Classical music's greatest hits - or your personal go-to classical crack

[oxcoug]

A lot of good contributions here. Keep them coming. I will come back to this regularly, I think.

[SeattleUte]

My alltime favorite is Mozart's piano concertos. I go there when I'm joyous, feeling blue, need to buckle down and focus, whatever my mood, it's appropriate for this music. To me all art aspires to this. And fortunately there are many of them and I love them all.

This is my favorite recording:

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[SeattleUte]

Rachmaninoff: Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini
Bach: Mass in B Minor
Grieg: Piano Concerto in A Minor

Agree this is genius.

[happyone]

Some others that I really enjoy - these are often used in movie scores so I'm sure you know them

Orff - Carmina Burana
Strauss - Also Sprach Zarathustra - Only about the 1st 3 min or so are used in 2001, and it is a 15-20 minute piece
Ravel - Bolero - The last time the Symphony performed this, in the pre concert lecture, Lockhart quoted Ravel as saying that he had only written one masterpiece in his life, unfortunately it wasn't music.

Vivaldi - Four Seasons

[MartyFunkhouser]

Bar Kokhba.
Various other John Zorn classical compositions.

[All-American]

Tchaikovsky, 1812 overture.

[Brian]

A few of my favs from Shostakovich: Symphony 5, Piano Concerto 2.
Bernstein is fun to watch, as well.

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Ravel's orchestration of Mussorgski's "Pictures at an Exhibition" is also an all time favorite. I remember cranking the hi-fi to the max and listening to this when I was a lad.

[YOUTUBE]SCn0yFu0wy8[/YOUTUBE]

[happyone]

One other thing, if you can go and watch a concert live - You live in NYC, there has got to be some symphony somewhere close every weekend.

This past weekend the Utah Symphony had an all Russian program

Stravinski - 1st Symphony
Prokofiev - 1st Piano Concerto
Tchaikovsky - 2nd Symphony (Little Russian)

Anyone of them would be a great addition to your list

[wuapinmon]

Pablo Casals playing Dvorak's Cello Concerto in B minor, Op.104:

[YOUTUBE]FXE6Ft52h8I[/YOUTUBE]

[oxcoug]

I prefer the romantic and modern eras. Don't much like a lot of baroque and classical era stuff. But here is my list of favorites:

Jean Sibelius: I love me some Jean. His symphonies are among my favorites. I never tire of the #2, especially the ending. #7 is nice as well.
Rachmaninoff. Love him. Most of his stuff is just plain amazing. Isle of the Dead, anything on the piano, symphonies 2,3. Hard to go wrong with anything from him.
Schostakovich: Beautiful music, but he's hard to listen while working. It gets me waving my arms too much....
Chopin. Crazy man on the piano. all the piano concertos are great.
Beethoven. all the symphonies are great, but 3,5 and 6 are my favorites. piano concerto #5, any piano sonata.
Berlioz. Symphonie Fantastique is great.
Samuel Barber. 20th century American. Everyone knows the adagio for strings, but his several Essays are beautiful.
Holst: The Planets is nice
Mahler: 9th symphony is great
Dvorak: New World Symphony
Saint-Saens: Organ symphony and Church Windows
Bruckner: Symphony #7.
Tchaikovsky: piano concerto #5, symphony #2
Brahms: piano concerto 2, symphony 3, 4
Rimsky-Korsakov: Scheherazade, Night on Bald Mountain
Respighi: The pines of Rome
Debussy: La mer
Smetena: Ma Vlast

Plug a few into Pandora, and enjoy the ride.

Having just listened to about half of the recommendations from this post I'm considering creating a "Brian" classical playlist in Grooveshark.

Lots of other great recommendations in this thread. Thanks HappyOne for the Prokofiev Piano Concerto. Good stuff.

[happyone]

Another piece to add to your list

Last weekend Andre Watts played the Rachmaninoff's 2nd piano concerto with the symphony - That man can play! I would have liked to have heard him when he was younger

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The symphony also played Beethoven's 4th symphony - not as powerful as the 3rd or 5th, but nice to listen to, almost pastoral or lyrical. In the lecture Fischer commented it was the only symphony he wrote when he was in love and unlike his other symphonies he left no comments or notes on its composition.

When they discussed the Rachmaninoff, he dedicated the concerto to his theropist. After his first symphony was panned (to put it mildly) by the critics, Rachmaninoff went into a deep depression and didn't compose a note for over 2 yrs. He started seeing a hypno theropist and Dr. Dahl was able to pull him out of it. The concerto is dedicated to Dr. Dahl

as an aside in the lecture they commented that as far as they, the current symphony leadership knew, Watts is the first person to guest with the symphony in 5 consecutive decades - he first played with them in 1971

[HauteCoug]

If you're loving the late Romantics, take a listen to Rachmaninov's Etude-Tableaux. Part of the fun is knowing how intensely difficult they are, and reveling in the realization that someone can actually play them. My favorite is Op 39 No. 6 in A minor.

[HauteCoug]

Another piece to add to your list

Last weekend Andre Watts played the Rachmaninoff's 2nd piano concerto with the symphony - That man can play! I would have liked to have heard him when he was younger

The symphony also played Beethoven's 4th symphony - not as powerful as the 3rd or 5th, but nice to listen to, almost pastoral or lyrical. In the lecture Fischer commented it was the only symphony he wrote when he was in love and unlike his other symphonies he left no comments or notes on its composition.

When they discussed the Rachmaninoff, he dedicated the concerto to his theropist. After his first symphony was panned (to put it mildly) by the critics, Rachmaninoff went into a deep depression and didn't compose a note for over 2 yrs. He started seeing a hypno theropist and Dr. Dahl was able to pull him out of it. The concerto is dedicated to Dr. Dahl

as an aside in the lecture they commented that as far as they, the current symphony leadership knew, Watts is the first person to guest with the symphony in 5 consecutive decades - he first played with them in 1971

Which one did you go to? I was there Friday evening, and I confess that I was extremely disappointed in the orchestra. Not in Mr. Watts - he was glorious.

[creekster]

Schubert's No 8, aka 'unfisnished.'

[Katy Lied]

If you're loving the late Romantics, take a listen to Rachmaninov's Etude-Tableaux. Part of the fun is knowing how intensely difficult they are, and reveling in the realization that someone can actually play them. My favorite is Op 39 No. 6 in A minor.

Hey Haute, can you play Op. 32, No. 10 in B-minor?

I'm just curious what one does when one doesn't have hands the size of Shaquille O'Neil.