Roman Turovsky wrote: > So do you really think it would be possible to spend time with Spohr, > Hummel, Viotti etc. without getting massively irritated?
My point was that Sor seems much better if your point of comparison is Viotti than if your point of comparison is Beethoven. But the answer to your question is yes. Those largely forgotten stars of the early nineteenth wrote their share of decent music. That's why they were stars. As a professional program annotator, it's occasionally my job to write about music I'm not inclined to like, but which, in my HIP way, I do my best to take on its own terms. There's always something to like. Which is good, since in that particular field of criticism it's really not permissible to pan the music; my purpose is to enhance the concert experience, and it somehow detracts from it to pick up your program and read that the first piece "really sucks". To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
