Give me your recs!

[einahpets]

I love classical/instrumental/opera/choir music (well mostly baroque, but that's only if we're getting into specifics) and I listen to it a fair amount. Ironically, I'm not one who memorizes everything written by a composer. Heck, sometimes I'll listen to a piece more than once and not even know the composer or even the song title.

Anywoo, I'm sure I'm not alone. If you're up for it, please link me some of your favorite pieces (any era/genre ... medieval, renaissance, baroque, opera, classical, romantic, 20th century, contemporary, movie scores, etc.)

"Praetorius: Dances from Terpsichore - La Bouree" (Watch on YouTube)

I actually first heard this melody in a 1960s cover of Ding Dong the Witch is Dead, and I loved the melody so I did a search and found the source.

"Bajazet:Qual guerriero in campo armato" (Watch on YouTube)

Love music composed for castrati. It's one of my weird quirks.

"Rameau - Pièces de clavecin en concert N° 3 (Tambourin) / Il Giardino Armonico" (Watch on YouTube)

Rameau is the shit. He's like the best example of overly embellished baroque music. While I do enjoy a lot of his ballet-operas, I picked this piece because I love the demonstration of baroque ballet.

"Miserere mei Deus - University of Utah Singers" (Watch on YouTube)

This is just awesome, the haunting echo in the caves is insane.

"Smetana ~ Moldau" (Watch on YouTube)

Another melody I first heard in a pop song, well a Japanese pop song by my favorite voice actress. The night I heard the song played on the classical radio station I freaked out in excitement, but never got the title. Then when I was a freshman in college I took a music appreciation course and I finally got the title to my mystery song!
 

Comments

[scotscookie.livejournal.com]

Oh, my goodness - where to start! There's a classical music radio station in the UK, too, www.classicfm.com - I recommend a listen... it's what's always on my radio! You'll probably know most of these already but here they are anyway!

Sorry, I suck at embedding things but these are a few of the many I love (I can provide more... so many more...) I love choral music, and also piano music

part of Requiem for my friend by Preisner -always sends shivers down my spine.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xacflWZig8c

Another Requiem - this time Faure - this is the Pie Jesu
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6LxquaZZFQo


Carmina Burana by Carl Orff - another good choral piece with some thumping good tunes
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GD3VsesSBsw


Missa Solemnis by Beethoven - this is the Kyrie
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ncKcq3bBK1Q

and some non-choral...

Beethoven piano concerto No 5 'The Emperor"
(anything by Beethoven really...)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W46JgM-K5SI

Bach Cello Suite No 1
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wKEgAn7bLgk


Vaughn-williams - Fantasia on a theme of Thomas Tallis
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5y7nJL1hpUU

I'll stop there... hope there's something there you like and might even be new to you!

Cookie x

[dk323.livejournal.com]

Great idea! I love listening to instrumental/classical music.

Most of these are contemporary.

Here are some of my favorites:

ERA ~ Ameno (one of my favorite pieces of music...there's a Game of Thrones fanvid to this song that just makes the overall vid so epic):


Gregorian version of Ave Maria (common pieces in churches, but I like the song...and this version is a nice one...I have the one by Celtic Woman on my iPod :p):


Dreamcatcher from Secret Garden (calming, beautiful musical piece):


Zelda Medley by violinist Lindsey Stirling (Lindsey is so good in what she does...this is a favorite of mine):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b3KUyPKbR7Q (embed disabled)

Gypsy by Ronan Hardiman (piece from Lord of the Dance...another of my favorites...kind of a seductive song...I find it motivational while writing ;)):

[itzcoatl.livejournal.com]

I was looking for a song by Purcell, and came across the fact that he'd done a semi-opera called King Arthur. Somehow I'd never heard about this. Apparently it's quite different from the legends, but it is the Britons against the Saxons, and Arthur and Merlin are in it. (No Guinevere, instead, Arthur's love interest is a blind girl). I shall have to listen to the rest of it now.



This was what I was originally looking for. "She loves and she confesses" by Purcell, I love this.

[lliri-blanc.livejournal.com]

If you like Baroque, Maite Beaumont has a lovely Baroque CD called Dolce Mio Ben of mostly forgotten/obscure composers. Some of it is on youtube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iaNQHI4uXJg

If you like it I'd be happy to send it to you, as I'm pretty sure the CD is out of print.

(I love Maite to bits; I saw her sing in Chicago and have been obsessed ever since.)

[emerish.livejournal.com]

Oh, been listening quite a lot to instrumental/classical music lately. A few of my favourites:

Maxence Cyrin - Where is my mind (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aYJ8_93krG4)

Claude Debussy - Arabesque I (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=28Qi4jLtigc)

and a violin music mix (http://8tracks.com/reallifeunseeliefaerie/the-otherworldly-violin-vol-1)

[iichristinll.livejournal.com]

my favs are all super popular, go figure, but I heard this one last week and found this guy's expressive performance of it:

[thalialunacy.livejournal.com]

WELL. You said 20th century was okay, and it's kind of my specialty, so.

Leonard Bernstein's Chichester Pslams (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chichester_Psalms), conducted by The Maestro himself.



I first heard this piece when one of my friends from Tacoma Youth Chorus did the solo in the second movement locally. I grew up on West Side Story, too, (my mother had this awful vinyl version with Jose Carrararrarrawhatsisface and... some female opera singer, I've blocked it out). I am a Bernstein fangirl. He made his musicians miserable lol but he made music so beautiful it's beyond compare. AND HIS LITTLE FACE. omg. lol.

[thalialunacy.livejournal.com]

But. My true love is Benjamin Britten.

Turn up your volume and put on your seatbelt for this. It's a snippet from the choral reckoning where the town calls for the title character's blood in the opera Peter Grimes (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Grimes). I had the unbelievable fortune of seeing the LA opera do this when I was in undergrad, and it was literally life-changing for me. Its genius can be found even in just this little snippet-- the plaintive fog horn underlaid at the end. Ung.



I could show you a dozen Britten videos, but this is the one that came to mind first.

[thalialunacy.livejournal.com]

And I wouldn't be a proper diva unless I put a little of myself in here.

This is a set from my 2nd senior recital four years ago, which was all 20th century music by LGTB composers.