(Part 3) Best classical music according to redditors

A few to consider, some more affordable than others:

• Complete Webern
  
• Complete Varese
  
• The DG Complete Beethoven Edition (if you can find it anywhere)
  
• The Philips Complete Mozart Edition (if you can find it anywhere)
  
• Steve Reich
  
• Philip Glass
  
• Handel - Orchestral Works
  
• Bach - Orchestral Works
  
• Ravel - Complete Edition
  
• Debussy - Complete Edition
  
• Shostakovich Edition (one of the few Brilliant Classics box sets I can wholeheartedly recommend, unlike many of the others which can be a bit patchy)
  
• Strauss - Complete operas
  
• Wagner - Complete operas (Solti)
  
• Boulez - Bartok
  
• Boulez conducts Schoenberg (far from complete, but this about the best you can do)
  
• Boulez - Stravinsky
  
• Various Bach choral stuff - Gardiner
  
• Stravinsky
  
• Alban Berg Collection
  
• Berlioz - Complete orchestral works (Davis)
  
• Brahms - Complete Edition (absolutely superb collection)
  
• Britten conducts Britten + operas 1 and operas 2 + Complete Britten
  
• Sibelius - Symphonies and tone poems
  
• Elgar - Collector's Edition
  
• Vaughan Williams - Collector's Edition
  
• Barber - orchestral works (Alsop)
  
• Scriabin - Piano works
  
• C.P.E. Bach Edition
  
• Corelli - Complete Works
  
• Telemann - Tafelmusik
  
• Schubert - Masterworks (Brilliant Classics - not always the best recordings, but for the amount of stuff you get, worth the money
  
• Poulenc - complete works
  
• Messiaen - complete edition
  
• Mahler - complete edition (the symphony recordings here are a representative cross-section, you might want to supplement it with another complete cycle, e.g. Solti, Bernstein, Abbado, etc.)
  
• Liszt - Complete piano music
  
• Janacek - Operas
  
• Haydn - Symphonies (Hogwood), not complete, but as close as anyone has come to it
  
• Mozart - Symphonies (Pinnock) - an alternative to Mackerras
  
• Bartok - Piano works
  
• Debussy - Piano works
  
  If you need anything more specific than that, let me know and I'll try to recommend something.
  
  If you have a look in the "Customers Who Bought This Item Also Bought" section for any of these, you'll find many more.

Good news! Chris Thile (mandolin not banjo) just put out an entire album of Bach.

Ligeti. I can understand not putting one together while he was still actively composing, but I highly doubt he'll be writing anything new any time soon. There's a "Ligeti Edition" series on Sony (of which I own all 7 volumes), but it's far from complete.

A complete Liszt edition would be cool too. Leslie Howard's recordings of all his piano music is a good start - maybe they could also throw together a box set of all his non-piano music.

Same goes for Schubert and his lieder.

DG should reissue their Messiaen box and make it at least somewhat affordable.

Also, Janacek.

The Gyorgy Ligeti Edition is definitive. Ligeti supervised all recordings and rejected what he wasn't happy with. It wasn't complete because when it came time to record orchestral works, Ligeti wasn't content with the performers available to Sony Classics. The project of recording all of Ligeti's acknowledged works in performances supervised by the composer was completed by Warner Classics in their The Ligeti Project. Originally five discs, it too was later released as a box set.

These two albums are cornerstones of my collection:

• Muti/PO: Symphonies 1-3, Poem of ecstasy, P. of fire - PoE and Symph1 (esp. mvmt 6) are two of my favorite pieces. no other recording of PoE keeps the second half as tense nor does the coda as perfectly as this one.
  
• Lettberg: Solo piano works - I have to highlight her op. 18 and op. 4, two large piano works that mostly predate the sonatas. Great great romantic, virtuosic passionate pieces that lie somewhere between Brahms more violent intermezzos (eg, 76/1) and Chopin ballades. The rest is all quality.
  
  Others to supplement, that I don't feel as strongly about.
  
  
• Ashkenazy: Piano sonatas - older recordings, but he captures the more eccentric side so essential to Scriabin, like the frenetic no. 2 and the disturbing no. 9. I still think Ashkenazy is more at home with Rach (ossia pc3!!) though.
  
• Diev: Preludes - simply a great value, for the 48 short pieces you get here. Solid playing, I don't think he has quite the edge needed to pull off the more hairy pieces, but he nails the tender side of 11/11 and 16/3.

What!? no!

I was in the Portland State University Chamber Choir and we got to work with Mr Tormis to record his works in english: https://www.amazon.com/Veljo-Tormis-American-Shores/dp/B000XLQGM2 .

He was truly a beloved composer in the choral community. He will be missed.

https://youtu.be/HPerWq-hnhE?list=PLMMsZ_leBbZLslMuK1aRg4V-SztuOgi4q

Don't bother with Bohm, it's awful. Go for Karajan's 70's or 80's versions (his 60's recording is not that good either).

