Recommend me some classical music

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If your first reaction to the thread title was, "Does he mean classical music, or 'classical' music?" then welcome! Your pedantry will be much appreciated.

I suppose I mean Romantic/Classical-Romantic music. I grew up on Beethoven, and my favourite piece of all time is "Marche Slav" by Tchaikovsky, so I probably prefer the bombastic stuff. But all I really have is MP3s of "Night on Bare Mountain", "In the Hall of the Mountain King", "Blue Danube". So I'd really like to fill out that collection. Obviously it all doesn't have to be ffff, or I could just get a copy of the Classical Thunder CD set or something. That's why I'm here looking for your intelligent, informed input.

Baroque is right out. I'll add that my music history knowledge doesn't extend much beyond this, i.e. knowing broadly that "classical" music can be divided into Baroque/Classical/Romantic. There's more I'm sure.

But the other thing is: I feel like it's not enough just to know the pieces and composers—when it comes to actually buying a recording, there's quality issues. So I don't want to get the Backwoods Part-Time Symphony Orchestra, conducted by a drinking bird toy. But I have even less knowledge here. I seem to remember a lot of my dad's CDs having the Naxos label. That's about it. (DirectSong used to sell Naxos albums, but they all seem to have disappeared.)

iTunes is useless for browsing by label, so any help in this second regard would be very helpful (like how important is performance/conductor/label anyway).

FurTWängler

The Mozart Collection by John Rutter; City of London Sinfonia
Frederick Chopin Waltzes and Nocturnes, performed by Peter Schmalfuss
Decca Classics 101 Violin, 6 CD set, performed by various artists

Ah! I'm glad that Chopin's Nocturnes were mentioned. Artur Rubinstein often gets the love when it comes to Chopin's works, but I've always liked Claudio Arrau's take on them. At least, on the Nocturnes.

Oh my goodness, this is a thread that I would hope could morph into a classical music catch all. Here are some good places to start:

A good sound system helps SOOOOO much when listening to classical music. Listening to classical music LIVE is a billion times better. It's just something you have to do.

You don't like baroque music?? *sad face* Europa Galante w/ Fabio Biondi does the best baroque music ever. It's like the rock music of classical music. They do the best version of Vivaldi's The Four Seasons.

Their performance of The Four Seasons is the craziest and best classical thing I've ever heard in my life. It blows my mind every time I hear it.

Here's another good one from Fabio Biondi:

I could keep going with all of this, but I've already spent 20 minutes putting together this post. More will come later whether you like it or not.

Oh yeah, and I mentioned Daniil Trifnov in the "Name a Band" thread. The guy is freaking incredible at Chopin. He's mind blowing. I've listened to the NPR performance a good many times. Note that the YouTube video audio quality from that old competition is not nearly as good as the NPR concert audio quality available via the link.

tuffalobuffalo wrote:

Daniil Trifonov is a really, really good pianist. He's playing a recital at The University of Washington in April. I wish I had an easy way of getting there. At any rate, he's now on my music radar.

You can really tell just how good he is when he's playing Chopin like in the NPR Boston concert and the below video.

I guess he's signed to Deutsche Grammophon, so I imagine he'll be putting out some good CD recordings in the future.

Gravey wrote:

iTunes is useless for browsing by label, so any help in this second regard would be very helpful (like how important is performance/conductor/label anyway).

You can always trust anything on Deutsche Grammophon, and I believe EMI is another good label. Good recordings of classical music don't necessarily make there way on to iTunes because the audio quality isn't up to the CD standard yet. Your best bet is to hit up the local record store or head to Amazon.

Puce Moose wrote:

Ah! I'm glad that Chopin's Nocturnes were mentioned. Artur Rubinstein often gets the love when it comes to Chopin's works, but I've always liked Claudio Arrau's take on them. At least, on the Nocturnes.

Chopin will always be my most respected composer. He was just completely brilliant. I played (not particularly well) the C sharp minor nocturne which is a minor work. I still think it's one of my favorites. I attempted to learn the 2nd Ballade but never got to where I could play it with the the amount of practicing time I put in.

I should also mention that I listened to the particular Debussy's Claire De Lune performance that I posted above, and I don't particularly like it. It's a rather forceful performance. You compare that to something like how Daniil Trifonov plays, and it's like black and white.

