Need some Classical Music suggestions

[CountArach]

Well as a change from my usual punk and hardcore music I have had a recent urge to listen to some classical music, mostly so I can relax whilst doing homework, etc. I have listened to some of it in the past and generally prefer the more fast-paced and militaristic pieces.

So yes, any recommendations?

[Fragony]

Most Wagner should suit your needs.

Takes a while to get going https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1edE...M&feature=fvsr <- my favorite

[CountArach]

Most Wagner should suit your needs.

Takes a while to get going https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1edE...M&feature=fvsr <- my favorite

Thanks for that, I'm listening to some Wagner on YouTube now (The very idea of which seems so strange to me... the internet being used for rather high culture...) and it does seem about right. Are there any other similar composers people can recommend to me?

EDIT: Preferably something more symphonic, as I prefer that to Opera in my previous experience.

[Fragony]

Maybe this https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iCEDfZgDPS8

I relax with this by the way, never been all that hot on too much fanfare, I like beauty in simplicity. Not what you are looking for but if you want to expand your horizon a bit.

Satie https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hXAJ...eature=related I am 100% Satie was manically depressive.
Chopin https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YGRO05WcNDk pure tranquility.

[Louis VI the Fat]

Thanks for that, I'm listening to some Wagner on YouTube now (The very idea of which seems so strange to me... the internet being used for rather high culture...) and it does seem about right. Are there any other similar composers people can recommend to me?

EDIT: Preferably something more symphonic, as I prefer that to Opera in my previous experience.

I protest the division between High and Low culture etc etc.


Anyway, based on your comments, I'd suggest trying these works, easily accesible:

Tchaikovsky 1812. The definition of bombast. Complete with cannon blasts and all.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u2W1Wi2U9sQ


Dvořák's Ninth Symphony - so very beautiful. (The accents here are more than pedantry, it tries to respect the pronunciation as 'Dvorzhak')
The fourth movement should suit you:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_OaU...A3A0AE&index=4
But the best part is the hauntingly beautiful second movement:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-ENf4VEhI40
The symphony was written as an ode to the new world. (I.e. America)


German romantic symphonies, especially Beethoven and Brahms.
Beethoven's Ninth is the greatest music ever written. The fourth movement is not of this earth.
Its most glorious performance was in 1989:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=imv2...eature=related

[Lemur]

Beethoven's Ninth is the greatest music ever written. The fourth movement is not of this earth.
Its most glorious performance was in 1989:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=imv2...eature=related

Lies and poppycock. Everyone knows Beethoven's Ninth was ripped off from American bluegrass music. Here's the proof.

[Azathoth]

Moldau.

[Subotan]

Most Wagner should suit your needs.

Takes a while to get going https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1edE...M&feature=fvsr <- my favorite

I can't listen to Wagner without the ghost of Nietzsche screaming in my ear that he's an idiot :[

***

Shosty (Or, Shostakovich if you want to be accurate) is always good fun. The Festive Overture is particularly good, mainly for the stomping tuba solo at 1:55
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0kBGP9iv1qw

Gustav Holst is also another favourite, with the Suite in Eb being my favourite piece, again because of the Tuba.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ehb6...eature=related
The suite is composed of three movements. You'll probably find the third the most interesting, which begins at 7:38

[Scienter]

I can't listen to Wagner without the ghost of Nietzsche screaming in my ear that he's an idiot :[

***

Shosty (Or, Shostakovich if you want to be accurate) is always good fun. The Festive Overture is particularly good, mainly for the stomping tuba solo at 1:55
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0kBGP9iv1qw

Gustav Holst is also another favourite, with the Suite in Eb being my favourite piece, again because of the Tuba.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ehb6...eature=related
The suite is composed of three movements. You'll probably find the third the most interesting, which begins at 7:38

Holst's Planets are aslo really fun. I like Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition.

[Beskar]

Rachmaninov, Liszt, Brahms, Gershwin, Beethoven, Chopin, Mozart, Debussy, Ravel, Strauss, Berlioz, Stravinsky, Franck, Dukas and Bach

Have a big fun long listen, though you can easily get one of those packs with like 40 odd CD's of everything for around $30 or so, or used to have them.. I remember them advertised around 6 years ago...

[Aemilius Paulus]

Well as a change from my usual punk and hardcore music I have had a recent urge to listen to some classical music, mostly so I can relax whilst doing homework, etc. I have listened to some of it in the past and generally prefer the more fast-paced and militaristic pieces.

So yes, any recommendations?

Well, although Mozart is not my choice, here is his complete collection of 16 GB (yes, the torrent is actually legal due to the lack of copyright on his work).

