Let's talk music, no genre boundaries

The last time i was stunned by an opera was Akhnaten of Philip Glass.

The way he portrayed musically the Ancient Egypt feeling about  spiritual meaning was stunning.

I was so stunned i wanted to read his biography...

My next  will probably be Kepler ...

 

For me i dont want to "see" the theater of the opera only the sound and music...

I see music when listening and seeing  anything else will intrude and impede my experience...

But going live to an opera is a thing in itself and i understand people who want to "see" it...

 

I discovered the miraculous beauty of Opera listening  from TV  an opera of Mozart "Cosi Fan Tutte"... For me a totally uninteresting libretto and visuals...

but i entered in an ecstasy understanding with my ears how Mozart genius makes of each voice a perfect musical instrument  speaking to one another in a perfect musical way...No other composer ever do it in this "perfect" way...Not even Puccini which is my favorite opera composer...Mozart reach Bach transcendent level with a ridiculous story, incredible, using only voices as we can use a piano...

It was useless almost a desecration to understand the words and the action play... I do not want at all ... I succeed because i dont understand italian and it was easy to see without seeing on the TV set  only listening...

i discovered Mozart absolute genius this day 40 years ago...

 

But paradoxically,  there was an opera i wanted to see not only listening to... The Faust of Busoni...But by Fisher Dieskau...but he is dead and i doubt i will ever see it...

Faust is not like "cosi fan tutte" a ridiculous story. 

 

Another example : I like Kurt Weil very much...

All of his music...

But i dont feel at all the urge to see the three penny opera... Only listening it with Lotte Lenya is well enough...I could see from my recording version with her, a prodigiously well recorded opera, i could see in my first acoustic room all the play all around me even when the singers walked singing and turning their head my eyes closed or open so good was my acoustic... Alas! i sold my house, it is another story...

 

By the way, i had seen the Magic flute by Bergman and i did not enter in ecstasy  like listening to Cosi Fan tutte, why ?

Simple the story of the magic flute is a masterpiece tale not a stupid story, and Bergman realisation is a masterpiece movie... But here all the music serve a goal which is telling the tale especially the visuals use by the director...Nothing is pure music in itself like in the Cosi case...The goal of Mozart is more philosophicaql than musical here ...

The greatest opera of Mozart are the magic flute and Don Giovanni...but his greatest pieces are the Requiem and Cosi fan Tutte... Which are more than a mass and more than an opera, in the case of Cosi especially pure music like the Art of the fugue by Bach...It is like Mozart saying, gave to me a stupid text and a stupid play and i will create an absolute piece of music... Incredible he did it...But he could not do it again like Bach writing once the art of the fugue...Mozart wrote the art of song...

 

Always a treat to watch Baryshnikov dance, the guy could make cats jealous if they were able to discern such....good to know he's still with us and mentoring the up and coming.... 
At 3 years my senior, he's still at the barre which ought to make me want to retain some of the nimbleness I've had when push became 'move your ass faster'....
It's when you forget the years have moved you on further through reality it shows...;)
...and sometimes, I just want to have some fun.... ;)

I'm listening to Berlioz's Requiem and liking it a lot.

@stuartk 

I’m almost positive you’ve heard of him, but for those who haven’t, here’s a taste of John Fahey. I went to several of his concerts in which he was all alone, like here, playing the guitar in what I take to be a classical or at least semi-classical style. It looks like he’s holding the guitar on his right leg like they do playing classical music. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ReW9uUYm-DA

And here's Jagger singing that same blues tune.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=humDgJ-SmHI

I wish i could explain the difference between spectacularly genius music and deeply spiritual one...

The requiem of Berlioz is pure incredible genius but do not move me spiritually as Christus of Listz or Bruckner motets for example...

Monteverdi  so genius he is in his sacred music do not move me either and beware i love him to death, i listened his 8th madrigal books one thousand times at least...But there not an ounce of spirituality in this absolute master of expression...

Josquin Des Prez and Hildegard de Bingen unlike Monteverdi and my beloved Gesulado are spiritual masters in a way nor Monteverdi neither Gesualdo can be ...

 

Sorabji is anything save spiritual...

Scriabin is almost spiritual in a demonic powerful way...

I wish i could put in words what is spiritual music...Why it matter the most...