Some other versions that I like are the two 1 2 recordings by Marriner, Colin Davis, and Schreier.

Concerning recordings with period instruments, I second Herrweghe's recording, and would also recommend Harnoncourt's recording which is very unique.

The whole album is on Amazon Prime.

>My last acquisition was a recording of Pictures at an Exhibition and its just not my favourite take on the piece

Which recording did you get? I'd recommend Fritz Reiner with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra or Antal Doráti with the Minneapolis Symphony Orchestra.

As for Sibelius, I think the most popular recommendation tend to be for Anthony Collins with the London Symphony Orchestra and it's a really safe pick. You can't go wrong with it. The tempos are quite brisk. He plays through all seven symphonies in three and a half hours, faster than most others.

You should know that you can often listen to complete recordings on youtube before deciding whether you'd like to purchase any of them. Here's a few youtube videos for the complete Sibelius symphony cycle:

• Anthony Collins, London Symphony Orchestra
  
• Vladimir Ashkenazy, Philharmonia Orchestra
  
• Paavo Berglund, Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra
  
• Leonard Bernstein, New York Philharmonic Orchestra
  
  You can also find samples, usually around 30 seconds per track, at various merchant websites like prestomusic.com or amazon.com. While each sample is short, they can still help give you an idea as to whether you would enjoy the particular recordings.

If the Karajan Symphony Edition is in your budget, that gets my suggestion hands down.

I'm a big classical fan (all I listen to) so I'll help you out. Frankly, I'm surprised it doesn't come up more often in this subreddit, but no big deal.

Orff: Carmina Burana, Eugen Jochum...fucking phenomenal choral work and recording. A real must-have and reading the included Latin/German/English text along with it enhances the experience enormously.

If you're willing to do opera, this recording of Puccini's La Boheme is fantastic.

If you want some crazy, loud opera, this recording of Strauss' Elektra is the best. Real cheap there, too. I was gifted it for $40 and it can be hard to find at times.

Finally, another must-have along with the Carmina Burana is this recording of the Verdi Requiem which has incredible off-stage brass (Tuba Mirum), a thunderous and apocalyptic Dies Irae, and tons of choral participation throughout. A real amazing work and my favorite Requiem although the Berlioz can be great in person. (Stick w/that Verdi for your audio setup.)

You buy all those, and you will not be disappointed. Those are some of the best recordings overall and absolutely regarded as the best by the vast majority for each work. Don't buy another recording of the same piece if you want the best. I'm vouching for those in particular.

| | |
|-:|:-|
|name|Christopher Tin|
|about artist|Christopher Tin is a Grammy-winning composer, whose eclectic career spans film, television, video games, advertising, and the record industry. His music is marked by a natural ease of melody, economy of gesture, and a flair for the dramatic. He is a native Californian, born of Chinese descent, and educated in England, and his aesthetic sensibilities are a blend of his diverse cultural background. ([more on last.fm](http://www.last.fm/music/Christopher Tin))|
|album|Calling All Dawns: A Song Cycle, released Oct 2009|
|track|Mado Kara Mieru|
|images|artist image|
|links|lyrics, wikipedia, vgmdb, blog, official homepage, [discogs](http://www.discogs.com/artist/Christopher Tin), imdb, twitter, CD on amazon|
|tags|soundtrack, orchestral, gamemusic, videogamesoundtrack, composer|
|similar|Stereo Alchemy, MC Frontalot, 崎元仁, Francisco Cerda, Alec Holowka|
|metrics|lastfm listeners: 20,924, lastfm plays: 534,012, youtube plays: 43,577, radd.it score: 14|


Please downvote this comment if this data is incorrect!
I am a bot by radd.it data services. I have been requested to post these reports.

Mike Sweeney, the principal in Toronto, commissioned an amazing piece from Marjan Mozetich for bassoon, marimba and strings. It's an incredible piece-- I've never played it and I've never heard anyone but him play it, which of course he makes sound easy, but I suspect it's actually incredibly difficult. You can hear it on this CD:http://www.amazon.com/Mozart-Well-Beyond-Wolfgang-Amadeus/dp/B000CAFMEC and buy parts from the Canadian Music Centre.

Another option that I used for more or less the same reason for my senior recital: do the Mozart (or Weber, or whatever) with an orchestra! It doesn't have to be a huge number of people (I think I had 13, no conductor) But it might be enough that they'll want to have a larger space and a backstage that can accommodate a small orchestra. It's also more fun and is a good exercise for your organizational and rehearsal-planning skills.

He's done more than just that one.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Composer-Anthony-Hopkins/dp/B005K7HBMS/

The Solti/Nilsson recording of Elektra. Sheer awesomeness.

Arvo part is great and all, Imma let you finish, but Tormis is my favorite. I sang on the premiere english-translation recording of some of his works (http://www.amazon.com/Veljo-Tormis-On-American-Shores/dp/B000XLQGM2). Don't blame us, he wanted it done in English! Still haven't made it to Laulupidu but maybe the next one :-)

Gardiner has a new anthology that's ridiculously cheap (less than $3/disc!) and unbelievably good, but it sounds like it's redundant with what you've already heard (except in a completely different style), so I'm mostly posting it here for other redditors' benefit.

