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8 Polonaises by Frédéric Chopin (Vinyl record album review)

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Record basics

  • Album name: 8 Polonaises
  • Composer name: Frédéric Chopin
  • Performer name: Peter Frankl
  • Year: 1964?
  • Number of discs: one
  • Label: Yorkshire Records
  • Collection: Brenner / Gessner
  • Distinguishing characteristics: “G” written on top left of album, indicating that my father owned it
  • Buy it on Ebay: $5.50

8 Polonaises by Frédéric Chopin

My review

Level of familiarity before listening

I’m familiar with Chopin, but I doubt that I would be able to identify any of his music.

What I expected

I associate Chopin with the piano, and specifically with études, but my musical education left me unable to define “études” (studies… of something), and I think of his compositions as short but energetic. I have no idea what the relationship is of a polonaise to an étude.

What it was actually like

I thought this was interesting and enjoyable, but no part of it was catchy or memorable.

I did not catch if there were any instruments at all besides the piano. I wonder if Chopin ever considered writing for multiple instruments, or if he even knew how to play other instruments. Some people are just really into the piano.

Op. 53, in A Flat Major sounded familiar at parts, and was the most lively and entertaining of the pieces.

Grade

3/5: interesting, but not for me

Le jour de clarté by Graeme Allwright (Vinyl record album review)

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Record basics

  • Album name: Le jour de clarté
  • Artist name: Graeme Allwright
  • Year: 1968
  • Number of discs: one
  • Label: Mercury
  • Collection: Brenner / Gessner
  • Who owned it: my mother, the family’s only Francophone.
  • Buy the CD on Amazon: $11.99

Le jour de clarté by Graeme Allwright

My review

Level of familiarity before listening

I have no familiarity at all with Graeme Allwright or this record.

What I expected

It’s in French, and it’s from 1968, and it includes songs by Leonard Cohen; Peter, Paul and Mary; Pete Seeger and Tom Paxton. So folk.

What it was actually like

This was pretty good, and I considered it the best of the three French-folk records from my mother’s collection so far – the other two being Garlick by Hugues Aufray (1972) and Une Selecton “La Fine Fleur” by Jacques Bertin (1964). I still felt like Ghost Dog while listening, though, and since I have no Haitian glacier friends, I doubt that my French will ever improve from its current state.

In any case, French Suzanne was a very faithful representation, and French The Stranger Song (L’étranger) was the same way. Though I consider Suzanne the quintessential Leonard Cohen song, I would not necessarily know the latter, but from the first bars, it sounded extremely Leonard Cohen, and I immediately felt like I was listening to Songs of Leonard Cohen.

The French What Did You Learn in School Today? (Qu’as-tu Appris A L’école) also stood out as mimicking its original singer Tom Paxton eerily well.

Of the others, I thought Jusqu’a La Ceinture was quite fun, and Ne Laisse Pas Partir Ta Chance was a most pleasant surprise – a bluegrass song! I never would have thought that bluegrass would appeal to the French taste in music.

Grade

4/5: would listen again

Stephen Stills (1970) (Vinyl record album review)

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Record basics

  • Album name: Stephen Stills
  • Artist name: Stephen Stills
  • Year: 1970
  • Number of discs: one
  • Label: Atlantic Records
  • Collection: Brenner / Gessner
  • Distinguishing characteristics: My parents each had a copy of this record. My father’s copy had a “G” written on the upper left corner of the album, and my mother’s copy had “Brenner” written on the back of the album and on the LP.
  • Buy it on Amazon: $12.00

Stephen Stills (1970)

My review

Level of familiarity before listening

I don’t have any particular memory of listening to this record, though I might have heard it at some point. I do recognize one song by name, Love the One You’re With, and I’ve reviewed a wide variety of Stephen Stills’ work:

What I expected

This is Stephen Stills’ first solo record. I’ve already listened to his second, and thought that it was not good.

What it was actually like

This was nowhere near as bad as Stills’ second solo record, so that was a relief.

Love the One You’re With is a truly great pop song – fun and catchy, rich and complex, memorable, rhythmic and melodic, and I even didn’t mind the soul style backing vocals. The steel drums were maybe the only part of it that I would have cut.

For whatever reason that I was unable to determine, he then took those soul style backing vocals and made an entire song around them, Church (Part of Someone), which was terrible (and also too slow). Sit Yourself Down was similar, but not as bad.

To a Flame was easy listening, and also quite bad. I had a difficult time picking the worst song between that one and Cherokee, which was a weird grab bag of lots of different sounds, with an atrocious horns part, but decided that the latter was the worst because of its abysmal and nauseating saxophone solo.

