List of great classical recordings?
 

iPod means music, right? Well, I want to expand my collection of good classical recordings.

Does anyone know where I can find an excellent list, something like "the greatest classical recordings ever"? And I don’t mean a list compiled by a record label trying to sell their wares.

I mean an honest list, compiled by great critics, pointing out specific recordings of well-known music. Now, I know that any such list will be subjective. But I’m looking for great, reliable subjectivity. :)

(Bach’s Brandenburg, Goldberg, Well-Tempered Clavier; Beethoven’s Symphonies; Händel and Haydn; Scarlatti and Shostakovich; Hindemith and Nancarrow; Arvo Pärt’s music; Erik Satie; songs by John Dowland; Hildegard von Bingen; Gregorian chants and mediaeval music; Steve Reich, Valentin Silvestrov, Fartein Valen, Lou Harrison, Paul Giger and other lesser known modern composers; performances by everyone from Pablo Casals, Jordi Savall, Leif Ove Andsnes, Glenn Gould, Kronos Quartet, the Hilliard Ensemble etc. etc.) And hopefully LOTS of GOOD stuff that I didn’t even know existed!

Anyone know of a good list or Web site?

Best regards,
ArcticStones


P.S. I’m also interested in a similar list of World Music. As wide a scope and as many surprizes as possible.

I believe I'm going to put this in the Coat Room. :)

I recommend getting this book, which I find invaluable: Discovering Great Music

Ah, the Coat Room - I believe you’re right...

Thanks!! I’ll check out Hemming’s book and see if our local library or bookstore has it. One friend mentioned that Grammophone magazine might have good recommendations on their Web site. I’ll check that out as well.

I do have 3 books in "The Rough Guide" excellent series: the volumes on Classical Music, Jazz and World Music. But they don’t update themselves, and they don’t have overall recommendations - a short list of great "must have" recordings.

Anyone with additional suggestions?

Best regards,
ArcticStones

Gramophone Magazine is a good source (especially if you're careful about the spelling <g>)

You might also look at the National Public Radio book:
http://shop.npr.org/catalog/Product....ID=8&PRODID=86

Breen

Gramophone ’tis, hereafter. Ah’ll watch me orthography!
Thx for the recommendation!!

Best regards,
ArcticStones

You'll get a wider range of answers, faster, here.

The 100 Greatest Classical Recordings of All Time
 

Gramophone is indeed a great source, but you can skip straight to this wonderful book...if you can find it! It was published in 1995, but I picked up a copy used, through eBay, I believe, in early 2003. It was sold as a magazine, I believe, as there's no ISBN but an ISSN (1361-3294). There is a bar code on the front cover which I assume is unique: 9 771361 329000 01

If you can't find a copy, feel free to eMail me - freddy_gier@yahoo.com - and I'll transcribe the list. The reviews are wonderful, and there's a lot of detailed info, but the raw list is still priceless.

Here are some used versions available on Amazon...

http://tinyurl.com/5ttgv

There's a good general-purpose, impressively fast & high-volume board with generallly sophisticated and intelligent members at the Cecil Adams column-based "Straight Dope" message board, http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb — and it has a forum called "Cafe Society" focused on the arts, culture and entertainment.

The problem with classical music is that the shallow focus has been on the piece not the performer/performance — i.e, recommendations for Swan Lake by Tchaikovsky or Variations on a Theme of Thomas Tallis by Vaugh-Williams, without pointing you towards a specific performance on a specific CD or vinyl album or MP3 or whatever.

You need classical music geeks to chime in about whether or not the Stokowski 1964 with Capitol was or was not superior to the Ormandy 1968 recording with London.

Go to SDMB/Cafe Society and ask about the best performance of Swan Lake and you'll get answers within 8 hours, sometimes within 20 minutes.

That list sounds promising! I would love to track it down.

Café Society on StraightDope sounds promising.
The focus is exactly the one that I’m interested in.

