Any classical music fans on here?

[Globalti]

Driving to work I heard the Capriol Suite by Peter Warlock aka Philip Arnold Heseltine. The second movement in this short suite is absolutely stunning, you can hear it at around 1:25 here:

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OdibDKnp7Mc


I was familiar with the tune and was trying to work out whether I was hearing a modern composer or somebody from the 16th century and my confusion was explained when I read up about Warlock and his obsession with Elizabethan music on Wikipedia. What an impulsive and troubled life he led. As always Wikipedia led me down several alleys including the possibility that Brian Sewell was Warlock's son, which would explain Sewell's odd manner. Warlock wrote his own epitaph:

Here lies Warlock the composer,
Who lived next door to Munn the grocer.
He died of drink and copulation,
A sad discredit to the nation.

Much of Warlock's brilliance seems to have been fuelled by alcohol but I wonder what would have happened if he and his bohemian pals had lived in the era of recreational drugs?

 

[rich p]

It's easy listening but not to my taste.
A weird and eclectic life for sure.

 

[twentysix by twentyfive]

Pleasant enough stuff. Not come across PW/PAH before. Thanks for the heads up. Is all his stuff a pleasant diversion like that?

 

[srw]

Pleasant enough stuff. Not come across PW/PAH before. Thanks for the heads up. Is all his stuff a pleasant diversion like that?

No! That's pretty atypical. When I'm at home with a laptop I'll try and remember to look up something more challenging.

 

[raleighnut]

Driving to work I heard the Capriol Suite by Peter Warlock aka Philip Arnold Heseltine. The second movement in this short suite is absolutely stunning, you can hear it at around 1:25 here:

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OdibDKnp7Mc


I was familiar with the tune and was trying to work out whether I was hearing a modern composer or somebody from the 16th century and my confusion was explained when I read up about Warlock and his obsession with medieval music on Wikipedia. What an impulsive and troubled life he led. As always Wikipedia led me down several alleys including the possibility that Brian Sewell is Warlock's son, which would explain Sewell's odd manner. Warlock wrote his own epitaph:

Here lies Warlock the composer,
Who lived next door to Munn the grocer.
He died of drink and copulation,
A sad discredit to the nation.

Much of Warlock's brilliance seems to have been fuelled by alcohol but I wonder what would have happened if he and his bohemian pals had lived in the era of recreational drugs?

Yep, he was too young to have indulged in the Laudanum/Opium 'dens' that the Americans made illegal, I think even Marijuana had been prohibited by that time too.

 

[Dirk]

I love nearly all classical music.
Gerald Finzi is a great favourite.
Chopin, Faure and Beethoven do it for me as well.

 

[Sharky]

I'm not particularly a fan of classical music, however in the car I nearly always tune into Classic FM as I can't stand the radio 1 & 2 stations etc with all the banter between the music.

 

[Markymark]

I enjoy it but Spotify removes my knowledge as I just choose a playlist and press play not really knowing what I'm listening too. It's also really useful when we want to calm the kids down in the car.

 

[Globalti]

The ads on Classic Fm annoy me, they are so smarmy.

 

[srw]

In case it's not obvious, I love this stuff. English 20th-century song is one of my favourite corners of the repertoire, and Warlock one of its great composers. I've probably forgotten something really obvious.

Written after a drinking session at a pub in Bramdean, Hampshire, with Bruce Blunt, looking at a stuffed fox's head on the wall. Blunt wrote the words last thing at night and Warlock set them through his hangover in the morning. A really difficult song to sing, despite its simplicity.

Again to words by Blunt. This one won the Daily Express Christmas Carol competition, and it paid for a Christmas's worth of drinking.

...although I prefer this version for its tortured harmonies, even if the performance is a bit rougher.

 

[srw]

One of my out-and-out favourite songs.

Probably Warlocks' masterpiece, to words by Yeats.

...and to finish, another drinking song.

 

[velovoice]

One of my out-and-out favourite songs.
[/MEDIA]

Easy to see why! Never heard of Warlock before, but that is stunning. Beautifully sung, too. Thank you!

 

[Ian H]

The ads on Classic Fm annoy me, they are so smarmy.

I can't listen to it: too much of easy-listening excerpts; little that's remotely challenging or interesting.

 

[lutonloony]

I'm a Richard Wagner fan....so not quite epic enough for me.

Wasn't he in hart to hart?

 

[Profpointy]

I can't listen to it: too much of easy-listening excerpts; little that's remotely challenging or interesting.

Whilst that was my view, a while ago I heard Honnager's 5th symphony on classic fm, a 20th century work so by no means easy listening. Wow - bought a box set soon after. That said, I nearly always go for radio3 instead