If aliens came to earth and threatened to destroy us all......

[O Delvig]

....what one recording would you play to convince them of humanity's merit? I'm definitely thinking Bach, probably Glenn Gould's 1981 recording of the Goldbergs, or Koroliov's Art of the Fugue, or maybe even Starker's recording of the sixth cello suite. Please note I said one recording, so by the rules that govern this place that means limit it to about five.

[The new erato]

O Delvig, Delvig. Guess we'd need Shostakovich symphony no 14.

[Luke]

The Busch Quartet in op 130-133, perhaps...

[greg]

My very obvious choice:

[Franco]

Buddy Holly's "That'll Be the Day"

[CD]

It's a Hollywood cliché that aliens would somehow understand our concept of music, or the concept of music at all. Who's to say their ears (if indeed they even have any!) would be so constructed that music wouldn't sound like the screeching of bats? (I know, I know, the topic was started in fun, but it irks me.)

[MN Dave]

THIS!

[Jupiter]

[O Delvig]

C'mon, I started a genuinely serious thread about aliens and now everyone's turning it into some kind of parody?

[Jupiter]

Ok, my Manson post was in poor taste... maybe. What I am saying is that the Mansons of this world have as much to say to aliens as Bach. They are two guys at opposite ends of a very wide spectrum, with everyone and everything in between. I'm not sure aliens would care about music anyway, except in the anthropological sense.

[O Delvig]

It's a Hollywood cliché that aliens would somehow understand our concept of music, or the concept of music at all. Who's to say their ears (if indeed they even have any!) would be so constructed that music wouldn't sound like the screeching of bats? (I know, I know, the topic was started in fun, but it irks me.)

Well, maybe they'd like some solo double bass music? Or the Goldberg Variations if you transposed it down three octaves and played it as some kind of ultra low-frequency electronic pulse? 

[Scarpia]

What foolishness!  The complexity of the human brain, a self-organizing, self programing computation machine that can do things that man in all his/her science can not come close to fathoming.  The subtlety of genetics, self replicating polymer sequences which create entire organisms of billions of cells just to propagate themselves.  You would present them with Starker scratching out some simple-minded patterns of acoustic vibration on a wooden box?  Snap out of it! 

[springrite]

I'd go with "Great Balls of Fire"!!!

[O Delvig]

[jochanaan]

Okay, assuming that the aliens can hear (or translate) sounds in our limited range of hearing, and that they are motivated by justice however twisted rather than simply evil, and that they AREN'T familiar with our music--yes, these are all rather large assumptions, but they're the assumptions we have to make for this thread to make any sense --I'd play them Mahler's Eighth Symphony.  Neither the Bernstein nor the Solti nor the Horenstein recording is perfect (maybe some of you others can think of one that's a little closer to that elusive quality), but any one of them would make the case if it could be made at all.

[Bogey]

I figure if they did not enjoy it and vaporize me, then this would be the way to go.

[greg]

THIS!

LOL 

[CD]

I would skip the music and hand them a Ubloobideegaian translation of In Search of Lost Time.

[greg]

I would skip the music and hand them a Ubloobideegaian translation of In Search of Lost Time.

I'll tell Ubloobideega to start working on that one...

[Scarpia]

Okay, assuming that the aliens can hear (or translate) sounds in our limited range of hearing, and that they are motivated by justice however twisted rather than simply evil, and that they AREN'T familiar with our music--yes, these are all rather large assumptions, but they're the assumptions we have to make for this thread to make any sense --I'd play them Mahler's Eighth Symphony.  Neither the Bernstein nor the Solti nor the Horenstein recording is perfect (maybe some of you others can think of one that's a little closer to that elusive quality), but any one of them would make the case if it could be made at all.

If you tried to force me to listen to Mahler's 8th symphony, I think I might just want to put an end to it all.