UKC

Hi All,

As suggested in the title I'm looking for musical pieces to expand my horizons.
I want to make a decent Spotify playlist I can relax and be inspired by.

I also will include Spanish guitar music into this as Asturias by Isaac Albeniz is a favourite of mine.

Regards

M

In reply to flash13:

What sort of thing do you listen to at the moment? Is there anything that you're particularly after or that you generally don't get on with? "Classical" is a rather broad church!

In reply to Ramblin dave:

Hi Dave I currently enjoy majority of piano based pieces like moonlight sonata, fur elise and Clare de Luna. I am also a fan of powerful opera pieces when I hear them but have limited knowledge into names and titles. I know it's broad but il take any recommendations.

In reply to Ramblin dave:

I now realise this should have been put into culture bunker...

In reply to flash13:

I was having a classical music morning yesterday as I was in the kitchen cooking a roast and here's a few that came up, as someone said up thread though it's a very broad church with, with a back catalogue going back several hundred years.

This was a gift from Radio 3 at 6.45 a.m. the other morning - just wonderful - Arvo Part's Spiegel im Spiegel youtube.com/watch?v=FZe3mXlnfNc&

Another Radio 3 gift combining medieval choral music with modern saxaphone. Perotin's Alleliuia Nativitas performed by the Hilliard Ensemble, with Jan Garbarek on the tenor sax. youtube.com/watch?v=xD5he4R4MGI&

Two more all time classics to finish with:

Wagner, Overture to the Rheingold - such waves of sound - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gDBa1jgwR7k, whenever I hear this I spend the rest of the day growling away to myself trying to recreate a full orchestra with my puny voice box. Shame they start singing after this bit.

And lastly simple, classic, timeless - Bach's Well Tempered Clavier, Book 1, Prelude: youtube.com/watch?v=ezZdbzreNcs&

Ye god's youtubes makes this easy. And to think I spent my twenties stood next to the speaker listening to drum and bass (still do from time to time mind).

Enjoy! I have found as I have mellowed that a morning with Radio 3 is a much more pleasant start to the day than a morning with the depressing, argumentative Radio 4...

In reply to flash13:

Recommending some classic music is like recommending food, there is a huge variety, and everyone will favour something else. So, just off the top of my head, and trying to include some representative works for a few different eras:

Claudio Monteverdi - Vespra della beata vergine, e.g. youtube.com/watch?v=VcsS5WzO2eY&

Heinrich Schütz - Geistliche Vokalmusik, Saechsisches Vocalensemble / Matthias Jung

J.S. Bach - Art of Fugue, piano version by Pierre Laurent Aimard. It is a fantastic, meditative and intellectual exercise, but requires repeated hearing.

J.S. Bach - St Matthew´s passion - a great recording for free on the all of Bach website, otherwise the 800 year anniversary recording of the Thomaner choir.

Händel - Giulio Cesare in Egitto, the Mortensen recording from Copenhagen, look for the DVD on youtube

C.P.E Bach - Magnificat (way better than his father´s!)

Mozart - Zauberflöte

Beethoven - Rasumowsky-Quartet, Symphony #3 (Eroica)

Schubert -Unfininished Symphony

Brahms - Ein Deutsches Requiem, e.g. Schönberg Ensemble / Harnoncourt

Dvorak - Cello concerto, I like the Janos Starker recording

Strauss - Eine Alpensypmphony (must hear for climbers, it actually describes climbing a mountain!)

Max Bruch - Kol Nidrei, Starker again, also his Eight pieces for Clarinet, Piano, and Viola youtube.com/watch?v=moNDX_HPvLE&

Sibelius - Violin Concerto, Valse triste

H.M Gorecki - Symphony #3 (Symphony of Sorrowful Songs)

I am not a great Mozart fan, someone else should offer their favourites...

CB

In reply to flash13:

Based on your preference for piano and powerful opera (which I've taken the liberty of expanding into romantic orchestral music and tone poems):

Puccini - Tosca
Richard Strauss - Also Sprach Zarathustra
Tchaikovsky - Anything, but particularly some of his tone poems, Piano Concerto and Symphonies 5 & 6
Rachmaninov - Piano Concertos 2 & 3, Rhapsody on a theme by Paganini, Prelude in C# Minor, Prelude in G Minor
Pergolesi - Stabat Mater
Vivaldi - Four Seasons
Dvorak - New World Symphony, Cello Concerto
Rimsky-Korsakov - Sheherazade
Mussorgsky - Pictures at an Exhibition, Night on Bare Mountain
Grieg - Piano Concerto in A minor
Mozart - Requiem
Verdi - Requiem (particularly the Dies Irae and Tuba Mirum)

Mix of older and newer (relatively!) stuff there.

Have fun!

In reply to flash13:

Ravel and Chopin are well worth a look for similar piano pieces. Also other things by Beethoven (e.g. Emperor piano concerto) and Debussy (e.g. Bergamasque suite) who wrote fur elise and clair de lune.

In reply to flash13:
i'm more of a strings guy:
Elgar: youtube.com/watch?v=Q7u89h7arlU&
Mendelssohn Octet: youtube.com/watch?v=p0rWLEgjbY0&
Strauss 23 strings: youtube.com/watch?v=2Bqka478hLI&
Janacek Quartet: youtube.com/watch?v=d6Ai9TfcGfI&

In reply to flash13:


Rodrigo's Concierto de Aranjuez. john Williams does a particularly fine reading.