Something you might enjoy if you like the Strauss family are the New Year's concerts by the Vienna Philharmonic. You can see some full concerts on YouTube before purchasing anything. Be sure to check out the ones with Carlos Kleiber conducting.

Furtwangler is unmatched. But be forewarned, the audio quality is often far lower quality than what's recorded with modern equipment.

I've always loved Schubert. The lieder especially, but that's not for everyone. His piano works are wonderful. Try Perahia doing the Impromptus or Pollini with the late piano sonatas.

If you like opera, maybe try Lohengrin, the one with Jess Thomas as the lead in particular. The opera sounds quite avant garde compared to what went before, but downright old fashioned compared to his later works.

Debussy's an odd one for a classical music composer. His music requires a lot of, let's say maturity, for it to sound right. You could be a musical prodigy, play it "perfectly" and it still wouldn't come out right. It takes a good deal of sensitivity and experience to grok the essence of his pieces.

FWIW, Gravey, I would highly recommend a recording of the entire set of The Nutcracker Suite by Tchaikovsky. Could just be me, but I like a lot of stuff there that isn't usually included in the popular stuff. You might to give those a go. "Night on Bald Mountain," is nice enough, but I personally prefer "Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairies."

tuffalobuffalo:

I liked playing Arabesques 1 by Debussy. It's quite relaxing and relatively easy so long as you're not too demanding on the sensitivity of your own playing.

Eh. It depends, I would say. Some guys just go outright against the musical notation on what the piece is supposed to be, and that goes against what I was taught in playing classical music. You just don't go around playing adagio allegro or pianissimo forte. That would be downright blasphemous! What is this? Jazz?

LarryC wrote:

You could be a musical prodigy, play it "perfectly" and it still wouldn't come out right.

That is what the essence of classical music is all about! The interpretation is where much of the genius is layered on top of the genius of the original composition.

Edit: LarryC, I did play the first Arabesque way back when. It's the perfect piece to learn eight versus triplet notes.

LarryC wrote:

Eh. It depends, I would say. Some guys just go outright against the musical notation on what the piece is supposed to be, and that goes against what I was taught in playing classical music. You just don't go around playing adagio allegro or pianissimo forte. That would be downright blasphemous! What is this? Jazz? ;)

So you are saying you don't approve of Glenn Gould?

Here is a really cool animated version for those interested of the first arabesque:

My current listen is Introduction and Rondo Capriccioso.

Yeah, can't go wrong with Chopin or Mozart, always been two of my favorites. I also like Edvard Grieg, Claude Debussy, Georges Bizet, JS Bach, and Liszt.

Oh, and check out Vadim Kiselev on Youtube. He's pretty awesome.

dhelor wrote:

Yeah, can't go wrong with Chopin or Mozart

I disagree. Far too much Chopin in this thread already. You're all going to scare Gravey off with your dinky piano crap.

iaintgotnopants wrote:

your dinky piano crap. :)

tuffalobuffalo wrote:
iaintgotnopants wrote:

your dinky piano crap. :)

:)

Dinky piano crap?

Since someone mentioned Mozart, I'll also suggest Franz Joseph Haydn and his Symphony No. 96 in D Major in particular. It's Classical era as opposed to the later Romantic era but I suspect you'd enjoy this symphony tremendously.

Also, based on the OP's original post, if you don't have the Deutsche Grammophon recording of the Gothenburg Symphony Orchestra's album "Tchaikovsky: 1812 - Marche Slave," you are missing out on some exceptional performances of your favorites. It's an all too brief Russian classical love fest of Tchaikovsky, Borodin, and Rimsky-Korsakov.

To book end this recommendation, if you wish to explore Russian classical beyond the Romantic era, the beautiful and tragic works of 20th Century composer Dmitri Shostakovich are also worth your time.

