Great underrated pieces.

[LaciDeeLeBlanc]

Basically self-explanatory. However, please include why you feel the way you do. 

[The Emperor]

My music, because it's mine!

[hornteacher]

In general I feel most all chamber music is underrated.  Orchestral warhorses get performed and recorded much more often than smaller chamber works, and it is usually in chamber music where composers make their most innovative artistic statements.

[Mark]

... and it is usually in chamber music where composers make their most innovative artistic statements.

Examples of which would be?

[Kullervo]

What is, in your opinion, the most underrated piece of music?

Why, Chausson's Concert for Violin, Piano and String Quartet, of course.

[hornteacher]

Examples of which would be?

Beethoven's late string quartets and violin sonatas, Mozart's clarinet quintet, Shostakovich's string quartets, Brahms Horn Trio and string sextets.  All of these are famous chamber works but are not nearly as recorded or performed as the "Eroica", "Emperor", "New World", or Brandenbergs.

Now if you'd like an example of a lesser known underrated piece of chamber music, I nominate the "Kegelstatt" Trio for Clarinet, Viola, and Piano by Mozart.  It was written around the same time as the more famous Clarinet Concerto and Quintet and is of the same high quality but for some reason is lesser known.

[Symphonien]

Beethoven's late string quartets and violin sonatas, Mozart's clarinet quintet, Shostakovich's string quartets, Brahms Horn Trio and string sextets. All of these are famous chamber works but are not nearly as recorded or performed as the "Eroica", "Emperor", "New World", or Brandenbergs.

The question was underrated. I don't think any of those works could be called "underrated". They are famous as you said, and, at least from my experience, regarded very highly. Sure, chamber music may not be performed as often as orchestral music but I don't see anyone saying that these works are particularly worse than their orchestral counterparts.

[lukeottevanger]

OK, then - how about Satie's Socrate? Everyone who writes about it knows it is a unique and very important masterpiece of twentieth century music; everyone who listens to it immediately knows the same. But given its quality and importance, a disproportionately small number of people know it and talk about it is rare.

[Sean]

I'll go for Strauss's Sinfonia domestica.

I don't know Socrate Luke, but Janacek's piano music also came to mind.

[lukeottevanger]

Well, of course, I'd always promote certain of Janacek's works. And I'd argue that the finest of his works belong not near the front rank but right at the front rank of the repertoire. But I've argued that enough before... 

But, honestly, Socrate is one of 'those' seminal pieces  - always described in the most glowing terms when it is described (it is, pretty unequivocally, Satie's masterpiece), and held up by musicians who do know it (like Cage) as a major influence. But outside that small circle, it is never discussed - the fact that you, Sean, (with your extensive listening history) haven't heard it rather bears out my point! Of course Satie's 'musique pauvre' by its very nature will never be pushed into the limelight; it will always be sidelined under by showier, more 'expressive' works (ugh)

[lukeottevanger]

Sure, chamber music may not be performed as often as orchestral music...

Not even that - for logistical reasons I imagine there are plenty more chamber performances than orchestral ones. But, partly because they are more of a logistical feat, and because the public tend to assume that bigger=better (the media tend to collude with this, of course), orchestral performances are higher profile, and orchestral pieces (above all anything called 'symphony' ) become more the focus of general attention than chamber pieces. This board has proof enough of that itself - what else prompts a thread called 'That one symphony you never get tired of' which makes an unwritten but implied presumption that symphonies per se are a class apart. It's not surprising, of course, but on musical grounds it isn't supportable.

[Sean]

Luke, oh don't mention the listening history, there are still quite a few important works I've never got hold of, for instance I have on my desk only now after 24 years, Sibelius's Kullervo symphony. I read however Grove says Socrate is a particularly sensitive and moving piece, and I'll seek it out at the earliest opportunity at the library.

Also many of Faure's works, another Frenchman, are also very subtle and civilized: it's been said he'll never be a really popular composer, but works like the Piano quartets are in a special category I think.

