Favorite Discoveries of 2008

[Brian]

Louise Farrenc has been a favorite discovery for this year.  I immediately fell in love with her cycle of three symphonies, and I look forward to exploring her chamber music.  She wrote some powerful and complex music at a time (mid-19th Century) when women weren't expected to compose anything more than light music.

Love Ms Farrenc's music. I have yet to warm to the Third Symphony - likely a mere matter of time - especially since the First is one of my favorites. What a bold, powerful statement; I love the introduction especially, and am consistently impressed both by the work's excellent craftsmanship and its musical vision. Hector Berlioz reportedly said Farrenc was "a good orchestrator, for a woman"; but that is selling her talents considerably short.

[Harry]

Love Ms Farrenc's music. I have yet to warm to the Third Symphony - likely a mere matter of time - especially since the First is one of my favorites. What a bold, powerful statement; I love the introduction especially, and am consistently impressed both by the work's excellent craftsmanship and its musical vision. Hector Berlioz reportedly said Farrenc was "a good orchestrator, for a woman"; but that is selling her talents considerably short.

O, I do so agree Brian having most of her works that are recorded!

[Monsieur Croche]

Without a shade of doubt, the GMG Classical Music Forum.  0:)

[Varg]

Mine is actually a conductor.

Celibidache

I have his Bruckner set, his Brahms, Mozart and Fauré requiems, his Schumann, Tchaikovsky and Brahms symphonies, his Wagner, Debussy, among others. All on EMI.

He made me discover some works, he made me nuts about works i just didn't care about before, and he made me love works i already loved even more. I cant even come back to my other recordings of the same works.

[Harry]

Without a shade of doubt, the GMG Classical Music Forum.  0:)

Nice!

[Harry]

Mine is actually a conductor.

Celibidache

I have his Bruckner set, his Brahms, Mozart and Fauré requiems, his Schumann, Tchaikovsky and Brahms symphonies, his Wagner, Debussy, among others. All on EMI.

He made me discover some works, he made me nuts about works i just didn't care about before, and he made me love works i already loved even more. I cant even come back to my other recordings of the same works.

Make me understand why Varg.

[ChamberNut]

This will obviously be updated as the year goes on, but here is a place to list some of your best discoveries (or rediscoveries) of 2008.

Some of mine, so far:

Vaughn Williams - string quartets and the Phantasy Quintet! 

Haydn - String Quartets

Russian and other Eastern European chamber music, specifically Tchaikovsky, Taneyev and Glazunov, Janacek and Smetana.

Mahler - Symphony No. 6 (long time in my collection, but discovered how fantastic it is last week).

Brahms - Transcriptions for Four Hands Piano Duet or Two Pianos

Bruckner's 8th Symphony

I must add to this list:

Mozart's Piano Concertos, and Geza Anda (as recommended by several GMGers, for whom a great big thank you is in order )  Thank you very much! I'm not even half way through the set yet and I love it immensely!

Bruckner's String Quintet

Beethoven's String Trios

[Monsieur Croche]

Nice!

You too, Sir.

[PaulR]

For me, so far in 2008, it's the music of Kurt Atterberg.  Though I got the complete symphonies late December of 2007, I got into him this year, and I'm glad I did  

[mn dave]

Lightweight, perhaps, but very enjoyable and definitely one for my library.

[marvinbrown]

  The musc of Shostakovich  0:).  This is proving to be the most rewarding of all my 2008 discoveries.  I love Symphonies 1, 5, 10, 11, 13, and 15 (from the Jansons set) most and that opera that I am currently listening to Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk.  I have yet to discover Shosty's string quartets.  That will most probably be my next purchase.

  marvin

[Brian]

For me, so far in 2008, it's the music of Kurt Atterberg.  Though I got the complete symphonies late December of 2007, I got into him this year, and I'm glad I did  

Ditto'd precisely, even down to the date when I got the symphonies. 

But another composer deserves to be mentioned -

Braga Santos! 

[mn dave]

Bach has been shooting up my composer chart this year. With a bullet.

[marvinbrown]

Bach has been shooting up my composer chart this year. With a bullet.

  You're very lucky, Bach composed A LOT and I do mean A LOT of great music!!  You really can't say that about many composers.

  marvin 

[mn dave]

  You're very lucky, Bach composed A LOT and I do mean A LOT of great music!!  You really can't say that about many composers.

  marvin 

No, you can't. Which reminds me, I'll have to get back to collecting the cantatas here pretty quick.

[karlhenning]

How many is many? 

[mn dave]

How many is many? 

More than 17. 

[Opus106]

Bach has been shooting up my composer chart this year. With a bullet.

Ditto. Even though Bach's music were some of the first I encountered, I realised that I'd never really got tired of his music. (in 2008.  ) I don't think I can say the same about Beethoven's.

[karlhenning]

More than 17. 

Not at all a bad answer 

[mahler10th]

Discoveries of the year for me so far:

Arvo Part - yep, Arvo Part, sends me into the clouds with angels, and sometimes to hell with demons.
Franz Schmidt - The last Romantic Composer, his stuff is about 60 years older than it actually is...great symphonic composer.
Eduard Tubin - An absoloutley superb symphonist, even if his themes can be somewhat repetitive.
Brian Havergal - Enough said by another friend on the boards about this forgotten composer.
Aulis Sallinen - Not enough said about this composer, truly unique and incredibly creative.
John Pickard - Modern English composer discovered last night from this forum, bought, listened to, enjoyed tremendously.

One or two others, but not good enough for me to remember offhand.