (Piano, Harpsichord, Organ) - Irina Kataeva / Pierre-Laurent Aimard / Elisabeth Chojnacka / Zsigmond Szathmáry Ligeti: Mechanical Music György Ligeti Edition 1: String Quartets and Duets - Arditti String Quartet György Ligeti Edition 3: Works for Piano (Etudes, Musica Ricercata) - Pierre-Laurent Aimard ASIN: B0000029P3 Release Date: 1997-01-21

Tracks:

1. Nonsense Madrigals: I Two Dreams And Little Bat
2. Nonsense Madrigals: II Cuckoo In The Pear-Tree
3. Nonsense Madrigals: III The Alphabet
4. Nonsense Madrigals: IV Flying Robert
5. Nonsense Madrigals: V The Lobster Quadrille
6. Nonsense Madrigals: VI A Long, Sad Tale
7. Le Grand Macabre: Mysteries Of The Macabre
8. Aventures
9. Nouvelles Aventures: Sostenuto
10. Nouvelles Aventures: Agitato molto
11. Der Sommer
12. Harom Weores-dal: I Tancol a Hold feher ingben
13. Harom Weores-dal: II Gyumolcs-furt
14. Harom Weores-dal: III Kalmar jott nagy madarakkal
15. Ot Arany-dal: I Csalfa sugar
16. Ot Arany-dal: II A legszebb virag
17. Ot Arany-dal: III A csendes dalokbol
18. Ot Arany-dal: IV A bujdoso
19. Ot Arany-dal: V Az ordog elvitte a financot
20. Negy lakodalmi tanc: I A menyasszony szep virag
21. Negy lakodalmi tanc: II A kapuban a szeker
22. Negy lakodalmi tanc: III Hopp ide tisztan
23. Negy lakodalmi tanc: IV Mikor kedves Laci batyam

Amazon.com

Rejoice! The world-premiere recordings of six Ligeti works are cause for celebration. Three of the pieces are recent (1988-93), and three were written during Ligeti's youth in Hungary. In the liner notes, Ligeti movingly describes the artistic climate under the Communist regime. One of the highlights, the third of six Nonsense Madrigals is a beautiful setting of the English alphabet. The other premieres are Mysteries of the Macabre sung by the brilliant Sibylle Ehlert, and a Hölderlin poem arranged for soprano and piano. The earlier premieres are settings of Hungarian poets, for one or three voices and piano. This is a stunning set, encompassing Ligeti's adventurous, polyphonic side and ample heartfelt poignance as well. --Robert Regile

Customer Reviews:

An important modern composer for voice........2006-08-26

'Gyorgy Ligeti Edition 4' composed by Gyorgy Ligeti and performed under the direction of Esa-Pekka Salonen is at least as entertaining as the second title in this series, even if it does not include any of Ligeti's works which were used on the sound track of '2001'. Like his 'a capella' works, this disk shows a great range of styles, going from central European folk dances to some phrases which sound as if they are being done by the Limelighters!. To the voices, the instruments add a lot of pops, whistles, and hoots which are beyond the range of the human voice, but the human and the mechanical sounds meld well to produce a really enjoyable sample of modern music.

Another Entry into the Ligeti Library.......2005-10-22

The solo voice and choral works of György Ligeti are rarely heard, with the exception of performances in some of the better university and college choral programs. This richly entertaining and fascinating recital once again survey's Ligeti's influence on contemporary music by scanning his career from early to current works, this time for the human voice.

The 'Nonsense Madrigals' as performed by the King's Singers are wildly funny and endearing. Here are compositional techniques that reflect the long career in instrumental composition that has influenced them. Esa-Pekka Salonen, long a devotee of Ligeti's music, conducts the Philharmonia when ensemble support is indicated ('Mysteries of the Macabre' excerpts form his opera "Le Grand Macabre" as perfectly intoned by Sibylle Ehlert; the various forms of 'Aventures & Nouvelles aventures' with soloists Phyllis Bryn-Julson, Omar Ebrahim and Rose Taylor). The remainder of the works are for voice and piano and are honored by the performances by the likes of pianists Pierre-Laurent Aimard and Irina Kataeva and vocalists Christiane Oelze, Rosemary Hardy, Malena Ernman and Eva Wedin.

The music recorded here may be new to many but it is fine, accessible Ligeti for the novice and true treats for the followers. Highly recommended. Grady Harp, October 05

Contains some good mature writing with some frankly dull early works.......2005-09-30

The fourth volume of Sony's "Gyorgy Ligeti Edition" series of the contemporary Hungarian composer's collected works is dedicated to vocal works, especially those that use instrumentation. Like with all installments in Sony's series, performances are by the Philharmonia Orchestra conducted by Salonen with Aimard and Kataeva on pianos. The vocal performances here are by the King's Singers.

The earliest pieces on the disc were written before Ligeti fled to the West following the Hungarian uprising, and among these the "Harom Weores-dal" (Three Weores songs) were composed while Ligeti was still a student. Sandor Weores was one of the greatest Hungarian poets of the last century, and was especially skilled in writing poems that hid deep philosophical insights behind child-like verse. This makes his poems especially suitable to be set to music (Peter Eotvos has tackled some of his more complex poetry). Ligeti's settings are quite traditional, and for lovers of contemporary repertoire that can even mean dull; Aimard must have been bored by the simple piano writing when he's tackled the composer's later "Etudes". Still, the music does complement the imagery of Weores well. The following two works by "prehistoric Ligeti" were composed as a way out of the straitjacket of socialist realism. The first, "Negy lakodalmi tanc" (Four wedding dances) takes folklore as a refuge, and the second "Ot Arany-dal" (Five Arany songs) sets to music the poems of the pre-revolutionary and accepted poet Jozef Arany. These early works don't hold up well against the rest at all.

