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What do you feel is the best piece of music ever written?

I think Beethoven's Piano Sonata No. 14 (Moonlight sonata) takes some beating.

Or this

 
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Brahms: Ein Deutsches Requiem. Ethereally beautiful. Karajan's 1964 account would be with me on my desert island.
 
mercalia said:
I dont know about best but at the moment enjoying the Decca double cd "The Silver Swan" English Madrigals selection from the many LPs the Consort of Musicke, Anthony Rooley with a young Emma Kirkby made in the 70s-80s( which I have ) A very aurally soothing (I dont mean soporific I mean caressing -how many cds can do that?) never ending collection of songs in English. I feel much better from listening to them. In this case songs from Gibbons, Wilbye & Morley
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Thanks for the reminder ! It's a while since I've played these discs. I can't believe how young sounding Kirkby's voice is: I'd forgotten.
 
If I have to pick one I'm picking The Rite of Spring, because it still astonishes me every time I hear it.
 
Up until yesterday I would have said that you couldn't possible give just one. Then Herreweghe directing the Bach B Minor Mass came up on the stream.
 
For a perfect combination of melodies and skilful use of all the potential sound colourations of the orchestra, how about Swan Lake? Its so often heard that's one tends to overlook or become blasé but its a brilliant piece of writing.
 
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I agree, there would be huge hole in the repertoire if Tchaikovsky hadn't been born. I was listening to the Nutcracker being played the other day- the woodwind writing is truly magical.
 
Verdi's Requiem for drama & Tchaikovsky's Nutcracker for pure joy have consistently done it for me. Handel's Giulio Cesare & Berlioz's La damnation de Faust are up there with them but at the very top of my tree is Mussorgsky's Khovanshchina. Incidentally the last 2 pieces both featured in the 2017 Proms.
 
Very interesting thread!
I'm not saying the "best music ever written", but no-one yet has mentioned Monteverdi, who certainly deserves being considered for the accolade. Perhaps one of his later books of madrigals?
ML
 
I have just discovered this section of the forum. Reading through it remided me of an incident from many years ago. A small group of us, failed jazz musicians all, had started discovering classical music. My great friend John Snee, bricklayer, trombonist and the one of us with greatest knowledge of classical music said: 'I'll tell you what the greatest music ever written is... ' We put down our pints and waited in something approaching awe. And he went on: 'Beethoven's Piano Trios.' We all said something like, 'Really?' He put down his pint and replied, with a look of wry wisdom, 'Yes, almost as good as his sonatas and string quartets.'
 
Brian S said:
I have just discovered this section of the forum. Reading through it remided me of an incident from many years ago. A small group of us, failed jazz musicians all, had started discovering classical music. My great friend John Snee, bricklayer, trombonist and the one of us with greatest knowledge of classical music said: 'I'll tell you what the greatest music ever written is... ' We put down our pints and waited in something approaching awe. And he went on: 'Beethoven's Piano Trios.' We all said something like, 'Really?' He put down his pint and replied, with a look of wry wisdom, 'Yes, almost as good as his sonatas and string quartets.'
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Nice anecdote. I love failed jazz musicians, they see to understand much of the world.

You might like this - it has a nice jazz solo:


Sounds much better on vinyl though. Listening much to this.
 
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