Classical Music for Aficionados

In case it hasn't been mentioned before, I'll put in a recommendation for Rameau's Imaginary Symphony, as conducted by Marc Minkowski:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WOZxiPU7wo4

https://www.amazon.com/Rameau-Une-Symphonie-Imaginaire-Jean-Philippe/dp/B000935TV8

A delightful recording, in excellent SACD sound.  It's hard to imagine anyone who likes classical music not finding this enjoyable.  

Tuning in to the zeitgeist, for about the last month I've been listening to a lot of Shostakovich, particularly the symphonies.  Listening to, for example, the Eleventh Symphony, you can imagine Russian troops in action.  Or you could just turn on the news.

Of the versions of Shostakovich's 11th Symphony I possess on CDs -- Nelsons, Stokowski and Barshai -- I'd recommend Barshai. It has the feeling of an invasion.

Olaffson is highly skilled, and has excellent taste.  I think his Philip Glass recording is the best piano Glass I've heard.  But his Bach is rather boring, and his Debussy and Rameau lack life and verve. For Rameau, I prefer Angela Hewitt.  For Debussy, try the incomparable Arturo Michelangeli.  

Schubert, I agree with you re: Kleiber's Brahms 4th.  A great performance.  Kleiber's Beethoven 5 and 7 are also among the greatest classical recordings.  And there is a live Kleiber Beethoven 4 that is equally great -- the 4th is an under appreciated work of genius, and Kleiber does it justice.

I am listening to Annie Fischer's complete Beethoven piano sonatas (Hungaroton CDs).  If you prefer your Beethoven piano full-bodied and fiery -- as I do -- rather than cool and classically restrained, Fischer has to be a top choice.

Twoleftears, thank you for linking to the Spectator piece by Pace.  

While it's an overstatement to say that "the culture wars are killing Western classical music," as the Spectator article's heading proclaims, that's not really what this opinion piece says.  The thesis is that the culture wars are endangering academic musicology, and that will have harmful effects on Western music itself.

The Spectator piece is interesting and insightful.  But even the actual thesis of the piece is somewhat overstated.  Western classical music will likely survive even if academic musicology is further marginalized.  

Classical music survives because it's played, and listened to attentively, not because it is written about in journals.  

The greatest composers wrote music that expresses, more profoundly than any other art can, what it means to be a human being.  And now, though mass media and the Internet, the music is accessibly to vast numbers of people like never before in history.  They can find it, hear it, and have it change their lives.

First-rate composers still can flourish, and produce first-rate music in the Western classical tradition.  Think of Philip Glass, John Adams, and Thomas Ades.

There are reasons to not be so pessimistic about the future of Western classical music.  

Muti is a wonderful musician.  I heard him twice in recent years live at Carnegie Hall with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, and both concerts were remarkable.  On record, his Prokofiev is especially terrific.  

I'll chime in and report my love for the music of Philip Glass.  He is a great composer.  While his earlier works -- such as the operas Akhnaten and Satyagraha -- are perhaps his best-known, and I enjoy them, I particularly love later works, such as the opera Kepler.

Kepler is an astonishingly beautiful, rhythmically forceful and impactful opera. The CD of Kepler is well worth a listen -- it rocks!

Glass's opera Orphee is also one of my favorites.  It is based on Jean Cocteau's great film, Orpheus, but in my view, arguably surpasses the original (just as Verdi's Otello arguably surpasses Shakespeare's Othello).

Other great Glass works include his 8th Symphony, his cantata Itaipu, and his first violin concerto (get the Kremer version).  Much of his best work is unfortunately not available on Qobuz, but is readily available on CD.  I strongly recommend a 2017 recording streaming on Qobuz -- Vikingur Olafsson's record of Glass Piano Works.  

The Brahms symphonies are each great, but I find few recording rise to the challenges of the music.  Conductors including Karajan, Stokowski and more recently, Ivan Fisher, emote and editorialize too much.  The Carlos Kleiber Brahms 4th, though, is astonishing, as is Furtwangler's WWII live recording of the 4th.  The sound is not great in either, though. It's poor in the Furtwangler, as should be expected from the vintage.   Abbado/Berlin, in better sound, is good, not great. Does anyone have any suggestions for Brahms symphony recordings in modern sound?