After Ligeti came to the West, his music changed greatly. "Aventures" and "Nouvelles Adventures" were composed in the mid-1960s and are very reminiscent of the theatrical project of the music avant-garde of that time. They use a soprano, contralto, and baritone backed by orchestra and articulating nonsense text (notated in the score with the International Phonetic Alphabet) seek to express all emotions without using words. I think the pieces have aged quite well, though I know that others disagree. I don't know if this performance was satisfactory to Ligeti for, although he allowed it to appear on this disc, another performance can be found on volume five of Teldec's "Ligeti Project".

"Mysteries of the Macabre" is a setting for chamber ensemble of the zany solo by the Chief of Secret Police (a coloratura soprano) from the composer's sole opera "The Grand Macabre". Even for those who dislike the opera--and it is a work that leaves no one ambivalent--this is an exciting work, perhaps the high point of the disc. The seven minutes of vocal acrobatics here have been called the most challenging piece ever composed for coloratura soprano, and yet Sibylle Ehlert carries it through gloriously. Note that an alternate setting using trumpet in place of soprano can be found on the first volume of Teldec's "Ligeti Project".

"Nonsense Madrigals" for voices a capella (1988-1993) is the most recent work here, a collection of six English-language pieces based on favourite meaningless writers, such as Lewis Caroll, William Brighty Rands, and Heinrich Hoffmann. The finest of these is surely Ligeti's setting of the English alphabet, a diatonic but non-tonal "labyrinth" of polyrhythms. It combines the best of the micropolyphony sound of his 60s works with his newer interest in non-Western metrics. In the course of putting these together, he also set Hoelderlin's "Der Sommer".

The liner notes are fine, containing remarks on the pieces by Ligeti as well as the sung text and many photos. All in all, this is a three-star installment. If you are interested in the work of Ligeti but haven't gotten anything from "Gyorgy Ligeti Edition" yet, try the third volume (piano works) or the first (string works). Save this one for later.

where's the dead weight?.......2004-12-08

This is an amazing disc, one of the best in Sony's monumental Ligeti Edition series.

On Sony's Ligeti Edition 4, the _Nonsense Madrigals_ were premiered. These six pieces for six voices, composed in the late-80s/early-90s, are some of the composer's finest offerings. Writes Ligeti, "They are virtuosic works in which I have tried to create a non-tonal but diatonic harmony as well as rhythmic labyrinths." The songs set different pieces of strange poetry against each other in tightly meshed counterpoint, with humorous melodic lines and overwhelming musical imagination. Ligeti also colors the arrangement with nonsense phonetic sounds.

_Mysteries of the Macabre_ takes the three arias of the Chief of the Secret Police from Ligeti's wonderful opera (_Le Grand Macabre_) and rearranges them. This has been called the most difficult music ever written from coloratura soprano, but you wouldn't know it listening to Sibylle Ehlert. Amazing!

Contrary to another reviewer, I think the harsher, earlier avant-garde vocal works (_Aventures_ and _Nouvelles Aventures_) have aged very well. They are comprised of meaningless vocal sounds with chamber orchestra accompaniment. Their pure chromaticism was something Ligeti would later abandon, but even with the prevailing seriousness of the Darmstadt school, these pieces are quite witty and amusing and consistent with Ligeti's goal of composing idiomatically for instruments (including voice), given that the music is pretty much atonal.

This disc also features pieces for one or three voices and piano from Ligeti's early Hungarian days. Because of stifling artistic conditions under Communist rule, the pieces are consonant and accessible.

I assure you that there is no other avant-garde vocal music like Ligeti's. Very highly recommended!

Excellent in parts, but lumbered with much dead weight.......2003-11-26

Gyorgy Ligeti has not been greatly known for his music for solo voice--indeed it was not until 2000 that he completed his first mature song cycle--but this disc conveniently collects all his solo vocal music before then along with the Nonsense Madrigals for six voices, the Aventures and Nouvelles Aventures for three voices and some early socialist realism for three voices.

The Nonsense Madrigals are without doubt the highlight of the disc. These wonderfully witty a capella works were written for the performers on the disc, the King's Singers, who reward Ligeti with a wonderful reading of all six songs. Five of the songs are based on nonsense poems, with the remaining item being a setting of the alphabet. These vary wildly in style from the complex counterpoint of the first through the floating Lux Aeterna-like harmonies of the alphabet setting, to the bizarre backbeat in the finale.

Less worthwhile is Mysteries of the Macabre, a medley of the three coloratura arias from Ligeti's opera Le Grand Macabre, with reduced scoring arranged by the opera's first conductor, Elgar Howarth. While these are certainly entertaining, they don't add anything to the opera.

Aventures and Nouvelles Aventures are works from the 1960s, and to be honest it shows. Their verbal shrieks, contortions and phonetic texts--along with the fragmentary accompaniment--are very much of their time. They aren't devoid of musical interest, or humour, but nothing can hide the fact that they, unlike almost all of Ligeti's other avant-garde works, haven't aged well.

