Suggest some lesser known works by famous composers

Cafe Society
1

I have amazon prime music plus, so I can basically stream almost anything.

I’m looking to go deeper into a few composers who I’m already familiar with. Please suggest some other works that I might enjoy by them that aren’t as well known.

Handel: I enjoy Messiah, Water Music, Music for the Royal Fireworks, the Coronation overtures, and the Organ concertos

Haydn: He wrote so many symphonies and string quartets that I could spend a lifetime exploring them. I’m particularly in love with his string quartets.

Beethoven. Probably nothing of Beethoven is ‘lesser known’ but I particularly like Symphony No. 1 and No. 7, String Quartet Op. 18 No. 2, and the Archduke Piano trio.

Ravel. I love his string quartet as well as the full Daphnis et Chloé

Schumann: I like all 4 symphonies, with #1 being my favorite. I also enjoy his string quartets.

Two composers that I don’t know very well, but want to explore are Elgar and Ralph Vaughan Williams. I listen to BBC Radio 3 quite often both composers are often played.

Please suggest away! And, if there are other composers you think I should explore based on what I’ve listed above, feel free to mention them as well.

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It’s pretty popular, but in case you aren’t familiar, try Dvorak’s “Serenade for Strings.”

You also might like Schubert.

3

John Williams composed the theme song to Lost in Space, a pretty jazzy little tune completely different from his later work, for which he is much better-known.

4

Bach’s cantatas. (Micro-operas, so to speak.) My personal favorite is “Hercules at the Crossroads.” Another wonderful one is “Flow Gently, Playful Rivers.”

Telemann’s “Don Quixote” (or Don Quichotte.) Also, Telemann’s “Hamburg Ebb and Flow.”

Beethoven’s opera overtures, perhaps the best of which is Leonore #3.

ETA: Boccherini’s Quintettino, ending with the majestic “retreat of the military nightwatch of Madrid.” The whole work is a gem!

5

Beethoven’s Septet, about which Richard Wagner wrote. Also the Violin Sonata No. 9 (“Kreutzer”) which is the one Beethoven piece of which I will never tire.

Handel’s Chandos Anthems. Also his charming flute sonatas – I play the flute, and they are as fun to play as they are to hear.

Elgar’s First Symphony is excellent, and uncharacteristic of him.

Vaughn-Williams: I like the Third Symphony (“Pastoral”), the Sixth (with the weird and eerie final movement) and the Seventh (based on his film music for Scott of the Antarctic, with the wind machines and all of the fatal and subzero themes).

If you like the Brit composers (I do) try Arnold Bax. Start with his tone poem Tintagel, then go on to the symphonies.

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Beethoven’s Great Fugue. Probably his most ahead-of-its-time work.

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Have you tried any of his other oratorios? Israel in Egypt is kind of fun: the ten plagues set to music! (Also second Ike’s suggestion of the Chandos Anthems.)

His “Choral Fantasy” is an odd but interesting piece. Starts out as a solo piano work and turns into a preview of the Choral (9th) Symphony.

They may not be “lesser known,” but don’t miss his piano quintet and piano quartet.

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There’s a lot of Dvorak that’s worth exploring. Since the OP seems to like string quartets, I recommend some of those (the “American” is probably the most popular).

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Re Schubert, I love the Octet in F, which I don’t have a clue if it qualifies as lesser-known. Plus I imagine he noticed Beethoven’s septet and thought, “well, this goes to eight!”

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Some of my suggestions from an earlier thread Your favorite not-super-famous pieces of classical music... - Cafe Society - Straight Dope Message Board

Ravel
Sheherezade (try the Victoria de los Angeles performance if available)
Miroirs No. 5, “La Vallée des Cloches”

Holst
Choral Hymns from the Rig Veda, group 3. Also try group 2.
Hymn of Jesus

Vaughan Williams
Five Mystical Songs for baritone, chorus and orchestra part 1 part 2 (the last one, Antiphon, is fairly well-known) (Thomas Allen is almost perfect in this performance)
The Wasps incidental music
Hodie (Christmas cantata)

Handel
Judas Maccabeus Arias “Sound an alarm!”, “Let the bright seraphim”. Final chorus “Hallelujah, amen!”
Acis and Galatea Aria “O ruddier than the cherry”. Duet “Happy we!”

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Handel : Great suggestions so far, so I’ll only add the logical follow-up i.e. …

Bach. Try the sacred vocal works, the dramatic and gorgeous St Matthew Passion first and foremost. I’d advise against listening to the whole 3-hour piece initailly. Find some exerpts which must however include the opening and closing choruses (Kommt, ihr Töchter, helft mir klagen + Wir setzen uns mit Tränen nieder, respectively) as well as the aria Erbarme dich. Want more ? Go for the extatic Magnificat or some of the cantatas (Ich glaube, lieber Herr, hilf meinem Unglauben, BWV 109 + Herz und Mund und Tat und Leben, BWV 147 are personal favourites but there are almost 200 to choose from…).

