Help me with a classical music project

Cafe Society
1

I want to put together a CD, mostly because I feel like it, possibly as a future tool in the fight against musical ignorance of overexposed pieces followed by other, better music that composer also wrote. For example:

Vivaldi
Four Seasons: Spring
Four Seasons: Winter

Bach
That goddamned minuet
Something good (from one of the Passions?)

Etc. So please suggest some well-known and overrated pieces and alternatives :slight_smile:

2

For the second Bach you could use the aria (opening theme) from the Goldberg Variations, or something from Art Of Fugue.

Beethoven: Fur Elise and Sonata Opus 101, first movement
Brahms: Hungarian Dance #5 and Opus 118, #2
Chopin: Waltz Opus 18, Barcarolle Opus 60
Mozart: Eine Kleine Nachtmusic, Symphonia Concertante for Violin & Viola, K364

3

Tchaikovsky
The Nutcracker
Symphony #4

Ravel
Bolero
Tombeau de Couperin

Prokofiev
Peter and the Wolf
Piano Concerto #3

Beethoven
5th Symphony
Archduke Trio

4

Prokofiev
Piano Concerto #3 :wink:
Sixth symphony

Beethoven
6th symphony
4th symphony

Ravel
Mother Goose suite
Scheherazade

Britten
Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra
Sinfonia da Requiem

5

For Mozart, try Lacrimosa from his Requiem. Sends shivers down my spine everytime. For a more dramatic Lacrymosa, try Verdi’s.

Sibelius’ Concerto for Violin and Orchestra in D minor is freaking fantastic, especially Maxim Vengerov’s rendition (be patient - there’s a fantastic couple of bars that repeat themselves throughout the first movement).

From Leoncavallo, Vesti la giubba, from his Pagliacci.

6

Vengerov’s got nothing on Oistrakh’s performances

7

Debussy (piano)
Clair de lune
The rest of Suite Bergamesque
Images I & II

Debussy (orchestral)
Prelude to the afternoon of a faun
Nocturnes

Holst
The Planets
Choral Hymns from the Rig Veda, third group
Hymn of Jesus

8

Hey, these are good :slight_smile:

May I ask, though, that you keep your well-known music suggestions to “things the average yutz would have heard without making any effort whatsoever to acquaint themselves with classical music” and not “music that anyone who knows anything about classical will have heard”?