It Would Have To Be…Symphony No. 4
Because it’s one of the unquestionably great, late Romantic symphonies, and until a couple of decades ago it was totally unknown.
The List So Far:
1. Ravel: Ma Mère l’Oye (Mother Goose Ballet)
2. Bruckner: Symphony No. 7
3. Schubert: String Quintet in C major
4. Shostakovich: Symphony No. 4
5. Mahler: Symphony No. 2 “Resurrection”
6. Tchaikovsky: The Nutcracker
7. Debussy: Preludes for Piano (Books 1 & 2)
8: Handel: Saul
9. Mozart: Le Nozze di Figaro
10. Brahms: String Sextet No. 2 in G major
11. Vaughan Williams: Job
12. Bach: Goldberg Variations
13. R. Strauss: Four Last Songs
14. Berlioz: The Damnation of Faust
15. Haydn: “Paris” Symphonies (Nos. 82-87)
16. Wagner: Der Ring des Nibelungen
17. Beethoven: String Quartet No. 14 in C-sharp minor
18. Mendelssohn: Violin Concerto in E minor
19. Chopin: Preludes
20. Verdi: Rigoletto
21. Roussel: Symphony No. 2
22. Copland: Appalachian Spring (complete original ballet)
23. Grieg: Peer Gynt Suites Nos. 1 and 2
24. Bartók: Sonata for Two Pianos and Percussion
25. Prokofiev: Piano Concerto No. 2
26. Rimsky-Korsakov: Opera Suites (Scottish National Orchestra/Järvi) Chandos
27. Schoenberg: Pierrot Lunaire
28. Smetana: Ma Vlást
29. Falla: Nights in the Gardens of Spain
30. Bizet: Carmen
31. Elgar: In the South
32. Sullivan: The Mikado
33. Dvořák: Symphony No. 8; Cello Concerto (Piatigorsky/Munch/Boston Symphony) RCA
34. Liszt: Hungarian Rhapsodies
35. Monteverdi: Orfeo
36. Scarlatti: Sonatas
37. Schumann: Fantasie in C, Op. 17
38. Berg: Wozzeck
39. Hermann: Psycho (film score)
40. Rachmaninoff: Rhapsody on the Theme of Paganini
41. Purcell: Dido and Aeneas
42. Holst: Suites for Military Band
43. Stravinsky: Oedipus Rex
44. Respighi: Three Botticelli Pictures
45. Sibelius: Symphony No. 5; Pohjola’s Daughter (Bernstein, New York Philharmonic) Sony
46. Britten: The Turn of the Screw
47. Borodin: String Quartet No. 2
48. Janácek: The Cunning Little Vixen
49. Korngold: Violin Concerto
50. Tallis: Spem in Alium
51. Nielsen: Symphony No. 5
52. Barber: Knoxville: Summer of 1915
53. Hindemith: Symphony in E-flat
54. Mussorgsky: Boris Godunov
55. Franck: Violin Sonata
56. Rossini: La gazza ladra (The Thieving Magpie)
57. Saint-Saëns: Piano Concerto No. 5 “Egyptian”
58. Weill: The Seven Deadly Sins
59. Pergolesi: Stabat Mater
60. Albeniz: Iberia
61. Bernstein: Mass
62. Schreker: Chamber Symphony
63. Walton: Variations on a Theme by Hindemith
64. Dukas: Piano Sonata
65. Gershwin: Porgy and Bess
66. Tippett: Piano Concerto
67. Poulenc: Songs (ATMA, 5 discs)
68. Szymanowski: Violin Concerto No. 1
69. Gluck: Alceste
70. Vivaldi: L’estro armonico, Op. 3
71. Puccini: La Bohème
72. Hanson: Symphony No. 2 “Romantic”
73. Alkan: 12 Etudes in All the Minor Keys, Op. 39
74. Dutilleux: Métaboles
75. Glinka: Kamarinskaya
76. Crumb: Makrokosmos III (Music for a Summer Evening)
77. Biber: Sonata violino solo representativa
78. Josquin: Missa Ave maris stella
79. Arnold: Symphony No. 5
80. Fauré: Piano Quartets (Trio Wanderer) Harmonia Mundi
81. Hovhaness: Fra Angelico
82. Martinu: Symphony No. 6 “Fantaisies symphoniques”
83. Grainger: Lincolnshire Posy
84. Corelli: 12 Concerti grossi, Op. 6
85. Bellini: Norma
86. Ives: “Concord” Sonata
87. John Williams: Jaws (film score)
88. Honegger: Le Roi David (King David)
89. Kodály: “Peacock” Variations
90. Milhaud: Une Vie Heureuse (10 CD Set, Erato)
91. Scriabin: Piano Sonatas (Hamelin/Hyperion)
92. Casella: Concerto for Orchestra
93. Rautavaara: Cantus Arcticus
94. Chabrier: España
95. Reich: Music for 18 Musicians
96. Waxman: Sunset Boulevard (film score)
97. Rameau: Hippolyte et Aricie
