What Classical music would you suggest?

I would like to expand my collection of ‘Classical Music.’

I have the basics and would be interested in some suggestions by those more knowledgeable in this area.

What would you suggest and why?

Thanks for the input.

The History of Classical Music, by Richard Fawkes, because when looking to learn and explore I found it useful.

Zbigniew Preisner’s work on the Three Colours films caught my ear. His stuff’s worth a listen.

Kiri Te Kanawa - Strauss: Four Last Songs, Orchestral Songs

amazon.com/Kiri-Te-Kanawa-St … B0000025C9

The woman has an amazing voice…pure, icy…and this album is perfect to listen to LOUD…at 3AM when you’ve drunk maybe a little too much single malt.

A lot of people go on about Beethoven and Bach, but I lways found them, Bach especially, to be morbid, structured and solid - for want of better words.

I love Chopin…just a pianist of course but I enjoy relaxing to classical music and Chopin tingles my nerves. I still feel that it is unbeliavble someone can actually play what he did.

the problem with his music is the titles - most of them have common nicknames though. Try The Minute Waltz to start.

You should find a copy of Robert Greenberg’s How to Listen to and Understand Great Music audiobook. You can buy it here or, um, download it elsewhere.

I’ve been seriously trying to get into classical music the past year or so. My preference runs towards the big, bombastic German stuff (Strauss, Wagner, some Beethoven. Maybe those Nazis were right…) and 19th century Italian opera (Puccini, Rossini, Verdi).

I started with a “Gateways to the Classics” 10LP (that dates me) set and since then have gone on to explore
polytonal choral music c.1500 - Brumel, Morales etc.
elaborate baroque - Biber (masses and violin sonatas)
viol consorts - Louis di Milan
heavy german opera - Richard Strauss
re-jigged old music in modern clothes - Respighi and Stokowski chief rearrangers
Schubert’s piano music
Arvo Paärt - modern minimalist but tuneful
Soundtracks such as Kilar’s “Portrait of a Lady” and Goldenthal’s “Final Fantasy”

that’s my 2$NT

I am saving all of your suggestions.
I very much appreciate them.

The Emerson String Quartet does an amazing version of Bartok’s string quartets.

Bartok’s a good introduction to 20th century classical music too if you haven’t explored that yet. His Concerto for Orchestra and Music for Strings, Percussion and Celesta are also great works.

William Orbit, Wendy Carlos, Isao Tomita.

Rouse your Scottish blood a bit with of romanticism. Mendelssohn’s Hebrides Suite or Fingal’s Cave. It’s one of those that you’ll probably recognise even if you’ve never been able to name it.
Dvorak is another easily accessible one, and Grieg is another whose work I’m fond of.
They’ve got the DVD of Immortal Beloved cheap at RTMart right now, too. Gary Oldman as bombastic as the music whose composer he plays.

I only really know about t’opera. Easy to get into are: Madama Butterfly or Turandot by Puccini or The Magic Flute by Mozart. The Puccini’s better fer shaggin’, though.

Beethoven, powerful
Mozart, airy fairy
Handel, for sheer beauty (and any lyrics are in English).

Rachmaninov, 3rd piano concerto is perhaps the greatest classical piano piece ever conceived

Tchaikovsky has a similar Russian style to Tchaikovsky
Chopin is also brilliant

Like loud, brassy stuff? Or hyper-romantic symphonies with no subtlety? Well I do. Borodin’s “On the Steppes of Central Asia” and Symphony No. 2" are cool, and my favorite version of “Prince Igor” is an old Russian b&w film.

I also like Brueckner and Mahler for being loud and boistrous, and for my Central Asian fix, Alan Hovhaness’ symphony “Mysterious Mountain.” (This is a bit modern–Hovhaness was Armenian with an esoteric bent.)

Gustav Holst’s “Planets” is hard not to like. I’ve never heard his “Savitri” but one of these days mean to get around to it. And I wish I could see some Stravinsky operas redone in the original style.

For some inexplicable reason, I absolutely hate piano music.

Ever heard of P.D.Q. Bach?

If you want something dark, get Dmitri Shostakovich’s Symphony No. 11 (‘The Year 1905’).

Or Mozart’s unfinished symphony

Didn’t someone “finish” that last year in honour of the 250th anniversary of his birth (or was it his death?)?

I like Mozart and Bach, among much else.

An excellent choice would be Elly Ameling’s early recordings singing Bach arias.

Not sure…its the work they play right at the end of the movie “Amadeus” right? Its a haunting but musically brilliant piece.

Not sure…its the work they play right at the end of the movie “Amadeus” right? Its a haunting but musically brilliant piece.[/quote]

Isn’t that his requiem?