Massenet's Meditation de Thais

[tcenrt]

I just listened to Josef Hassid version of the Meditation de Thais. Totally haunting. What a tormented soul!!
I actually has to listen to Yo-yo Ma's version in order to calm down.

If anyone care to listen to that version, go to " onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; (LD)
" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; (digital)

I personally like the LD instead of the digital, I think too much cleaning up of the sound and some emotion seems to have cleaned out of the original.

Ann

[tcenrt]

Also amazingly that the pianist Gerald Moore just rode with this madness.

Ann

[kjackson83]

I just listened to Josef Hassid version of the Meditation de Thais. Totally haunting. What a tormented soul!!
I actually has to listen to Yo-yo Ma's version in order to calm down.

If anyone care to listen to that version, go to " onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; (LD)
" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; (digital)

I personally like the LD instead of the digital, I think too much cleaning up of the sound and some emotion seems to have cleaned out of the original.

Ann

Very lovely--I like old, scratchy LP recordings too!

I think Clara Rockmore gave this on theremin...

[tcenrt]

Just a little trivial information. Josef Hassid was diagnosed with Schizophrenia, and dead at the age of 26. May be that explain some of the painful emotion in his playing.

Ann

[TullyBascombe]

The story behind this piece is that Thais is one of Venus' companions, a leader of the nymphs, who has spent most of her immortal life frolicking in one bacchinalia after another. She meet St. Paul, who eventually convinces her to renounce her pagan ways. She does so, knowing that she will die. She sings this meditation while she is dying, repenting of her past life and eager to embrace her redemption, glad to exchange the lustful pleasures of her past life for the more pure pleasures to come.

[tcenrt]

The story behind this piece is that Thais is one of Venus' companions, a leader of the nymphs, who has spent most of her immortal life frolicking in one bacchinalia after another. She meet St. Paul, who eventually convinces her to renounce her pagan ways. She does so, knowing that she will die. She sings this meditation while she is dying, repenting of her past life and eager to embrace her redemption, glad to exchange the lustful pleasures of her past life for the more pure pleasures to come.

Thank you for enlightening me regarding the story of Thais. I didn't know that. What intrigue me most is that Josef Hassid's version doesn't offer me a sense of resolution or peace. For one thing, he plays it much faster than other artists' versions, and he uses vibrato in the most unusual places in the piece to enhance that restlessness. A brief phrase to sum it up.......I love it.

Ann