My mom had a collection of ten classical LPs, one of which was the 1812 Overture. I was sufficiently fascinated by the mechanical action of the turntable itself, letting one stack six records and shutting itself off after the last, etc. that playing with the turntable was as enjoyable as the music itself, which I even came to appreciate.
Plus I was reflexively anti-cool as a kid, indifferent to whatever passed for popular music. Sure, Samantha Fox was hot, but even at that age I knew her music was vapid.
I have listened to classical, big band, swing, jazz, blues and folk all my life, I don’t remember ever not listening to classical. When I was very young I would fill in for my Dad and go to the Rochester Philharmonic on Thursday evenings - we had season tickets. I have Ogden Nash doing Saint-Saens Carnival of the Animals that was given to me when I was very young, I should really get it converted to MP3.
Both my parents sang in church choir when they were younger, and my father played amateur violin, so they were both interested in classical music. We had LPs and later the classical 45s. My older brother sang and played the organ and classical piano and eventually taught music at a high school.
I can’t remember my very first experience. It was always part of my life. Among my early experiences were the following:
Four children’s records using classical music as background: Oswald the Rabbit (Haydn’s Surprise Symphony); Sunshine (Semiramide and other Rossini overtures); The Lonesome Pine (Beethoven’s 6th); Madeline (Schubert’s incidental music to “Rosamunde”).
Fantasia
Around age 8, after hearing the Scherchen recording of Handel’s Messiah (mono) many times, singing “O thou that tellest” to myself from memory, trying to get the 3 sections in the right order.
Hearing the music at the end of Hemo the Magnificent and being told it was Beethoven’s 9th symphony.
A 78 rpm record presenting and comparing the instruments of the orchestra, the only part I remember being how much better Rameau’s Tambourin sounds on the harpsichord as opposed to the grand piano.
Classical music in cartoons.
I’m sure there was classical music in church, too. I remember hearing “Hodie” from Dubois’ Seven Last Words many times.
My parents listened to classical music a lot when I was growing up, with J.S. Bach a particular favorite, and for many years going to a live performance of Handel’s Messiah was a Christmas tradition in our family. The Warner Bros. cartoons exposed me to some opera at an early age, and I distinctly remember my elementary-school music teacher playing Handel’s Water Music in class, and totally knocking my socks off.
Back in the eighties when I started working fulltime, I was putting together a record collection. And one of the things I bought was albums in the CBS Great Performances series. It was a basic library of classical pieces, which was a good way for somebody like me to get some exposure to classical music.
Whilst I feel certain that music was played on the radio during my formative years, probably its introduction was enhanced upon arriving at infants school in the early 1950’s, where each morning following assembly, the headmaster Mr Brooking would have the class recline cross-legged and place a 78rpm recording of classical music on the gramophone for us to listen to. This happened every school morning for the best part of six years. At the end of each month, he would invite us to list our ten favourites; in effect becoming a hit-parade of classical music. As you can imagine, it was usually stirring music that children would highlight. From memory the best loved were Elgar’s Pomp and Circumstance, Gustav Holst’s The Planet Suite and Wagner’s Ride of the Valkyries.
From time to time, the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra would visit the school and each year we attended a concert at the Birmingham Town Hall to listen to music performed by the CBSO under the baton of either Sir Adrian Boult or Andrzej Panufnik.
In the past – I hasten to add I was not present - Felix Mendelssohn composed a number of works especially for Birmingham, his oratorio Elijah remains the most well-known. A popular, as well as revered, performer, on one occasion when he played the organ at the Town Hall the audience “waved their handkerchiefs and flourished their hats”.
I first heard a lot of classical music in movies, TV shows, and cartoons as mentioned). I think everyone my age first heard Aram Khachaturian’s Sabre Dance while watching people spinning plates on the ends of stickls on The Ed Sullivan Show (or something similar).
I think I first heard good recordings of classical music at planetarium shows. New York’s Hayden Planetarium used to use things like Gustav Holst’s Planets Suite or Mozart’s Jupiter Symphony to give auditory signatures to their astronomical lectures, and as incidental music before and after shows.
