[bellytimber]

Granted, the post I wrote yesterday was incredible. But I still thought I owed it to the 2p2 community to follow up with a list.

Here is a list of classical music that I think is really easy to like. It's not a list of my absolute personal favorites, it's just a list that I made especially for anyone who might be curious about classical music and could use a few suggestions to get started.

after the title of each piece, in parenthesis I'm going to put a little info on a specific recording of it that I think is terrific. Of course there are lots of other great versions out there, but there are also plenty of skunky ones.


ALLEGRI
--Miserere (Tallis Scholars, Peter Philips, often paired on a CD with Palestrina's missa papae marcelli)
OK, it's killing me not to tell you the story of this piece, but then I'll probably feel that way about half the things on here, so I'm just going to make it my policy to let others elaborate.

BACH
--Brandenburg Concerti (Pinnock, English Concert)
--Double Concerto in D minor for two violins (Mutter, Accardo, English Chamber Orch; angel/EMI)
--The Goldberg Variations (played by Gould, 1955 version)

dang there was a really great and quirky Bach compilation on an old cassette series called "CBS Classical 90s"; I still have that tape, I really need to transfer it to CD
anyway the tape was later condensed by CBS/Odyssey and crammed onto a shorter CD, they totally botched it but some good stuff survived, mainly...

--the Toccata and Fugue in D Minor (transcription by Ormandy, this is way better than other people's transcriptions in my opinion. Ormandy, Philadelphia orchestra)


BARBER
--Adagio for Strings (Bernstein or Slatkin)

BEETHOVEN
--Piano Concerto #5 (Fleisher on piano conducted by Szell)
--selected piano sonatas: Pathetique, Moonlight, Appassionata (Serkin piano); Waldstein, Les Adieux (Giles piano)
--Symphony #5 (Kleiber, Vienna Philharmonic)
--Symphony #7 (Kleiber, Vienna Philharmonic)
--Symphony #9 (Reiner, Chicago Symphony Orch)

BRAHMS
--Hungarian Dances (Masur, Leipzig Orch)
--Requiem (Klemperer, Philharmonia Orch)

CHOPIN
--tons of great piano music
add it all together and there would be around 150 Ballades, Mazurkas, Nocturnes, Waltzes, Etudes, Polonaises, Preludes, Scherzos, and some other stuff I'm forgetting. You can't go too wrong sampling these with some compilation CD like Mad About Chopin or whatever. In general, there's no shame in buying compilations to get a sense of a composer's approach. And some hokey-looking series like the "Mad About" series usually do a decent job.
some pianists you can trust with Chopin include: Pollini, Rubinstein, Zimerman, Ashkenazy

COPLAND
--Appalachian Spring (Bernstein)
--Fanfare for the Common Man (Bernstein)

DEBUSSY
--Prelude a l'Apres Midi d'un Faune (Haitnik)
--piano music including Clair de Lune (Weissenberg or Roge or Gieseking or Michelangeli or others)

FAURE
--Pavane (Dutoit, Montreal)

GERSHWIN
--Rhapsody in Blue (Bernstein)

GRIEG
--Peer Gynt Suites (Beecham, Royal Phil)
--Piano Concerto in A (Perihia)

HANDEL
--Water Music (Pinnock)

HOLST
--The Planets (Boult, London Phil)

JOPLIN
--piano rags (Rifkin)

LISZT
--Paganini Etudes (Watts on piano, especially Etude #6, the theme and variations)

MASCAGNI
--intermezzo from Cavalleria rusticana (Jarvi)

MOZART
--Piano Concertos (there are 27 of these, I get the numbers mixed up, but #21 is the most famous)(good dudes performing them include: Perahia, Serkin, Casadeus, Ashkenazy, Giles)
--Overtures from the operas (esp the overtures to Magic Flute, Figaro, and Don Giovanni) (Marriner good conductor here)
--selected piano sonatas: K331, K332, K545 (lots of good choices for pianists; I like Klien)
--Requiem (Karajan)
--more piano: variations on Twinkle Twinkle little star (A Je vous Dirai Maman)...these are not going to change your life but they reminded me of something that I forgot to mention in my post yesterday: Variations are a great way to learn a little about how classical music works. First you hear the theme played in a simple way, and then the composer alters the theme into a lot of different forms and often stretches it to the breaking point. Look out!
--Serenades, especially #10 (Schneider) and #13 (Walter)
--Symphony #40 (Bernstein)
--Symphony #41 (Bernstein)

ORFF
--Carmina Burana (Blomstedt, San Francisco)

PACHELBEL
--Canon (Palliard conducting Palliard Chamber Orch, I mention it partly b/c it's on a really good RCA Victor baroque compilation CD)

PROKOFIEV
--Peter and the Wolf (Gielgud narrating)
--Classical Symphony #1 (Ormandy, good CD that also has Love for three oranges suite and lieutenant Kije suite)
--Romeo and Juliet (especially the Montagues and the Capulets) (Levi, Montreal)

RACHMANINOFF
--Piano Concerto #2 (Rubinstein)
--Vocalise (Moffo, soprano; Stokowski, conductor)

RAVEL
--Bolero (Dutoit, Montreal)

RIMSKY KORSAKOV
--Scheherazade (Reiner, Chicago Symphony Orch, often paired with Reiner/CSO's equally great version of Debussy's La Mer)

ROSSINI
--Overture to The Barber of Seville (Reiner, CSO)
--William Tell Overture (Reiner, CSO)

SAINT-SAENS
--Carnival of the Animals (Dutoit, Montreal)
--Danse Macabre (Dutoit, Phil Orchestra)

SCHUBERT
--Impromptus for piano (Perahia)
--piano sonata in B flat, D960 (Brendel)
--andante from the piano trio in E flat D929 (Beaux Arts Trio)
--theme and variations from the trout quintet (Curzon)
--Symphony #8 (Solti)

SCHUMANN
--lots of piano music, especially Carnival, and also Kinderscenen (Rubinstein or Shelly are good pianists here)
--Dichterliebe (it's a song-cycle) (Wunderlich singing, please don't [censored] with this)

SIBELIUS
--Finlandia (Stein)

SMETANA
--The Moldau (from Ma Vlast) (Szell)

STRAUSS, Johann II
--lots of waltzes e.g. Waltz of the Beautiful Blue Danube (Reiner, CSO)

STRAVINSKY
--Rite of Spring (Muti)

TCHAIKOVSKY
--first movement of Violin Concerto in D (Nishizaki violin, Jean conducting, it's on Naxos label)
--Marche Slave (Dutoit, Montreal)
--Nutcracker Suite (Rostropovich)

VILLA-LOBOS
--bachiana brasileria #5 (Moffo, Stokowski)

VIVALDI
--The Four Seasons (

WAGNER
--Orchestral selections (Szell or Bernstein or Reiner)


OK everyone, I'm very sorry that I left off your favorite piece by your favorite composer. And obviously there are tons of holes up there, it's really a slapdash list, but hey--at least none of it is remotely subjective. Anyway, for an easy-listening Classical 101 type syllabus that I intentionally made with an emphasis on good melodies, it probably could be worse. For the record, most everything on this list is relatively famous (some of it to the point of caricature), but then there are a few items up there that maybe you haven't heard.

please note that there's no opera, because I hate opera.