Any reccomendations?

That's a tough one, Floyd. There's 400 years or so to cover, and a lot of very divergent types of musical expression.

I would suggest trying something by Johann Sebastian Bach, then a symphony by Mozart or Beethoven, then maybe a "late romantic" such as Dvorak or Brahms, or an early modern like Debussy or Ravel, and then a more modern composer like Stravinski or Aaron Copland.

As for specific works by the composers I mentioned, may I suggest:

Bach: the Brandenburg Concerti
Mozart: Symphonies 40 and 41
Beethoven: Symphony 5
Dvorak: Symphony 9 ("From The New World")
Brahms: Symphony 1
Debussy: La Mer
Ravel: Mother Goose (full ballet score)
Stravinski: Rite of Spring or Firebird (full ballet score)
Copland: Appalachian Spring or Symphony 3

Try those to figure out what period you're most interested in, and go from there.

It's probably more important to use performers as a starting point. You could end up with a great piece of music and a crappy performance...and that will most likely discourage you. I'm sure you can look up all the big, famous classical pieces yourself...Maybe this will lead you in a better direction:

Avoid Karajan (German conductor) like the plague. His vintage stuff is good...but he tends to make music sound inaccessible and sluggish.
Avoid Charlotte Church (Welsh opera "singer") like the plague. If you like Church's singing, you don't really like music. Same with that Celtic garbage.

Definitely look up Fritz Reiner (Hungarian conductor): get anything from the RCA/BMG "Living Stereo" series.
Reiner notables include:
Bartok's Concerto for Orchestra...etc
Dvorak's 9th Symphony
Rimsky-Korsakov's Scheherazade

Charles Munch is another great (French) conductor...if you can find his Walter Piston cycle, LET ME KNOW where you got it!

Glenn Gould (piano):
It's good to have J. S. Bach's Goldberg Variations...both 1955 and 1982 recordings are good. You can get them both together on Sony's "A State of Wonder" release. I know...what a dumb title! It's a quote from Gould himself. Seriously though, this 3CD set is a great bargain at a little over ten bucks...well, great considering Sony's bait-and-switch tactics with its once "bargain" priced Glenn Gould series on CD. There's also a DVD you can get of the 1982 recording session (by Bruno Monsaingeon, GG's friend). Amazing to watch!

Look up BIS. It's a Swedish record label distributed by Qualiton Imports LTD in NYC. Basically, northern European music rocks (Kokkonen, Aho, Holmboe's symphonic cycle) The Martinu (Czech) symphonic cycle on BIS is killer (Neeme Jarvi conducts...he's great with the more obscure symphonic stuff, but he kind of spreads himself thin. He's made, like, millions of recordings.)

I got into classical music because of Arnold Schoenberg...more specifically, the chamber symphonies and other orchestral stuff. So you don't necessarily have to start out with Tchaikovsky and Mozart.

Oh, the Lasalle Quartet released a great boxed set of Schoenberg's, Webern's, and Berg's muic (2nd Viennese Schule).

Mahler is important to have...
Simon Rattle and Klemperer (much doomier) do great 2nds
In my opinion, George Szell does the best 6th
The Fifth, of course...Giuseppe Sinopoli, Leonard Bernstein, Solti.
The ninth, Sir John Barbirolli

If you can find E. Mravinsky's recording of Hindemith's Harmonie der Welt and Honegger's 3rd symphony (on Melodiya/BMG), do not pass it up! It's metal.

Violinists: David Oistrakh, N. Milstein, Bartok's friend: Joseph Szigeti (on older recordings only), Mischa Elman (mostly older recordings)...

Pianists: Sviatoslav Richter, Emil Gilels, Martha Argerich, M. Pollini, A. Michelangeli, Ivan Moravec...

Cellists: Janos Starker, Jacqueline Du Pré, Mstislav Rostropovich...

Horn: Dennis Brain

Almost forgot the best part, conductors: Fritz Reiner, Charles Munch, Leopold Stokowski, Otto Klemperer, Bruno Walter, Wilhelm Furtwangler, Sergiu Celibidache (hated recording, but there ARE some out there), Evgeny Mravinsky, Sir Thomas Beecham, Sir John Barbirolli, Serge Koussevitzky...and countless others.

Mercury Living Presence recordings are amazing if you can handle the "Presence" of the sound.

If you have a library nearby that lends CDs...seriously, that's the best place to start. Just go nuts.

Thanks for the suggestions fellas, I really appreciate it.

My favorite composer of all time, no less...but I don't think it would be a very good idea to start with him, if classical is a new thing to you. You need some grounding before getting into Mahler's work (although a lot of rock people might find him more accessible than many other composers, because of the extreme emotional intensity, sense of the surreal, and occasional sarcasm found there).

Many excellent recommendations. It's sacrilegious to music (at least in my opinion), to not include Beethoven's 9th Symphony, which is The King of Symphonies. That Beethoven was deaf while composing a good majority of the 9th only adds to the luster.

I would also add in Beethoven's Piano Sonata's and String Quartets.

Bach's Solo Cello Suites.

