Message #32597

[guest145]

Your lists are invariably useful and interesting, Colin. It's great that you codify and disseminate what more often that not are random observations kicking around in the back of some of our minds! While I'm a completist at heart as well and would love to see many of these works recorded and more widely available in good sound and performances, I can at least offer forum members an opportunity to hear some of the works mentioned in your list and by others in this thread, that are not already here in our Downloads folder.

I have live performances of Kevin Puts' Symphonies Nos. 1 & 2 and will be happy to upload them here if there's interest. I like his music and am glad that he's been getting more exposure in recent years. I believe I also have Tomas Svoboda's 4th & 6th Symphonies and Rouse's 5th Symphony.

On the matter of withdrawn symphonies, there is a private recording of Persichetti's First Symphony, in a rehearsal reading with Howard Hanson and his Eastman students. Let's also remember that Diamond wrote an early, withdrawn symphony, which is on YT.

While I try very hard to be fair, open-minded and judicious in my comments on most music and musicians, I regret that Roy Harris' 13th Symphony strikes me as an embarrassment richly deserving its oblivion. I say this having great respect for Harris' music in general and fondness for many of his works. I suppose that a more professional performance than the one on YT might possibly present the work in a better light, but I'm not sure there's much there worth salvaging regardless of the quality of the performance or recording. After hearing all the other Harris symphonies and wondering why the 13th hadn't surfaced, when it finally did the reason was quite obvious, disappointingly so.