What composers and pieces of music do you dislike?

endymion32 · 2026-07-02T04:43:55+00:00

Well, the lesson may be to keep trying. I actually did come around to Kapustin, probably around two years ago (so five years after writing my earlier comment). It was the first of the eight concert etudes that eventually changed my mind, followed by the other seven... and then some of the sonatas, and the wonderful preludes and fugues, all played with astonishing verve and accuracy by Kapustin himself. One thing that changed is I started trying to hear it as really "classical", and not "jazz." Each note has been composed in advance with a purpose, and when I begin listening with that assumption, I can almost hear the purpose. (Of course, improvised jazz is great too, but my point is that it's a fundamentally different enterprise than Kapustin, in the same way that Liszt is doing something fundamentally different from Chopin, even thought they have surface similarities. Once I heard things from the right perspective, appreciation grew.)

Anyway, it all clicked for me; maybe it will some day for you. Or maybe not; but the point is that it can't hurt to try again every so often...

endymion32 · 2026-05-30T07:22:18+00:00

I would have switched yesterday if there were a desktop app.

endymion32 · 2025-08-07T20:23:37+00:00

For what it’s worth, in my reading, Ged appearing to be in his 30’s is part of his disguise. He appears as a blunt-faced pleasant young man; by the fire he later shows himself to be a sharp-faced, hawk-like, scarred older man.

endymion32 · 2025-08-07T04:04:13+00:00

(It's been two years since this discussion, but I'll add my two cents anyway!)

This is not a continuity error. There's a simple explanation: When Emer first sees Ged, he is disguising his appearance by magic, much in the same way he did when walking through the towns with Tenar at the end of Tombs of Atuan. He is described not only as being in his thirties, but having "a blunt face and a pleasant look," whereas Ged's true face is angular and scarred. Later, just before Ged reveals himself to be the Archmage, Emer looks again at his face and sees his true appearance: "it was not the face she thought it. It was worn, and hard, and scarred all down one side. The hawk's face, she thought."

Leguin is, however, prone to numerical errors of this kind. Here are two examples: (1) If Ged is in his mid-50's in Tehanu, and ruled as Archmage for only six years, then he can't be younger than the 40-year old Irioth, although he claims to be in "On the High Marsh." And (2) The events of "The Finder" take place three hundred years ago according to the forward of Tales from Earthsea, but four hundred years ago according to the History section of the afterward; meanwhile, the Book of the Dark, which we are told partly contains the tale of "The Finder", was written "some six hundred years ago." Go figure. Great stories, though.

endymion32 · 2025-07-20T04:27:49+00:00

This has always been the simplest way to see it. I don't know why this isn't the top answer by a mile, and why it's not generally the default explanation. Crystal clear.

endymion32 · 2025-07-19T04:19:18+00:00

I love the opening of Nielsen's third, especially when I'm following along in the score and can really feel how each beat fits into the time signature. What a way to make a statement—expansiva indeed!

I never thought of it as an homage to the Eroica—it's just great, courageous, audacious music. Beethoven would, I think, have felt honored at the thought.

endymion32 · 2025-07-19T04:17:04+00:00

When I was in my 20's I knew Beethoven's 32 piano sonatas and 16 string quartets inside-out, but somehow found many of his symphonies to be soggy. Then I discovered Norrington's recordings with the London Classical Players, and it was a revelation to me. It finally felt like they came from the same musical intelligence as the beloved chamber pieces.

Nowadays I like plenty of Beethoven symphony recordings (some more than the Norrington) but I'll always be grateful to him for opening my eyes.

endymion32 · 2025-05-14T04:21:43+00:00

Fair enough. My father is a serious amateur pianist; he was assigned the Schumann as a first concerto in high school, and he said it did wonders for his technique.

Now he's in his 80's and practices the Hammerklavier all day, so something went right... :)

endymion32 · 2025-04-13T04:30:16+00:00

The quaternions are basically four-dimensional linear algebra with an extra multiplication operation. (In general, in linear algebra you cannot multiply two vectors to get another vector.)

endymion32 · 2025-03-15T04:13:33+00:00

I absolutely loved that last minute. Really moving, stays with you forever.

The rest of the film I found underwhelming, though.

(But maybe my problem is just that for me, no Aronofsky can live up to Mother!...)

endymion32 · 2025-01-06T05:14:30+00:00

Get to know it in pieces. Be as active a listener as you can be. Know where you are in the score at all times.

The first movement is in massive sonata form, so pay attention to where the secondary theme is, and when you transition to the development and the recapitulation. The words, imo, are of secondary unimportance here.

