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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZNeJNMcN1EM

The mighty handful was a group of five prominent 19th-century Russian composers who worked together to create a distinct national style of classical music source. They were
Balakirev (best remembered for Islamey), three still prominent: Mussorgsky,Borodin, and Rimsky-Korsakov. And the fifth one, no-one remembers: César Cui. I don't think that I've ever heard his music until today.

I enjoyed this flowing, lilting waltz and have found the score on IMSLP. I might have a go at playing it myself.

Perhaps Cui is neglected because, as an engineering professor and military general, as well as being a composer, he is just too bad-ass for the small men of today to admit that he even existed.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w4nnjhHe15U

1971 recording. Beautiful tone. A little slow. I would love to learn to play these three pieces myself. So Radu Lupu's performance is reassuring: there is no need to rush, despite Brahms writing No 2 using lots of demi-semi-quavers. The technical challenge of No 1 is that the right hand has to play the tune with the middle fingers while playing accompanying octaves with the thumb and little finger. Radu Lupu is inspiring to me; not only is this is really possible, he shows that it is very easy :-)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4nMUr8Rt2AI

It has been some months (years? LIES!) since I posted this. I absolutely love this song. Cheers!

Brahms String Sextet No.1 (Op.18):
https://yewtu.be/watch?v=y0ZboerS4zc

Schubert String Quintet in C major (only the 2nd movement here, but the whole opus is incredibly beautiful):
https://yewtu.be/watch?v=-FEODPzkKSw



Enjoy frens

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V9xoBcygSnU

YT ALT: https://www.yewtu.be/watch?v=V9xoBcygSnU
The nickname "Minute" Waltz, was intended to mean "small" in French, in the sense of a "miniature" waltz. It was added by the first publisher, not Chopin. Chopin did not intend this waltz to be played in one minute as is sometimes thought.

Chopin's is said to have got the inspiration for this waltz watching a small dog chase its tail, and named the piece Valse du petit chien, meaning "The Little Dog Waltz"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BxViWp5vD_Y

Scriabin writes too many notes. Kristina Miller plays all of them very clearly, not forgetting to make the quiet, slow ones achingly beautiful.

Oh! That is how it is meant to go, Scriabin composed it just right :-)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3LU2GZfST_w

WA Mozart's 'Fantasia in F minor K 608' played on the organ of Arundel Cathedral during a live Organ Recital I gave there on 21st January 2023.

This piece was originally written for a mechanical clock/organ which meant that Wolfgang didn't have any player limitations. To play the original version by him would be impossible (not least because we don't have the original manuscript!). The version that I'm using is the rather romantic and inappropriate arrangement by Walter Emery. But d'ya know what? I love it as it was the first version I ever heard of it played by Noel Rawsthorne on the legendary Great Cathedral Organ Series at Liverpool Cathedral. Classic!

Let me know if you enjoyed it... or not!

Rx

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Making money is not my primary objective. After expenses are taken into consideration, remaining revenue is invested back into BEAUTY IN SOUND. Audio and visual equipment is expensive, and I also pay a fair fee to all recitalists who appear on BIS. This is why I regularly ask YOU to help, and I’m sorry for having to do so. I hope that you can all see the tangible improvements being made to BIS along our shared journey.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iHNxdOTFt7c&t=572s

I grew up playing some of these songs. To learn Bach was more of a technical exercise than learning a song by heart and being moved emotionally. Strange guy! And a brilliant man.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y0kD_32Yhf8

Re-upload of 2K video from 2016 passed through Final Cut Pro X noise reduction for grainy video and stereo image narrowed with Logic Pro X.

I'm posting this because I told @Yargiyankooli I would suggest some things. I've been listening to orchestral music since the early 70s. I hadn't even started to notice girls when I discovered orchestral music and realized how much I liked it.

I'll start by saying that conductors who are the of the same nationality as the composer are the best interpreters of the music. Russian music is best performed by Russians. Gennady Rozhdestvensky was an excellent conductor of Tchaikovsky, particularly "Swan Lake". Herbert Von Karajan was an excellent German conductor and conducts the German composers brilliantly. French conductors seem to understand French composers best, etc.

You get the idea. Just make sure you look at a conductor's early history before you get one of his albums. Note that George Solti was a jew. He was a good conductor, especially for Bartok, but I can't listen to him any longer for that reason. And I just can't stand Leonard Bernstein because he was both a kike and a faggot.

Now, some recommendations. These are good for the new listener. Some of this you can find on jewtube.

Karl Richter's performance of Handel's "Messiah" with the London Philharmonic Orchestra is without question the best. It's easy to find if you do a search for those search terms. I have it on vinyl, with a paining by Salvador Dali on the front cover of the crucified Christ, but I also have it on DVD. Highly recommended.

Bizet's "Carmen" is the greatest opera ever written. Look for a version performed as opéra comique, which is where the musical segments are separated by spoken dialogue. Try to avoid a version with recitative, which is where the dialogue is sung rather than spoken.

"The Planets" by Holst should be familiar to most people. Very moving and inspirational.

I've always liked "The Grand Canyon Suite" by Ferde Grofe. It's the music used in the train ride at Disneyland during the Grand Canyon sequence.

Anything by Bach is perfect in every way, but his Brandenburg Concertos are lovely and very accessible.

"Symphonie Fantastique" by Hector Berlioz is surrealistic and strange but moving and captivating. One of the movements is in 5/4 time, unusual at the time.

"Scheherazade" by Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov is long, but lyrical and beautiful. It can be described as a tone poem that expresses the feeling of the various stories in the series of books "A Thousand Nights and a Night".

The Peer Gynt Suite by Edvard Grieg, which is the incidental music for the play "Peer Gynt" is lyrical and beautifully harmonious. You'll hear quite a lot that will be familiar to you.

Tchaikovsky's "Nutcracker" is an old and familiar stand-by, famous for good reason. It's accessible, fun, and has the composer's usual lush orchestration. If you're up to heavier stuff, try his First Piano Concerto. His Symphony #6 is very melancholy, and one of the movements is also in 5/4, but it requires some listening to appreciate it.

Prokofiev was a Russian modernist who wrote lyrically with some integrated dissonance, a bit jarring sometimes, but it works. His easier works are the Lieutenant Kije suite, music he wrote for a Russian film, his Symphony #1, called his "Classical" symphony, and "Peter and the Wolf". If you listen to the latter, listen to a version with the narration first so you understand the story and the breakdown of the instrumentation, and then find a version without the narration.

Aram Khachaturian was very much a modernist, and a nationalist commie as was Prokofiev, but neither of them were jews. His most famous work is the ballet "Gayeneh" or "Gayane". It has the "Sabre Dance", which you have probably heard before.

That's enough for now. I just turned the soil for the first row, and there's much, more to add, but I don't want to make this too long. If anyone has other good recommendations that could be accessible to the new listener, please feel free.