This is not exactly the same as the previous editions of #OriginalvsCovers. The main difference is that this post will feature an original classical musical piece and arrangements written upon that. The #hive guest will be featured, of course, this part is a must in these posts. And not just one... you will see if you continue to read this post.
First of all, I would like to stress out the difference between what is a song and what is musical work. I often hear people call "song" a piece that actually is not. In classical music, a song is considered a piece written for voice to be sung (with the accompaniment of an instrument, or without, so acapella) That is a song. Just an instrumental piece is not considered a song. Today, we clearly don't have a song and covers, we have one musical work written for piano by a great master of the piano, Franz Liszt and arrangements for other instruments. That work is the very famous Hungarian Rhapsody, no 2, in c sharp minor. A very difficult piece to play, an extremely developed technique is needed for playing it well.
Liszt composed nineteen Hungarian Rhapsodies, and this is the second one that we will hear here. It is more than obvious that this piece is perfect for a pianist to show its virtuosity. Also, if the pianist is not prepared for it, well, then better skip it from the repertory. This work has always attracted the public with its dramatic first part, which is called Lassan (in Hungarian it means slowly) and virtuous second part Friska (meaning: fast)
Franz Liszt - Hungarian Rhapsody No. 2 - Alberto Lodoletti
Alberto Lodoletti is an Italian pianist, playing mostly Beethoven, Chopin and Liszt in his concerts. Last year he had several cancelled concerts, we all know the reason. Here we listen to a clear, very well executed performance of the Rhapsody. He is playing in this video on a Fazioli piano. The company which makes these pianos was founded in 1981 on the initiative of Paolo Fazioli, engineer and pianist. An interesting fact is that they reject any industrial-type production and focus on quality crafted pianos, so just around 140 pianos are made during one year.
Arrangement 1 - Orchestra version performed by RCA Victor Symphony Orchestra, conductor - Leopold Stokowski
This orchestral version can lead us to other places and times in our mind. More fun can be heard listening to the motifs from different instruments...it sounds more comical than just the piano version. It is not strange so many times it has been used in movies and even cartoons. The orchestra in this case is led by Leopold Stokowski, who was especially known for conducting with a particular freehand style, eliminating the traditional baton.
Arrangement 2 by Jeff Luke and performed by Seraph Brass
Five girls rocking on brass instruments. That is what we can listen to here. I admire this funny sound and way of their playing. The arrangement is done by Jeff Luke and it seems very demanding for the musicians. However, they are playing it with absolute perfection.
Arrangement 3 by BAKU NAKATA
I don't know if Liszt would imagine that his Hungarian Rhapsody would be played on the marimba, accompanied by piano. However, it is an interesting, different sound and deserves to be here. Also, as this is a percussion instrument, which piano partly is, it is not so different in some passages from the piano sound. The quality of this video is great, one more reason to include it in this edition.
Arrangement 4 "The Cat Concerto" played by Florent Hu
This pianist, Florent Hu, uses the cartoon The Cat Concerto for his performance. We can simultaneously watch the cartoon, and he matches with his playing the sound from it. It has been always funny to watch this Tom and Jerry episode, and having a pianist playing this version is even better. The audience enjoys it as well, we can hear their reaction and laughter at humorous scenes. Well done mister Florent Hu.
HIVE guests of this edition:
Arrangement 5 by @contrabourdon and @tomsummerfield
This is an absolutely fantastic arrangement and performance coming from those two piano and organ players. Tom is a newcomer and we hope he will be an active user as definitely he has really good piano skills to present. He made at the moment just his introduction post, but let us hope his friend @contrabourdon can convince him to post more often and be a stable part of this chain of musicians here in hive platform. I have to admit that for me, @primalamusica has been the association for organ music played at hive for a long time. Just recently I discovered contrabourdon with his performance of Bach's Taccata and Fugue in D minor and another post with a recording from a concert he participated. And of course, the recording we see here, the arrangement for 4 hands, played by him and Tom. Great and sparkling performance of this extraordinary piece, arranged for two players. Hours and hours (days, weeks...months... :D ) of practice are needed for this level of performance. Listen to those double octaves and the scales! And the cadence, awesome.
The quality of video and audio is extraordinary too and I would like to have such a nice piano studio :)))
Hope you liked this edition and the selection.
