I like their "A Christmas Gloria" CD. It's a recording of John Rutter's Gloria. I especially like the third movement: "Quoniam tu solus sanctus." I asked my neighbor, who is in the Choir, about that recording, and he said they had a lot of fun recording it.
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I borrowed a CD of Stravinsky’s Firebird this evening on katharina’s and T.Analog.Kid’s recommendation. Unfortunately I had to sit through the first four tracks, which were from “The Song of the Nightingale.” What a cacophonous mess! The fourth movement with the mechanical nightingale was interesting with the instruments sounding like machines and the Morse code tapped out on the piano, but I was relieved when it was finally over. I really enjoyed The Firebird however. It was interesting and exciting, not music to fall asleep to. I will have to attend a live performance, and I’ll probably get my own CD if I can find one without the nightingale.
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When I was a kid we had to play Rite of Spring once. It was great, cause we didn't need to practice, on account that no one but a music scholar or critic could've known what the hell was going on. I sure didn't.
Yeah, that's my work ethic, right there.
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I loved Kat's and Narnia's list (especially the Copland stuff).
I would add Tchaikovsky's Swan Lake to the list. As for contemporary composers, I think John William's Empire of the Sun and James Horner's Legends of the Fall & Braveheart will stand the test of time.
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Pachelbel's Kanon D-dur First Suite in E-flat for Military Band - Holst Beethoven's 9th symphony Overture to Candide - Bernstein Prelude and Fugue in B-flat - Bach
and probably a few more that aren't just coming to mind right now...not to mention all the ones in this thread that I'm probably try to locate...
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Curious -- what is the appeal of the infamous Kanon? It's almost as boring as Telemann. Not to mention it's not even a real canon (I doubt Pachelbel had the chops). If you like the chaconne format, there are awesome works throughout the literature.
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I think it's just because it's one of the most played and most accessible pieces to the untrained ear. It's easy for anyone and everyone to hear, enjoy, and appreciate. That's also why Bach is widely loved by most who hear his work.
Now Bartok or Stravinsky. It takes a little effort to enjoy their stuff. Posts: 6415 | Registered: Jul 2000
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?? ??` ny 1,2, 4, 3rd violin sonata, and sextet opus 16. Tchaikovsky 5th symphony and violin concerto Beethoven's third, violin concerto, and I dig the slow movement of the seventh. Shostakovich' 10th. It took a while to understand, but there are <i>so</i> cool themes explored.
Depending on my mood, I like energy of the Razumovsky quartets or Ravel's Tzigane.
I think that Bartok's Dance Suite is engaging and accessible.
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We played a long piece by Hindemith in all-state band. It was quite a beautiful piece from my perspective. I wish I could have heard more of it, but I was third-chair trumpet deep in the brass section. I have no idea what it actually sounded like to the audience.
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I’ve been listening to Rimsky-Korsakov’s Scheherazade and Stravinsky’s Firebird during the past week, and I wish I had a background in music so that I could discuss the two works intelligently. I wish my local university had a crash course in music called Critical Listening.
Anyway, in my opinion Stravinsky’s work doesn’t quite measure up to that of his teacher. Rimsky-Korsakov’s themes are more fully realized, while Stravinsky seems to ramble.
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Stravinsky had different periods. You need to catch some of his late late stuff and you'll be baffled at the total absence of theme.
Actually, I think that part of the reason that Rimsky-Korsakov seemed to have more thematic development was because of the 'period' in which he was writing. Firebird is more like contemporary music and closer to The Rite of Spring (which is very un-thematic). Stravinsky's earliest stuff was quite melodic and very similar to that of RK.
The thing about both of them was their genius usage of the orchestra. Rimsky-K was so deft with the way he combined and used the intruments. He passed that on to Stravinsky I'm sure, and Stravinsky experimented quite a lot.
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No. Firebird was when he was beginning to get unorthodox. There is a whole bunch of music he wrote before that that's MUCH more orthodox.
The cool thing about Stravinsky is that he often imitated styles. There are several pieces that sound like Bach, or Mozart, or Schubert, or Brahms...and they are all by Stravinsky. If you listen to them, you hear 'new' stuff that those composers would never have included in their music, but the style is very similar all the same. Our music history teacher used to try to trick us by playing some of that stuff now and then and making us crazy.
