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Hovhaness: Mysterious Mountain Symphony No. 2 God Created Great Whales

Alan Hovhaness (Composer), Gerard Schwarz (Conductor), Seattle Symphony (Orchestra) Format: Audio CD
4.5 out of 5 stars 50 ratings
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Audio CD, CD, April 12, 1994
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Track Listings

1 Mysterious Mountain-Symphony No.2: I. Andante Con Moto
2 Mysterious Mountain-Symphony No.2: II. Double Fugue
3 Mysterious Mountain-Symphony No.2: III. Andante Espressivo
4 Prayer of St. Gregory
5 Prelude & Quadruple Fugue
6 And God Created Great Whales
7 Alleluia & Fugue
8 Celestial Fantasy

Editorial Reviews

Hovhaness,A. ~ Mysterious Mountain/God Creat

Product details

  • Is Discontinued By Manufacturer ‏ : ‎ No
  • Product Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 5.64 x 0.38 x 4.96 inches; 3.36 ounces
  • Manufacturer ‏ : ‎ Delos
  • Item model number ‏ : ‎ DE 3157
  • Original Release Date ‏ : ‎ 1994
  • Date First Available ‏ : ‎ December 16, 2006
  • Label ‏ : ‎ Delos
  • ASIN ‏ : ‎ B0000006ZD
  • Number of discs ‏ : ‎ 1
  • Customer Reviews:
    4.5 out of 5 stars 50 ratings

Customer reviews

4.5 out of 5 stars
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Top reviews from the United States

  • Rockin' Reader
    5.0 out of 5 stars An Underrated American Master of the Symphonic Form at his Spiritual Best
    Reviewed in the United States on September 10, 2024
    Verified Purchase
    Alan Hovhaness is a composer of original and sumptuous music. He is also the only classical composer I know you captured the music of whales in orchestral form. If you love classical music, and you want to hear some that is truly fresh and interesting, you must give this CD of Hovhaness a listen. You will want to add it to your home playlist.
    One person found this helpful
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  • RE Maven
    5.0 out of 5 stars Awesome: God Created Great Whales
    Reviewed in the United States on February 28, 2024
    Verified Purchase
    This was a gift, and I am thrilled to have it. I assume the customer service was fine. I am Reviewing “God Created Great Whales”… I may be biased, because I saw this at its premier, and it is my home city’s Symphony Orchestra that recorded this. I believe that Alan Hovhaness was present for the premier. Both pieces are great. The whale piece has a section of recorded whale song in it! Awesome in concert. I am so happy to have this on CD to replace my broken cassette copy.
    3 people found this helpful
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  • R. Nadel
    4.0 out of 5 stars A very good place to start with Hovhaness
    Reviewed in the United States on March 22, 2011
    Verified Purchase
    Hovhaness wrote some 60 symphonies and approximately 500 pieces of music. This is a very good introduction to his unique sound and style.

    His second symphony, "Mysterious Mountain", is very satisfying. Its rhapsodic, prayerful, and unashamedly tonal melodies wash over you. I feel the Fritz Reiner performance on RCA is better, but admittedly it is older and the sound is showing its age. Hovhaness may have been present for the Seattle recording sessions, too. Nonetheless, Reiner makes this music a degree more exciting with the Chicago Symphony. Be that as it may, this is still a very satisfying performance, and the Seattle Symphony sounds very good. The sound quality is very good, if not quite at demonstration level. This is also one of the few Gerard Schwarz albums with cover art that addresses the music content instead of having his mug on the cover! ;^D

    "And God Created Great Whales" is a haunting and original work, combining as it does orchestra and recorded humpback whale songs. This short piece was originally suggested to Hovhaness by Andre Kostelanetz, who premiered it with the New York Philharmonic, later recording it for Columbia Masterworks in 1971. That performance is only available on vinyl (with surprisingly good sound) as of this date, but it is more involving than this newer one. The recording of the whale songs on the Columbia LP are more other-worldly and quite haunting. Nonetheless, I really enjoy this Seattle recording very much as well.

    The other works on this CD are beautiful and beautifully performed, particularly the "Prayer of St. Gregory". I used to play trumpet, and the trumpet music and performance on this disc are outstanding and very moving!

    Hovhaness was a master of the fugue form (Bach being the undisputed fugue genius). For those unfamiliar with that term, a fugue is essentially a musical "round" (remember Three Blind Mice? That is a fugue). Not only are there two *double* fugues in "Mysterious Mountain", this disc comes with two works that feature fugal composition, including "Prelude and *Quadruple* Fugue"(!). They are excellent.

