Saint-Saëns: The Carnival of the Animals, Piano Concerto No. 2, Various Solo Pieces by French Composers (incl. Women!). Lang Lang and Gina Alice (pianos), Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra, Andris Nelsons (cond.) DG
Man, I loved watching this review. If only I could say what so many Juilliard teachers say about this pianist. This review had me in stitches. Thank you!
One of your funniest, most intelligent and UNbiased reviews EVER. "If death could die this would be death dying" Please tell me that was an ad lib so I can be doubly impressed.
I have the feeling LL and GinaAlice were dubbed in subsequently. „Pianists“ is such a mess it’s unbelievable 😮This would explain the different acoustics of the pianos vs the orchestra.
Speaking of Richter, his recordings of both 2nd and 5th Saint Saëns concertos are absolutely incredible, especially with the 5th I think that's the best recording of the concerto ever.
I remember when a CD by Yuja Wang came out, and an American Record Guide critic basically said that after Lang Lang, it was nice to hear a young Asian pianist whom he actually liked, so people could stop accusing him of being a racist because he didn't like Lang Lang.
Yes. Yuja actually did a brief imitation of him in a funny video. Tho' her dresses are flashy, her expressions are subtle and appropriate for her joy and inner emotion playing the actual music. Another great example of the difference in taste and musical understanding between them: When chatting with Charles Dutoit about performing Liszt, he mentioned to her that a part of understanding the music would be understanding the milieu that influenced it in the period, and said she should read Goethe. And she did. Can't imagine Lang ever doing that...
@@bloodgrssLang reads shit. There was a video about him introducing a Chinese dance and he pronounced the name of the dance incorrectly and said that was a dance of turtle while in fact it’s a festival type. 😢 this dude doesn’t not learn or read, just purely translating every note to a greasy meaningless crap
If you are referring to his Carnegie Hall debut then it might be one of the best recitals in the 21st century, but yeah, almost everything Lang Lang produces after that is second class at most.
I'm not THAT familiar with his approach - is he always this bad? Is he the culprit, or the record label - though if he is always this bad, then the record label deserves censure for promoting him..
@@RobertJonesWightpaint Some folks like him. I am definitely not one of them. I've never heard him play in a way that didn't massacre the music, or ever had the sense that music is anything to him but a series of notes to be performed in the order they were written. (Not that it keeps him from writhing on stage in an effort to pretend he has some sort of deep connection to the sounds coming out of the keyboard he's currently pounding into submission.) It does not seem to have hampered his fame or bothered his core audience.
Lang Lang is just the worst. And shame on DG for issuing this. Have you heard that abomination of a Disney album? I did. It’s enough to make you heave.
2 месяца назад
@@richardtomasek Unfortunately, from the glimpses of the album I inflicted myself upon listening to this review, the technical aspect is quite subpar by today's standards. Mushy articulation, uncontrolled dynamics, rythm all over the place. I daresay he wouldn't even land a major conservatory first prize with that kind of performance, on technical merits alone.
The marketing people at DG/Universal who are behind this campaign should be fired immediately. What a discredit to Deutsche G and to Lang Lang, who, at times, is a very good pianist. His manager should be fired, too, by the way.
Nice rant!! Could you at some time talk about the career of Ivo Pogorelich that ranges from the astounding (e.g. Schumann Toccata, Gaspard) to the dreadful (e.g. deconstructed Skrjabin 4th sonata which is somewhere on youtube), combined with an eccentric bellicose personality?
I laughed at 1:21 when you talked about "Everything you can do with the flower". Your British viewers might remember the old comedy movie "Carry On Nurse", which featured Wilfrid Hyde-White's embarrassing encounter with a daffodil...
Precisely the thought that came to my mind. I suspect we both have vulgar minds, but - why the hell not? Better vulgar than saccharine sweet, sickly slick performances from artists who should know better than allow themselves to be seduced by the sinister approach of the marketing department.
Maybe the notes were written by chat GPT??😂 Saw Alexandre Kantorow do the Concerto in Amsterdam. One of the best performances of anything I've ever seen. Luckily he recorded it on BIS with his Dad conducting.
Hello Dave, This has got to be the most hilarious, comedic and devastatingly honest review of yours and probably in the entire history of classical music reviews. You could easily give all those stand up comedians a run for their money. Thank you for this video. It made my day.
Lang Lang - is a prime example of presentation over substance - I saw him in recital once and left at the interval as I was annoyed by his posing & lack of ability to communicate his vision of the music as a coherent whole. I can stand perverse performance if delivered with conviction and a sense of style.
He can give good performances. I saw him play a great Strauss Burleske with Cleveland, preceded by a mannered version of Chopin Andante spianato with much grimacing. The Strauss kept him too busy to make faces.
