I only agree about the Messiaen, and let's face it, most music lovers find him too difficult. But taking that as as one of my choices, here is a better list, in roughly chronological order, much more enjoyable:
Gothic Voices, "The Dufay Spectacle"
Niquet/Le Concert Spirituel, Benevolo Missa si deus pro nobis
Sigiswald Kuijken/La Petite Bande, Bach Christmas Oratorio
BBC Orchestra/Martyn Brabins, Vaughn Williams, "A Sea Symphony"
Marine Band of the Royal Netherlands Navy "Rimsky & Co. Originals (Gliere, Stravinsky, Prokofiev, etc.) no, I'm not kidding, a navy band, check it out
Michael Foyle/Maksim Stsur, "The Great War Centenary," (Debussy, Respighi, Janacek)
James Ehnes, William Walton, Viola Concerto
There's a lot of great newer music out there but nothing to match these AS RECORDINGS
For those with a jazz interest, keep a lookout for the next Maria Schneider big band release, her compositions and arrangements are always tremendous, and she played some great new things recently at The Jazz Standard.
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Thanks for the recommendations.
I'm listening right now on Spotify to "Hush," the album of renaissance songs sung by Nora Fischer, accompanied on electric guitar by Marnix Dorrestein. Makes them sometimes sound like pop songs from the rock era. What a pleasant choice. Nice.
Thanks also for pointing out the Bach piano recordings by Vikingur Olafsson. Check out the virtuoso playing on the second track, "Nun freut euch, lieben Christen g'mein."
The fifth track, Organ Sonata No. 4, brought me to tears.
We plan to hear this wonderful music during a boat parade in Ft. Lauderdale tomorrow night with about 50 converts to Classical music. That will be from the top of a not so high building there.
Great! Thanks.
Wow, what a musty, limited list this is, and much of it the same repertoire that has appeared on these lists for many years now. Hard to believe it, but the current Times critics must not be getting out and about as much as I am. You're emphasizing a couple tiny corners of the repertoire, and I'd think you're missing most of the really great stuff out there--in fact, judging by this list, I'm sure of it.
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@Sidewalk Sam
Please let us know what you recommend.
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I listened to one of the pieces, and now I can’t close the little white listening square. I tried to do the mini crossword, and it was in the way.
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Debbie: Same thing also happened to me
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You have to manually scroll the bar at the bottom over to the right to ‘fast forward’ to the end.
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To Jammie Mevis: Thanks!
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Could you share a streaming service playlist for these? I’d prefer Tidal, but Spotify would be good, too.
Well you know it’s mostly just music by white males of privilege. It would be really nice to hear music that expresses a female aesthetic.
@Sunmuse What about "He(ar)", where the review makes the point: "...this quiet and wise music, written and performed by women..."?
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It may sound uncultured of me to say this, but I really cannot stand "Dr. Atomic." I think the opera needs a sense of dark irony. It's too sincere and holy. I would have had Pakistani and Indian physicists swinging from the ceiling singing or even rapping about their bombs. And I would have given the Bomb an aria. Why shouldn't it have one? The Devil gets to sing in "Faust."
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Great recommendations! I was really impressed with Pierre-Laurent Aimard interpretations of Messiaen's Catalogue of Birds and Sabine Liebner's take on Stockhausen's Klavierstucke. Aimard gets invited to perform at the Carnegie once or twice a year, but NYC also deserves Sabine Liebner, who is a great interpreter of Feldman and Cage. Yuja and Trifonov are fantastic, but their repertoire is usually more of the same. There is a lot of great music beside Chopin, Liszt, Beethoven (or the usual Russians ) or Bach for that matter.
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HomePod as a small room compromise ain’t half bad with some of this if you’re stuck with digital. I appreciate this list and will enjoy listening from it frequently. The guidance is helpful.
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Hasn't Bach been recorded enough? I really think it's time we move on.
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@Gregory
One of the many interesting things about Bach is that when he composed he put in very few of the markings that would indicate how he expected the music to be played.
Editors, over the years, have added those markings but none of them are written in blood. So new generations of Bach musicians interpret the music in their own ways. Some to good effect, some not so good.
So, for those of us who cherish Bach there are not enough recordings. We especially cherish new, beautiful interpretations. You certainly can cross him off your list.
But one of the “duties” of NYT music reporters is to let those of us who haven’t crossed him off know what is new.
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Excellent selections. How can I hear the whole playlist with going one by one?
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Nice to see Philip Glass's 11th on the list. Interesting how it's he and Adams - the most senior living composers - who write in a mainly tonal style and traditional forms. The relative youngsters are taking up the knotty, dissonant, textural music - as heard in the clips by Laubrock and the two Icelanders.
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@Brian
When I first heard Glass (Einstein) he was considered so extreme. Now he is mainstream.
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I am beyond impresses. What a wonderful collection of differences.
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