Show and Tell: One More Non-Item

Either I don’t get out as much as I should, so to speak, or my computer is a raging Anglophobe. Yet somehow, today I managed to find myself on the U.K.’s MusicalCriticism.com, a relatively new site (established in 2007) devoted to the kind of in depth reviews that many of our American newspapers can ill-afford. Most of the authors are youngish academians who don’t shy from explaining the tough to explain.

Unlimited by space, this is a sample of what you get:

Composers Ruth Crawford Seeger and John Adams created works with unusual musical structures. For Crawford Seeger, it was to take dynamics as the basis for her Andante for Strings, while John Adams' Short Ride in a Fast Machine is a minimalist piece focusing on repetitive and modulating rhythms. Composed fifty years apart, they both have a historical American connection through their composers' shared nationality, yet each piece displays a different intellectual aspect of American music.

Author Mary Robb seems to like American classical music more than Americans. How refreshing! And no disparaging remarks about atonality! Yeah!

Anyway, I thought I’d give ‘em a shout out and their very own spot on our blogroll. You should check them out. They’re different and good.
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Help the Detritus, Save the Queen

Give this CD review a gander:

Paul Lewis’ Beethoven piano sonatas lovely, but a bit too British

Today’s question for the Detritusites: what is it exactly that Cantrell says about British comportment?

First, Lewis is described as able, thoughtful, eager, lovely and elegant. Then, somehow, his inner-Brit gets in the way. Cantrell wants more wit, more danger and more ecstasy, just like he received from Schiff’s recording.

And Mr. Lewis misses the songlike qualities of the variation themes in Op. 109 and 111; the former is too foursquare, the latter too slow.

Foursquare: unless Cantrell is referring to a church, waterproof jackets, rum, an American architectural style, an archaic definition or a video production company in San Diego, he’s saying that the performance of Op. 109 was childish or simplistic, like the game. Sure, he could’ve meant “square,” as in "conventional or boring." But "foursquare" is an archaic English definition of the geometric figure; it's not related to the informal shortened form.

Now, dear Detritusites, I'll ask again: what about the British demeanor that makes for an unsatisfactory Beethoven performance?
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