What are some good classical songs?

[GohanDZ]

Right now I only have Beethoven's 5th Symphony, 9th Symphony, and Ode to Joy. Any other suggestions?

[mrisch[$]]

Well, I am not sure they call them "songs", but I am a fan of Vivaldi's Four Seasons and just about anything Mozart

[MrsNormanMaine[$]]

There are lots and lots of inexpensive 'best of the classics' collections out there but here are some highlights that you're bound to recognize...

Bach - Tocatta and Fugue in D minor, Brandenburg Concertos
Beethoven - Moonlight and Appassionata piano concerti
Mozart - Eine Kleine Nacht Music, Symphonys #39 & 40
Tschaikowski - Nutcracker, Symphony #5 & 6, 1812 Overture
Handel - Royal Fireworks Music, Water Music, Messiah
Bizet - Carmen Suite
Grieg - Hall of the Mountain King
Sibelius - Finlandia
Gershwin - Rhapsody in Blue, An American in Paris
Stravinsky - The Rite of Spring, The Firebird
Brahms - Hungarian Dances, Symphony #1


MNM

Pachelbel's Canon in D

If you're looking for a good place to listen to all of this, try:
http://www.classicalarchives.com/

Some of the variants are better than the others. But that's the way the MIDI bounces.

[kurt_messick]

In addition to the many fine things listed above:


Beethoven - Pathetique
Respighi - Ancient Airs and Dances
Mussorgsky - Pictures at an Exhibition
Holst - The Planets
Dvorak - New World Symphony

and

Allegri - Miserere

A piece that was presumed of such power that the Pope wouldn't permit it to be written down and distributed, and would only permit it to be performed in the Vatican (of course, various stories abound, including the young Mozart's transcribing it from memory).

[frazzledspice]

If you need composers who wrote in the classical period, some of the choices listed above wouldn't be good. Mozart and Beethoven would be your two best choices (and Beethoven is classical transitioning into Romantic.)

Bach and Vivaldi would be considered baroque--Chopin, Liszt, Tchaikovsy would be considered romantic.

I would go to Amazon and look for some anthology CD's of Beethoven and Mozart and see which choices come up most frequently. If there are listening samples, listen to them.

Another suggestion: Call up the DJ's at your local classical radio station (usually National Public Radio--NPR) and ask them what they would recommend. They play it all day, and they'll know.

Many of my favorites are already listed--New World Symphony, Brandenburg Concertos, Pathetique and Moonlight Sonatas, Finlandia--lots of great stuff to choose from.

[kurt_messick]

frazzledspice wrote
If you need composers who wrote in the classical period, some of the choices listed above wouldn't be good. Mozart and Beethoven would be your two best choices (and Beethoven is classical transitioning into Romantic.)

I took the term 'classical' in the more generic sense that the term is used as today. Frazz is right with regard to historical time period, however, in that there is a narrower range of 'classical' in that regard. Is this for a school assignment or personal interest?

[GohanDZ]

Yeah, I consider everything you guys listed as classical, by what I meant. And kurt, it's for personal interest....broadening my musical horizons.

[magenta321]

When I was broadening my musical horizons, I bought a 4 or 5 cd set called "Classical Music for People Who Hate Classical Music". It was basically all the stuff I grew up listening to in my Bugs Bunny cartoons, and in pasta sauce commercials. I really enjoyed it and learned that "oh gee, I already knew all this stuff, I just didn't know the name of it."

Quite honestly, I know what is classical music in my mind, and it has nothing to do with when it was written, but with the style in which it was written. I think that's why you were given the question, because a lot of teacher's would fault you for citing something written in 1930 as a classical song. It might be written in a classical style, but it's not from the classical time period, ya know. But, then again, others might be more knowledgable about classical music than I am.

Ok, but for my fave, it's Beethoven's Fur Elise. It's a sentimental thing that makes it my favorite though. The song always makes me want to cry.

[laura10801]

My hubby is big on classical music. All of the music at our wedding ceremony was Baroque Music, which I really liked. I am especially fond of "Water Music," but I can't remember who was the composer. You would definitely recognize it if you hear it.

Laura

[satan]

Ahhh . . . classical . . . i use the intro to Also Sprach Zarathrusta in my answering machine message (you've heard it at the beginning of Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odessey).

Originally posted by laura10801
I am especially fond of "Water Music," but I can't remember who was the composer.

Originally posted by MrsNormanMaine
Handel - Royal Fireworks Music, Water Music, Messiah

Ludwig van's 9th, eh? Have ya watched A Clockwork Orange?

