Holst: The Planets

Comment: I am only a casual listener to classical music, and I came to "The Planets" after hearing "Mars" somewhere. What strikes me most about the Planets suite is how much it gets ripped off by modern composers. The first time I heard "Jupiter", I heard little snippets that sounded as though they came from movie scores such as Braveheart and Conan the Barbarian- then realized it was the other way around. The writers of that exciting "National Geographic" theme have certainly heard and appreciated "Jupiter". The womens' chorus at the end of "Neptune" is heard in some fashion in "The Wizard of Oz"; "Mars" has influenced so many movie score thematic elements, from "Star Wars" to "Merrie Melodies" cartoons, it would be hard to list them all.

An outstanding orchestral work that has appeal to casual listeners as well as hardcore devotees.

Comment: This CD was very inexpensive and a great value. I love listening to it. It definitely creates the mood of "boldly going where no one has gone before."

Comment: This is a great production piece of familiar compositions. The quality is very good, and the set itself is an inside joke about Holst and John Williams -- Williams "borrowed" liberally from Holst for his StarWars music.

Comment: This is a reasonably decent version of Holst's masterpiece, but there are many superior versions available at all price levels. "A. Customer's" 3-star review lists excellent alternative renditions (I own them all). I would also list Stokowski's interesting 1956 performance with the same orchestra on EMI.

What really killed this for me was "Jupiter." the centerpiece of the suite and many listeners' favorite. At its' concluding climax, Mehta completely loses control of the orchestra, and the music disintegrates into a real train wreck. Think of the L.A. Philharmonic, all sections playing at full tilt, collectively falling down a flight of stairs.

A great performance of "The Planets" cannot be without a great performance of "Jupiter." Check out the alternatives.

Comment: As with anything that touches upon the eternal, after the technical is accomplished, then it is a matter of preference. Here we have the Herbert Von Karajan version.

Placed side-by-side with any other version the technical parts are excellent. You are immediately taken to that other world as Mars takes over. You may be able to argue minor differences but then you are not listening to it.

The tough call is preference; most people prefer the version with which they grew up. Others may have some preferences based on what they should like. Listen to this and make up your own mind.

During the process of listening, thinking about the music and noticing how Holst capture the mood of each planet, note that he did not make up the concepts of which planet was War, Peace, Messenger, etc. They are the definitions of the original gods that the planets were named after. Each god had the attributes we see given to the planets. You may want to read about them and then come back to the music.

Holst: The Planets / R. Strauss: Also Sprach Zarathustra