Classical Music I Hate

My top five - make that my bottom five - classical music pieces.
This was a very hard video to make, as there's not much music I dislike. But there is some...and by my favourite composers too!
If you like my work, please buy me a coffee: www.buymeacoffee.com/classicalmk
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Robprocks Pachabel Rant (it's funny!) • Pachelbel Rant

[@NigelRamses]

With you on Eine Kleine Nachtmusik. I don’t exactly hate it, but when I tell someone I listen to classical music, I expect they imagine that piece. It seems almost like a caricature of the genre at this point.

[@JRCSalter]

That's because it's always used in movies when the scene is a posh upper class party, and has therefore become cliche.

[@NigelRamses]

@@JRCSalter …yet, there I am brooding over it with Bruckner 9 blasting at full volume.

[@spikespa5208]

Just over used by everyone and his brother. But if you had *never* heard it before........ ?

[@Casutama]

The other movements are quite nice though :)

[@NigelRamses]

@@spikespa5208 If it were fresh and unfamiliar it would be nice enough. Not sure how often I would listen to it, though.

[@supercringeteam6666]

i never get sick of eine kliene no matter how many times i hear it, is simply too catchy

[@smokefan1010]

And even if you think the first movement is too "cliche" or whatever, the other three movements are also bangers

[@supercringeteam6666]

@@smokefan1010 agree but the first movement is still the best one

[@keithparker1346]

It's simply one of the best pieces of music ever

[@dzwiecznebzdury]

In the defence of Eine Kleine Nachtmusik, it's so popular that everyone seems to know it, but at the same time, not so many people know that it's a four-movement work, so it's good to check the remaining movements as well, besides the opening Allegro.

[@peskylisa]

I prefer the Romance movement, myself.

[@ftumschk]

Cage was mistaken if he thought that his 4'33" would silence the critics ;)

[@WayneKitching]

Instead, they critiqued the silence.

[@ftumschk]

@@WayneKitching Excellent!

[@vinylarchaeologist]

Funny you should say Albinoni’s Adagio was composed hundreds of years earlier, when in fact it was composed in 1958: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adagio_in_G_minor?wprov=sfti1

[@annelarrybrunelle3570]

BTW, I'd LOVE to hear 4'33 played over and over on the PA at the Kroger instead of what they DO play.

[@thecarman3693]

Just about any store, actually. If I had to work in virtually any of today's retail establishments I think in a week I'd go postal.

[@classicallpvault8251]

Brahms composecd a far superior 4'33 - the finale of his opus 120 f-major violin sonata, in the recording by Jenny Abel and Roberto Szidon for Deutsche Harmonia Mundi, is exactly 4'33 long.

[@dianewilson7415]

4'33" was a joke. It was supposed to be about all the noise that happens during a performance - coughing, programs rustling, impatient people shifting in their seats, foot tapping... OK, maybe no one taps their feet to this. It annoys the road apples out of me to see people take this seriously in a performance, when the audience listens respectfully and makes such an effort NOT to make any noise. Cage's personal favorite performance happened when a student was in an offstage practice room, working on the last movement of the Moonlight Sonata. He'd practice a run, screw it up, swear, do it again, screw it up again, swear. Cage loved it!

[@joespencer471]

In a way, it feels like a 'Mindfulness ' exercise.

[@pikachuchujelly7628]

Cage created 4'33" to make a statement, that all of the background noise and random sounds you hear are music. It's a statement that I don't really agree with, but I get where he was coming from.

[@YooLookMarvelous]

4'33" illustrates how much listeners add to a performance--in this case, all of the sound. But really, my favorite is Child of Tree, a percussion piece composed for amplified cactus.

[@keithparker1346]

I've listened to some Cage stuff and didn't like it 4'33" could be the one for me...very minimalist

[@user-yp6me9by2b]

I didn't know 4'33 had an orchestral version, I've only heard the piano version.

[@grafplaten]

It's even better performed by vocal soloists, full chorus, organ and an orchestra of the size required for Stravinsky's early ballets.

[@angreagach]

As far as Haydn's Surprise Symphony is concerned, the second movement is definitely the least interesting. The finale is much better and is chock full of better surprises.

[@PopeLando]

"Daah duh daah duh dadadadada daah oh I love that! I didn't know you wrote that!" *wearily* "I didn't. That.... was Mozart. Wolfgang. Amadeus. Mozart."

[@Alejandroide82]

I get the reference😂 amazing movie

[@marypugh3905]

As Thomas Beecham famously said: I'm looking forward to his longer pieces.

[@jbaldwin1970]

TBF to Beethoven, the Wellington piece was commissioned for a mechanical device and later orchestrated. And TBF to cage he was making the point that there is music in the hum of the air conditioning, the birdsong outside, the shuffle of feet. There is never ‘silence’ All the others I’ll give you. Anything by Strauss with a 3/4 tempo can go in the list too.