@@poturbg8698 Yes, funny that also when he plays duets with others, the grimaces seem to go away too. Show over substance. But he does inspire fanatical devotion.
I so enjoyed your video. You talk with intelligence yet never patronise. I was in tears with laughter. The only problem is - now you made me curious and I want to hear that album. And what do you mean anything British related to food would not be appealing? Haha. Great stuff, thanks for this!
That, and I fear you may be right, would be a tragedy the classical music industry has inflicted on itself - and on the rest of us. I hope it'll grow out of its self-destructive phase, but it's about money, populism, the assumption that our attention spans and emotional depth are so limited that all we want is superficial performance by celebrity performers. If they can do this to Saint-Saens, Ravel, Fauré, just imagine (or try not to) what they could do to Stravinsky, Rachmaninov, Debussy, and more modern composers. Sugar-coating Shostakovich could be difficult, but who would bet that they won't try to?
@@carlob95 Oh ffs. Do you think that dedicating disc space to woman composers is where this recording went wrong? :eyeroll: ETA: David didn't help matters by referring to the second disc as the 'politically correct' one, as if recording woman composers was worthy of scorn. Lang Lang's playing is tasteless enough without the implication that including works by women makes a disc 'politically correct' or, in your words, 'woke'.
As with many of Dave's reviews, this one prompted me to pull something out of my collection rather than purchase (or not!) for a listen. To wit, I played the Saint-Saens Piano Con. 2 by Rubinstein/Wallenstein/RCA from 1958. How lovely! What fun! Sincerely hope that Lang Lang can pull out of his current nose dive.
'It makes you want to scratch yourself....or take a shower...'😂😂😂...and 'How do you exagerate tedium...that's the question...well, they figured it out..'🤣🤣🤣
I love hearing you read through goofy CD booklets. To invoke that one anecdote you mentioned with the Scotsman construction contractor, the writing on them makes my (feeble) attempts at writing feel so...adequate.
Andris' contract with the Boston Symphony has been extended ad infinitum. I shudder at the thought of Bang Bang coming to Boston to play the Saint Saens Second Concerto. Oy vey....
Thank you thank you thank you! Lang Lang’s affectations and over-the-top mannerisms must be called out by honest critics like you. The sad thing is how his super-stardom has influenced younger pianists, as well as musicians in general - how they emote with their contorted faces when they’re playing. True musicianship doesn’t need this kind of display (or distractions). And when it comes to musicianship, I’ve always find Lang superficial and “playing-for-effects.”
There's a great early '60s film starring Peter Sellers called "The World of Henry Orient". It centers around two pre-teen girls who are obsessed with a hack concert pianist--played by Peter Sellers, hilariously. (A plus factor is Angela Lansbury playing a slutty older woman; another is Elmer Berstein's score). I have a feeling that Lang Lang is turning into his generation's version of Henry Orient.
Look on the bright side: at least he didn't "discover" Alkan. Even on a French album. That would only have been half obvious. However it is the recording that I dread ever happening "Lang Lang plays Alkan." How bad would Festin be if he can't play a winner like Carnival of the Animals? It's not even amusing to speculate
Still fairly new to Dave's channel, but was wondering, has he ever been more critical of an album then the evisceration he just gave Lang Lang's Saint-Saens album? Either way I sure did enjoy hearing him trash it.
@@DavesClassicalGuide Thanks Dave, I'll make sure to explore more of your past videos. Next let's hear all about somebody train-wrecking several beloved century-old Stravinskian masterworks. I love your caustic-as-caustic-can-be album reviews.
The first Lang Lang performance I heard was a broadcast of Tchaikovsky's 1st piano concerto from a BBC Prom. I ended up with my mouth open, not in admiration but in disbelief: never had I heard anything so entirely technical and entirely unmusical. Subsequently I made a CD compilation from various other Lang Lang broadcasts to torture a pianist friend of mine. I entitled it "The Dubious Art of Lang Lang".
@@willemboone7912 Cortot recorded only the 4th I believe. (nice transfer as I recall). I'm unclear about the Lang Lang. Not too certain whether I would risk purchasing this recording. Thanks for replying.
@@denisehill7769 Thanks for the warning Denise. I don't play the piano but I've a good collection of piano recordings with various artists. I strongly recommend the recordings of Francois Samson and Robert Casadesus in the French repertory. Many thanks for your reply.
It seems whomever is actually in charge of DG, has managed to drive the bus right over the cliff. Do they actually pay staff members to come up with this stuff? I think "a Swann going through a wormhole" was my favorite thought this week.
I started to listen to it yesterday and could not take it anymore… I played the piano in the second piano concerto and I was vainly hoping for something interesting.
'Pavane pour une Infante Defunte' is that rare thing: a title that sounds better in English than in French. In French it sounds like a clapped-out old Renault with a flat tyre.