When I studied at the university (art studio and mathematics), I did my utmost to find out who the great teachers were, and then asked myself what courses they were offering. Never once did I regret that approach.

I believe the same holds true for great musicians.
(So I would rather hear Pablo Casals playing scales and fingering exercises, than to suffer a lukewarm cellist who turns a Bach fugue into indifferent sound.)


With best regards,
ArcticStones

It's titled: "The 100 Greatest Classical Recordings of All Time"

You're right. Great performers can turn the pedestrian into something wonderful. The two versions of John Cages Sonatas and Interludes for Prepared Piano are so different as to be separat compositions: One is fabulous, one is difficult.

Unless you are wedded to only internet discovery, Gramophone, BBC Music, American Record Guide, and for the truly erudite, Fanfare provide more reviews than most can digest.

I have asked a friend of mine who has several classical discussion sites that he frequents, and downloads from, for some of his sites. I know few people who are as knowledgeable as he about the classical genre! No bull... but ask him about any other musical venue and he's lost. Sometimes he is slow to respond, but if he sends me any links, I'll pass them along... they're attended by rabid classical fans....

Thanks!
I suppose I’m an incurable eclectic. In addition to classical, my interests span from Jan Garbarek, Keith Jarrett, Anouar Brahem, Chet Baker, Billie Holiday, Egberto Gismonti, Jaco Pastorius, Miles Davis, Meredith Monk, Oregon, Fairuoz, Oum Kalthoum, Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan, Lakshmi Shankar (!!!), Mari Boine, U2, Pink Floyd, Sinead O’Connor, Peter Gabriel and Carlos Santana, to Johnny Cash, bluegrass, Salif Keita, Radka Toneff, Laurie Anderson, Lou Reed, African vocal music…

God, it’s an incredible time we live in – to have all this wonderful music available!!

Best,
ArcticStones

Don't forget Andrea Bocelli.

Best music to eat Italian food by.

I too span the gamut of musical tastes (with just a few exceptions...) One cd I was just movin to my Mac the other day still remains a favorite... Officium by the Hilliar Ensemble with Jan Garbarek.... If you "get it" you'll like it, if not, you'll probably hate it! (And I also find Hounds of Love by Kate Bush to be a great concept cd...)

Here is what my friend suggested...

"I suppose a good basic website is http://www.classical.net/ , but the poster would be better served by listening to a classical music station in his area and noting which type of music he prefers, or listen to streaming classical music websites, of which there are dozens. Then, if he doesn't want to spend too much money, he can go to the classical music binary newsgroups (not available on Google, by the way--- he'll have to access them with a Mac newsreader. MT-Newswatcher is free from VersionTracker or Simon Fraser's website http://www.smfr.org/mtnw ) and request any work that has caught his fancy. The major NGs are:

alt.binaries.sounds.mp3.classical, alt.binaries.sounds.music.classical, alt.binaries.music.classical, alt.binaries.sounds.lossless.classical

These are frequented by kind folks who will respond to any reasonable request for a particular selection.
"

Happy Listening!

I get it. I'm fortunate to sing now and again with one of the Hilliards, and he told me not too long ago that they're going to be touring again with Jan in the spring. Keep your eyes open!
(They'll at least be in San Francisco.)

Officium is a great record! So is their other joint recording, Mnemosyne.

I have almost every CD released by Jan Garbarek. A few of my favourite are: Dis (with a wind harp), Song for Everyone (with violinist L. Shankar), Rosensfole (with singer Agnes Buen Garnaas), My Song and Belonging (both with Keith Jarrett), Twelve Moons (with Mari Boine), Eventyr, and Folk Songs. And Legend of the Seven Dreams.

I’ve enjoyed him four times in concert, each time accompanied by master bass player Eberhard Weber. (Check out his Colors of Chloe, and Endless Days!)

When Manfred Eicher launched ECM Records, I had an intuitive moment where I wanted to write him a letter asking the price for a lifetime subscription. Really regret leaving that a pipe dream!