Der Sommer is a brief Hoelderlin setting for soprano and piano dating from 1989. Even though this song reuses the lamento motif prominent in the finale of the Horn Trio and the Sixth Etude, the general style and use of minimal material reminds me as much of Ligeti's countryman Gyorgy Kurtag as of Ligeti himself.

The rest of the disc is taken up with songs written from before Ligeti escaped from Hungary. The Three Weores Songs are from 1946 and 1947, during Ligeti's first year at the Budapest Conservatoire, and I'm sure they must have made it very clear that Ligeti was an outstanding student. Couched in a language derived from Bartok and Stravinsky, but going further than either, they have a splendid rustic feel. Sadly, the Stalinist ousting of the short-lived post-war regime made it impossible for Ligeti to continue along this direction and still be performed. Hence the Five Arany songs are pallid in comparison, and even if the last of the folk-song transcriptions that end the disc is infuriatingly catchy, the cycle as a whole is very minor Ligeti.

This disc can be recommended for the Nonsense Madrigals and (to a lesser extent Der Sommer and the Weores Songs). The rest of the music on it is more for completists only, despite the generally fine level of the performances.

Average customer rating: Good opera, probably not destined for classic status just say yes to life -- a slapstick satire of the apocalypse One of the few contemporary masterworks in opera This opera is a horrible, boresome joke!! A great opera of our time

Gyorgy Ligeti Edition Vol 8 - Le Grand Macabre Esa-Pekka Salonen , Philharmonia Orchestra , Laura Claycomb , Charlotte Hellekant , Jard Van Ness , Derek Lee Ragin , Graham Clark , Willard White , and Frode Olsen Manufacturer: Sony ProductGroup: Music Binding: Audio CD General | Ligeti, György | ( L ) | Featured Composers, A-Z | Classical | Styles | Music Vocal & Song | Modern, 20th, & 21st Century | Historical Periods | Classical | Styles | Music General | Symphonies | Classical | Styles | Music General | Classical | Styles | Music General | Opera & Vocal | Styles | Music Modern & 20th Century | Historical Periods | Opera & Vocal | Styles | Music Operettas | Opera & Vocal | Styles | Music Classical Instrumental Music | The Sony BMG Masterworks Store | Amazon.com Label Stores | Stores | Music Opera & Vocal | The Sony BMG Masterworks Store | Amazon.com Label Stores | Stores | Music Similar Items: Ligeti: Mechanical Music György Ligeti Edition 4: Vocal Works (Madrigals, Mysteries, Aventures, Songs) - The King's Singers / Philharmonia Orchestra / Esa-Pekka Salonen György Ligeti Edition 1: String Quartets and Duets - Arditti String Quartet György Ligeti Edition 3: Works for Piano (Etudes, Musica Ricercata) - Pierre-Laurent Aimard György Ligeti Edition 6: Keyboard Works (Piano, Harpsichord, Organ) - Irina Kataeva / Pierre-Laurent Aimard / Elisabeth Chojnacka / Zsigmond Szathmáry ASIN: B00000ICMU Release Date: 1999-03-23

Tracks:

1. Le Grand Macabre: Car Horn Prelude
2. Le Grand Macabre: Scene One - 'Dies irae'
3. Le Grand Macabre: Scene One - 'Away, You Swagpot!'
4. Le Grand Macabre: Scene One - 'Shut Up!'
5. Le Grand Macabre: Scene One - 'Oh...!' - 'Amanda! Can Do No More!'
6. Le Grand Macabre: Scene 1 - 'Ha-Ha-Ha-Ha! Hey! Give Me My Requisites'
7. Le Grand Macabre: Scene 1 - 'Melting Snow Is Thy Breast'
8. Le Grand Macabre: Second Car Horn Prelude
9. Le Grand Macabre: Scene Two - 'One! Two! Three! Five!'
10. Le Grand Macabre: Scene Two - 'Shapely And Attractive Figure'
11. Le Grand Macabre: Scene Two - 'Venus! Venus!' (Mescalina) (Astradamors)
12. Le Grand Macabre: Scene Two - 'Stop' - 'Sh!...Quiet, For Heaven's Sake!'
13. Le Grand Macabre: Scene Two - 'Who's There? A Man?' - 'A Man!'
14. Le Grand Macabre: Scene Two - Finale: 'Fire And Death I Bring' (Nekrotzar) (Piet) (Astradamors)

Tracks:

1. Le Grand Macabre: Scene Three - Doorbell Prelude
2. Le Grand Macabre: Scene Three - 'Arse-Licker, Arse Kisser'
3. Le Grand Macabre: Scene Three - 'Posture Exercises!'
4. Le Grand Macabre: Scene Three - 'Tsk...' - 'Psssst!' - 'Ha! Head Of My Secret Service!'
5. Le Grand Macabre: Scene Three - 'Ahh!...Secret Cypher!'
6. Le Grand Macabre: Scene Three - 'Hurray, Hurray, My Wife Is Dead' (Astradamors) (Prince Go-Go) (Chorus)
7. Le Grand Macabre: Scene Three - Nekrotzar's Entrance
8. Le Grand Macabre: Scene Three - 'Woe! Ohh!' - 'For The Day Of Wrath'
9. Le Grand Macabre: Scene Three - 'There's No Need To Fear'
10. Le Grand Macabre: Scene Three - 'Up!' - 'Drink!' - 'Up!'
11. Le Grand Macabre: Scene Three - Galimatias: 'Hmm! It's Delicious!'
12. Le Grand Macabre: Scene Three - 'Where Am I? What Time Is It?'
13. Le Grand Macabre: Interlude
14. Le Grand Macabre: Scene Four - 'Ghost Astradamors, Are You Dead?'
15. Le Grand Macabre: Scene Four - Mirror Canon - Nekrotzar's Death
16. Le Grand Macabre: Scene Four - Finale. Passacaglia: 'Ah, It Was Good'