[@nodarikirtadze8220]

Oh, Fur Elise and Mozart's Turkish March definitely annoy me

[@memeguy6059]

Ahhh both pieces are in A Minor

[@airpanache]

Oh yes I’m so irritated that people think Mozart’s music are just simple, jolly, catchy like this rondo alla turka.

[@cometsmith]

I think it's important to look at the context for 4'33. The original commission and performance was for an outside venue. The original point was to listen to the symphony of nature happening around you, and every little bird chirp and gust of wind as an instrument. When taken out of that context, its understandable that 4'33 could be seen as a "stupid" or uninspired piece, but the original performance, and further performances, are popular for a reason. It strikes a chord with people. The type of hyper-focused listening that happens in a concert hall is a really special thing, and 4'33 plays with that religious listening. It creates a sense of worship around the silence, as everyone is intently focused on what is happening; nothing. I think you could make an argument that modern, indoors performances of 4'33 are lacking, and I would be inclined to agree with you, but no flack should be given to John Cage without first understanding the context of the original performance. It was not just "lets sit in silence for 4 and a half minutes," it was a study on the natural world and appreciating the sounds that happen around us all the time; sounds that we dont usually consider music.

[@enjoyclassicalmusic6006]

Yes, my problem is it tells you less about the atmosphere of natural world, and more about the atmosphere of a concert hall

[@classicalricky]

I actually don't hate any classical music

[@enjoyclassicalmusic6006]

I sort of agree, and I say in the vid!

[@classicallpvault8251]

Have you ever listened to the work of Karlheinz Stockhausen? Experimentation for the sake of experimentation resulting in completely un-enjoyable garbage relying on self-deception of the audience, who only pretend to enjoy it because they are a bunch of snobby elitist nincompoops who have their heads up their own arses and want to show off their 'open-mindedness' to likeminded ignoramuses.

[@Mike-zh1ew]

About Beethoven's Wellington's victory, I LOVE it, it's not very good, technically, it wasn't intended to be, Beethoven was making a pop boiler, it's supposed to be just fun, it's a structural mess, but you can enjoy it if you turn your brain off a little

[@josefkrenshaw179]

Mine is a pet peeve more than everything. The finale of Beethoven's sixth symphony. It is the rondo that will not die. Just when you think it is almost over, here comes another round.

[@joespencer471]

I LOVE Beethoven! But he definitely has pieces that seem to have fake-out endings!

[@josefkrenshaw179]

@@joespencer471 Who doesn't love Beethoven? The big problem with the sixth stems from I've seen it live so many times,

[@marypugh3905]

The old cellist joke: he dreamt he was playing Pachelbach's canon and woke up to find that he was.

[@phwbooth]

Albinoni's Adagio was not written by him, but in the twentieth century.

[@Jan34279]

I sometimes have a problem with some complex pieces, especially symphonies and suites. I often can't get the melody, they seem messy and I wonder if I'm to dumb to understand it or is the piece just bad.

[@sandrobirnbaumer5444]

Most of the time it's nobodys fault and just a question of taste :)

[@isaacbeen2087]

I would stop listening for a "melody". That's not really what symphonic music is about.

[@Jan34279]

@@isaacbeen2087 I totally agree, I just lack a better way to explain it. I mean more something like an understandable and memorable pattern, like Bethoven's 9th. And as an example of the opposite, I'd take Meerovich Symphony no. 1. As much as I love Meerovich, cause I'm mostly into russian composers, I can't get his symphony, unlike his memorable film/cartoon music. This symphony just seems a complete mess for me. Also my favorite composer is Yuri Levitin and I love almost all of his works. But there's his "Little suite for marimba and vibraphone" which I completely don't get either.

[@isaacbeen2087]

@@Jan34279 Have you heard the 12th symphony of Shostakovich? our school did that years ago, it made quite the impression on me. Perhaps the trick is to really study the piece first, internalise all the various themes, etc. this is what Britten advocated.

[@marypugh3905]

Also Anything Rachmaninoff, Ein garbage naudi or Karl Junkins, Tchaikovsky piano concerto 1, Greig piano concerto, wedding day at Troldhagen, flower duet, clog dance etc

[@dynis15]

These are good takes imo, I been saying the same thing for years about the John cage 433 song and modernist music in general. I also agree with the Mozart pick and Haydn pick. Good calls.

[@paulw.harvey3093]

I see your point about the Surprise symphony. That's just one movement. A lot of Haydn symphonies have maybe one or two interesting movements and dull ones for the rest. Surprise has four interesting movements. Haydn wrote tons of music, not for his own accumulation of wealth, but because he had a huge extended family and he was always helping them out. Mozart's scatological music is fun. I especially like "Bona nox." Beethoven's "Wellington's victory" just wasn't very good. Pachelbel? He wrote a lot of other music, and a lot of it is enjoyable. Thank you for the video.

[@sandrobirnbaumer5444]

I knew Cage was gonna come up

[@JRCSalter]

To be honest, the remaining movements of Eine Kleine Nachtmusik are much much better (particularly the second), and rarely played as much.

