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Nabaza.net-The MarketPlace - Lang Lang: Dragon Songs (Plus DVD)
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List Price: $19.98
Our Price: $14.99
Your Save: $ 4.99 ( 25% )
Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours
Manufacturer: Deutsche Grammophon
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Average Customer Rating:  
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Binding: Audio CD
EAN: 0028947765769
Label: Deutsche Grammophon
Manufacturer: Deutsche Grammophon
Number Of Discs: 2
Publisher: Deutsche Grammophon
Release Date: 2007-01-09
Studio: Deutsche Grammophon
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Editorial Reviews:
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Lang Lang has fascinated audiences all over the globe--now he takes them home to show them "his" China with Dragon Songs, a CD+DVD set with Chinese piano solo, chamber, and orchestral music. Discover the musical culture that forged one of the most acclaimed classical musicians of our day. The CD juxtaposes the Yellow River Concerto, a large-scale, highly virtuosic piano concerto with colorful sound scales, with miniature pieces for solo piano and with chamber pieces that combine the piano with traditional Chinese instruments. Most of the pieces merge tradional Chinese melodies and idioms with the Western classical music--the result is music of astonishing beauty and ease that will strongly appeal to a broad audience. The 130-minute DVD features a full-length documentary offering a fascinating and intimate look behind the scenes of Lang Lang's latest China tour. The DVD also includes a concert of the solo piano and chamber music pieces from the CD filmed during the Dragon Songs recording sessions in Beijing.
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Spotlight customer reviews:
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Customer Rating:
Summary: Great job!
Comment: Regardless of what you think of Lang Lang, there can be no doubts that this artist is incredibly enthusiastic about his art. This enthusiasm is absolutely infectious. I've used this CD/DVD as part of a unit on Chinese music I teach to my middle school students. They were absolutely fascinated by this young pianist. It offered great information - it was not "dumbed down", but offered ideas they could understand. The documentary portion of the package helped inform them about what they heard on the CD.
I found these pieces utterly imaginative and full of wonderful colors and ideas. It was a pleasure listening to!
Customer Rating:
Summary: Album of Utter Finesse
Comment: Many claim Lang Lang to have dire interpretational problem.
What in fact is 'interpretational problem'? There is simply no standard answer, as the topic is pure subjectivity.
That said, for those (Chinese especially) who claim that Lang's "Yellow River Concerto" lacks in any thing at all, I would rebut by a direct answer - Lang's Yellow River is his OWN Yellow River; not the one in the 1970's, nor 1940's.
Lang Lang grew up under the direct influence of Chinese music - his father was member of a Chinese performing troupe and plays the Chinese instrument erhu, as many may have known already.
This album compiles many songs that Lang Lang has grown up with, and he has a very intimate and personal approach to those songs, transcribed to the pianoforte.
Some diehard Chinese music followers query the combination of traditional Chinese instruments with the pianoforte in this album. Again, such worries are unfounded. Lang's ability to 'sing' on the pianoforte is abundant, and the pieces flow demurely and elegantly throughout the various tracks.
Just sit back and enjoy. Do not forget the truth that music is about the senses, not the critical cerebrum.
Customer Rating:
Summary: The Genocide Piano Concerto
Comment: If you are interested in the actual history of the Yellow River Concerto, check out the Wikipedia entry on this piece of music's sordid history. The concerto is the product of a People's Republic committee during the Mao regime (Mao's wife was in charge of the project). This is the same regime responsible for the deaths of millions of people during its reign.
The fact that Deutche Grammophon has released this work is particularly puzzling, since I doubt that they would record and release a work written during or about the Third Reich.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Thoroughly enjoyable!
Comment: Recorded in Bejing in 2006, this combination CD/DVD from Deutsche Grammophon offers a comfortable mix of East and West in fourteen musical selections that run the gamut from major compositions in China such as the 1939 "Yellow River Concerto," running 20 minutes in four major parts and moods [This writer's favorite would be "Ode to the Yellow River" with its rich base and cello introduction and melodic, flowing low-to-mid range piano melody] to the simpler traditional sound of "Dialogue in Song" piano solo. The blending of styles throughout is intriguing.. "Ode," for example, alluded to above, might sound like something straight out an American western, depicting in music the rolling rich prairie land of the American West, yet the music was written as a string choral cantata during the Japanese occupation of China in 1939 and, according to Lang, was a piece "that helped bring back our energy and self-confidence - a reminder that we would do great things." In other words, the piece is, at its foundation, distinctly Chinese in origin. But this two-for package contains something else; it contains a bonus DVD, widescreen, beautifully filmed and composed feature about the pianist, his journey back to China, his concerts and personal glimpses of his family life and teaching techniques to some amazing students. It is a wonderfully entertaining, National Geographic quality tour of Lang's homeland as well as an entertaining - almost hypnotic - biography of this talented pianist. It is a thoroughly enjoyable CD/DVD combination that is hugely successful in what it sets out to accomplish, both musically and visually. This review appeared at [..]
Customer Rating:
Summary: Total delight!
Comment: I can't praise this CD enough. Hearing this wonderful Chinese piano music, in Lang Lang's brilliant performances, is a total delight! Even the Yellow River Concerto, which could be considered kitsch, is given such a warm and sincere reading that it radiates a kind of "New World Symphony" energy. There are
guest artists playing Chinese instruments. And there's a bonus DVD about Lang Lang and his roots.
Pure joy!
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