If I were a virtuoso pianist, I think I'd want to play Bach like Glenn Gould. Not so much because his Bach is my favorite, although it is certainly a favorite, but because it is constantly changing.



On CD

I was enjoying some of the English Suites.

Igor Levit's recording of Mendelssohn's Lieder Ohne Worte was his response to raising anti-Semitism. And it is deeply moving, with or without the back story.



On CD.

One of the bits of trivial you might pick up in music class is that the piano is considered a percussion instrument because the strings are hit by a hammer while a harpsichord is a string instrument because the strings are plucked. Then there is the lute-harpsichord where the strings are made of gut rather than metal, and it sounds a lot like...you guessed it... a lute.



16/44 FLAC download

The lute-harpsichord is not my favorite thing on the menu, but I'll order it once in a while when the mood strikes.

In 1947, while Europe was digging out from under the rubble of WWII, the Philadelphia Orchestra was making phenomenal recordings, like the evergreen showpiece Scheherazade. The recording is in excellent mono, and while it isn't in the same league as Reiner's RCA recording a decade or so later, the playing and performance are every bit a match.



On CD from the Ormandy/Philadelphia mono box.

Bruckner's Symphony no. 7 is thrilling in both it's loudness and quietness. Esp. the way the Münchner Philharmoniker and Sergiu Celibidache play it.



On CD from the Celibidache/Munich/Bruckner box.

The 1954 Munch/Boston/RCA recording of Ravel's Daphnis et Chole was one of the first stereo recordings ever made of anything, and it remains pretty much much sans pareil. I'm guessing it has been recorded at least a hundred times since, but the combination of the Boston Symphonies superhuman playing, Charles Munch's suave interpretation and RCA's Living Stereo recording remain-state-of-the art 70+ years later.



DSD rip from SACD

I love the music of Georg Friedrich Händel, pass the candle. He wrote some of the most popular and recognizable (classic) music every written by anyone, like the Water Music. He wrote a lot of other great stuff that is not as well known, but that is for a different post.



On CD

The early digital recordings Delos made of the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra are some the best recordings I own, both musically and sonically.

Enjoying Beethoven-Liszt's 2nd Symphony from the Leslie Howard/Hyperion recording. This is simply a great way to experience this great music.



16/44 FLAC download

Edvard Grieg was one of the great miniaturists of music, even though he is probably best known for his piano concerto and the incidental music he wrote for Ibsen's play Peer Gynt. Most of his output was piano music, and much of that is based on Norwegian, or Nordic folk songs. For example his Op. 66 19 Norwegian Folk Songs from the BIS Complete Grieg piano music.



On CD.

This is great collection for anyone who loves piano music.

I binged Beethoven's awesome Hammerklavier Sonata a while ago, and I got a new recording that has got me doing it again. Sviatoslav Richter was the pianist of the second half of the twentieth century. He recorded a lot of Beethoven but not a complete set of the 32. He didn't perform The Hammer (as it is known in the biz) much, just a single concert tour in the mid-70s, but man, what he did rocks.



On CD

This BBC recording, made live at the Aldeburgh Festival is probably his best.

The Sixteen are one of the great choral groups of our time, and Tomás Luis de Victoria was one of the great composers of the Spanish Renaissance. Put them together and you have a spectacular album.



16/44 FLAC Download

When I first got serious about classical music recordings 40something (cough cough) years ago Janos Starker's Mercury recording was considered the last word on the Bach Cello Suites, full stop. Since then the so called historically informed performance movement has taken over and that has lead to a critical reevaluation of Bach in general and Starker's Bach in particular. No one is claiming it is actually bad, but people are claiming that it isn't "authentic" in the sense that the dance movements don't swing in a way that would actually be danceable. And that is true enough, but I love Starker's approach that emphasizes the architecture of the movements, rather than their "purpose." But, to be clear, I doubt anyone ever actually danced to these pieces.



24/192 FLAC download

I have three versions of these recordings, the Mercury CD, Analog Productions vinyl and this download. It was a very early hirez download, I forget where I got it, but it is the best sounding of the three.