Amazon.com's Best of 1999

It's apocalypse now in Hungarian composer György Ligeti's brilliantly imaginative opera about a comic-book Armageddon. Ligeti revised and tightened the original 1970s version of this masterpiece, which boils over with Brechtian grotesques. Conductor Esa-Pekka Salonen, always sensitive to the pulse of the most compelling contemporary music, brings off a wacky, threatening, sardonic, and exhilarating account. --Thomas May

Amazon.com essential recording

It seems oddly fitting that 1999--a year marked by Y2K paranoia and doom-and-gloom trainspotters--is the year in which Sony chose to release this brilliantly charged version of György Ligeti's Le Grande Macabre, the Hungarian master's comic tale of apocalypse and "what me worry?" Originally composed between 1975 and 1977, Macabre follows the various bumbling citizens of "Breughelland" during "anytime." Problem is, their time is about to end, thanks to grim reaper Nekrotzar (played with deadpan grotesquerie by bass-baritone Willard White), who, aided by his bumbling servant Piet the Pot, has decided to lay waste to the world. Of course, nothing ever goes quite right. A pair of indistinguishable lovers (including the radiant mezzo of Charlotte Hellekant) sleeps right through the Armageddon, and the Great Macabre is reduced to asking himself, "Have I not just laid to waste the entire goddamned world?" in the hilarious final scene. Esa-Pekka Salonen's live recording zeroes in on the score's sardonic humor as well as its postmodern raidings. Compared to the first Macabre on disc--sung in German and not as compact as the revised, English version that Ligeti prepared for the 1997 Salzburg Festival revival--this one is the keeper, with better sound staging, wildly imaginative orchestrations, lucid program notes, and an enjoyably perky English rendition of the original text. Hearing all this perfect craziness--the townspeople mimicking a skipping record as they sing "Our Great Leader" in the third scene, the car horn prelude that leads off the production, the absurdist arguments of the Black and White Ministers--is a comic delight. Here is one of Ligeti's masterpieces--a must for fans of modern opera--in its full glory. --Jason Verlinde

Customer Reviews:

Good opera, probably not destined for classic status.......2006-02-13

Though I haven't heard the German-language recording (the original libretto is in German), I have to believe that, in a language in which the listener lacks fluency, the immediacy of the text's impact would be lost. That's a serious loss when one is dealing (as here) with music that exists largely to amplify a text: rather like the acting in a silent movie (or--perhaps a more appropriate comparison here--the action in a Punch-and-Judy show). This English-language recording I therefore found very welcome.

No recording of course can give one a feel for the bizarre stage sets that (I have to think) must be essential to the impact of this opera in a live performance.

Relatively new though this opera is, to me it already seems somewhat dated, heavily redolent of the early 1970s. It also reminds one of Thornton Wilder's THE SKIN OF OUR TEETH, in that, after showing our Cosmic Problems, it facilely solves them by telling us (sort of) that Love Conquers All.

It IS refreshing to find such a broadly-targeted satire not unloading principally on the United States. Instead, there's a good deal of comic (and pretty funny) business about the follies of parliamentary government.

just say yes to life -- a slapstick satire of the apocalypse.......2005-06-02

The concept for LE GRAND MACABRE is great, a slapstick anarchistic satire of the apocalypse. The execution is another matter. I have to say that this might well be tremendously enjoyable in live performance, but it just doesn't work very well without the visual drama. As a caveat, I have to say I don't find most recorded opera to be very effective, and modern operas are even worse, because they don't even have the recognizable melodies and arias of the traditional works to carry you along. I can find no fault with the performance or recording, which was live in Paris in February, 1998. The Sony package, #8 in the Ligeti Edition, is fantastic, with a long booklet containing the entire libretto in English and comments by Ligeti on the work's evolution. There are a handful of black-and-white photos of the cast -- my one quibble is that more would have been good, some small attempt to convey the visuals that are otherwise missing.

It seems to me that the anarchistic vision of LE GRAND MACABRE is very much of its time, the 1970s -- it shares that recent past zeitgeist with Monty Python and the Firesign Theater. Young people today can't imagine what it was like living in a world faced with the threat of nuclear annihilation at any moment -- black comedy and absurdity was one logical response. Today's post-9/11 threat is nothing by comparison.

The story involves the mission of Nekrotzar, the Angel of Death, to destroy the world. Death is confronted by Life in the form of two lovers, who in the end prevail. Death and evil are not taken seriously, but are relentlessly mocked throughout, along with governments and self-important leaders of all sorts. The anti-hero, Piet the Pot, is a drunken buffoon everyman who is used as a horse by Nekrotzar. Other characters include an astronomer and his domineering wife, and a kingdom with warring ministers, the White Minister and the Black Minister, and a chief of the secret political police, who are used to ridicule racism, repression, bureaucracy, careerism, and the social evils of hierarchical societies of rulers and ruled.