[@TheRadioactivepiggy]

Agreed with everything except for 4'33, but I totally like your reasoning and how you went about it! I think for me when it comes to modernist music it is often more about the composing experience rather than the performance, which some people dont like which is totally valid. I think modernists compose for the first audience, themselves, and we are just kind of looking in a window, but since we are "outside" looking in of course it doesnt always make sense to us. great video I really enjoyed hearing you explain things in a different, respectful way

[@memonk11]

I had to analyze Eine Kleine Nachtmusik in college. LOVE Mozart, but... I need to give that particular quartet a rest, maybe for another 50 years.

[@stvp68]

What is the name of the 70s-fied Mozart piece?

[@Guzunderstrop]

Ein musicalische spass (a musical joke)

[@stvp68]

@@Guzunderstrop danke!

[@grafplaten]

@@Guzunderstrop *Ein musikalischer Spaß

[@Nilmand]

6:32 ok but Schönberg's Suite for piano is a banger

[@thepostapocalyptictrio4762]

Genius… so much emotion in that and the piano concerto

[@Whatismusic123]

@@thepostapocalyptictrio4762 religion not music

[@gonzoengineering4894]

​@@Whatismusic123 deranged take

[@michaelwright2986]

The one thing I absolutely agree with you on is the Beethoven (which I know as Wellington's Victory--has the name changed). It makes Tchaikovsky sound elegant and restrained. For the Mozart and Haydn, I see your point, but in their original setting it would have been different: music you can talk over, and a pretty close relationship between composer and audience, deliberately facile intro to the bang, like a stand-up comic saying "Wake up at the back, there" (was that Franky Howerd?)

[@alecrechtiene558]

For me it is: -Pachelbel Canon -Brahms Hungarian Dance no. 5 -Dvorak Symphony no. 9 mov. 4 (just the main theme) -Rachmaninoff Prelude in C-sharp minor -Pretty much any piece by Tchaikovsky after hearing it more than 3 times (Except for Romeo and Juliet and Symphony no. 6) -Vivaldi “Spring” from 4 seasons mov.1. -Verdi “La Donna è Mobile” from Rigoletto.

[@bogdan98ify]

Agree. add to that 1. Shostakovich waltz no.2 2. Beethoven "for elise" 3. Mozart symphony no. 40 begining

[@YooLookMarvelous]

Can't say I agree with most of the items on the list. A few opinions.... Carmina Burana: Love Adagio for Strings (and most everything by Barber): Love. It moves very slowly, builds very gradually, and pierces my heart every time when it reaches its conclusion. Haydn Surprise Symphony: really, it's Hadyn. It comes from a period when music was supposed to be metrical, orderly, and quite frankly, predictable. Eine Kleine Nacht Music: Love it in the right quantities. People tend to gravitate to what they know, and maybe this particular piece could take a break for a while. Für Elise: WAY WAY overplayed! It even got used in a McDonald's commercial several years ago. Enough already! John Cage: Has anyone--I mean ANYONE--actually *enjoyed* any work by John Cage? His music was experimental. Result of the experiment: a big fail. Add to the Annoying list: Khachaturian's Sabre Dance Most of Beethoven's choral works. The guy just didn't care about singers!

[@michaelwright2986]

Agree about Beethoven choral, and would add a lot of post-Baroque liturgical music: like, if you want to write an opera, write an opera, stop messing around with masses.

[@tylers9006]

lol I love Cage especially his piano sonatas and the freedman etudes but everyone has their own preferences

[@pikachuchujelly7628]

While it's annoying to hear Für Elise being played so much, it's overplayed for a reason. It's one of the few Beethoven pieces that are easy enough for beginner pianists to play, so it's often one of the first serious pieces that they learn and a stepping stone to more advanced works.

[@patrickhackett7881]

Some people like the Sonatas and Interludes for Prepared Piano.

[@Guzunderstrop]

Waltz 3 from the 3rd movement of Tchaikovsky's 5th Symphony.

[@OmarTravelAdventures]

Barber, as an American, did a great job at composing something that does not sound irritatingly american. I do like the adagio and the string quartet it comes from. Nothing amazing, but not irritating at all. In fact when it set to choral music, it is touching.

[@truefilm6991]

Eine kleine Nachtmusik was the first thst came to mind. Especially since the second movent, Romance, is so beautiful.

[@martineyles]

I consider 4'33" to be more a piece of theatre than a piece of music.

[@johncrwarner]

I tend to have performers or performances that I hate often a performance of a piece I love.

[@jenesuispassanslavoir7698]

Just reiterating the note that the Albinoni isn’t by Albinoni. The bassline may have been composed by Albinoni, but the famous piece is a contemporary work written in a baroque style by the musicologist Remo Giazotti. And to say that it is one my absolute least favourite works. Lark Ascending is also not a patch on the RVW Oboe Concerto yet gets so much air time and I hardly ever hear the OC.

