Well, favorite symphony: Mahler's 9th. The way the music keeps disintegrating and reappearing through the entire work, until it finally vanishes in the end never ceases to amaze me. The most misunderstood musical work of all time, even by fervent Mahlerians.
Other favorite symphonies: The rest by Mahler, somewhere in this order: 10th, 6th, 8th, 5th, 1st, 2nd, 7th, 3rd, 4th.
Then comes Beethoven, somewhere in this order: 7th, 9th, 3rd, 5th, 8th, 6th, 4th, 1st, 2nd.
What about Shostakovich? His 7th symphony, the 6th, 4th, 5th, 15th, 14th, 13th?
What about Brian, a composer of great philosophical depths greatly misunderstood?
Then the most misunderstood composer for piano: Liszt. Mistaken for plain speed mostly, instead of using speed as a mean to express something, not one's technique. After all, speed, always remains an musical element in first place, not a vehicle to show yourself, that's almost always secondary, unless the composer did it with that purpose.
I would like, since this forum invites it, to share a story with you all: I have never, through the entire time that I have been listening to clasical music, which is a bit over 3 years, had much problem to digest any music. Sometimes it took me some time to appreciate a certain piece, but I never had to stop listening anything. I could hear at first Synaphai, Threnody for the Victims of Hiroshima, Herma, Sorabji, Finissy, Makrokosmos, or even some extremely uncommon contemporary music with no complaints. But in this entire time, I came across two works, that I couldn't listen to.
One was Mahler's 9th Symphony. I remember clearly that when I first heard it, I had to turn it off. I simply couldn't stand it. It was so different from anything I had heard before that, it was a completely different universe, so imaginative, so terrible, celestial, spiritual, nihilistic, unresolved, open to eternity...
The other, was actually a compilation of pieces. Messiaen's organ works. In this case, I could listen for about 25 minutes, then I had to stop.
Something similar also happened to me with Philip Glass, but I could hear his music complete. And it also took me some time to really get inside Bach. Actually, the first piece I ever heard by him was the Art of the Fugue. How heavy this is for a beginner, I don't know, but I came to enjoy it quite quickly.
Anyway, later I came to love all of these works and their composers.

Oh and I almost forgot about Dvorak's Symphonies. My favorite is actually the 7th. I hope this post wasn't too long to read.
Jakub Eisenbruk,
Mexico City.