    Hovhaness was a very spiritual person, and that comes across in all the works on this disc. Schwarz is an excellent proponent of this unique American composer. All-in-all, an excellent place to start if you're new to Hovhaness - and if you're not.
    16 people found this helpful
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  • L. R. Hieber
    5.0 out of 5 stars A wonderful way to experience Alan Hovhaness
    Reviewed in the United States on September 28, 2020
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    Mysterious Mountain is the perfect place to start when listening to Alan Hovhaness for the first time or as a fan of his work. This arrangement is absolutely perfect. The fact that this CD also has Prayer for St. Gregory on it means the listener gets some of Hovhaness' best and most influential work in one CD. Highly recommend this recording and these arrangements of this incredibly important composer. His mysticism and devotion to beauty, while still being an innovative voice, is truly inspiring and timeless.
    4 people found this helpful
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  • You mean she's NOT Irish?
    5.0 out of 5 stars His 2 most famous compositions, in great, modern recordings
    Reviewed in the United States on June 28, 2021
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    First heard Great Whales in a 1970s LP- the spooky sound of actual whale voices is integrated with music that recalls Vaughan Williams' Fantasy on a Theme by Thomas Tallis. Magic Mountain is a tribute to Armenia, flavored by his early studies is Japan ~ wonderful.
    2 people found this helpful
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  • TREAT
    5.0 out of 5 stars Mysterious Mountain
    Reviewed in the United States on January 5, 2013
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    This compact disc offers a dreamy and esoteric presentation of Mysterious Mountain (Symphony No. 2), Op. 132 by Alan Hovahness. This recording embodies the qualities which the composer himself considers central to any artistic performance:
    " ...heroic, monumental style of composition simple enough to inspire all people, completely free from fads, artificial mannerisms and false sophistications, direct, forceful, sincere, always original but never unnatural...the worthiest creative art has been motivated consciously or unconsciously by the desire for the regeneration of mankind."
    One person found this helpful
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  • Michael Roof
    3.0 out of 5 stars Okay Hovhaness but not my favorite.
    Reviewed in the United States on November 23, 2016
    Verified Purchase
    Some of this is good, some not so appealing to me. Well-performed in nice sound. With Hovhaness, you like him or not - never earth-shaking but often pleasant and enjoyable.
    2 people found this helpful
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  • Miss Budgie
    4.0 out of 5 stars Great pieces, but...the whales?
    Reviewed in the United States on July 22, 2014
    Verified Purchase
    I got this disc after hearing "Mysterious Mountain" on the local classical station. I enjoy a lot of 20th Century music, but only tonal music. I had never heard of Hovhaness before, but the lush string harmony sounds he uses reminds me a lot of Ralph Vaughan Williams more peaceful works. If you like that sort of sound, you will probably like this album. I was really impressed by the sound quality of this recording, as well as the quality of the performances. My favorite tracks were the fugue movement from the symphony, and the "Prayer of St. Gregory". I docked a star because of "And God Created Great Whales". I just didn't get it, and the whale sounds were just too much for me to handle. Overall it's a really nice album though.
    6 people found this helpful
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Top reviews from other countries

  • Andrew C. Mitchell
    5.0 out of 5 stars Time to find
    Reviewed in the United Kingdom on April 26, 2011
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    Hovhaness is a composer who seemed to compose outside his time. There are harmonies involving the use of modes. There are polyphonic procedures from the baroque. There is the use of the nineteenth century symphony orchestra, and the string orchestra. Often the sound is like Vaughan Williams and sometimes like Sibelius. There are influences from Martinu and others. But is it any good? Yes, there is wonderful musicianship and careful craft lovingly displayed.
    The works are from the mid nineteen thirties to nineteen seventy. A good place to start might be track 8 'Celestial Fantasy' since this represents one pole of Alan Hovhaness personality. Another dimension is represented by 'Prelude and Quadruple Fugue(track 5) and Alleluia and Fugue (track 7.) There are some lovely trumpet moments accompanied by strings on 'Prayer for St Gregory.' The Symphony on this CD is No 2 'Mysterious Mountain' (1955) (There are more than 60 other Symphonies - many of them not recorded!) But the best track without a doubt contains 'And God Created Great Whales.' The recorded sound of the whales is magnificent and awe-inspiring and the Seattle Symphony Orchestra pays them fitting tribute. The trombones to my mind are particularly glorious. I hope that you will find your enjoyment in this music.
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  • KaleHawkwood
    4.0 out of 5 stars Peaks & whales
    Reviewed in the United Kingdom on November 26, 2019
    Verified Purchase
    The prolific Armenian-American composer Hovhaness {1911-2000} was someone whose music is on the one hand easy on the ear and fairly unremarkable, on the other hand unapologetically, bracingly tonal, spiritually inclined, and unafraid of broad brush-strokes ~ a little like a cross between Bax and Bruckner, though without the substance of the former or the {dubious} grandiosity of the latter.
    The music of Hovhaness reminds me, oddly perhaps, of certain seventies 'prog rock' bands whose music rarely takes flight beyond the banal and obvious {Camel or Barclay James Harvest come to mind} but who have their inspired moments, and can be at times uplifting.
    This is a pleasant, beautifully played and recorded disc of six works by this likeable composer, including a surprisingly {given its olympian subtitle} uneventful symphony, a shortish piece incorporating whale song, and a splendid Alleluia and Fugue.
    The Celestial Fantasy lives up to its title, though even here it seldom reaches the heavenly heights of, say, Byrd or Beethoven.
    There have always been composers of what is called {more and more anachronistically} classical music who have seemed to be amateurs or merely content to paddle their own canoes, away from the churning ebb and flow of the mainstream or the outer limits. One thinks of Raff, Lord Berners, the Icelander Jon Leifs, or even Erik Satie's left-field pianistic whimsies. Hovhaness is among their number, and one senses he was happy to follow his own mystical, tonal muse and be true to his vision rather than pretend to be otherwise.
    He produced music of as much bathos as pathos, but so much of it pleases the ear that I am happy to have this one lovingly played and packaged disc of his charmed, often charming, music in my collection.
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