Jean Sibelius - 2nd Symphony is amazing, my personal favorite (the Minnesota Orchestra recently put out a recording of the 2nd and the 5th, the director, Osmo Vanska, is also Finn and he does amazing things with Sibelius, highly recommended), everything else is good too
Gustav Mahler - 1st and 5th are my favorites of his, I don't like the later symphonies as much as the earlier ones (Leonard Bernstein had a thing for Mahler and has a lot of recordings that are pretty good)
Anton Bruckner - can't recommend any specific works off the top of my head but he's got some real good stuff
Ottorino Respighi - Roman trilogy (I've actually never heard Roman Festivals but both the Fountains of Rome and the Pines of Rome are great)
Hector Berlioz - Symphonie Fantastique (if only for the musical depiction of decapitation via guillotine complete with rolling head)
Tchaikovsky - his symphonies are often overlooked because he wasn't particularly good at the form but the 4th and 5th are good and the 6th is amazing, his ballets are good but I would suggest trying to find video of the actual ballets instead of just listening to the music

I'm sure I'll think of more.

ringsnort wrote:

To book end this recommendation, if you wish to explore Russian classical beyond the Romantic era, the beautiful and tragic works of 20th Century composer Dmitri Shostakovich are also worth your time.

There are quite a few really good 20th century Russian composers. Aside from Shostakovich, Rachmaninoff and Prokofiev are both really good (both have piano crap that doesn't put me to sleep like Chopin (I really don't like Chopin)). Stravinsky's a deep cut. He's not really easy to listen to but there's a lot of good stuff.

Thanks for the names and pieces all, especially the YouTube links. My day at work tomorrow will be served. And by all means keep'em coming, or let the thread evolve into more beyond "I like 'Ride of the Valkyries', recommend me more like that". (But seriously, "Ride of the Valkyries"? Super sweet in Battlefield Vietnam.)

tuffalobuffalo wrote:

You don't like baroque music?? *sad face* Europa Galante w/ Fabio Biondi does the best baroque music ever. It's like the rock music of classical music. They do the best version of Vivaldi's The Four Seasons.

Well, when I think baroque I think powdered wigs and harpsichords. When I think of orchestral music I would want to listen to, I envision loud Russians and Germans. I won't pretend I'm not ill-informed.

Gravey wrote:

Well, when I think baroque I think powdered wigs and harpsichords. When I think of orchestral music I would want to listen to, I envision loud Russians and Germans. I won't pretend I'm not ill-informed.

You can kind of use the big three composers that everybody can name as guides to the three main periods. If you like Bach, you'll probably like stuff from the Baroque period. If you like Mozart, you'll probably like stuff from the Classical period. And, if you like Beethoven, you'll probably like stuff from the Romantic period. That last one isn't great because Beethoven kind of straddled the Classical and Romantic periods.

More good ones.

"Allegro con brio" from Symphony No.7 by Beethoven
Piano Concerto No. 5 "Emperor" by Beethoven
"Adagio cantabile" from Piano Sonata No. 8 by Beethoven
Sonata for Two Pianos in D major by Mozart.

I forgot to mention that our very own Tanglebones helps run a label that has a lot of really good stuff. I highly recommend you check out what they have and help pay his gaming habit.

http://www.bridgerecords.com/
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/09/ar...

I've gotta put my vote in for Rachmaninoff as my all-time favourite classical composer. Obviously it requires at least 12 fingers to play, but the sheer passion in virtually everything I've heard of his is phenomenal.

Oh yes, and there's very little "dinky piano crap".

I saw this thread title and thought "Nah, I'll just wait for tuffalo to own face in there for a while"

Win.

Thin_J wrote:

I saw this thread title and thought "Nah, I'll just wait for tuffalo to own face in there for a while"

Win.

Ha! Those Hillary Hahn -- Bach Violin Concertos you recommended way back when are good.

iaintgotnopants wrote:
ringsnort wrote:

To book end this recommendation, if you wish to explore Russian classical beyond the Romantic era, the beautiful and tragic works of 20th Century composer Dmitri Shostakovich are also worth your time.

There are quite a few really good 20th century Russian composers. Aside from Shostakovich, Rachmaninoff and Prokofiev are both really good (both have piano crap that doesn't put me to sleep like Chopin (I really don't like Chopin)). Stravinsky's a deep cut. He's not really easy to listen to but there's a lot of good stuff.

+1

I bristled for a second at your deep cut comment, but yeah, I guess that's true. Stravinsky is the anti-Mozart.

Stravinsky rules, and Rite of Spring is one of the pivotal works of the 20th Century, if not THE pivotal work. I really liked this take on it:

A century on, the truly shocking thing about The Rite is still with us, right there at its climax. A good performance will merely pulverise you. But a great one will make you feel that it's you – that it's all of us – being sacrificed by Stravinsky's spellbinding and savagely cruel music.

Also, the 1st movement of his Symphony of Psalms gives me goosebumps every time.

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