98. Suk: A Summer Tale
99. Delius: A Song of the High Hills
100. Telemann: Tafelmusik
101. Stenhammar: Serenade
102. Orff: Trionfi (Carmina Burana, Catulli Carmina, Trionfo di Afrodite)
103. Bax: Symphony No. 2
104. Turina: Canto a Sevilla
105. Glass: Koyaanisqatsi
106. Zelenka: Missa Dei Filii
107. Martin: Petite sinfonie concertante
108. Braga Santos: Symphony No. 3
109: Messiaen: Des canyons aux étoiles
110. Harris: Symphony No. 3
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Ah Magnard….
Thank you for reminding me that I haven't played any Magnard for too long a time.
Killed by Germans in WWI, just like Cecil Coles and Granados. What have the compatriots of Bach, Beethoven & Brahms done?
"Like Bruckner with sex" is an image that is hard to erase.
I love that you are keeping this series going, doggedly. It is really enjoyable, and I have learned so much. I do not know how long it will run for, but I hope it will go into the 200s, there are so many composers with unique oeuvres and contributions to the genre! Please understand also, that we gratefully appreciate everything you are giving us – this channel and ClassicsToday are two of the greatest fonts of music knowledge anywhere on the Internet!
That Plasson performance on EMI(Angel) was one of my first tape cassettes for my Sony Walkman.
Thank you! It’s off to Magnard again for the next hour or two. Love these “Only one of” features as they come, but I’m itching for Ernest Chausson to soon appear!
Never heard of Magnard before this video.
Dave, it sounds like you worked on your whistle. You were ready this time!
It's always good to get a shout out for Magnard. Thank you!
When I first bought the Plasson 4th (on cassette tape), I was blown away by the filler, the Chant Funebre, op. 9.
Subsequently, I conducted the Chant during 2 different seasons with my orchestra, first on a "War and Peace" program, the second time on a Veteran's Day tribute program; in both cases, the audience was very impressed. At the first read-through of the latter performance, 3 or 4 players approached me to express their delight in having a chance to perform this majestic, elegant and beautifully structured work. I can't remember that happening with any other of the many rare works we played.
NOTE: the morning after my first performance, I attended a breakfast given by a major Music Festival's Educational Dept, at which a very distinguished conductor had been invited as special guest. This particular maestro had spent MUCH time in Paris, with extensive experience as music director, etc and many high-profile recordings to his credit. When introduced to him, I said "just yesterday I had the pleasure of leading the 1st area performance of Alberic Magnard's "Chant Funebre". I immediately sensed a problem and, sure enough, he said: "Never heard of him." LR
What if you could choose only one work by Carl Stalling?
Interesting little tie-in between this and another of your recent videos: Nathalie Stutzmann, conductor of the Haochen Zhang Beethoven Concerto cycle, is in Plasson's recording of Guercoeur. What an interesting and varied career she's had!
I agree – it’s an absolute masterpiece and for my money, the finest late-romantic French symphony alongside Saint-Saëns’ 3rd (and much more compelling than any of d’Indy’s numbered symphonies, tbh). The glorious ending never fails to move me to tears! “Poignantly triumphant” is the best way I could describe it, with its blazing brass chorale eventually leading to a final statement of the motto theme and a fade-away “sunset” ending.
Magnard also left the military due the mistreatment of Alfred Dreyfuss