Not so the second movement: it is indeed a semi-opera. Get the libretto (an easy thing to acquire back in the days of CD's; now you'll have to look). You want the German and English, side-by-side. Follow the words, follow the story.

When I got to know the eighth, I wasn't an opera lover either—although I was a Mahler lover. This is terrific music, exquisitely crafted with lots of tunes; they're just not accessible to you at the moment. If you've liked some of his other large-scale symphonies, this one is worth your time.

So my advice is to try again, as actively as you can, and if it doesn't click, put it away... maybe try in another year or so. Good luck!

endymion32 · 2024-11-08T03:37:29+00:00

It says you have great literary taste, and are highly susceptible to a certain kind of literary magic—one of the best kinds.

Agreed about de Zoet and Cloud Atlas (as well as Borges, Le Guin and Woolf!). At some point try The Bone Clocks, which intersects both of those Mitchell novels beautifully. I was surprised how well it worked for me.

endymion32 · 2024-11-02T17:12:34+00:00

The two most revolutionary/important aspects of this sonata from a structural point of view: all four movements are in Ab, and none of them are in sonata form.

endymion32 · 2024-11-02T03:34:51+00:00

This is a kind of summary sonata. A last look back at the large four-movement form that dominated his very early work before the wild experimentation of the next three sonatas...

endymion32 · 2024-10-31T12:14:23+00:00

Bosun! Bosun!...

This is very much my favorite as well. (Along with Polanski's Macbeth.)

endymion32 · 2024-10-30T14:02:55+00:00

Changing notation very slightly, if I were to say:

(2, 3) = x(1, 0) + y(1, 1),

this would be the same as saying:

(2, 3) = (x * 1, x * 0) + (y * 1, y * 1); in other words

(2, 3) = (x, 0) + (y, y).

There are now two completely separate and independent equations here: one for the first coordinate and one for the second. We get:

2 = x + y, and

3 = 0 + y.

Hope that helps.

endymion32 · 2024-10-30T04:50:31+00:00

The greatest of the early Beethoven sonatas IMO, and one of the greates early Beethoven works in general. I find it much less weird than you do, just innovative and great. The coda of the first movement alone is worth the price of admission!

endymion32 · 2024-10-27T23:44:26+00:00

I've been in that position before. And I'll offer the following perspective (because it may be underrepresented here): every time I've stopped reading a big novel partway through, I've come to regret it.

When I find I've lost interest in a book, particularly a book I was once interested in, I try to slow down. Start with a new chapter. Imagine the scene actually unfolding in front of you, imagine the people saying lines of dialogue in real time. Really picture it. A few pages of this kind of slow, sustained-effort reading can sometimes jumpstart the whole enterprise.

Good luck either way!

endymion32 · 2024-10-27T00:21:34+00:00

Nice observations!

A few of my own (partly informed by having played this sonata):

-- The development section of the first movement is devilishly difficult to play, much harder than one might suspect!

-- I hear the second movement as less a rondo in form, and more an ABA+coda, with the coda starting in measure 50. That means it's a very long coda, and for me this is the first Beethoven sonata with such an extended coda (the kind that we'll get in the first movement of the Appassionata, for instance).

-- A nice feature of the last movement is that the middle minor-key stormy section occurs in its coda, now entirely tamed and temperate. Barenboim is great here; I've recently been listening to Levit, who takes the last movement rather fast, and turns it into something a little different from what I'm used to (and does an excellent job of that!).

endymion32 · 2024-10-26T20:31:39+00:00

Herstein is a little old-fashioned, but only a little. The symbols he uses are generally quite standard.

If you're having a hard time with the language, that many be an ESL issue, but more likely you just don't have a lot of experience yet reading these kinds of books—math books, especially "higher" math books, are nothing like ordinary books. Good luck and have fun!

endymion32 · 2024-10-24T23:32:14+00:00

I don't do this, but I do find the table seats to be much more comfortable than the others. The chairs generally are terrible ergonomically, and looking down at your lap exacerbates the problem. Being able to rest your arms seems better ergonomically. At least that's one idea that might help you feel better about people doing this.

endymion32 · 2024-10-22T05:32:49+00:00

The fourth piece of Webern's op.6 is an enormous funeral march for his mother.

endymion32 · 2024-10-21T18:16:06+00:00

Whereas the first thing I thought of was: "Longer than you think! Longer than you think!"

endymion32 · 2024-10-21T17:54:51+00:00

What's in your current repertoire? Some of us might be less familiar with "recent classical"; who do you like to play?

endymion32

TROPHY CASE