In reply to flash13:

Some classics...

Opera:
- Puccini: Tosca (already mentioned; Puccini's most Wagnerian?; particularly Vissi d'Arte, E lucevan le stelle).
- Verdi: Traviata (particularly Un di Felice, Addio del passato, Libiamo ne' lieti calici)
- Wagner: overtures/preludes are some of the very best music out there in my opinion. Try Tannhauser, Rienzi as well as Siegfried's Idyll.
- Mozart: Don Giovanni

Symphonies:
- Beethoven: 7, 3
- Brahms: 1, 3, 4
- Mendellesohn: 4
- Mahler: 5
- Bruckner: 4,7
- Dvorak: 8
- Rachmaninoff: 2

Concertos:
- Tchaikovsky: piano 1; violin 1.
- Beethoven: violin; piano 4,5
- Liszt: piano 1
- Chopin: piano 1,2
- Bruch: violin 1

For something a little different, I'll throw a few horn pieces into the mix: Strauss 2nd concerto; Schumann Konzertstuck for 4 horns.

And a few others to bear in mind: Beethoven Kreutzer violin sonatas; Schubert Trout Quintet & Wanderer Fantasy.

Classical guitar: Tarrega, Memories of the Alhambra.

In reply to flash13:

I rather like some of Resphigi `s stuff youtube.com/watch?v=vFkqyxy6oUw& but I am a bit lightweight.

In reply to flash13:

Joaquin Rodrigo if you like the Spanish flavours!

In reply to flash13:

Thank you for all of the suggestions so far, it looks like I have a lot of listening ahead of me. It's exciting exploring new musical worlds.

In reply to flash13:

Shostakovich 24 preludes and fugues, especially no 7

youtube.com/watch?v=Qe1vF0bgmb4&

In reply to flash13:

youtube.com/watch?v=OLhpkvQLDt0&

In reply to flash13:
And for more Piano music: Chopin, Nocturnes played by Brigitte Engerer (as I am listening to this right now...):
youtube.com/watch?v=liTSRH4fix4&


CB

In reply to flash13:

_Maxence Cyrin - Novö Piano (2010): http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL4y0rKnx-PbdI-ZRCqPkyX0fbEehjwsEF

A beautiful pop/classical album

In reply to flash13:

If you liked Clair de Lune you might like Gnosienne No 1 by Erik Satie. It stopped my in my tracks the first time I heard it. I couldn't explain why if I tried, I just find it so haunting. Link below.

youtube.com/watch?v=oOTpQpoHHaw&

All the best.

Tom

In reply to Bishop:

The starting point is JS Bach collected organ works - 48 preludes and Fugues, Mass in D minor (pref with Elizabeth Schwartzkopf. After this all other composers are a bit, well....meh. Except for Vaughan Williams, try Variations on a Theme by Thomas Tallis, On Wenlock Edge, and Lark Ascending.
Enjoy

In reply to flash13:

Check out this youtube channel - I think it's a great way to listen to classical music that you don't already know.

youtube.com/watch?v=4KNb44ScQDE&

A good bit of Mozart chamber music there, my kind of thing (I don't like overbearing, pompous, grandiose stuff at all).

Annoying that whole pieces sometimes aren't there (there seem to a lot of 2 or 3 movement quartets), but it's easy enough to find great performances if you like something.

In reply to flash13:

How has no one recommended The Planets Suite by Holst? Truly wonderful.

In reply to flash13:

My favourite form is the string quartet: purity, complexity, beauty and daring...you get them all in spades with these-
Beethoven: all the late quartets, but particularly 14, 15, 16 & Grosse Fuge - pinnacles of the western classical tradition, up there with the Sistene Chapel and Shakespeare's tragedies;
Schubert: 12, 13, 14 & 15 - they just keep getting better, and the last is a somewhat neglected masterwork;
Bartok: 3, 4 & 5 - superbly varied 20th century writing;
Schoenberg: 3 & 4 - dazzling experimentation, but not for the faint hearted!

In reply to Andy Clarke:


Talking of the Sistine chapel...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miserere_%28Allegri%29

In reply to flash13:

A favourite of mine is The Pilgrimage to Santiago by Philip Pickett and The New London Consort. Not really classical but it fits the bill according to your op. Also a good introduction to early music if that floats your boat (it does for me)

In reply to flash13:

I don't think anyone has mentioned Vaughan Williams?
In particular "Fantsia on a Theme by Thomas Tallis", and "The Lark Ascending"

Others you might like to try listening to:-
Mozart's Piano Concertos Nos 20,21, 23 and 24. Mozart's Requiem, Faures Requiem, Mozart's Clarinet Concerto
Carl Orff "Carmina Burana"
Elgar's Cello Concerto, and Enigma Variations
Dvorak's Symphony No 9
Rodrigo's "Concierto de Aranjuez" - If you like Classical Guitar you will love it.
Sibelius "Finlandia", 5th and 7th Symphonies
Handel's "Messiah"
Bruch's Violin Concerto
Sibelius Violin Concerto
Beethoven's Violin Concerto

Just a tiny selection of the joy that's out here in the Classical music world.

In reply to Trangia:

... and again something I am listening to at the moment:

youtube.com/watch?v=bWbBK2poJlE&

Much better than the recording I have at home!

CB