a thoughtful web.
Good ideas and conversation. No ads, no tracking.   Login or Take a Tour!
comment by nathank
nathank  ·  3106 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: I need classical music recommendations

Welcome to the incredibly diverse and actually “unscratchable” world of classical music. Seriously, there’s just so much that you will never run out of something new to listen to!

One thing to realize when you start out is that different conductors/musicians can greatly change the overall experience of a song due to things like the way it’s played or the speed it’s played at. Beethoven’s 5th symphony sounds very different from these two conductors and orchestras Karajan vs Klemperer. So if you find yourself greatly disliking a particular piece, try listening to it with a different musician, or conductor, or orchestra, etc it can make a HUGE difference.

I’ve thrown together a quick list of some of my favorites from the “big 3” plus a few others to get you started. There’s just so much out there, that these kinds of lists could go on and on depending on what you like. Any of these pieces could lead you to additional pieces by the same composer or to composers from the same era of which there are many in both cases.

Mozart

Clarinet concerto

Gran Partida

Marriage of Figaro Opera

Great mass in C

Flute and harp concerto

Beethoven

6th symphony

7th symphony

5th piano

Bach

cello suites

The Well-Tempered Clavier

Chopin

nocturnes

Dvorak

9th symphony

Glass

The Hours

Here’s another interesting webpage with a tiny bit of background and some suggestion lists I found useful in my early days of classical music discovery.

Have fun!





War  ·  3106 days ago  ·  link  ·  

Excellent! Thank you for all of the recommendations. I'm very excited to begin my journey through all of this wonderful music.