Finally, my mother had a record called Fifty Great Moments in Music. While its goel – giving you a taste of many of the great classical works, even if only a few minutes long – might be questionable (as one of my teachers remarked, it’s like giving only the best mouthful of a steak), it at least whetted my appetite to hear more.
As a last note, when I was in parochial school, one of the nuns gave her own little course on classical music. The main problem with this course was that it was all lecture – there was no music in it. Not one recording in any form. To this day, I haven’t heard Tyl Eulenspiegel’s Merry Pranks. And have no desire to.
My dad listened to it every day. I liked the symphonies but pass on opera. He took me to concerts to hear the Detroit Symphony Orchestra. Back when I was growing up, they even had some free concerts.
My good friend, the recently deceased Dave. He got me all stoned and then dipped into his father’s collection of classical vinyl. My mind was thoroughly blown! I particularly remember listening to Bach’s Toccata and Fugue in D minor and being utterly astonished. It was familiar but with a good buzz I was getting the full effect!
One of my favorites to this day. I still get in the mood for that stuff once in a while.
My parents played some records and tapes that were classical, church songs old enough to be beyond-classical were a part of my childhood, but what made me conscious of Classical music was Music Class in school.
We had to take “music theory” (sorry, m-w doesn’t know how to translate “solfeo” and I don’t have my paper dictionary here) and learn to play that-bloody-flute starting in 4th grade. Many of the songs were folk ones, others came with author’s names. I remember a Barcarola (Offenbach’s) which was quite stunning because on one hand it was quite easy to play(*) yet at the same time even I could tell that it wasn’t just some little ditty someone had pulled out of his left armpit, it was the result of a lot of thought. Pour Elise on the other hand got pretty “bleh” reviews (sorry Ludwig).
*: mind you, Offenbach probably would have thrown a fit hearing our version. I’ve been told that “you Navarrese can be recognized because you turn any song into a war hymn”; the tempo we used when the teacher wasn’t there to say “slower! slower!” was 3 to 5 times faster than what I find in youtube.
I forgot this. I have a vague, unverified memory that long ago the Adler Planetarium used the “Daybreak” section from Ravel’s Daphnis and Chloe at the end of their shows (as the “sky” brightened and the “sun” rose).
We had 78s of various romantic composers that I played a lot as a small child. In elementary school I was exposed to a good bit, especially in 6th grade, when music class consisted entirely of the teacher playing records (greatest class ever!). This was also mainly romantic, orchestral music, with a dollop of Haydn (strangely, not Mozart) and Beethoven, and some of the more melodic 20th Century stuff.
I greatly preferred romantic music, especially Grieg, Tchaikovsky, and Dvorak, over 50s rock and roll. The only thing I liked better was folk music.
I didn’t really start listening to “true” classical music till my early 20s. And oddly enough, I didn’t encounter Bach until my late 20s when, on a whim, I bought a music appreciation collection at a college bookstore. I bought it mainly for the medieval and renaissance music it contained, which I’ve always liked, but then I put on the fifth Brandenburg concerto. That was huge for me. It was like, “Holy crap, this is better than all the other stuff I’ve listened to over the years put together!” Bach remains by far my favorite composer.
In my early 50s I was casually watching a PBS special with Sarah Brightman, who was mixing up Andrew Lloyd Webber material with operatic arias. Although the ALW seemed as crappy to me as ever, I found myself drawn to the operatic pieces, and started going to the opera. I guess that’s something that happens on the way to old-farthood.
From Andrew it’s a short hop to Julian Lloyd Webber, who is a classical cellist.
I also found a couple of volumes of the Menus and Music boxed cookbooks with CDs in the thrift store. Since I am sucker for menu cookbooks, I bought them for the menus, got into the music.
Warner Brothers cartoons, The Lone Ranger. Really liked the music, although I didn’t realize it at the time.
A new neighbor moved in next door when I was fourteen. He was a classical pianist (a rather good one, I learned many years later) who practiced at all hours, including very late at night. My bedroom window was where our house was closest to his, so I couldn’t help listening to him. It irritated the hell out of my parents, but it quickly dawned on me: “Hey… I love classical music!”
Five years later I was studying classical piano in college.
My parents listened to classical music and played records of it. From the time I was a baby, they played it for me. I can’t remember a time before I knew of classical music.