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OK, I'm a classical music tasteless bourgeoise who probably needs a lot of enlightening.
That said, I really love solo classical guitar. I have a lame Sugo music CD with nature noises, but some of the most beautiful classical guitar I've heard. My favorite is Vivaldi's guitar concerto in D. I can't find this anywhere else or in any other versions, though. All the Vivaldi CDs I find are the 4 seasons.
I'm also slowly being exposed to opera. I hate to admit this, but I find Opera Babes really nice to listen to. My favorite so far is Lackmé. Carmen is great too.
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Bach's Passacaglia and Fugue in C minor Bach's Prelude and Fugue in G minor Copland's 3rd symphony (includes Fanfare for Common Man) Debussy's La Mer and 3 Noctunres Everything by Vaughan Williams (ok, not everything--but notably Dona Nobis Pacem, his 5th, 6th, 7th, and 9th symphonies, Serenade to Music, 5 Variants on Dives and Lazarus--LDS hymn 284, For All the Saints--LDS hymn 82, O Clap Your Hands)
Not on my iPod and stuff I haven't yet seen posted: Carlo Gesualdo's Moro Lasso John Adams' Harmonielehre (I had a lesson from him ) Samual Barber's School for Scandal Leonard Bernstein's West Side Story Bela Bartok's Music for Strings, Percussion and Celesta Beethoven's 2nd movement from the 7th symphony Alan Hovhaness' And God Created Great Whales and Mysterious Mountain Charles Ives' The Unanswered Question Erich Wolfgang Korngold's The Adventures of Robin Hood Gyorgy Ligeti's Lux Aeterna (made popular by the movie 2001) Modest Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition (Enchantment readers should like this especially) Francis Poulenc's Sonata for Clarinet and Piano (I play the clarinet, what can I say?) Sergey Prokofiev's Peter and the Wolf Leroy Robertson's Oratorio from the Book of Mormon Kurt Weill's Three Penny Opera (especially Mack the Knife)
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Annie, if you slog through all the gazillions of Vivaldi CDs on Amazon.com, you'll find those guitar concertos. I have CDs with one of his guitar concertos and one of his pieces for solo guitar, as well as a Mandoline concerto!!
My favorite Vivaldi are the cello concertos.
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Check out Leo Brouwer, especially his Estudios Sencillos and La Espiral eterna. Nikita Koshkin is also a very interesting composer for the guitar, though you may have more trouble finding recordings.
Just had to recommend some of my favourite stuff. Posts: 1996 | Registered: Feb 2004
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I'm so pleasantly shocked that other people also like a lot of the stuff I particularly like.
Bach's B minor mass is so great! My dad arranged three or four of the sections for piano and they are my favorite pieces to play. The Two Kyries and the Christi Elyson, and one I can't get enough of is the Qui Sedes ad Dextram Patrus or whatever. (I'm no good at Latin.) Ah, that one is so good! If I were God I think I would just so totally be flattered that such great music was inspired by me. Bach really didn't write anything that wasn't really good. He's far and away the best composer ever.
Stravinsky rocks the house! Firebug Suite (well, we call it that, since we're all pyros in my family), Rite of Spring, and Petroushka are my favorites by him.
Beethoven's odd numbered symphonies, particularly 5 and 9 of course. Anyone else ever notice that everyone's odd numbered symphonies are best? Everything by Beethoven is good. That boy wrote some good stuff, particularly after he ceased to be encumbered by a sense of hearing.
For Holst the Planets I also add my vote.
Aaron Copeland Appalachian Spring. The very most beautiful part of this piece is the prayer near the end. It brings tears to my eyes always.
Rachmaninoff wrote some really good stuff. There's a waltz my dad used to play on the piano that's kickin.
Maurice Ravel too. I'm thinking of this thing in G that I can't remember the name of. Again it was a piece my dad played. So many weird notes that when you hear it enough to feel what they mean are just exactly perfectly right!
Khatchaturian whose name I can't spell and am too lazy to google. Violin concerto. And one I can play but I don't know what it's called. His stuff is passionate and sounds so very Russian to me though of course he's Armenian which is probably a lot different to people who know.
I love Handel's Messiah too. So add one tick mark beside that one.
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