Somtow Sucharitkul

[cjvinthechair]

Just come across this on YT. Any thoughts (for me, it's beautiful...but I'm biased when it comes to 'sacred' music !) ?
If you like it, there's another full Requiem on YT !

[Elroel]

Thank you Clive

From this composer I new only that he helped a former American Ambassador in writing a 'Holland Symphony'.
I always wondered how much of it was from Somtow Sucharitkul. Together with two othewr works it was released on lp in 1970s I believe. I taped the works, but the sound is horrible now; the works were not that interesting btw.

[Holger]

Thank you Clive

From this composer I new only that he helped a former American Ambassador in writing a 'Holland Symphony'.
I always wondered how much of it was from Somtow Sucharitkul. Together with two othewr works it was released on lp in 1970s I believe. I taped the works, but the sound is horrible now; the works were not that interesting btw.

I have that LP, the American ambassador in question is J. William Middendorf II (* 1924). However, I have to admit that I really find these works (I mean the Middendorfs) pretty uninteresting indeed, composed in a very undemanding manner, basically not much more than simple melodies accompanied by similarly simple harmonies.

[SerAmantiodiNicolao]

There are some excerpts from his opera Ayodhya on YouTube - I'll maybe post one when I can get to a connection that is YouTube-enabled.  It's a bit bland, perhaps, but there's much to like in it, I find.  And it's a good deal more effective than I'd expected, honestly.

[cjvinthechair]

Think the whole work's up there, in fact.
As mentioned elsewhere, not a huge opera fan, but on brief acquaintance this 'bland' I could get used to !