[@kristinejohanek]

I think your list of disliked music has generally become that list because it has become over-familiar. I conduct a community orchestra, and we tend to play one overly-familiar piece per concert. (out of 6 or 7 pieces or movements) We do that because we play for a very wide range of tastes in our small city, and families come together to hear our performances. If we avoid the 'chestnuts' because they are too familiar, eventually, they will be forgotten, because they aren't played. We're doing the Vivaldi 'Spring' this March, and played the Haydn Symphony 94 last year. That being said, there's so much more music available, that we can't spend all of our time playing through the old familiar stuff.

[@enjoyclassicalmusic6006]

It's not just familiarity, although that is important. I discuss ear-worming in the video...

[@sergei-prokofiev]

I am fan of Prokofjev but his first violin concerto is just not doing it for me. The second one is great but the first one yeah idk

[@stevenwilgus5422]

For the causal listener, one wonders if Gustov Holtz ever composed anything else... Or, the same can be said for Antonín Dvořák... Hopefully, you take my point.

[@johnwalzer9187]

That's why it's up to the individual to fix the "warhorse" problem. When I first heard Holst's "The Planets," the first thing that came to mind was, "this is fantastic - what else did he write?" And by looking, I found out and now have a whole batch of Holst pieces I like. I took the same approach with Vivaldi and Rachmaninoff and Vaughan Williams and lots of others. People need to stop listening solely to the acknowledged masterpieces and explore the 1000 years of music that the classical genre has to offer.

[@stevenwilgus5422]

@@johnwalzer9187 Well stated. As for Dvořák and Symphony No. 9 in E minor, "From the New World", the issue that has become an earworm must be put squarely on the State of Texas ("I'm From Texas.") I thoroughly love the full display of his works. As for Texas, I would never admit that to anyone, if I were.🤣 The classical music genre if priceless!

[@pikachuchujelly7628]

Holst's first suite for military band is very well known. It's one of the standard pieces that everyone in concert band has played.

[@patrickhackett7881]

Dvorak is not a one hit wonder-- he has several really popular pieces (7th Humoresque, Cello Concerto, the Eighth and Ninth Symphonies, American String Quartet).

[@stevenwilgus5422]

@@patrickhackett7881 I take your point. I have always loved Antonin's work. But, like Holtz...

[@thecarman3693]

I wish they'd play 4'33" by Cage in my grocery store (and many other places) over what they do play.

[@gspaulsson]

"Albinioni's Adagio" wasn't written by Albinioni, but by the 20th century Albinioni scholar Remo Giazotto. Giazotto figured that no one would listen to the music of some obscure 20th century musicologist, so he claimed that it as an authentic Albionioni masterpiece that he had discovered .

[@mangstadt1]

For me, it's Brahms' Hunarian Rhapsody No. 5, just because of how often it is played as an encore by orchestras that are touring. And I agree, Eine Kleine Nachtmusic is quite annoying too.

[@mangstadt1]

Hungarian Rhapsody.... I met John Cage at a concert in Madrid around 1990. Right at the end of the last work of his in the concert (I remember the musicians were hitting and dipping gongs into buckets filled with water), a loud motorcycle went off in the street and the clock from a building across the street also started sounding at the hour. They were the type of random noises that he cherished as part of the musical experience. I mentioned it to him and he agreed.

[@karrotkake]

hungarian dance you mean?

[@karrotkake]

and i mean i do agree that its overplayed and that annoys me with alot of pieces, but i definitely wouldnt put it as my least favorite, i feel like theres other extremely overplayed pieces that are way more simple and arent very well written musically speaking

[@mangstadt1]

@@karrotkake Yeah, Hungarian dance No. 5. Such a stinker :))

[@ListenToTheNEST]

Bolero would be my least favorite. It's repetitive, about seven minutes too long, and ends stupidly. It's a tragedy that's the piece he's most remembered for.

[@lesnyk255]

Non-musician here, so fill up your saltshakers (saltcellars?) I do rather enjoy atonal, "weird" music - George Crumb, Iannis Xenakis, Donald Erb, et al - but I have a problem with Charles Ives. To my uneducated ear it sounds like music I'd make if I got drunk enough to overcome my self-consciousness. Beethoven in a karaoke bar. I also like the more traditional classics, except perhaps for the overplayed stuff public television might broadcast during pledge drives - I guess that's because it's gotten so familiar it's lost its ability to surprise. I like music that surprises me.

[@josephromance3908]

You simply don't understand John Cage.

[@Georgeth-kb6rg]

Glen Gould... everything he does... grrrrrrrrrrr

[@Alejandroide82]

Pachelbel's Canon

[@tristankalan6158]

What is vrong vith eine kleine nachtmusic?

[@teresagardiner153]

Nothing, really. It's just overplayed and some people are sick of hearing it.

