Ravel - Bolero
 

What do you think of Ravel's Bolero?
Everyone I make him/her listen to it, they say it is boring and lifeless. To me it sounds like something which makes me high.

What do you think of it?

Ravel's Bolero is a beautiful piece like all others from this marvelous composer, and...I think...the first piece that uses the saxophone in the orchestra. If Bolero makes you high, then try listening to Ravel´s Daphnis and Chloe.

I love Ravel, especially Gaspard de la Nuit and Jeux d'eaux (both piano pieces). Check out Martha Argerich playing Jeux d'eau - she really gets Ravel. Completely transcendent, tears a hole in space we can look through:

I absolutely adore Bolero, one of my fav pieces of music.

I love Bolero, and have done ever since i first heard it, which was as musical accompaniment to a show on TV - think it was Disney - that showed a series of time-lapse (sped up) videos of plants growing and flowers blooming.

To appreciate Bolero you should not think of it as a conventional piece, like a song with a structure. It has more in common with ambient music such as produced by Brian Eno or Klaus Schulze. The well-known part of Tubular Bells where the instruments enter one by one is a similar kind of piece - repetition, but with little changes introduced each time the main motif is repeated.

:thumb:

Try listening also "Pavane Pour Une Infante Défunte", in its simplicity is a really beautiful piece, for me :)

uhuh you are really a great connoisseur! :clap:

(I know I can talk in italian with you, but I think it'd be a bad-manner by me)

"Ravel" by Jean Echenoz
 

Ravel wrote this music that made him famous in a day,
for a dancer friend who wanted to renew his repertoire;
a little busy music he did not believe.
Council about this episode read "Ravel" by Jean Echenoz,
a literary gem that provides some moments of great pleasure.

The whole structure of the piece is brilliant. It's long and grand, at least to me. It's a pain to play though. Requires patience and you really need to be prepared to give everything at the end to make it sound good.