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I suppose I should not have been surprised.
I got home from work a few days ago just as a performance by the New York Philharmonic of Antonín Dvořák's Symphony No. 9 in E minor, "From the New World" came onto the radio. I actually had a break in my busy schedule and was able to listen to it uninterrupted from start to finish. I especially enjoy the introduction of certain 'passages' that reappear later as well as the tension as the piece builds to a huge fanfare.
I thoroughly enjoyed it and remarked on this in our IRC (Internet Relay Chat) channel. Not only did several people recognize it, there was a sudden discussion of people's favorite classical works and a suggestion that I should post a story to the main site.
Other favorites of mine include:
- 1812 Overture - Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky
- The William Tell Overture - Gioachino Rossini ("The Lone Ranger" theme)
- The Barber of Seville - Gioachino Rossini
- Pictures at an Exhibition - Modest Mussorgsky
- Brandenburg Concertos - Johann Sebastian Bach.
In retrospect, a well-performed piece of classical music is like a well-written piece of software. Everything just flows together. Intricate passages combine into something much greater than its constituent parts.
So, fellow Soylentils, what are your favorite classical works? As performances vary in quality and there are many recordings out on the internet, it would be very much appreciated if you included a link to a free (libre) copy if you know of one that you think others would enjoy.
(Score: 1) by steveg on Thursday December 17 2015, @01:13PM
When I was in college, the local "pirate" radio station hired DJs at minimum wage and let them play anything they liked. One of them introduced me to Mozart's Horn Concertos. There are lots of excellent suggestions in this thread, but the 4 Horn Concertos have to be my favorites of all time.
By "pirate" I don't mean it was illegal, but the owner treated it like it was. You had to be on the right side of town to even get it -- it was a licensed station but it broadcast at a power of something like 10 watts.
(Score: 2) by tadas on Thursday December 17 2015, @04:14PM
Mozart's Horn Concertos. There are lots of excellent suggestions in this thread, but the 4 Horn Concertos have to be my favorites of all time.
I heartily recommend the version with Dennis Brain (who died in 1957 at age 36 when he plowed his Triumph TR2 into a tree on his way back from a concert). I've heard many other recordings of these concertos, but none can match the magic of Dennis Brain's performance with the subtle support of the original Philharmonia Orchestra conducted by the not-always-subtle Herbert Von Karajan.
In addition to being a wonderful performance, this was a triumph of the early stereo era, and, like in the field of printing, some of the early works were the best. In the 50's, engineers concentrated on getting the best two microphones positioned in the best locations, and making the recording. Later on, they went nuts with miking everything under the sun, then mixing it down to 2 tracks, to the detriment of the recording.
For something "completely different", track down Brain's recording of Leonard Mozart's (Wolfgang's dad) horn concerto -- performed on a garden hose.