[@erikthomsen4007]

@@teresagardiner153 That's the sad thing, when great music is worn out. Mainly by people that don't know the first thing about classical music, but they _do_ know "that piece. And that one. Who was it you just mentioned? Joe Pan?" 🙄

[@enlightenedanalysis1071]

I agree with your last choice on John Cage. But I am sorry, your fifth choice to put Barber’s Adagio into this list is serious bad judgement. It’s a sublime and profound piece that encapsulates the feeling of suffering, pain, loneliness and beauty. There are plenty of better choices you could have included into this list - such as the endlessly boring and repetitive concertos from the baroque era (most of which sound very similar to each other). But overall I agree with your other 4 choices. Thanks

[@scharnhorstkaisarbeethoven]

F off Barber's adagio rules

[@JohnSpawn1]

As someone else already mentioned: The supposed Albinoni piece was really composed by 20th-century musicologist Remo Giazotto. As far as atonal music goes, I do think there are some outliers which are fairly approachable and moving, particularly some works by Alban Berg like 'Wozzeck' or his violin concerto. In terms of what major works of classical music I don't care for myself, let's just say one or two major works by Bach which I don't dare name here (and as others have suggested to the first commenter, maybe I'll come to appreciate those works over time...). Also to some extent Pachelbel's canon, but thanks to Japanese jazz pianist Hiromi Uehara I don't dislike it anymore (I can do without hearing the original, though). Other than that, some 20th-century avant-garde works leave me perplexed (*cough* Helikopter-Streichquartett *cough*), but I'm largely indifferent to work like that (after all it's avant-garde, it's not meant to be accessible).

[@jpiccone1]

It wasn't composed by Giazotto, it was reconstructed by him. The instrumentation is off, but it it consistent with compositions of the time and period.

[@JohnSpawn1]

@@jpiccone1 Giazotto claimed that's what happened. The Saxon State Library (central to his claims) and various musicologists have never found any evidence of the fragment Giazotto supposedly used for his "reconstruction" except for a piece of paper whose origin was determined to be from the early 20th century. It's still an open question whether this fragment ever actually existed, many musicologists regard it as a hoax. The copyright is in Giazotto's name and he is widely considered to be the composer (even if a lot of KZbin uploads still misattribute the piece to Albinoni).

[@barrymoore4470]

'Wozzeck' is, along with Debussy's 'Pelléas et Mélisande', my favorite opera. The work's atonality is totally apposite for the bleak story being conveyed.

[@Alun49]

The over use of Barber's Adagio in far too many films and documentaries has killed this piece for me.

[@joaopaulochavespinto9685]

The classical music I hate is anytime I hear a baroque or older piece performed like it's a romantic piece. I just hate hearing such an exagerated vibrato, tense bows, wrong trills and other ornaments in such delicate music. If the group is amateur I let it pass, but there is no excuse for trained musicians to not know how to play what they are playing. I once played Charpentier's Te Deum with a semi-professional orchestra (most of the players were college educated), and it hurt me so much to hear a piece I love beeing played with vibrato all the way thru, trills from bellow and no dotted rythm in the prelude. Even the conductor didn't know an apropriate continuo setup for the solo arias, as he instructed both cellos, double bass (me) and organ to play them. Needless to say, the concert didn't go very well.

[@jmwoods190]

Then I'd suggest not to watch Barry Lyndon then. The main theme is a work by Handel that was interpreted with the same heaviness as a late romantic symphony!

[@roberthunt1540]

I can't listen to baroque recordings made after, say, 2000. All the soloists think they're rock stars. They heard that Baroque music sometimes had improvisation, and they just overdo it.

[@mr-wx3lv]

PACHALBELS CANON IN D. I actually remember the bass player smirking at his colleague at the lack of variety of his part.

[@vantarinitel]

For my scifi story, their memory systems work ~just differently enough that every song is earwormable and that is a plot point and this video is very validating for this. xD xD

[@rembo96]

Eine Kleine Nachtmusik made me hate Mozart as a kid.

[@nuttysquirrel8574]

What a fun topic. From your list of 5 I love nos. 2-5, as for your no.1. I completely agree with you. The bloke, I won't call him a composer, was totally taking the p*ss. As for what I, genuinely, 100%, totally HATE - anything by stravinsky and his gang of early 20th century discordant 'composers' who only did that 'stuff' because they could and to be contentious; whenever anything by them comes on the radio I make the effort to turn it off. Also, anything by debussy - bland tosh. Add in most 'modern' composers such as william walton; elgar can be pretty dodgy too, along with rachmanikov. Call me old fashioned, many do, but it's the 'popular' ones for me - Beethoven, Tchaikovsky, Rossini (you can't beat a good overture!), all the Baroque era, et al.!! Thanks for the fun.

[@libor4128]

I am sorry, but apart from the Beethoven and the Cage pieces I cannot agree. For me Eine Kleine Nachtmusik is gorgeous and so is the Haydn symphony - maybe overused, but they are masterpieces nonetheless.

[@rbrooks2007]

After putting up with atonal music, Tigran Hamasyan says "Here! hold my pint." then composes Levitation 21 which musicologists are still trying to pick apart.

