response 158 of 194:

Feb 14 13:22 UTC 2000

This was certainly not the standard repertoire in 1972.

Here are my answers to this pop quiz:

"Celeste Aida" is from Verdi's Aida.  The "Habanera" 
is from Bizet's Carmen.  "Lucia" is "Lucia di Lammermore."
"Vesti la giubba" is from Pagliacci.  The "Anvil Chorus"
is from a Verdi opera which I forget.  "Un bel di" is from
Puccini's Madama Butterfly (first syllable of "Butterfly"
rhymes with "foot," if you want to be all Italian about it.)

Rhapsodies:  Roumanian No. 1 is undoubtedly Enesco's 
greatest hit.  The two Hungarian ones are probably by Liszt.
Espana is probably by Chabrier.  The Cornish rhapsody I
don't think I know.

Marches:  Colonel Bogey was used in the movie Bridge over the 
River Kwai, which is why it's on this disk, but who wrote it
I don't know.  Malcolm Arnold?  March of the Toys might be 
Victor Herbert.  Pomp and Circumstance I'm sure means P&C #1 
by Elgar, the one with the "graduation march" (as we think
of it in this country -- in England it's the anthem "Land of
Hope and Glory," by which I believe they mean England).

Reveries:  Air on the G String is by Bach.  Greensleeves is
probably the Fantasia on Greensleeves by Ralph Vaughan
Williams.

The Sleeping Beauty Waltz is from the ballet by Tchaikovsky.
Sabre Dance is from Gayaneh by Khachaturian.  Russian Sailors' 
Dance I really ought to know, but I've forgoten.  Some
Sovcomposer, I think.  Hungarian Dances 5 and 6 are probably 
Brahms.

Capriccio Espagnol is probably the one by Rimsky-Korsakov.

Grand Canyon Suite is by Ferd grofe.  El Salon Mexico is by
Aaron Copland.

Les Sylphides is Chopin.

Of the listed film themes, only 2001 counts as "classical"
music, because Kubrick drew all of the music for that movie
from existing "classical" pieces.  The most famous one, and
the one probably on this disk, is the opening "dawn" sequence
from Also Sprach Zarathustra by Richard Strauss, which was
later adopted by Elvis Presley for the opening of his Las
Vegas act and then became an intolerable cliche.  And I
didn't even like it that much to begin with.  I don't know 
who composed most of the other themes.  West Side Story is 
Leonard Bernstein, of course.  I think Henry Mancini wrote 
the Breakfast at Tiffany's music.

There have been a couple of Scheherezades.  My favorite one
is by Ravel, but the more famous one is by Rimsky Korsakov.  
Le Coq d'Or is also Rimsky.  "Bridal Procession" might be 
Wagner.  

Pictures at an Exhibition was a piano piece by Moussorgsky 
which was arranged for orchestra by several composers.  The
only arrangement you ever hear is by Ravel.

Danse Macabre is by Saint-Saens.

Liebestraum is probably the one by Liszt.  The Rondo alla 
Turca is undoubtedly the one by Mozart, from his 9th (?)
piano sonata.

response 160 of 194:

Feb 14 16:13 UTC 2000

Would you suggest that I own any of the ones I could not identify?
Anyone want to list all the good composers who did not make it onto the 30
record set?  They did get Bach, Handel, Mozart (not Haydn), Beethoven,
Schubert, Schumann, Mendelssohn, Dvorak, Tchaikovsky, Liszt, Grieg, Wagner,
Ravel, Debussy, Rimsky-K, Mussorgsky and Rachmaninoff, Smetana, Sibelius.
Bizet, Puccini, Verdi.  A bit heavy on the Tchaikovsky, why?
Thanks for all the answers. I have also seen one-disc compilations of all the
best classical music (at K-Mart).

response 162 of 194:

Feb 14 23:37 UTC 2000

It used to be Wagner coming into the church,
Mendelssohn going out.  Now it's Pachelbel
both ways.  Yech.  

Note, btw, the absence of Pachelbel's "immortal"
Canon from the RCA list, which was compiled back
before the New Age had blown the dust of well-
deserved oblivion off of that stupefyingly dull 
piece of music.

response 164 of 194:

Feb 15 14:10 UTC 2000

Khatchaturian, from the ballet Gayaneh.

response 166 of 194:

Feb 18 21:27 UTC 2000

If Pachelbel's Canon is so boring, why do so many people like it so 
much?  Surely they can't be so enamoured of being bored.

Seriously, I suggest a real difference in perception of the 
meaningfulness of music here.  Some people find it in simple chord 
progressions; others in complex structures.  The second type call the 
music the first type like "boring" or "dull" or "mindlessly simple".  
The first type call the music the second type like "Augenmusik" (if 
they know the term).

response 168 of 194:

Feb 19 03:19 UTC 2000

Nothing wrong with simple music.  Every 12-bar blues ever written is the same
three chords, over and over again, song after song, album after album - but
they're three _really good_ chords.  I happen to like blues and dislike
Pachelbel, but I imagine that there are people who would say the same sort
of thing about Pachelbel's canon.  It is one of the standard chord
progressions, after all.

response 170 of 194:

Feb 19 21:01 UTC 2000

Pachelbel's cannon is classical music light.  It tends to be
a bit over-played but it's a short enough piece, so no big deal.

It's time to get over it, Michael.

response 172 of 194:

Feb 20 13:01 UTC 2000

Re "time to get over it": you first.  ;-)

Re #171: I can identify most Beethoven symphonies
from hearing a bar or two, plus lots of other music
besides.  Repetition has nothing to do with it:
I hated Pachelbel's Canon the first time I heard it.

You realize I'm doing it mostly for effect now.

response 174 of 194:

Feb 20 22:22 UTC 2000

I bet that's what you said when you first set
eyes on the cello part of P's Canon.

response 176 of 194:

Feb 21 02:08 UTC 2000

I think you already told it -- that's what I
was referring to.

response 178 of 194:

Feb 21 11:47 UTC 2000

Fuck.

response 180 of 194:

Feb 22 03:39 UTC 2000

<nods>
Quit while you're ahead.