If you prefer instrumental works, you could check out some of the solo harpsichord/piano pieces in the Well-Tempered Clavier (Book 1, preludes and fugues 1, 2, 4, 16 for a start), the flute sonatas (BWV 1030 first), the cello suites (1 is the most famous one), the orchestral suites (2 and 3) or the violin concertos.

Beethoven : his piano sonatas are essential, all 32 of them. Ok, more realistically, start with the famous ones (8 “Pathetic”, 14 “Moonlight”, 15 “Pastoral”) and then move on to the introspective, metaphysical last ones (30, 31 and especially 32). Once you’re hooked, you’ll want to know them all. You should also give his piano concertos (4 and 5) and symphonies a try (at least the fifth !). And, as jayjay mentioned, his Great Fugue, too.

Logical follow-up : Brahms ! First and foremost his late piano pieces op. 116-119 as well as his clarinet quintet, all of these are achingly beautiful, the works of a composer in the autumn of his life who masters his art totally. Wistful but never maudlin. Then, his chamber works (the first cello sonata, the third violin sonata), symphonies 4 (!) and 1 as well as the first piano concerto

Ravel. The piano concerto in G, with one of the most beautiful slow movement in the whole repertoire. His solo piano cycle “Miroirs” is also wonderful as well as his vocal works : “Shéhérazade”, “Chansons Madécasses” and “Trois Poèmes de Stéphane Mallarmé” (the latter is perhaps Ravel’s most experimental piece, so leave it for later).

Logical follow-up : Debussy (actually the oldest of the two composers). The piano works (Préludes, Images and Estampes + Six Epigraphes Antiques for two pianos) and the orchestral pieces (La Mer, Prélude à l’Après-Midi d’un Faune, Trois Nocturnes).

If you still have some energy left (I hope my suggestions were not overwhelming), try Chopin’s heartbeaking Nocturnes and Tchaikovsky’s violin concerto.

I excluded almost all 20th-century composers as many are an acquired taste but some are well worth discovering, too.

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A bit more Holst: Suites 1 & 2 for military band

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Dvorak’s Stabat Mater. Schumann’s Fairy Tales (op. 132). Every single one of Mozart’s string quintets. All Haydn’s string quartets–for some reason, the same dozen or so, often with nicknames, are well known when there’s nary a dud in the bunch. His Opus 50 is one example of 6 unjustly ignored masterpieces. Dvorak and Schubert string quartets are much the same–a few (again, often with nicknames) you hear all the time, when virtually every single one is a joy to listen to. All Haydn Masses. Any of Saint-Saens’ 5 piano concertos.
The 4-hands-piano stuff Mozart composed. The 4-hands arrangement of the Grosse Fuge that Beethoven wrote (opus 134), for those already familiar with the string quartet version.
Someone above already mentioned Messiaen’s Turangalia Symphony–also pretty much anything else by this modern-era composer: much of it “inspired” by birdsong.

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Vaughn-Williams “The Lark Ascending” is one of my all-time favorite pieces of music, it’s beautiful.

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As for Beethoven, like the 4th movment of the Fourth Symphony quite a lot, though I have some excellent versions and some less interesting. “Ruins of Athens,” (Op. 113) was surprisingly good. And for something maybe not so good, but obscure today, try Wellington’s Victory, Op. 91.
Greenberg played a tiny bit of it to show how bad it was, and he played the good part. And it apparently made a lot of money, showing classical audiences might not have been a lot smarter than present day ones.

16

Samuel Barber’s Music for a Scene from Shelley is a terrific short piece that doesn’t get much attention compared to his other orchestral works.

I’ve played those more times than I can count! I actually think they’re overrated, and are performed constantly because they have Holst’s name on them. (I realize this isn’t a mainstream opinion.)

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I’m a big fan of Dvorak’s Piano Quintet #2, op.81. I first heard it when a group of teachers at a Summer music camp near my home town. The director of the program took part. :wink:

I’m also a big fan of Milhaud’s Le Boeuf sur le Toit.

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Beethoven’s Triple Concerto. There’s a great recording on YouTube that has it with Itzhak Perlman, Yo-yo Ma, and Daniel Barenboim. And then the Choral Fantasy right after as a bonus. His Violin Concerto as well, it remains my favorite piece I’ve ever played.

Schubert, the Trout Quintet and the Cello Quintet

Mendelssohn Octet

Dvorak Piano Quintet No. 2 and the New World Symphony

Tchaikovsky’s Serenade for Strings. There’s one recording on YouTube that’s done in the Catherine Palace in Tsarskoye Selo and the acoustics are really something.

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Brahms, definitely.

Start with the violin concerto, symphony 4, Ein Deutsches Requiem, and the clarinet quintet.

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The latter is generally recognized as one of the most beautiful chamber music pieces (and I agree with that). If you want to look for it, it is known as the Schubert string quintet.