Thank you SO much for this. You win "King of the Adjectives" for the year. You nailed everything wrong, from the performance itself to the insipid arrogance of DGG.
They call them Lang Lang's "cast" because he's now sponsored by Disney and these are the "cast members" like Mickey and Pluto and they will encore every Lang Lang CD with a rendition of "It's a Small Small World".
Thanks, Dave. Ive heard Lang Lang a couple times, listened to several recordings and just could never put my finger on why i find his playing less than enthralling. I loved your comments about what is "fed" into students about standard repertoire performance. His Bartok recordings are equally appalling.
When I was a kid, DGG cultivated its image as a classy publisher. I won't say they necessarily were what they tried to seem, but at least they tried. What the Hell happened to them?
"Though the Philistines may jostle, you will rank as an apostle in the high aesthetic band, If you walk down Piccadilly with a poppy or a lily in your medieval hand. And everyone will say, as you walk your flowery way, If he's content with a vegetable love which would certainly not suit me, Why, what a most particularly pure young man this pure young man must be!" 😂 Sorry, but the photo irresistibly said Bunthorne to me.
At least you can play it as an example of the very worst, so you can better appreciate the very best. Slender consolation I know, but - the best I could do.
Dear Dave. It seems you are the only voice of reason in the industry. Even CD booklets are going rapidly downhill. Thank you for all these warnings. It is a shame what a joke once prominent DG has become.
Albrecht Mayer does the same "air oboe" pose in his Venice album (I think). The playing is superb, however. Between him and Andreas Ottensamer, Polygram is really hitched to these marketing gimmicks.
Thank you, thank you, thank you. Lang Lang represents the epitome of treacle-y cliched finger-bangin clunky insults to our ears. nice to know that some people noticed... what the hell is going on with DG?
It seems clear DG is marketing these "discoveries" to young Chinese piano students, most of whom are girls. Hence, the flower, the emphasis on Lang Lang in the balance, the lack of dynamism. Their delicate sensibilities and Lang Lang-obsession require it. That is not me being racist, because I think these girls are underestimated: it's DG being racist, if anything, and condescending. We know he can be better than this, although he has never been a very interesting pianist: In 2013 he recorded a perfectly reasonable Prokofiev 3 and Bartók 2 - Bartók 2! No wonder he left Sony. .
i can always use a laugh and boy did i get many more than one with this review. the only others that were even near to this were a skewering of a russian conductor who shall remain nameless and your marvelous review of the crappy packaging cd's come in.
I remember the days when DG was fairly reliably very good, and boring. Dave, love your videos because you admire greatness, but keep in mind that many of us love takedowns.
This seems to me like a bad college term paper from a student that goes out of his/her way to make the binding as nice as possible. It's all about presentation, and nothing about substance.
Lang Lang has made me uncomfortable ever since I saw him on TV playing the Second Hungarian Rhapsody as part of an ice skating exhibition. It was the glossiest, most mechanical reading I could imagine, maybe more than was imaginable. I do have to take exception to making fun of La Bagel Delight. There's a restaurant down the street called Szechuan Delight. The "delight" is local and understandable. The "La" is obscure. There was a place on Smith Street next to the F train called F Train Bagels that the MTA sued for copyright infringement. Maybe, since F is La in solfege, La Bagel Delight's lawyers crafted it as a strategy to keep the MTA away. Or not. Try their carrot cake. It rocks.
"No subtlety, no wit". That describes the recent Lang Lang perfectly. He's wildly talented, but he's turned into a caricature of a virtuoso pianist. No subtlety, no wit, just a lot of notes. And it sounds like DG has poured gasoline on this bonfire of narcissism. I enjoyed your review, but I wish it hadn't shown up in my RU-vid suggestions. I have no reason to doubt anything you say, but now I feel a compulsion to listen to some of a disc of which I was happily unaware. I expect to suffer, but curiosity compels me to hear for myself how bad it can get.
@@DavesClassicalGuide After listening to a couple of tracks, I can't say that I had a good time, except that it felt good when it was over. I couldn't write a review as entertaining as yours. About all I can say is that there were a lot of notes, some of them played very quickly, most of them the right notes. But a dementor had sucked the joy out of them. And apparently out of Lang Lang. His expressions looked like 20-year-old CGI. Unsettling.
Regarding photo essays and liner note promises, is this trend striving to generate new classical listeners or have label execs simply lost their minds at a new level? Moving forward, I think you should start referring to orchestras, soloists and conductors as casts.
“There’s the hand stuff, because ya know, he plays the piano which is a ‘hands’ instrument”-that killed me. I’m sick of these albums that are so deeply convinced of their own profundity. What, I wonder, would Karajan think of being called a “cast member”, even a “stellar” one at that?
