We usually dislike music because of music. But do you sometimes tell yourself "no! I won't listen to this!" before you even start to listen for the first time? Something that you've heard about composer, piece, performer? Something that you imagination told you and you didn't want to try to learn if it's true or not?

I had a lot of problems with Mahler. Because of ALL OF YOU BASTARDS! I came to this forum as a newbie, knew only Mozart etc and was surprised that no one talks about this stuff. I just saw the same, unknown to me names over and over again. And one of them appeared most frequently. Mahler. In latest purchases: always milions of posts like "sup, today I've purchased Mahler's 9th by Zimbabwe National SO and 587233298128 other recordings of Das Lied von blablablaaa". He was everywhere while there was no Mozart at all. I thought "who is this Mahler anyway? Why do they talk about him all the time instead of some good stuff? To the hell with this guy, I won't even touch his CD". It prevent me from listening to him for months. To tell the truth I could take a easy breath only after Mirror Image was banned for good, he talked about him the most. Ach, Mirror Image! So it was with Ravel - when I once asked for some recommendations of early romantic music he recommended me big, really big set of Ravel and Debussy. And I got it before I've learned that it's not what I've asked for. Was like "wut? this is romantic music? really?". So I rejected Ravel for some time.

What else? Actually I strongly hate Barenboim. I disliked his performance from the musical point of view just for once (played some Chopin too fast), but in general it's all about the fact that in one of his Tristans und Isoldes he casted the most terrible and repulsive Isolde ever. I could stabb him for this. I think I will. Where's the knife... okay, see ya, I'll write to you from jail.

Ach, I can also recall one more thing, I'll tell you before I go to the airport and catch my plane to Barenboim. I really couldn't push myself to listen to Bartók for some time because of this photo:



But can you blame me?

I've never really suffered from anything like that :/

I do have one thing that was kind of half-musical/half-not-musical. Basically, in my adolescence (which was only a few years ago!) when I discovered 'classical music', I originally liked a bit of Mozart and then some Beethoven, but when I came across Brahms, he had a great effect on me. A profound effect - it would be pointless trying to summarise it here. Anyway, because of the immense connection I felt with him and his music, I developed a rather shallow loyalty to him and when I came across the great (and rather misleading) Brahms vs. Wagner war, I point-blank decided that I would listen to no one on Wagner's side and only people on Brahms's. It's actually probably held my exploration of music back for quite a bit! Although it does mean I have amassed a fair deal of Brahms's and his allies' music. To this day, even when I try, I still don't see the beauty in Wagner's music - but I think that's because there simply isn't any

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Hehe Aramis I will try and shut my mouth about Mah… you know who when I'm around you.

Speaking as a newbie to classical music I try not to let other people's negative prejudices influence what I listen to. Just because one person doesn't like it doesn't necessarily mean I won't. Although if someone says 'listen to this piece, it's utterly amazing' it might encourage me to listen to whatever they're recommending.

When I first started listening to classical someone once recommend I stay away from watching Seiji Ozawa conduct (the facial expressions and movements were a bit too much this guy). Well that may have been all well and good for that guy but boy if I hadn't taken that remark with a pinch of salt I would've missed out on some great performances b/c I now think Maestro Ozawa's conducting is absolutely tremendous.

I do have one minor prejudice though which is sort of unrelated to the music and would probably be considered immature to many. I have trouble watching performances when conductors use 'toothpick batons'. While I'm aware that watching a performance (whether it be on tv or live) isn't solely about the conductor's movements from the footage I've seen of conductors using 'toothpicks' they always end up looking silly and this can sometimes distract me from the performance or put me off watching it altogether (although I'd still listen to it or look at something else).

I would rather see a conductor use their hands alone to conduct rather than watching one waving around a Crayola like a little kid who's overdosed on Orange Tang.

I also can't help but giggle at very short-legged dogs like Corgi's and Daschunds when they walk although that's b/c they look adorable.

Maybe these two prejudices are connected?

Sadly it it looks like you were just another victim of someone whose knowledge was clearly deficient and who provided lame advice.

But I am tempted to ask how come you accepted advice from someone who had only been listening to classical music for a couple of months, a fact he openly admitted to. When he recommended Debussy and Ravel in response to your request for advice on Romantic composers, I can't see why it wasn't it obvious to you that neither of these was a Romantic composer. A very simple Wikipedia search would have told you that.

It would appear that there have been numerous references on this Forum to the ArkivMusik website which lists hundreds of classical music composers and their most popular works. In general, places like that are far more reliable as sources of solid, objective information of the type you requested than the kind of hit-or-miss answers you tend to find on most Forums. For example, I could easily rattle off a long list of "greatest works" by all of the "greatest composers", but I can't be bothered to do so. Why bother when it would very soon just get buried beneath tons of other threads? One could spend the whole time simply regurgitating the same information time and time again.