[@50Steaks68]

I’d remove all of these and replace them with Philip glass pieces.

[@DavidMillsom]

Pachelbel's Canon is a one trick pony.

[@ThatOneGuyRAR]

This comment section is going to be a wasteland

[@roberthunt1540]

How could you miss Fur Elise??

[@joespencer471]

Fun list. My top three: -Sabre Dance by Aram Katchaturian. I hear it and think 60's sitcoms at their goofiest.🤣 The other two that get on my nerves somehow made to Disney's Fantasia (1941) 😮. Night on Bald Mountain by Modest Mussorgsky, at least the first Halloweenish part, and then THE RITE OF SPRING by Igor Stravinsky. I wonder if harsh atonal music would ever have gotten popularized without it.

[@owlcowl]

The Rite of Spring is NOT atonal music. As revolutionary as it was in its treatment of rhythm, harmony, instrumentation, and form, it was still thoroughly grounded in tonality, and became the founding document of 20C tonal modernism. The corresponding score for atonal modernism was Schoenbergs Pierrot Lunaire, written at the same time as Stravinskys masterpiece (1912) and even more radical in its approach to melody and harmonic relationships. So the two great streams of 20C music for the next four decades issued forth from these two remarkable but very different compositions. If you don't like atonality, fine, you have lots of company, but don't blame it on The Rite.

[@davidcolver2502]

I understand that Khachaturian wrote Sabre Dance in a single evening as a vulgar joke and was himself appalled that it became among his best recognised pieces.

[@Guzunderstrop]

I disagree about the Stravinsky; as someone else wrote, there are tonal centres in the Rite of Spring. Also, I think you have to blame Wagner for the popularisation of atonal music. Obviously, there's the Tristan chord sequence, but I'm not talking about that. Wagner showed the world what it was to write completely tuneless melodies. My vote for classical music I hate is anything Wagner wrote with a solo voice involved. The purely instrumental music is amazing, some of the choral pieces from his music dramas are spellbinding, but the parts for solo voice are just so much doleful wailing. Other than the ambivalent tonality of Tristan, this is Wagner's other great gift to atonal music.

[@jmwoods190]

Not sure if you're referring to the original version of Night of the Bald Mountain or the much more popular version arranged by Rimsky Korsakov which has fairly significant redactions of the original. I personally find Rimsky-Korsakov's arrangement to be overly polished and percussion parts have been significantly watered down, but I much prefer Mussorgsky's original version to be a much interesting and original work despite some of its instrumentation issues with the woodwind & brass, a major reason why many musicians prefer Rimsky-Korsakov's arrangement.

[@johnmcgoldrick7085]

Conductor is amazing. Who the shnizzigaggle paid to go see that last “piece”?

[@yon8378]

I have a category of pieces that are actually fine, but they make me groan because they are played too often. In no particular order, I include the following: Eine kleine Nacht Musik; The seasons; Haydn's trumpet concerto; Dvorak's American symphony; the second Hungarian rhapsody. Oddly enough, I actually enjoy the Bolero.

[@ColonelFredPuntridge]

I have a category: Schubert songs that I’m so sick of hearing. They include: _Erlkönig, Heldenrösslein, Die Forelle, Der Tod und das Mädchen,_ and _Ave Maria._

[@radualexa1356]

I agree with the description you gave it the groan because it is too overplayed but the music itself is good. Otherwise it wouldn't be remembered

[@yon8378]

@@ColonelFredPuntridge I agree in principle, but there is something about Schubert songs that make them ungroanable, to me atleast. In particular, I stil enjoy Erlkonig, perhaps because of the variety among different performances. I do dislike the fact that currently live lieder recitals seem to be confined to these most popular examples, and Winterreise, wonderful as these are, But there are many equally wonderful songs that are rarely, if ever, done. One of my top favoritess, which hardly anybody seems to know, is Thekla.

[@jmwoods190]

@@yon8378 My personal picks of the 'overplayed to death' category would include Elgar's Pomp & Circumstance March No. 1 aka Land of Hope & Glory, Offenbach's Can Can, Händel's Halleujah Chorus(though I adore Unto Us A Child Is Born from the same oratorio). I don't mind Schubert's songs or most of his works, even though I don't really listen to them that much, though I agree that Ave Maria has been overplayed somewhat, but not enough to make me groan. On another note: Most people like Richard Strauss's Also Sprach Zarathustra only for its iconic opening(which I love as well), but my favorite parts are the quieter parts of the work- hidden gems they are!

[@tt3569]

great!

[@bluetortilla]

I agree with the Wellington Symphony. being, well, just awful. (Sorry my god Beet.). Maybe Beet. was still a Napolean admirer even at that point, and didn't have it in him. In any case, it doesn't even sound like Beet., sounds like it was composed in an evening for a traveling circus or something. Only superficial people like Fur Elise. The joke among Beet. circles were (and Beet. was in on it), "Who's Elise?" It was not meant as a serious piece. I have to disagree big time with Mozart,s Eine Keleine Nachtmusik. It's masterful and delightful, and yes, I know it was the top 40 of its day, performed fur poof heads. it's still great though.