You ever listen to this album by Chris Thile doing Bach?. It's really wonderful. Great recording, his 1924 Gibson F5 mandolin sounds like it's right in the room with you.

As with all box sets, there are strong points and weak points, but if I had to recommend a single Schubert box set, it'd be Wilhelm Kempff. Kempff was one of the first (maybe the first? not sure) to record the complete Schubert piano sonatas and did a lot to bring them into the core repertoire. The entire set is of a very high musical quality, with no glaring weaknesses and a great musicality that is typical of Kempff.

Sets that I have listened to and chose Kempff over:

Uchida
Lupu
Schiff

Another good option to consider is this Brendel set: http://www.amazon.com/Schubert-Musicaux-Impromptus-Wanderer-Fantasia/dp/B0042LJTQO/ref=sr_1_1?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1344243350&sr=1-1&keywords=schubert+brendel+box

Though not the complete piano sonatas, it also includes some of Schubert's most popular other piano solo works, and all of the readings are fantastic.

If you ever find yourself enamored with Schubert's sonatas, I suggest looking to Richter as the first stop for supplementing your collection with individual sonatas. His D960 is superb.

Oh god OP, that Kleiber beethoven 5 is crazy intense. Good choice.

Mahler's Symphony No. 5 - Bernstein

Mahler's Symphony No. 8 "Symphony of a thousand" - Sinopoli The greatest recording of this ever. And yes I have heard Solti and Horenstien.

Schumann's Fantasie in C major If you know Richter's Schumann, no explanation is required. If not, you need to hear this.

Scriabin's 10 Piano Sonatas - Ashkenazy I've heard people call Ashkenazy bland. He definitely isn't here.

I really don't want to limit my choices, but I think maybe I should keep it at 5 or this list will become too big..so for something completely different..Phases - Box set of Steve Reich's music on Nonesuch label

I recommend the Barenboim live Bayreuth recording: http://www.amazon.com/Wagner-Der-Ring-Nibelungen-Richard/dp/B004FLKV5O/ref=pd_sim_sbs_m_1

this one?
http://www.amazon.com/Wagner-Der-Ring-Nibelungen-Richard/dp/B004FLKV5O

Bruckner - Symphonies 3 - 8, Te Deum & Mass in F minor (Celibidache)
Webern - Complete Works (Boulez)

Celibidache's Bruckner.

I plan on buying the rest of the boxed sets of live performances at some point.

How about this?? It oughta count, I think...

http://www.amazon.com/Composer-Anthony-Hopkins/dp/B005K7HBMS
Oops, he's already in there.

Here are a few bassoonists you might want to consider:

Nadina Mackie Jackson is making a career for herself as a soloist and has a lot of recordings available on SoundCloud.

Michael Sweeney has a great CD available with a brilliant take on the Mozart Concerto plus some inspiring new pieces.

Judy LeClair has a few albums available.


I also really like this recording of Gil Shaham playing Barber's Violin Concerto.

• Janowski's Ring Cycle - The version I'm referring to is the 1980-83 studio version. Virtually perfect sound quality owing to the fact that it is a studio recording. There's really no particular part that stands out, it's just an incredible recording in general. Sample
  
  
• Karajan Bruckner 9 Symphonies - The version I'm referring to is the box set that was released by DG. It has all of Bruckner's symphonies and is my favorite collection. Again, they're all nearly perfect.
  
  
• Bernstein Mahler 9 Symphonies - Bernstein actually recorded two cycles of Mahler symphonies, although I don't think he finished them all the second time. Either cycle is great, but the first is classic.
  
  
• Backhaus Beethoven Piano Concertos with Hans Schmidt-Isserstedt conducting - They're all amazing but I love the 5th concerto.
  
  
• Brendel Beethoven Sonatas Recorded 1970's - A lot of Beethoven interpreters are either really mechanical or overly dramatic. I find Brendel to be great because of his traditional classical approach, while still having a sentimental tone. I believe it is this version. This set is far superior to the 1990's version in my opinion. He also did this Schubert set which I highly recommend as well.

I also like the Double Concerto more, although afaik, it's not a popular opinion.

His German Requiem is a great piece of choral music as well, and so is his chamber music. You might as well buy this - can be found cheaper elsewhere.

The symphonies are great as well. 1 is the best, but so are all the others (especially the opening on the fourth - exhilarating.)

Ohh, man, I love Karajan. Easily atop my list of greatest conductors. Karajan: Symphony Edition is the first thing I'll be getting as soon as I'm back in the green.

That DG set looks awesome. Might have to be a Christmas present this year.

Some of my favorites are the EMI Elgar and Vaughan Williams sets, the Stravinsky collected works, and the big RCA Toscanini set.