:)

Breen, fascinating! One of our daughters is a great singer. (I don’t even dare sing in the shower myself.) I would really love to hear Garbarek with Hilliard in concert. I’ll check out the tour details at the link in www.ecm-records.com
I see you’re going to MacWorld...

Best regards!
ArcticStones

Yet nowhere near as different as any two versions of 4' 33"! :cool:

No, not quite as different, but still strikingly dissimilar...

An interesting pairing, though. I've long considered S&I for Prepared Piano to be Cage's most significant achievement...I adore the 12th Sonata, especially. And yet, as much as I admire Cage, I do suspect him of descent into musical quackery at times. 4'33" has a sound philosophical purpose, but some of his other musical compositions/experiments which lean on philosophical concepts begin to strike me as compositional laziness beyond a point.

When I studied art at UC Davis, a visiting professor, announced a coming telephone call from John Cage. He reserved an auditorium and invited everyone to listen in. After half an hour or so, the impatience was palpable; yet a sizeable section of the audience got exactly what they expected: Nothing.

Then the visiting professor started explaining himself, how the whole essence of the evening’s event was to not hear the phone call from Mr Cage. The waiting… I too like some of John Cage’s music and thoughts. But some of it seems to be “posing”, “imposing” or “imposter”. And I think the wannabe “conceptual artist”, however much or little inspired by John Cage, was dealing in… (Well, I don’t want to say the word.)

John Cage has, for instance, done some fascinating stuff with Meredith Monk – a boundary breaker in her own right. But I find myself far more drawn to Arvo Pärt.

Best regards,
ArcticStones

Here is a list of 20 recordings that should belong in anyone’s collection (roughly chronologically, by composer). Although they don’t necessarily contradict what most critics say, they remain my own choices – recordings to which I have devoted years of thoughtful listening. The list could easily be two or even three times as long, but I have limited myself to what’s here for now, even if it means excluding many recordings that people shouldn’t be without. I hope you’ll forgive the concentration of recordings devoted to music of the trinity, Bach, Mozart & Beethoven. I hope someone benefits from it!

J.S. Bach: Cello Suites [Pablo Casals; Naxos]
J.S. Bach: Goldberg Variations [Glenn Gould; Sony, either 1955 or 1981]
J.S. Bach: Well-Tempered Clavier [Andras Schiff; Decca]
J.S. Bach: Mass in B Minor [Gardiner; Archiv]

Joseph Haydn: Piano Sonatas [Hamelin; Hyperion]

Mozart: Symphonies 35-41 [Böhm; DG]
Mozart: Late Piano Concertos [Perahia; Sony *or* Uchida; Philips]
Mozart: String Quartets 14-19 “Haydn Quartets” [Alban Berg Quartet; EMI]

Beethoven: Piano Concertos 4 & 5 [Claudio Arrau; Philips, bargain reissue on Eloquence]
Beethoven: Piano Sonatas – Waldstein; Les Adieux; Appassionata, [Emil Gilels; DG]
Beethoven: Symphonies Nos. 5 & 7 [Carlos Kleiber; DG]
Beethoven: Missa Solemnis [Klemperer; EMI]

Schubert: Piano Sonatas D958 & D960 [Sviatoslav Richter; Regis]
Schubert: Trout Quintet & String Quartet 14 [Gilels & Amadeus Quartet; DG]

Chopin: Nocturnes [Artur Rubinstein; RCA]

Brahms: Piano Concertos [Gilels; DG *or* Fleisher; Decca]

Debussy: Preludes Books 1 & 2 [Walter Gieseking; EMI]

Mahler: Das Lied von der Erde [Ferier; Decca]

Rachmaninov: Piano Concert No. 3; Piano Sonata No. 2 [Martha Argerich; Philips]
Rachmaninov & Ravel: Piano Concerto 4 & 1 [Arturo Benedetti Michelangeli; EMI]