Boccherini Cello Concerto 1 and 2, by Haydn
Suggested by Bryan Connolly
I have a confession to make… I’m an uncultured oaf.
Given the choice, I’ll almost always choose the baser option. Caviar or Creme Eggs? I’ll take Cadbury’s finest. Champagne or Coca-Cola? Holidays are comin’. Chaucer or Jackie Collins? Bring on the Hollywood Wives.
There are some outliers, naturally. I like Shakespeare, and I can’t abide Kardashian-style Reality TV But even so, I do prefer trash over treasure nine times out of ten.
It’ll come as no surprise, then, that Classical Music leaves me cold.
Sure, it’s a pretty noise. I guess it’s soothing. I just think it’s rather fetishized, simply because it’s Classical Music.
First up, there’s so damn much of it. When hunting down the Boccherini Cello Concertos 1 and 2 on Amazon Music, there were SO MANY albums that could have neem the intended choice. The covers were similar, the orchestras were faceless, the individual tracks were incomprehensibly named. The one I finally chose was nice enough, and I suspect it was functionally identical to the others. And that’s just a subsection of one composer’s work on one instrument.
Second, music has changed so much since the golden age of madrigal, operetta and sonata. Given the wild expanse of aural entertainment on offer, I can never really see a time when I’d choose to regress to this particular noise. This project is a monument to what hardcore boardgamers call Cult of the New: the constant focus on that shiny new game on the horizon, to the detriment of those already in the collection. Classical Music feels like a tugged fetlock to the Cult of the Old. Why are you listening to it, little Jonny? Because everyone loves Grandad, mum!
When I watch a film, I’m rarely in the mood for Charlie sodding Chaplin. When I read a book, it’s never the bloody Iliad. When I play a computer game, it won’t be pissing Pong. When I listen to music, why on earth would I want to listen to some pillock dry-humping a Cello when I could listen to Pop, Rock, Jazz, Blues, Dance, Metal, Hip Hop, Musical Theatre, Prog, Folk, Big Band, Swing and much much much MUCH more, with sub-genre and splinter styles aplenty. There’s a lush savannah of options available, and time is fleeting.
So. Cellos. Yeah.
It sounds sufficiently Classical.
My favourite is, I dunno, the first one?
3/10.