The most pleasant surprise on the record was two songs at the end of the first side, Old Times Good Times, a great rock song with pretty strong wailing guitar, and Go Back Home, an excellent blues rock song. I was really impressed with Stills when I heard how great those two songs were, and then I checked the back of the album to read the credits… and who was it that played the guitar on those songs? Jimi Hendrix and Eric Clapton. So, yeah.

Grade

3/5: interesting, but not for me

A Gift From a Flower to a Garden by Donovan (Vinyl record album review)

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Record basics

  • Album name: A Gift From a Flower to a Garden
  • Artist name: Donovan
  • Year: 1967
  • Number of discs: two
  • Label: Epic Records
  • Collection: Brenner / Gessner
  • Who owned it: my father
  • Buy it on Amazon: $68.40

A Gift From a Flower to a Garden by Donovan

My review

Level of familiarity before listening

I’ve never listened to this record before, but I recently reviewed The Real Donovan (1966) and thought it was not that bad!

What I expected

The Real Donovan was not that bad, but I’m getting a very bad sense about this double album.

First of all, lots of musicians were putting out double albums in the late 1960s, and the way they always did it was by having an extra sleeve in the album, and sticking the second record in there. For whatever reason, Donovan seems to have felt the need to go all out and create a whole box set for his double album, as if it was going to be an unforgettable experience to buy it and then take it home, lovingly unbox it, and diligently listen to it.

Moreover, there’s a folio inside, with DONOVAN printed on the cover, and he’s printed twelve sheets on very heavy stock, each in a different color and labeled “the first” through “the twelfth,” with a song name and that song’s lyrics, and a drawing that presumably illustrates the song. It’s as if he saw a William Blake book in a bookstore one day and decided to copy that exact idea.

Also, on the back cover, there’s a photograph of Donovan fawning towards his guru, captioned “His Holiness Maharishi Mahesh Yogi and the Author.”

In short, all indications are that this will be an extremely pretentious record.

What it was actually like

You know the famous story about how automatic double tracking was invented for the Beatles to use when recording Revolver? I’m all for new advances in music recording, but there’s a good reason why no one listens to Revolver and finds the vocals to be distractingly unnatural, which is that the Beatles knew not to overdo it. Since they understood that it was critical to integrate technological changes judiciously, why couldn’t they tell their pal Donovan to chill out and not ruin his record with the ADT effect?

The whole first LP was so heavy on the voice effect that I could not stop noticing it. It was very folk rock and very psychedelic, and I recognized Wear Your Love Like Heaven, but I would not recommend it.

The second LP was way better, far more about folk music and some folk rock, and what it lost in ADT, it gained in flute, which was particularly prominent in songs like The Enchanted Gypsy and The Tinker and the Crab.

A low point of the second LP was the sound effects – seagulls and laughing children – at the beginning of Song of the Naturalist’s Wife, and then again with more chirping birds at the beginning of The Magpie. That was totally unnecessary.

There was also absolutely no justification for making this a double album, since very few of the songs were memorable enough that they needed to have been included.

Grade

3/5: interesting, but not for me

I’m A Lover, Not A Fool by Randy Burns (Vinyl record album review)

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Record basics

  • Album name: I’m A Lover, Not A Fool
  • Artist name: Randy Burns
  • Year: 1972
  • Number of discs: one
  • Label: Polydor
  • Collection: Brenner / Gessner
  • Who owned it: my father
  • Buy it on Amazon: $29.76

I'm A Lover, Not A Fool by Randy Burns

My review

Level of familiarity before listening

I’ve never listened to this record before, but it will be the fifth by Randy Burns that I’ve reviewed. The previous four were:

What I expected

Since this record is from 1972, I assume it will be most like his 1971 record Randy Burns and the Sky Dog Band, which was country rock and folk rock.

What it was actually like

This was an interesting mix of rock, folk rock and country rock, and many of the songs were more complex than on his previous records, with a lot more going on musically.

The songs that I liked the least – Seasons, Lisa and Christmas Lights – made heavy use of piano and orchestral backing music, with whiny vocals.

I tended to enjoy his country style songs more, however, such as the title track I’m A Lover, Not A Fool, which had country vocals and steel guitar, and Rocky Road.

I also liked Lady Rain Again, a folk rock song with a country rock chorus, and thought that the best song on the record was probably Country Rain, a kind of Oompa Loompa rock song with a country fiddle chorus and soul backing vocals. Sing Out was kind of similar, a folk rock with soul backing vocals in its chorus.

One very pleasant surprise was She’s No Good, a great cover of Bob Dylan’s You’re No Good (which was not actually a Bob Dylan song), but with a totally different musical interpretation.

Grade

4/5: would listen again