Your favourite classical composer(s)?

Um, a few in no particularly fussy order

Poulenc (whom noone's mentioned yet : (... his concerto for two pianos is extraordinary)
Saint-Saens
Rachmaninov
Grieg
Bach
Stravinsky, but that's more or less obligatory here

this is worth reporting-
          today i heard what i feel is the greatest recording of Bruckner's 6th Symphony -a studio stereo one recorded in 1963 conducted by Joseph Keilberth with the Berlin Philharmonic
             it is an example of an absolutely perfect recording in every way

The T wrote: but many acts, specially bands like Gentle Giant, I just cant stand anymore.

I never could stand this band.

aginor wrote: can someone pleace recomend me some Rachmaninov, I have heard that he is very complex and "prog" in he's composing

the best music of Rach's ouput are the symphonies-there are 3  of them-conductor Lorin Maazel has recorded all three in a set which is quite lovely-if you can find it, i would suggest the 3rd Symphony conducted by Dr. Serge Koussevitzky who is a brilliant interpreter of this composer
         Rachmaninov was also a conductor and recorded the 3rd-highly recommended
     many people think highly of his piano music-for me it is ok, but the symphonies are a must
      

what motivated me was seeing Amadeus-the very next day i went to the local library and borrowed some Time Life box sets -that started the wheels in motion-i have listened to classical music practically every day since, and that was in the summer of 1985
           for me, Bruckner and Berlioz are at the top of the heap.. though like some other people, there are so many composers  that i listen to  that it is hard  to cover all bases
         there are about 45 different classical composers that i collect and listen to but hardly any of them approach what Bruckner and Berlioz do  for me

BaldJean wrote: you probably mean "Grieg", not "Greig"

Grieg's great-grandfather was Scottish and the original family name was Greig. The name was only later changed to Grieg, so crimhead isn't that far from the truth.

Now as an answer to your complementary question, I got into classical music from a very early age. It all started when I heard Bach being played on church organ as a little kid. I instantly fell in love with both Bach's music and the church organ.

I started playing piano when I was seven years old and soon made the leap to classical music. Initially I played mostly Bach, Haydn and Mozart to improve my technique and went on to play a wide array of Romantic works by various composers. I've been in love with classical music ever since, especially the baroque and Romantic periods.




Edited by Zebedee - August 08 2010 at 16:57

Stravinski and Shostakovich

Complementation of my question:

Edited by Gandalff - August 09 2010 at 01:40

Beethoven
Bach
Mozart
Copland
Tchaikovsky
Mussorsky
Ravel
Greig

if I made a full list of them I would not know when to stop - there are so many of them.

first of all Johann Sebastian Bach. he is the Alpha and the Omega. "The Art of  Fugue",, "The Brandenburg Concertos", "The Well-Tempered Clavier", the "Mass in B Minor", "The Goldberg Variations", "The St, Matthew Passion",  "The Musical Offering", to name just a few of his works.

Gustav Mahler.  I especially love his 9th symphony, his "Songs of a Wayfarer", his "Song of the Earth" and  his "Children's Death Songs",

Ludwig van Beethoven, especially his 5th, 7th and 9th symphony, but also his "Egmont Overture", his violin concerto and his numerous piano works.

Carlo Gesualdo. He is not that famous, and many may not have heard his name before, but his madrigals move me like nothing else. just listen to this:


Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, especially for his piano concertos, but also his operas "The Magic Flute" and, most of all, "Don Giovanni", which is unsurpassed.

and a long long list of others - too many to mention them all. Felix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy, Maurice Ravel, Claude Debussy,  Antonin Dvorak, Bedrich Smetana, Joseph Haydn and and and.....


Edited by BaldJean - August 08 2010 at 14:14