As magenta321 points out, you probably have heard more classical music than you might have realized in association with advertising, pop culture & whatnot. If you're just starting out with the horizon broadening project, it wouldn't hurt to get some sampler CDs to get a feel for what you like . . .

Some of my favorite pieces have been mentioned (Dvorak's From the New World, Bach's beautiful Brandenburg Concertos, bits of Holst's The Planets). i'm sure there are many in the classical world i haven't yet discovered; some of my other favorite pieces include Smetana's Die Moldau, Rimsky-Korsakov's The Sea and Sindbad's Ship from the Scheherazade suite, Berlioz's crazy Symphonie Fantastique, Górecki's Symphony of Sorrowful Songs . . . umm . . . have liked a lot of the Rachmaninoff i've heard . . .

Thanks file13 for the link to CMA . . . hadn't come across it before . . . pretty impressive, though unfortunately it didn't have any samples of Schoenberg.

Oh yeh . . . if you really want to broaden your horizons to the late 21st century, check out Philip Glass (soundtrack to Koyaanisquatsi, Kundun) . . .

HTH.

[sylvanb]

The term classical, as has been suggested, is used in two different ways: as a general term to refer to "serious" or "long-hair" music; and specifically to refer to the structured compositions, like symphonies and chamber music, of the 19th century -- Mozart through Brahms -- with considerable slop-over into the 20th.

As you're broadening your horizons, I'd urge you to keep classical stations burbling away in the background, Public Radio or Net Radio, and especially if you can listen while driving. Notice what sounds good to you, and when you can, make a note of the composer, and maybe the name of the piece.

And go the library and browse for introductions to music. I'll rummage around in my mental library and see what I can come up with (the only such thing I currently have on my actual bookshelf is PDQ Bach but, trust me, you don't want to start with that

Happy listening (and reading).

[patach]

If it's "Classical" does it necessarily means it has to be during the last Enlightenment period? Or can we include new Orchestral symphonies?

Such as anything from Apocalyptica... my favorite "Orchestral" band :p

[sleeper54]

Hey all,

Rather than start a new thread I'll ask in here and see if I get any help.

I had checked out a CD from the library that was titled "Sorrowful Music" or something like that and it had a work on it that virtually wrung tears from the listener. People at work who heard it playing would stop to ask about it. But I can't find that CD at the library now and I can't remember composer or name or period.

Any suggestions on what it might have been ? I just remember, I think, that it was a string quartet.

I know, not much to work with. But throw out a suggestion or two if you have any and I'll check them out. TIA.

sleeper54

[sylvanb]

Promised reading suggestion:

Phil G. Goulding's Classical Music: The 50 Greatest Composers and Their 1,000 Greatest Works.

This is a very quirky, opinionated and entertaining book. The author ranks composers and compositions; these are strictly his own opinions, but do pretty much fall in line with the concensus. You can learn a lot here.

More info at amazon.com:

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/AS...496597-8234319

These also look interesting (at Amazon):

The NPR Guide to Building a Classical CD Collection : The 350 Essential Works

The Rough Guide to Classical Music

[mjfrombuffalo[$]]

My absolute favorite is Bach's Fugue in G Minor. Goosebumps every time.

mj

[vonboob]

There is too many to list but for introduction to classics, please try TCHAIKOVSKY! That seems to be one composer that NOBODY minds...

[Redlass]

Wagner's Ring Cycle is invigorating.

[sylvanb]

Originally posted by Redlass
Wagner's Ring Cycle is invigorating.

-- Yes -- up to a point

Since the whole thing runs for about six weeks, not counting bathroom breaks, I'd suggest "Wagner's Greatest Hits," specifically:

Ride of the Valkyries
Siegfried's Rhine Journey
Magic Fire Music
Siegfried Idyll

[satan]

Seattle's King FM 98.1 . . . good stuff!

[AshleyA[$]]

Some of my favorites that haven't been mentioned yet are as follows:

Grieg: Peer Gynt
Beethoveen: Symphony #6 "Pastorale"
most anything by Claude Debussy
most anything by Frederic Chopin
Carl Orff: Carmina Burana
Prokofiev: Peter and the Wolf
Saint-Saens: Carnival of the Animals

I'm sure there are quite a few others I could name, but I'd have to dig a bit.

Ashley

[copernicus]

Here is a thread I know something about.......which is a bit of a worry.

But if you are after something truly different, in this genre, see if you can find something by Heinrich Ignaz Biber, who was truly revolutionary in his day and wrote music akin to pop music today - although it was certainly a lot more difficult to play