Although there is a serious point, this is low, grotesque slapstick. Compared to WAITING FOR GODOT, it's juvenile. And musically, it's thin. Esa-Pekka Salonen doesn't have a whole lot to do directing the Philharmonic Orchestra. The singing requires some acrobatics, and there are some very funny moments. I still enjoy Monty Python and the Firesign Theater, but while Michael Palin and John Cleese might be able to improve the dialogue in LE GRAND MACABRE, I doubt that they'd be much help with the music.

Obviously we still have leaders hell-bent-for-destruction who deserve a good mocking as much now as ever.

One of the few contemporary masterworks in opera.......2005-02-07

I will not bother defending Le Grande Macabre for those dismayed at how it differs from earlier Ligeti; having studied the works from 1943 on, I hear a continuity that others may miss. Know only that the opera was influenced by the visual arts of Bosch, Brueghel and Saul Steinberg, the operas of Monteverdi and Verdi, the absurdist theater of Alfred Jarry, and the films of Charlie Chaplin. In other words, be forewarned!

Having not seen the recent San Francisco production I can only imagine the wild visuals, but the performers in this spanking new edition are spot on. Ligeti has considerably abridged and tightened the opera (first written in 1974-77), and has greatly refined his original vision (the composer has even gone on record preferring the English libretto to the original German.) The Wergo original is of interest primarily to completists.

Let me just add that history is everywhere present in LGM; this is the closest Ligeti's come to a "collage" work, which seems completely appropriate given the darkly surreal subject matter. He would never produce something quite like this again, but let us hope against hope that he finishes the long running operaplanned on the Alice books. For more about Ligeti, I recommend the Richard Steinitz work and life (although the earlier bios by Griffiths, Toop and Burde are great as well).

This opera is a horrible, boresome joke!!.......2004-10-31

I realize Ligeti has his strengths in a sort of dischordant, magical way which can be very effective, such as Aeterna, so I was eager to see Ligeti's only opera. I was unfortunate not only to listen to it, but to see it performed. Without a doubt this was the worst performance I've seen of my life. The symbols were not lost on me, they were so painfully obvious they felt like a slap in the face. The character development was non-existant not to mention the storyline, leaving only the lame satire and badly written prose in sing-song form to redeem it. The music was the only strong point, but nothing in this opera even approached Aeterna, most songs only disjointed screaming, honking, and clanging which couldn't even be compared to the da-da movement...because Ligeti was actually trying to say something, and it was intended to be symbolic! The only skill in this opera was making this non-sense and childish production last for four long acts. I have seriously seen more original, creative, and clever works in high school productions. I can definitely appreciate modern and post-modern works, political satires, and even Ligeti...but this type of painfully overstated attempt at writing a political satire (so called "opera") makes it easy to see why Ligeti's first opera was his last.

A great opera of our time.......2001-07-26

Ligeti's opera "Le Grand Macabre" based on the ballade of Michel de Ghelderode is a great musical achievement of our time. This version by Salonen, sung in English, is a reference. Salonen is a young enthusiastic conductor who loves the score (he told once something about composing and opera, after conducting Ligeti's Grand Macabre) and it is an authentic gift hearing Philharmonia Orchestra under his rules. In the casting, this version counts with a shining and lovely Amanda (Laura Claycomb),a funny Mescalina (Jard van Ness) and a really dark (literally) Nekrotzar (Willard White). Only Gepopo (Sybille Ehlert) is not fully convincent. But it is delightful hearing her, in any case, singing "Stern measures".

I am not agree with the stern reviews of some colleagues in this page. This Opera by Ligeti is magical, funny and delicious, as "The magic flute" of Mozart, for example. The music is powerful (the entrance of Nekrotzar, Astradamors' torture...) and filled with beauty (Gepopo's "misteries").

I love this opera and those of Penderecki, and I consider them the best works in their genre of the last 50 years.

Average customer rating: Minor, but okay pieces, unsatisfying performances Ligetilicious Ligetilicious

Ligeti: Aventures Manufacturer: Deutsche Grammophon ProductGroup: Music Binding: Audio CD General | Ligeti, György | ( L ) | Featured Composers, A-Z | Classical | Styles | Music Etudes | Forms & Genres | Classical | Styles | Music Chamber Music | Forms & Genres | Classical (c.1770-1830) | Historical Periods | Classical | Styles | Music General | Keyboard | Instruments | Classical | Styles | Music Piano | Keyboard | Instruments | Classical | Styles | Music General | Classical | Styles | Music General | Chamber Music | Classical | Styles | Music General | Opera & Vocal | Styles | Music Deutsche Grammophon: Music | Specialty Stores | Music ASIN: B000066I9D Release Date: 2002-08-13

Amazon.com

These reissues of pioneering recordings of contemporary works are a good introduction to the sound world of György Ligeti. Several genres are included, opening with a pair of striking works for the organ, played here by Gerd Zacher, who championed the composer after his escape from Soviet-dominated Hungary. Volumina is an adventurous, 17-and-a-half minute exploration of the expressive capabilities of the instrument, including ghostly sounds made by blowing across its small pipes. The Kontarsky brothers are at their best in the Three Pieces for Two Pianos. The first moves from a Lisztian chord to notes repeated in irregular rhythms, suggesting a clockwork gone berserk. The second is at once an homage to and a takeoff on minimalism; the final one, a whirlwind tour de force with hints of Bach and Chopin lurking in the background. Fascinating. So are the two wordless Aventures, in which grunts, shrieks, and whispers are transformed into a mini-opera, and Mysteries of the Macabre, an adaptation of a section from Ligeti's opera Le Grand Macabre, played with verve by Hakan Hardenberger. --Dan Davis

Customer Reviews:

Minor, but okay pieces, unsatisfying performances.......2004-05-02

AVENTURES is the first of Deutsche Grammaphon's recent reissues of works by Gyorgy Ligeti in its "Echo 20/21" series. Ligeti is among the greatest of contemporary composers, but this disc does not contain the most noteworthy portions of his oeuvre.