[@fazivles]

I also used to be fairly annoyed by 4'33 too but the story behind it is at least interesting. I wouldn't call it a stunt at all! Rather, just an action by an avant garde composer that pushes into thinking about what music really is. Off the top of my head- The story is something along the lines of Cage going into a completely soundproof room, but he still hear noises! Incredibly high pitches and low pitches were always buzzing in his ear. This was possibly because of tinnitus but I read somewhere that he thought he could hear his own bloodflow! So, 4'33 is just an excercise in realizing that we are always immerse and digesting some sort of sound, whether we like it or not. Now are there better ways to make this discussion in music? Possibly but this is what we got! Total Silence!

[@fazivles]

Now, Wellington's Victory I might add is hilariously bad. I love to make fun of it in fact! There's a hilarious recording with the Berlin Phil conducted by Karajan that has all of the cannon shots done are electronic which means they all sound the exact same and oh my god it's like a musical shitpost ahead of our time.

[@ginopagnani7286]

So who recorded the best performance 😂😂😂😂

[@mlconlanmeister]

For some reason, Prokofiev's "Classical" symphony annoys me: how is it that, for me, Prokofiev 1 seems overlong, while the Mahler 6 feels, (again, IMO), too short?

[@jmwoods190]

Mahler 6's length was an issue for me, BUT I do put it on repeat quite a bit as it has long been a favorite of mine, and it was the very piece that made me first consider pursuing a music career!

[@JohnJohnson-du7vc]

Satie's Gymnopaedia & Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue. Both good pieces, sick to death of hearing them.

[@thecarman3693]

You can always switch off to Gershwin's Piano Concerto.

[@JohnJohnson-du7vc]

Obviously I don't choose to listen to these, but they get overplayed in media that can be hard to avoid.

[@reidwhitton6248]

This is sad. Barber's Adagio is beautiful.

[@84422112]

Debussy's L'Apres Midi D'Un Faun is always likely to see objects hurled in the direction of whichever device is inflicting it on me.

[@radualexa1356]

You mean you don't like it? I actually love it

[@ThatOneGuyRAR]

I also actually really like it 🥺

[@84422112]

​@@radualexa1356Each to his own. I just know that as soon as I hear the first notes of that bloody flute, my teeth are set on edge: it is like listening to fingernails being dragged down a blackboard. I don't think that the crime of faunicude exists, but if it did, I'd commit it. It isn't the only piece that has this effect on me. I'm not certain that Greensleeves counts as classical music, but that also induces an unpleasant nervous reaction.

[@egorovvladimir7304]

I hate Grieg's in the hall of the mountain king

[@Boccaccio1811]

I could never... it's one of the pieces that got me into classical music and I still love it to this day. But I also like pop concert pieces more than most classical listeners

[@memonk11]

And 4'33...Amen brother.

[@annelarrybrunelle3570]

A fair comment: there's a fair amount of good music that can be somewhat defeated by a weak performance (and I mean here still a performance by professionals who will not commit technical errors), and there's a fair amount of music of lesser quality that can be rendered bravissimo by inspired performers who know what to do with it. And then there is the body of Bach's work, which is hard to ruin even by an inferior performance. BTW, Eine Kleine can very easily be diminished by competent players who simply aren't treat it respectfully. Lotta nuance in this conversation.

[@54blewis]

I love Bach,Prokofiev, and at times Mozart…..Beethoven when I’m in the mood.

[@pg4662]

Music gets into your soul! And it can also be associated with certain life events for good or not so good. But many pieces of music can just grate! There are some so called classic pop songs that 'everybody loves' hmm don't count me in on that! But there is a piece of music, a 16th century English folk song called Greensleeves that when ' telephone hold music' first became a thing was on every single phone system and drove me nuts! Thankfully it went out of fashion!

[@jmwoods190]

For me(a musician myself) it has long been the majority of the marches & waltzes of Johann Strauss family- too shallow for my personal taste to the point of making me cringe. Another one is Offenbach's Can Can, which I find to be overplayed to death. An honorable mention would be Elgar's Pomp & Circumstance March No. 1 aka "Land of Hope & Glory"- though I didn't mind the music itself too much, rather that it is yet another piece that has been overplayed to obscene level. On the other hand, I am VERY partial to the majority of Richard Strauss's works albeit he was *unrelated* to the Johann Strauss family.

[@jgesselberty]

For me, almost any of the 12 tone music of Schoenberg, Berg, Webern and their cohorts. Moses und Aaron is torture.

