Classical Countdown: What's in your top 10?

[CBHagman]

Inspired by WETA FM's Thanksgiving week Classical Countdown. Listeners voted and the Washington, D.C., area station is playing the top 90 choices. We're up to number 9 now, The Lark Ascending by Ralph Vaughan Williams. Here's the rest:

[url]http://www.weta.org/fm/features/classicalcountdown[/url]

What would be your top three classical music selections, for Thanksgiving or any day?

[Turbineguy]

1. Our turkey

is in final defrost to a couple of St. Seans Piano Concertoes.

[Joe Shlabotnik]

2. Tough one.

I'll go with:

1) Rachmaninoff - Piano concerto no 2, op 18
2) Smetana - Ma vlast moldau
3) Wagner - Siegfried's funeral

Pretty much any time of year, although coincidentally all 3 of the above (to me) are evocative of the end of autumn and the foreboding onset of winter.

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[CBHagman]

3. Autumn...

I hadn't thought to associate the Moldau with fall, but I'll reconsider that. Thanks for posting.

[Fortinbras Armstrong]

4. My top three classical favorites -- today, tomorrow it may differ

My top one is Bach's Toccata and Fugue in D. BWV 565

Mozart's Sonata in D major for Two Pianos, K. 448

(This is just the first movement)

Mozart's Piano Concerto Number 22 in E flat K. 482

(This is just the 3rd movement)

I must include a fourth: Mozart's Serenade for 13 Winds, K. 361; 3rd Movement

I was listening to this one in my office when one of my co-workers poked her head in and said that his had to be one of the most beautiful pieces she had ever heard. I must agree

[aint_no_life_nowhere]

5. Lately I've been listening to these over and over

Last edited Tue Dec 18, 2012, 02:51 AM - Edit history (1)

Mozart's beautiful Concerto for Flute and Harp, 2nd movement

Rameau's lively Rondeau des Indes Galantes.

I'll probably move on to other frequently listened to choices soon but one piece I listen to year in and year out is Bach's incredible Chaconne for solo violin which I believe he wrote in the wake of his wife's death. To me, it's the most emotionally overwhelming piece of music ever written. I can't even conceive of how a human being could compose something so powerful and so perfect. Keep in mind that's one lone violinist playing what sounds like a string quartet, with double stops (violin plays two notes at once), alternating melody and harmony in the base line, implied counterpoint or compound melody, and many other devices. It's one of the more challenging pieces on the violin.