When I have time (sometime in the next decade ) I will respond in more detail. Even actual recordings I prefer.


A few of my favorite composers

Beethoven - It's good to be the DA KING!
Mozart - The Crown Prince is almost there.
J. S. Bach
Wagner
Hayden
Mahler
Schubert
Schumann
Chopin
Rachmoninov
Debussy
Stravinsky
Webern
Dvorak
Brahms
Sibelius
Tchaicovsky
Liszt





A few of those from the last century


Bela Bartok
Aaron Copeland
Dimitri Shostakovich
Arnold Schoenberg
Alban Berg
Charles Ives
Karlheinz Stockhausen
Morton Feldman
Arvo Part
John Cage
Phillip Glass
Iannis Xenakis

... Roivas has gotta be the exception to the rule here... if you want to wind up liking some or much of "classical" music, *DON'T* start with Schoenberg. He was marginally ok (and maybe almost a thirteenth as interesting as his two disciples-- Berg and Webern.) before he thought he'd made the greatest discovery of music for the 20th century and went off on his 12-tone serialist tangent and wasted just about the rest of his life on it... (as well as influencing a legion of other composers to waste much of their lives on it as well...)
...as a composer I think of Schoenberg the same way Roivas thinks of the conductor H. von Karajan: clunky at best. To me he's sort of the Karl Marx of Music. He had a really interesting *theory* about what would make great music. Like Marx's theories about what would make a great society, Schoenberg's 12-tone theory looks pretty interesting when you read about it. But in practical application, composing as well as listening it can be pretty dull and restrictive. If you feel you really HAVE to check out 12-tone serialist stuff first, start with Berg or Webern. These two far outshine their teacher.

-- drsquid

Squidquote follows:
Yes, I KNOW it's an albatross, but what flavor is it?

I guess I don't believe in spoonfeeding people classical music...like, Mozart is baby food...then we can introduce some Bach after a couple years. Folks, this is how people end up with those Vivaldi's Greatest Hits records.

I'm all for a head on musical collision.

I don't know why you have to drown me, though...or where you even got that emoticon.

Re: Beethoven recordings to go find:
Why not just get 'em all at once? George Szell's boxed set is great. The "Eroica" (3rd) might not be the best interpretation, but the rest is amazing.
Carlos Kleiber's 4th and 5th are pretty much regarded as the best.

Jim Svejda's books are fun to read and GREAT for beginners. He has a radio show out of USC. No one agrees with everything he says, but he's very helpful.

Anyway, re: serialism...I was just trying to prevent the topic starter from getting stuck in the never ending Bach-Mozart-Tchaikovsky whirlpool. It doesn't have to be Schoenberg, it could be...let's say Janacek!

Arnold Schoenberg always gets a bad reaction...even in L.A. (a very HIP little town, right?)...after Esa-Pekka performed some of his (pre-serial) stuff, I think it was Transfigured Night (not serial, inspired by Wagner), there were ALL THESE hateful letters to the L.A. Weekley. Schoenberg's not even modern anymore and he still gets a reaction. Gotta love it! The name Schoenberg itself, much like atonal has become sort of a pejorative and it's acceptable for people to make gagging noises when these words are mentioned. They usually haven't really listened to his music.

BTW, Webern is the one who REALLY serialized music...and then, well, Boulez...but we can talk about him some other time.

For easy listening:
Transfigured Night (Verklarte Nacht Op.4)
Ode to Napoleon (get the LaSalle Quartet playing it)
Chamber Symphonies (Kammersymphonies)

Not so easy listening:

His solo piano music beautifully played by Paul Jacobs or Maurizio Pollini.

So much to get into, it is hard to say I find that if you start with classical period, romantic or baroque it is easiest to listen to. But if you are very curious about crazy worlds of music, go for anything post the romantinc period.

Standard folks to start with I woudl say are:
Bach
Mozart
Betthoven
Chopin
Rachmaninov

I myself could not live life without the second piano concerto of Rachmaninov (I feel that way when I hear it). I would love to recomend this piece for you, I hope you love it also

I'm not drowning YOU... It's more like the listener drowning in boring 12-tone crap.
Anywho, for the icons go to --> http://www.click-smilies.de/smilies_engl.html


Janacek could work for me... .... go later and somebody like Bartok, or later Ligeti, or Penderecki could REALLY work for me... "modern-classical" ... errrr so to speak... maybe "neo-classical" -- ala Stravinisky ... but then I don't really want to get into that whole neo-classicism vs. serialism thing. old news. ancient history.


...or maybe they HAVE listened to his "music" and haven't found enough actual "music" IN it... don't get me wrong. This has nothing to do with tonality. Atonal is just fine. In fact, I think some of Schoenberg's most listenable stuff is in his atonal period right before the 12-tone stuff.


...yeah.. and yet somehow Webern does have his moments DESPITE the serialism... and Berg REALLY has his moments. IMHO Berg was really more of a Mahler man than a Schoenberg man deep down in his heart of hearts. ... as for Boulez... well...
... he can stick to conducting I guess...

--- drsquid

Squid Quote of the moment:
Physiology? ... OH! You mean the study of corbonated beverages?!