Schnittke - Concerto Grosso No. 1 ?
hard to decide though.

have heard the Solti 7th and its very powerful - good suggestion for an alternative. however there's something Karajan brings out in the second movement (particularly with the way he ends it) that always brings goosebumps. it was the first version i ever heard, so maybe i'm biased there, but it must be the 1st cycle (from 1963?). in other versions of this piece he's become sloppy.

Berstein can be very flamboyant, i know. he irritates other classical music lovers i know, as well. thing is, on certain selections he's spot-on. his version of Gershwin's Rhapsody In Blue is perfection, and his Rite Of Spring (with the London Symphony not the NY Phil) is among the most demented i've heard. check it out, maybe. give him a second chance.

I will relisten my Karajan. When I was 10 I heard the toscanini recordings (the famous ones form long ago), then when I was a teen I bought Karajan. That was great. I think that when I first heard Solti and CSO, I really never wanted to listen to any other since I liked it so much (though they get a tad sloppy sometimes, you wold be surprised). Karajan is more tight form what I remember, but Solti was so passionate...

Bernstein tends to upset me as a conductor at times so I avoid him. I bet he is good with Gershwin, that makes sense Thanks for the suggestion!!

I am a tad ashamed to say this but I sort of like Boulez's Rite of Spring Generally I hate everything Boulez ever wrote. For me, he is the tailor in the story "The emperor wears no clothes" when it comes to his compositions and essays. What I ususally refer to Cerebral Masturbation

rachmaninoff- humoreske
philip glass- music in 12 parts
ligeti- the second etude, first book
john cage- the seasons
glenn branca- the ascension
debussy- brouillards/feuilles mortes

Awesome list.

Mozart (my favorite composer): Le nozze di Figaro (my favorite opera)
Beethoven: Piano Concerto No. 5 - Emperor (my favorite concerto)
Tchaikovsky: Swan Lake (my favorite ballet)
Wagner: Der Ring des Nibelungen
Bach: Saint Matthew Passion
Handel: Rinaldo

Those are my favorite composes. My favorite Symphony is Tchaikovsky's No. 2 - Little Russian, although Swan Lake is my favorite thing that he composed.

Oh, I love this piece...it is so cool. Too bad it's the only think I like from Glass

Naaaa - I absolutely love Vivaldi's Gloria - Especially when the Tenors break out in soli in the Domine Fili - except I cringe every time I hear it because in a performance I missed the entry, and alas so did the rest of the tenor section and it sounded weird...

Art of Fugue-Bach - String Quartet.

It's not really a string quartet.

It's just music. No instruments were designated by Bach.

I like the Canadian Brass doing it. The Julliard Quartet. Glenn Gould on pipes and piano out on Sony (he doesn't use the pedals on the organ either!)