[@joannedj1]

Classical music I don’t hate but do think is a bit overused… Elgar - Nimrod from the Enigma Variations. Lovely tune, very stirring, but of all the variations, this is the ONLY one that ever seems to get played and I live in the UK, England to be exact, same country as Sir Edward Elgar, and yet we never seem to hear any other of the Enigma Variations, it’s ALWAYS Nimrod! Why?! Beethoven’s 5th Symphony 1st Movement. The whole symphony is well worth a listen, there are three other perfectly good movements, but most of the time it’s just the first one which is so famous that practically everyone knows it even if they know nowt else about classical music! Spring from the Four Seasons - Vivaldi. I feel so sorry for Vivaldi. He composes this lovely bit of music, and what does it remind people of? Yep, that’s right, being on hold on the phone with some lying message telling you that “your call is important to us” when it clearly isn’t! See also Für Elise and Greensleeves for the same reason. With regard to your comments about Barber’s Adagio for Strings - I get that it’s not the most interesting piece of music ever composed, but there is a time and a place for “boring” tunes, which is late at night on Radio 3 or Classic FM so that you can nod off to them, so don’t discount boring classics, they can come in handy if you need zeds! 😂

[@donaldjones5386]

The Pines, the Fountains, Roman Festivals

[@dorothysatterfield3699]

Richard Strauss, Ein Heldenleben.

[@realdemons3273]

"Talking about music is like dancing about architecture" - Thelonious Monk...should say all you need to know about this video.

[@Georgeth-kb6rg]

Tempered clavier... grrrrrrrrrrr

[@kingvii7250]

Often you tend to "hate" music that is most played. When I grew up learning piano I refused playing "Für Elise", because every one wanted to play that and by the time it was experter that I would get my hands on that, I really hated it, because I've heard it so many times, it felt laim and boring.

[@airpanache]

Yes the very best example: Eine Kline Nachtmusik. So overplayed over all places and in all kinds of forms

[@davidthom7127]

I get that you're not able to appreciate these. (

[@johnpcomposer]

4'33 post-modern BS. I agree. I don't give Fur Elise a pass. You've done quite well with your list. I would have added Strauss's Blue Danube on there. It has even become tiresome as post-modern ironic foil.

[@ayethein7681]

No, earworm is not the problem. If I get an earworm, I just drive it out by listening to something else. There's only a couple of pieces that make me want to curl up...'Fur Elise' is one.'Brahm's' lullaby' is another. Not even 'Wellingon's victory.'.and I actually like the 1812 overture.

[@Georgeth-kb6rg]

Maria Callas... everything she sings.. grrrrrrrrrrrr (musical saw)

[@pabmusic1]

Beethoven's 'Wellingtons Sieg oder die Schlacht bei Vittoria' (to give it its full name) was written 18 months before Waterloo. It actually celebrates (as it says in its title) the battle of Vittoria in the Peninsula. This dire piece of music was written for a mechanical device worked by clockwork.

[@marknieuweboer8099]

From composers I hold dear: Tchaikovsky's March Slave; Borodin's In the Steppes of Central Asia; Rimsky Korsakov's Sheherazade (except for the Third Movement); Shostakovich' Second Waltz. They are terribly bland and formulaic. Also everything by Lyapunov except the symphonic poem Hashish.

[@AlamoCityCello]

Interesting. This list does not include Wagner or Strauss. I wonder how many young soldiers marched to their death, listening to Flight of the Valkyries. Nobody beats the war drum like a classical symphony orchestra.

[@AlamoCityCello]

Music is like food. It’s really not about “enjoying” it. You might enjoy chicken-wings and Butter-fingers. But in the long run, broccoli and blueberries are better for you. I’ll take anything written by Mozart and Haydn over the 19th century warmongers!

[@enjoyclassicalmusic6006]

@@AlamoCityCello I know what you're saying, but I think there's a bit more to the comparison to taste, see my vid on taste kzbin.info/www/bejne/iJmUi2SgndBppLs&ab_channel=iamlcubed

[@boptillyouflop]

Honestly, most people don't enjoy atonal music. Its appeal is just inherently extremely narrow, and will probably always remain so.

[@valenz995]

I despise the canon in d

[@RobertJonesWightpaint]

John Cage isn't a classical composer. There are many very good expressions, mostly in Yiddish, to tell us what he actually IS: but I don't have enough interest in him to recite them. Though Shlemiel would be a good start.

[@josefkrenshaw179]

I always figured John Cage cribbed the five-minute pause Mahler put in between the first and second movements in the "Resurrection" symphony. I heard Salonen conduct it once with the pause. It worked really well with the powerful first movement in the brain.

[@Prospro8]

Why would Albinoni be better than the Barber? It'd be Monty Python comical!!!! The Barber is full of tragic sense of loss. Not to mention it's an American piece of the PERIOD, like all that film's source music, that's the point. Composed in the 1930s it became massively radio-popular in the 1960s. The chordal structure gives it its poignancy. A basic fact is that all music isn't meant to be 'liked'. Today 'arts and entertainment' are grouped together even in places like the BBC News app. This shouldn't be. Some art is meant to plunge us into compassion or remorse. If I were more arrogant I'd hint that maybe you haven't yet experienced the sense of loss that the Barber instantly causes us to identify with and recognise. Oh, hey ... I just did.