Can anyone recommend some classical music?

[GRLMGC]

I want things that are kind of obscure.


Thanks in advance!

On Edit: Let me open this up to all instrumental music. I just heard some things from Erik Satie and it made me interested in more music.

[NightWatcher]

1. not obscure but I still love my Tocca and Fugue

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ipzR9bhei_o

to go with Carmina Burana
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nqw3KWb9bH4&feature=related

metal version
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yzAe_xWpJgM&feature=related

[GRLMGC]

4. A good one! nt

[Fire Walk With Me]

2. Scriabin, the Poem of Ecstasy

http://youtube.com/watch?v=LWtf-fvsDM4

[GRLMGC]

5. That sounds familiar

Would I have heard it in a movie or something?

[Fire Walk With Me]

9. I don't know.

[1gobluedem]

3. I like Jacques Loussier's jazz treatment of the Brandenburgs

http://www.audaud.com/article.php?ArticleID=2013

Good stuff.

[GRLMGC]

6. That sounds pretty cool nt

[LanternWaste]

7. Might I suggest Tchaikovsky's Symphony No. 4?

Might I suggest Tchaikovsky's Symphony No. 4?

The first movement is is very melancholy and haunting. Its' opening with a trombone solo sets the tone and the ambiance for the entire piece.

But it's the final movement which is ... awe inspiring (to say the least) in its energy, its wall of brass, and its frenetic discourse between the strings and the winds ending with a climatic raise of sound, energy and passion.

It's one of my favorite pieces of music, regardless of genre (if you couldn't tell already :) )

[GRLMGC]

8. Let me check it out

I am definitely into haunting and melancholy!

[RainDog]

10. probably not obscure enough

...but about the only classical music I listen to these days is Yo-Yo Ma playing Bach: The Cello Suites.

[BrotherBuzz]

11. Ravel's Boléro May not be classical by definition, but it's a classic

[Left Brain]

12. Paganini

Violin Concerto No.1 in E flat major

The lilting violin in that piece is pure joy.

[Proud Liberal Dem]

13. Tod Machover: "Bug Mudra"

I heard this piece when I was taking a music class in College and it was included on a compilation of music pieces discussed in the accompanying textbook. It's kind of hard to describe but it is basically a 15-minute "new age" electronic piece. I don't know if you would consider it to be "classical" per se but it was referred to in the text as being an example of modern day "classical" music. I don't know if it's still available on CD but you can listen to a sample of it and/or download it (album only) from iTunes for $9.99. I recently downloaded the album but haven't listened to the whole thing yet but it is really neat. I think that this would be about as obscure as this kind music gets. I myself certainly never would've known ANYTHING about it had I not taken the aforementioned class/read the assigned textbook.

Also, many of the soundtracks composed by John Williams, particularly his Star Wars scores are considered by many to be representative of "Romantic-era" (mid-late 1800's) music.

[StrongBad]

14. Check out some 20th century composers for some experimental stuff

Philip Glass, John Cage, Charles Ives and Terry Riley are some good names to go by if you're looking for some obscure/avant-garde stuff.

[tjwmason]

15. Shostakovich

to my mind, one of the most extraordinary composers ever - particularly recommend 4th and 5th Symphonies (ideally side-by-side) the former was written just before and the latter just after a massive attack on him by Stalin, it's no understatement to say he was very close to going to the Gulag; his 7th Symphony was written in Leningrad while it was under seige from the Nazis, understandably it leads to a great pathos; the string quartets, being written for only 4 instruments they contain an extreme concentration.

[DarkTirade]

17. Heh, I didn't even see yours when I posted mine. :)

[DarkTirade]

16. How 'bout some hardcore russian composers? :P

I've been on a big Shostakovic kick lately. I highly recommend being exposed to his 8th string quartet.

It's a perfect example of just how powerful music can be, IMO.

[GRLMGC]

21. Russians know how to do it

That's for sure.

[Hardrada]

18. Missa Papae Marcelli

by Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina, also his Stabat Mater.
Great choral works.


(I think this is the first time anyone has referenced Stabat Mater on DU!)

[pippin]

19. Any Woman Composer

Fanny Mendelssohn Hensel, Amy Beach, Cecile Charminade, Clara Wieck, Ethel Smyth, Nadia Boulanger, Vitezslava Kapralova etc. etc.,

Anything by them would be "obscure" given how little exposure they've been given historically.

[Rabrrrrrr]

20. Stockhausen's Helicopter Quartet. Crumb's Ancient Voices for Children.

Crumb's string quartet "Black Angels" (Kronos Quartet has a great recording on an album of the same name, with some other wonderful obscure modern works)

Penderecki's Threnody of the Victims of Hiroshima.