"Volumina" (1961/62), which opens the disc, is Ligeti's first piece for organ. Beginning slowly, the piece takes some time to pick up (and become decently audible), but eventually shows some energy and an instability characteristic of Ligeti's keyboard works. "Organ Study No. 1 'Harmonies'" (1967) follows, and shows a remarkable contrast, for unlike "Volumina" it is not wispy and insubstantial, but boldly presents a series of shifting harmonies. It is closely linked to the composer's "Lontano" for orchestra of the same era.

"Three Pieces for Two Pianos" I find to be less interesting than his other piano works, namely "Musica Ricercata" and his Piano Etudes. The opening "Monument" shows the cooperation of two pianos in terms of the dissonance they create. "Selbstportrait" is an homage to minimalist composers Terry Riley and Steve Reich, whose work Ligeti discovered in the early 1970's. However, I don't find the pace of these performances very agreeable and would recommend hearing them on Gyorgy Ligeti Edition 3: "Works for Piano", where they are performed by Ligeti's favourite pianist Pierre-Laurent Aimard with Irina Kataeva.

"Aventures" and "Nouvelles Aventures" are a total evolution beyond Ligeti's early vocal works. Before fleeing fromn Hungary his vocal works were mainly based on Hungarian poetry or folk music, and his masterpiece "Requiem" is the traditional Latin mass for the dead, though set in a very modern way. With these two works, however, Ligeti no longer uses a specific text to express emotion and invents his own universal language. Though the words the singers are singing are nonsensical, the basic emotions come through quite clearly in this drama. As fascinating as the experiment is, however, it is somewhat frustrating to simply listen to a recording, as the visual element is lost.

Finally, "Mysteries of the Macabre" is a light-hearted except from Ligeti's bizzare opera "Le Grande Macabre", set for chamber orchestra. The version here uses a trumpet in place of coloratura soprano, which I think will seem lackluster to anyone who has heard Sibylle Ehlert's thrilling vocal rendition on Gyorgy Ligeti Edition 4: "Vocal Works".

I've found DG's Ligeti reissues to have a much clearer sound than recent recordings from Sony's "Gyorgy Ligeti Edition" and Teldec's "The Ligeti Project". Those series, however can claim the advantage of portraying Ligeti's hand-picked performers and conductors. I think that anyone looking for an introduction to Ligeti should look towards those series, while the DG reissues are better for established Ligeti fans looking for historical recordings.

Ligetilicious.......2002-08-21

Many composers have tried to make a career out of being outrageous, but perhaps only Ligeti has really made it work. The first two tracks on this disc, Volumina and Organ Study No. 1 ("Harmonies"), perform the ridiculous feat of applying the avant-garde concept of 'extended' instrumental techniques to the pipe organ--with thrilling results.

The next three tracks, Three Pieces for Two Pianos, demonstrate the minimalist influence which crept into his composition--most notably in the middle movement, the "Self-Portrait with Reich and Riley (and with Chopin in the Background)," though really all three seem to demonstrate some kind of 'gradual process'--combining his strident complexity and intensity with a strident tendency toward repetition. And yet, it's never less than enjoyable.

The piece ends with three somewhat operatic works: the absurd Aventures and Nouvelles Aventures for voices (without words) and ensemble, and the Mysteries of the Macabre, a thrilling arrangement (for trumpet and piano) of music from his opera Le Grand Macabre. I'll confess that the lunatic drama of the various "Aventures" may be a bit too extreme even for me, but I appreciate their experimental spirit and bizarre sense of humor. And of course, I doubt that there could be any more qualified interpreters of the Aventures than Boulez and his Ensemble Intercontemporain. I recommend this CD to those who would like their stereos to emit some very, very strange noises once in a while.

Ligetilicious.......2002-08-21

Many composers have tried to make a career out of being outrageous, but perhaps only Ligeti has really made it work. The first two tracks on this disc, Volumina and Organ Study No. 1 ("Harmonies"), perform the ridiculous feat of applying the avant-garde concept of 'extended' instrumental techniques to the pipe organ--with thrilling results.

The next three tracks, Three Pieces for Two Pianos, demonstrate the minimalist influence which crept into his composition--most notably in the middle movement, the "Self-Portrait with Reich and Riley (and with Chopin in the Background)," though really all three seem to demonstrate some kind of 'gradual process'--combining his strident complexity and intensity with a strident tendency toward repetition. And yet, it's never less than enjoyable.

The piece ends with three somewhat operatic works: the absurd Aventures and Nouvelles Aventures for voices (without words) and ensemble, and the Mysteries of the Macabre, a thrilling arrangement (for trumpet and piano) of music from his opera Le Grand Macabre. I'll confess that the lunatic drama of the various "Aventures" may be a bit too extreme even for me, but I appreciate their experimental spirit and bizarre sense of humor. And of course, I doubt that there could be any more qualified interpreters of the Aventures than Boulez and his Ensemble Intercontemporain. I recommend this CD to those who would like their stereos to emit some very, very strange noises once in a while.

Average customer rating: the end is nigh...or not.