Getting a little off topic, here's a few of those works I've yet to get hold of, which I read are key listening:

Danzi         Wind quintets
Diamond         Rounds for string orchestra
D'Indy         String quartet No.2
Dvorak         Biblical songs
Eisler         Die Massnahme & Zeitungsausschnitte
Gesualdo                   Sixth Book of madrigals
Gluck         Alceste
Goetz         Piano quartet & Piano quintet
Holmboe                   Requiem for Nietzsche & String quartets inc 5, 10 & 13
Ives         String quartet No.2
Norgard         Symphony No.6
Pettersson      Symphony No.6
Piston         Symphony No.4
Rachmaninov      All night vigil
Rimsky-Korsakov                The Invisible city of Kitezh
Rouse         Flute concerto
Schnittke                   Piano quintet
Schoenberg       Von Heute auf Morgen & Wind quintet
Schumann                         Scenes from Goethe's Faust
Stockhausen      Hymnen
Vaughan Williams                Riders to the sea
Wilbye         Madrigals
Xenakis         Keqrops

[Grazioso]

Not necessarily underrated, but woefully underappreciated:

Bruckner's masterly, gorgeous string quintet, which gets totally overshadowed by his orchestral and choral works for no right reason.

Zemlinsky's opulent tone poem Die Seejungfrau (The Mermaid), which would surely garner the love of fans of Strauss and early Schoenberg (Zemlinsky's father-in-law) if it were only heard more.

Lili Boulanger's striking and eerie early 20th-century choral work Psaume 130 "Du fond de l'abime". Her entire oeuvre is unjustly unknown to most.

Pettersson's 7th symphony, surely one of the greatest (and darkest) 20th-century symphonies. Anyone who likes Shostakovich needs to hear this immediately. (Indeed it excels most of his symphonic output, to my mind.)

Czech composers Fibich, Novak, and Suk, who wrote some pieces every bit as beautiful and interesting as those by Smetana and Dvorak, yet are known only to die-hard collectors/explorers.

[Mark]

Getting a little off topic, here's a few of those works I've yet to get hold of, which I read are key listening:

Rachmaninov      All night vigil

If I may, Sean, I'll make an extremely biased suggestion (I have about 19 versions of this masterpiece) that you hear this work most urgently. An absolutely awesome choral composition that very often leaves me humbled by its brilliance. If you can find Sveshnikov's landmark recording with the USSR State Choir, buy it without a moment's hesitation. If not, Hillier's fairly recent recording on Harmonia Mundi is the second disc of choice (SACD if you have the facilities).

[Sean]

Thanks Mark. Actually I understand this piece is another title for the Vespers, which I do know...

[DavidW]

Any Gesualdo.  I've been listening to him of late, and he's grown on me.  His music is emotionally stirring.  It doesn't come across as boring chant or anything like that.  I had a silly impression like I think others do (not necessary on gmg but instead the general classical music listener) to think that pre-Bach music is a boring, tedious chore.

I think that I'm not the only one that underrates well, pretty much all pre-Bach music.  And the madrigal is a form that I've nearly completely overlooked, associating it all with Dowland.

[not edward]

I think that I'm not the only one that underrates well, pretty much all pre-Bach music.  And the madrigal is a form that I've nearly completely overlooked, associating it all with Dowland.

A very good point. I know I do.

I might still nominate Karl Amadeus Hartmann's Sixth Symphony, not only because it's an almost unplayed great symphony, but also because it's so exciting to listen to that it ought to be a crowd-pleaser live.

[BachQ]

Art should not be "rated" in the first place, and, as a consequence, art should not be susceptible to being either overrated or underrated ........

[mahlertitan]

anything by Bruckner, just because people were too impatient to try to listen to it.

[Mark G. Simon]

Now if you'd like an example of a lesser known underrated piece of chamber music, I nominate the "Kegelstatt" Trio for Clarinet, Viola, and Piano by Mozart. 

The world is chock full of clarinetists, and they are constantly badgering their violist and pianist friends to play it with them.