Well youre wrong


I think I still have some prejudices against renessaince and early baroque music.. how can I overcome them?

Regards Renaissance music, try some Byrd (Mass for Five Voices), and Palestrina (Missa Papae Marcelli). For early baroque, Monteverdi is the man. One of the greatest composers ever. Try Vespers 1610. If you don't like any of this you have problems that only time will cure.

I was always resistant to the idea of Britten because of his rumoured paedophilia, but this Wikipedia article made it clear to me that, although he was attracted to young boys, he wasn't a vile predator:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Britten%27s_Children

I think I still have some prejudices against James Levine and this is probably my first time admitting to it. His was the worst performance of Tristan und Isolde I had ever heard, bar none. The prelude in particular was abysmally slow. When it comes to Mozart, he tries to get it to sound as Romantic as possible while the orchestra plays at blistering speeds. Plus his conducting style and body language seems eccentric for its own sake at times. Admittedly, I enjoyed his performance of Berlioz' La Damnation de Faust (although I might have been distracted by the technically dazzling stage direction), but I get the feeling there is more risk than reward in buying his records.

In terms of composers, well... Tchaikovsky was one that took me a while to come around to and shake off my stuffy attitude before I realised that the 'dreamy' escapism is all part of his charm. I still can't stomach Swan Lake, the Violin Concerto or the Romeo & Juliet overture though. I think I shunned Prokofiev for a long time too, dismissing him as little more than a Soviet apparatchik who wrote consigned himself to living in the USSR, writing music to please the state. It didn't help that I was forced to listen to him in school also. But I must admit, I am really starting to love his chamber works, particularly for piano.

I don't think I've ever harboured any anti-Mahler prejudices, it's just that I have a lot of difficulty appreciating his music at times, due to the length of his symphonies and his weird, unusual way of developing themes. I would go so far as to say I actively dislike his first symphony. Maybe I'm not yet ready to give into the huge emotional demand that Mahler places on the listener, even though I enjoy other 'bombastic' composers from the 19th century such as Bruckner, Liszt and Wagner.

I've always been somewhat prejudiced agains Mozart, because when the film Amadeus was at the height of its popularity you never seemed to hear anything on the radio but Mozart. And I have never entirely gotten over it, even though I've tried. There are certainly some Mozart pieces that I, a bit begrudgingly, admit that I like. But Ein Kleine Nachtmusik still makes me see red.

Oh, another one (which may be surprising given my very overt Romantic leanings) is Chopin - I never listen to his music, however beautiful it may be. One (admittedly irrational) prejudice is against the fact that he almost entirely composed for piano solo. But as well as that, his music seems to have a special charm for being what you turn to if you want 'pleasant, relaxing, easy listening'. I am especially sick of his nocturnes - never again!

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That's definitively not true and you should confront this idea to reality. And not by listening to the nocturnes, for God's sake! (second piano sonata, first piano concerto?)

I know I should probably listen to the sonatas, but I can't stand the concertos either. There seem to be few redeeming features about his music! Besides, if he's so great, why does no one ever talk about him on here

I guess I'm lucky for not being old enough to remember the 80's.

You should listen to more of Mozart's vocal music. I love his piano concertos and symphonies, but can see why they might seem a bit 'schlager' to some people. His operas and masses are his main strong point.

Russian and near-Russian has been at the top of my list from the beginning.

As much as I love Tchaikovsky, I have to admit he comes and goes. Even if you dislike everything else, you should give his 4th and 6th symphonies the college try. He could extremely sad, but it's hard for me to imagine anyone who likes classical at all disliking the 3rd movement of the 4th with the pizzicato strings.

I see how one could get the impression that Prokofiev was a soviet hack but it was not that way at all. One mystery to me is why he seemed to operate without any obvious constraints while Shostakovich lived in fear of being disappeared by Stalin. Anyone who doubts the integrity of Prokofiev need only listen to his 5th Symphony. The 3rd movement (as one critic accurately put it) is "unapologetic about its outpouring of feeling." I recommend the Leonard Slatkin - St Louis Symphony version from 1993, which if I remember correctly won the Grammy for the best classical album of the year.

On to my own prejudices. I have one major one that's purely musical. Mozart and Haydn, among others, were fond of a grace note that truly gets under my skin. This is where the grace note is on the minor 3rd of a chord and slides into the major 3rd. Every time I hear this grace note my ear tells me that the piece has switched into the minor key and I expect it to stay there. Then it turns out to be a grace note and the piece suddenly jumps back into the major key. This drives me bananas. If I could hear the high classical composers with these grace notes removed, I know I would enjoy them more.