György Ligeti: Le Grand Macabre Manufacturer: Wergo Germany ProductGroup: Music Binding: Audio CD General | Ligeti, György | ( L ) | Featured Composers, A-Z | Classical | Styles | Music Vocal & Song | Modern, 20th, & 21st Century | Historical Periods | Classical | Styles | Music General | Classical | Styles | Music General | Opera & Vocal | Styles | Music Modern & 20th Century | Historical Periods | Opera & Vocal | Styles | Music Classical | Imports | Stores | Music Opera & Vocal | Imports | Stores | Music ASIN: B000025RRC Release Date: 2004-10-12

Tracks:

1. Vorspiel zum 1. Bild
2. 1. Bild_1
3. 1. Bild_2
4. 1. Bild_3
5. 1. Bild_4
6. 1. Bild_5
7. Zwischenbild
8. 2. Bild_1
9. 2. Bild_2
10. 2. Bild_3
11. 2. Bild_4
12. Vorspiel zum 3. Bild
13. Anfang 3. Bild

Tracks:

1. Fortsetzung des 3. Bild, Zwschenspiel und Beginn des 4. Bildes_1
2. Fortsetzung des 3. Bild, Zwschenspiel und Beginn des 4. Bildes_2
3. Fortsetzung des 3. Bild, Zwschenspiel und Beginn des 4. Bildes_3
4. Fortsetzung des 3. Bild, Zwschenspiel und Beginn des 4. Bildes_4
5. Fortsetzung des 3. Bild, Zwschenspiel und Beginn des 4. Bildes_5
6. Fortsetzung des 3. Bild, Zwschenspiel und Beginn des 4. Bildes_6
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8. Fortsetzung des 3. Bild, Zwschenspiel und Beginn des 4. Bildes_8
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Customer Reviews:

the end is nigh...or not........2005-02-21

This is the first opera I ever heard, and I picked it up because it is was by Ligeti, not because it was an _opera_ by Ligeti. Ligeti is my favorite composer, so I guess the only natural thing was to hear his opera too. I actually really love it. Ligeti wrote a lot of dark and apocalyptic music, so his opera's subject matter, the end of the world, would be something he has good sense for. This is a very humorous work, however, from the dark yet wacky libretto to the musical score, which could be the soundtrack for an apocalyptic avant-garde cartoon. The story revolves around the angel of death Nekrotzar, emerging ominously from a tomb, sent to destroy the world. He apprehends the drunkard Piet for a steed and trumpeter, and rides off to announce the End Times to the people of Breughelland. There are other strange characters, like a pair of astrologers who enjoy S&M, the hapless Prince Go-Go, and the leaders of two identical political parties. Fortunately for all the funny people in that imaginary place, Nekrotzar ends up getting too drunk to carry out the annihilation of mankind.

There are numerous parts here that amaze me, and on the whole _Le Grand Macabre_ is a highly amusing, dramatic, and adventurous work of music. It has a lot of dark irony, and also some downright haunting passages, and some really quirky, bizarre parts. For all these reasons, _Le Grand Macabre_ is completely set apart from the rest of Ligeti's works. And some of my favorite Ligeti moments are here: The end of Scene III is some of the composer's darkest, the final sense of dread settling in with an atonal orchestra with solo harmonica accompaniment, and boy's choir singing "Consummatum est" ("it is finished"). Only Ligeti could make a harmonica sound apocalyptic. The especially rapturous lovers Amando and Amanda share a ravishing duet at the end of the first scene, singing their love to each other, essentially oblivious to the threat of impending doom. Nekrotzar's doomy entry to the court of Prince Go-Go includes a violin, bassoon, clarinet, and piccolo playing twisted, gloullish folk-music with clattering rhythms.

This is yet another masterpiece from the best composer of the post-war era, and the recording is exceptional. The singing on this one is German; there is an English version on Sony's OOP Ligeti Edition series.

Average customer rating: Brilliant libretto, not so brilliant music Una Opera con letras MAYUSCULAS. Amazing A Strange Composition One of the great masterpieces of the century.

Ligeti: Le Grand Macabre Manufacturer: Wergo Germany ProductGroup: Music Binding: Audio CD General | Ligeti, György | ( L ) | Featured Composers, A-Z | Classical | Styles | Music Vocal & Song | Modern, 20th, & 21st Century | Historical Periods | Classical | Styles | Music General | Classical | Styles | Music General | Opera & Vocal | Styles | Music Modern & 20th Century | Historical Periods | Opera & Vocal | Styles | Music ASIN: B000005W9D Release Date: 1993-12-08

Tracks:

1. Vorspiel zum 1. Bild
2. 1. Bild_1
3. 1. Bild_2
4. 1. Bild_3
5. 1. Bild_4
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7. Zwischenbild
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12. Vorspiel zum 3. Bild
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1. Fortsetzung des 3. Bild, Zwschenspiel und Beginn des 4. Bildes_1
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4. Fortsetzung des 3. Bild, Zwschenspiel und Beginn des 4. Bildes_4
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Amazon.com

An essential disc. Ligeti's 1978 Le Grand Macabre is in many ways a summation of the great Hungarian composer's work up to this time. From the opening sounds of car horns blasting a parody of Monteverdi overtures, Ligeti recycles everything: from Gregorian chant through the history of opera to Ligeti's own musical discoveries. The subject of the libretto is nothing less than the apocalypse, but Ligeti's talent allows him to treat the material in surprising, manifold ways--tender, ribald, grotesque, heartrending. A vital work. --Joshua Cody

Customer Reviews:

Brilliant libretto, not so brilliant music.......2002-06-02

Ligeti has written some great music, such as the piano concerto, the violin concerto, the 2nd string quartet, the Requiem.