If you missed the previous Original vs Covers posts, you can take a look here:
Original vs Covers #1 with edprivat
Original vs Covers #2 with manujune
Original vs Covers #3 with ithil94
Original vs Covers #4 with dianakyv
Original vs Covers #5 with ylich, salvadorhr18, mariajruizb, gulia.peito and enriqumarval
Original vs Covers #6 with nessycanta
Original vs Covers #7 with marijocnt
Also, any suggestion is very welcome, if you recently saw a post of someone with a good cover, drop me a name in the comment so I can check it out and maybe include it in one of the next posts. Thanks for reading and hope you will have nice moments listening to the selection and the featured guest of this post.
Oh wow! This is exactly what I was talking about in my last post on crossover music. And you've got a whole series on it going! I just loved the marimba version of this famous piece, though I also enjoyed the brass group. Best of all, I think, is how you have included interpretations of Hive musicians in your posts! Simply fantastic.
Hi @stortebeker. I saw the mention and your post but I was still not able to get to the comment section (in general and in your post either, but will go now to read thoroughly 🙃 )
Ow, thank you so much for you appreciation. The idea came some time ago and you see now we are already in week 8 of the series. I hope I will continue, as some people can connect, a musician can be discovered... but there is always that factor of invisibility, and that it was in vane. Somehow, in the middle of the week I always get new energy and motivation, the search for a hive artist and matching a good song and covers requires some time, that is a fact, but then until Friday (or Saturday if it was not possible to bring it the usual day) there is new edition coming out from the oven of my laptop keyboard 😅
I also liked the brass and marimba version, but if you have time and want to check out the last week post, edition 7, where @marijocnt was a guest, there were some really interesting covers (in my opinion) . Something you mentioned in your post, crossover music. Anyway, I am going to read now your article, and listen to the music, so our next chat will be there :)
Oh, of course, everything in its due time. I feel the same way, as Hive is expanding, it also spreads my attention a bit thin. But it's all good, we understand. (Besides, these things happen to me constantly too! Like how we've been chatting back and forth for months now, and only today did I realize that I wasn't even following you! So caught up on that too now.) So let me go ahead and read (and listen) to your Original vs. Cover post from last week.
Que bonito post, la maestría con la que interpretan todos la pieza es increíble, me encantó😍 , gracias por compartirlo 👏👏👏
Sí, para esta obra se necesita maestría, de primera calidad jejeje. Sí no, no queda bien la obra. Gracias Nessy, me alegro que has pasado por mi post, que incluye siempre un invitado (o en este caso dos) de este espacio. Y no por casualidad has entrado tú también una vez 😇 Es el trabajo exelente que se demuestra que me hace decidir por alguien, y tú por supuesto haces muy bien! Un besito guapa, cuidate 🤗
Your post has been supported and upvoted from the Classical Music community (Subscribe at peakd and Steempeak) as it appears to be of interest to our community. We also support jazz and folk music posts!
If you enjoy our support of the #classical-music community, please consider a small upvote to help grow the support account!
You can find details about us below.
The classical music community at #classical-music, Peakd, Steempeak and Discord. Follow our community accounts @classical-music and @classical-radio or follow our curation trail (classical-radio) at Hive Vote or SteemAuto!
Thank you @classical-radio 🎶🎶🎶
Your post has been voted as a part of Encouragement program. Keep up the good work!
Use Ecency daily to boost your growth on platform!
Support Ecency
Vote for Proposal
Delegate HP and earn more
Thank you 😊
Great addition to the playlist of any readers. The first time I heard this piece was in Tom and Jerry. But many old cartoons are filled with classical music as they were once mute images with piano making up for all the auditive images. There's so much to see and stand in awe with these different takes on such a complex piano composition as this.
You heard it for the first time in the Tom and Jerry? At least, they did a great job then so this piece became this super popular :)
This piece was like a dream for us while staying, as well La Campanella from the same composer. Just crazy technique needed to be well played...Liszt was the same for piano as Paganini for violin. Aliens 🤣
Yes, I know about that. A friend once showed me a piece by Liszt and I remember asking him if that the Paganini of piano. He laughed and they said "yes". There were a lot of annotation on that paper. The jumps between some notes and also some of the scales in there make me think the guy had some pretty big and flexible hands.
Great !!!
Thanks Ludmila 😇
Happy Caturday musical @cuddlekitten. You liked the Cat Concerto, right? :))