I myself am more partial to Shostakovich (in accordance with the copyright law of 1973 which gives a 25 year period after the death of the author - Shosta died in '75) - and Beethoven but that is my personal preference. (both links are the full collections IIRC)

Links deleted by busybody mods, Lemur

[CountArach]

If I am not mistaken the musical scores themselves are public, but the recordings are not because they are the property of those who performed them. Not entirely sure though. Also linking to Torrent sites is prohibitted according to the site's rules, so you may want to remove those.

Thanks for the recommendations everyone, I have some listening to do.

EDIT: Oh and Lemur, I actually cringed at that...

[Lemur]

To clarify for CA and AP, there's nothing wrong with torrents per se; both Europa Barbarorum and Ubuntu are best grabbed as torrents.

That said, CA is correct, all of those recordings are probably in copyright, so I'm deleting the linkies, AP, and you should know better going forward. The musical scores are free of copyright, but the recordings of the performances are probably not.

EDIT: Oh and Lemur, I actually cringed at that...

And I am now officially obsessed with Beethoven on the banjo. Here's a more epic version of Ode to Joy.

[CountArach]

I protest the division between High and Low culture etc etc.

I know, so do I. It was meant as a wry observation more than anything else.

Dvořák's Ninth Symphony - so very beautiful. (The accents here are more than pedantry, it tries to respect the pronunciation as 'Dvorzhak')
The fourth movement should suit you:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_OaU...A3A0AE&index=4
But the best part is the hauntingly beautiful second movement:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-ENf4VEhI40
The symphony was written as an ode to the new world. (I.e. America)

I'm just listening through the 4th Movement now, and wow... this is fantastic.

[Beskar]

I just found out I actually know some one in the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Choir, weird.

[Louis VI the Fat]

I'm just listening through the 4th Movement now, and wow... this is fantastic.

I love watching it together with paintings of the Hudson River School. The two mix, reinforce one another, as beef and Bordeaux becoming one in entrecôte Bordelaise.


19th century America sought to express, to find, its identity, in its landscapes. Art representative of the dramas of settling a new continent. A new man, a new freedom, a new world. But still grounded in European romanticism. America is always at its best when it mixes European with something completely new. They mix like cèpes and chestnuts, so very different, at once contrasting and complementarity.


Then by the end of the 19th century Americans grew rich and could afford boat fares to Paris to study European arts, and decadence and festering decay was spread to American arts.
New European immigrants by then, meanwhile, found not the wide open spaces of virgin land anymore, but urban blight and poverty.
Ah well, we can still dream of America as paradise. What an age, what a splendid new world!

[/all sorts of tangents]

[Aemilius Paulus]

To clarify for CA and AP, there's nothing wrong with torrents per se; both Europa Barbarorum and Ubuntu are best grabbed as torrents.

That said, CA is correct, all of those recordings are probably in copyright, so I'm deleting the linkies, AP, and you should know better going forward. The musical scores are free of copyright, but the recordings of the performances are probably not.

Good thing I asked before posting, or else I would have been in trouble

So if the music is uncopyrighted, does that not mean the recordings are free to distribute? Not sure about this, I will have to check the source of that music. If the Shostakovich music was recorded by the Russians, it is likely free to distribute. The rest I cannot answer for.

[CountArach]

Good thing I asked before posting, or else I would have been in trouble

So if the music is uncopyrighted, does that not mean the recordings are free to distribute? Not sure about this, I will have to check the source of that music. If the Shostakovich music was recorded by the Russians, it is likely free to distribute. The rest I cannot answer for.

It is free to distribute if there is no copyright on the recording itself, or the copyright is specifically public domain (You will find that most are not).

Now listening to Wagner's Das Rheingold Scene 1... not understanding what is going on, but it is very nice music, particularly the violins screaming out.

[Lemur]

So if the music is uncopyrighted, does that not mean the recordings are free to distribute?

No. No. No. In music there are many angles of copyright and licensing. Let's boil this down: If I record Bruce Springsteen playing "Mary Had a Little Lamb," I may not distribute that recording without Mr. Springsteen's permission. "Mary Had a Little Lamb" is public domain, but Springsteen's performance of it is not.

If the Shostakovich music was recorded by the Russians, it is likely free to distribute.

That may well be. There's a whole sub-class of works that either weren't copyrighted or were incorrectly copyrighted. For example, the original Night of the Living Dead was never copyrighted, so you can legally sell copies of it. Weird but true.

[Fragony]

I like Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition.

Yeah, especially Gnomus, so dreamy and sinister https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IYY6kT_0cxE

[spmetla]

In terms of militaristic pieces I think the following two should be alright for you: Radetzky Marsch and Preußens Gloria