"Le Grand Macabre" has a brilliant and hilarious libretto. There is a joke about what the distinction is between a German and an Austrian (extremely stereotypical of course like all jokes about nationalities, but with an oh so slight grain of truth):

The German says with heroism: the situation is serious but not hopeless.
The Austrian says with a smile: the situation is hopeless but not serious.

The libretto to the opera hits that mentality (actually more Viennese than Austrian in general) perfectly in sphere. That the recording is from a performance of the opera in Vienna, sung in German with Viennese accent, is very fitting. A brilliant libretto alone however does not necessarily make for a brilliant opera. The music is composed with accomplishment and great craft, but personally I don't find it particularly inspired and imaginative, with a few shining exceptions. It does not have too many musically surprising moments - once you know the musical languages of the 20th century well. Musical effects mostly (not always) sound rather stereotypical and therefore not witty - a situation in strong contrast to the wit of the libretto.

Definitive opera of the last third of the twentieth century? One of the great masterpieces of the 20th century? Well, I may see it differently than [others], but personally I take the Stockhausen operas, Birtwistle's "Gawain" amd Maxwell Davies' opera "The lighthouse" over "Le Grand Macabre" anytime.

Una Opera con letras MAYUSCULAS........2000-07-25

Qué satisfacción para los amantes de la música contemporánea, encontrar ésta Opera del húngaro Gyorgy Ligeti. Dentro del repertorio operístico de la música del siglo XX podemos decir que después de las Operas de Alban Berg (Wozzeck, Lulu) y de la de Shostakovich (Lady Macbeth), creo que viene ésta de Ligeti.

Una sátira sobre el fin del mundo en algo inspirada por la obra de Carl Orff "De tempurum fine comedia". Ligeti nos muestra, como en toda sátira una realidad, que en este caso es la del mundo carente de valores a la espera de respuestas de sus problemas por agentes extra terrenales, cuando en realidad el ser humano debería ser el propio arquitecto de su destino.

La música es activa en todo momento, la orquesta hace un gran trabajo de seguimiento de los acontecimientos que se desarrollan en escena, dando una expresión adecuada. Note el oyente en la segunda parte antes del ingreso del Gran macabro, la orquesta toca una melodía muy similar a la de "Un americano en Paris" de Gershwin. El trabajo de los solistas es sobresaliente, de igual manera la dirección de Howarth. La grabación es en vivo, en Viena, al finalizar la Opera hay una ovación del público que lo dice todo...

PD.- Esta música no es para principiantes.

Amazing.......2000-02-25

This is an extraordinary piece of music. If you have a taste for 20th century music -- and, admittedly, not everyone does -- then you will probably agree that this is the definitive opera of the last thord of that century.

It is difficult, irreverent, salty, bizarre and, at times, insanely funny. The music ranges from modal harmonies reminiscent of Kodaly to micropolyphony and tone clusters.

This is not a happy, relaxing opera. It is taxing and challenging. You will feel as if you've run a marathon by the end. But it is incredibly rewarding.

A Strange Composition.......2000-02-24

It is a puzzle to me that expert reviewers agree that this is a work to buy and enjoy. I found it bloated, unmusical, scatological, and preceded by a self-important introduction by the composer. The text is in English. After struggling to hear the work through, I was reminded of Tippett's "The Ice Break". Those who share my taste will give these two non-operas a wide berth.

One of the great masterpieces of the century........1999-01-08

For once, both the Grammaphone and Amazon reviewers are right on the mark. Ligeti's magnum opus is one of the top three or four masterpieces of the century. Yes, it's on a level with Rite of Spring, Wozzeck, you name it. And amazingly, the work is absolutely full of humor. It's amazing that this is so because Ligeti went through so much as an artist in an iron curtain country before the Berlin wall came down. But look at the way he handles, for instance, the singing of the chief of the secret police. He gives the role, not to a man, but to a high soprano in drag, who comes in whispering, clucking, clicking, singing incredibly high nonsense syllables, in what is ultimately a virtuoso role (some say the most difficult since Mozart's rage aria for the Queen of the Night in The Magic Flute). Ligeti must have known some real secret police, and I'm betting they were none too pleasant, but here in his opera the character becomes the vehicle for transcending humor, dazzling virtuosity, and pure pleasure for the audience. Now that's creativity for you.

Meditation Music:

1. Luigi Cherubini: Medea
2. Massenet: Werther
3. Mozart: Die Entführung Aus Dem Serail
4. Mozart: Don Giovanni
5. Mozart: Famous Arias
6. Mozart: La Finta Giardiniera
7. Mussorgsky: Boris Godounov
8. Oktoberfest
9. Ottorino Respighi: Lucrezia
10. Pavarotti Magic

Meditation Music

meditation music

Meditation Music

The Fugs Second Album

Mozart: Last Symphonies Vol.1 [Enhanced]

Piano Concerto 5: Emperor

Music: Everybody Get up & Boogie [CD-single] [Import]

No.1 Summer Dance Album [Import]

Overload [CD-single]

Only Love [Import]

Pixel Revolt

Perfect Life [Import]

Pure And Simple

Play Therapy

Perfect Body [Import]

Now You Know [Explicit Lyrics]

Add to the Beauty

Din of Inequity