5 recordings that changed your life!

[m1469]

How can one define a piece as being life changing? There are some pieces which are extremely close to my heart, yet I'd be reluctant to say any of them truly "changed my life".

It's difficult to define in words, of course, yet for me there is a definite difference between recordings and performers and pieces that I enjoy and even love, and then those who have actually changed my life (yet I may love these, too).  For it to change my life, I experience it as a particular connection which goes beyond sound, though obviously sound is there, too.  But, I feel a connection with the performer in a way that is something like seeing through their own eyes, and almost as though they are also seeing through mine, as well.  Every one on my list above has changed my life and in some ways it's been a similar kind of fundamental experience with each, but some have intoxicated me much more than others.  

I once said to a friend "You know when somebody just comes along in your life and then everything is just different, like they've somehow just changed your entire life just because you met them (...)" and I was going to continue, but she said "no, I don't."    I guess some people experience this and others don't.  I've definitely felt like meeting particular people have changed my life  .  Of course, that doesn't mean life is over and there are no more challenges, but there's been something about meeting particular individuals ...

[sordel]

It's difficult to define in words, of course, yet for me there is a definite difference between recordings and performers and pieces that I enjoy and even love, and then those who have actually changed my life (yet I may love these, too).

I think I would have found it difficult, but not impossible, to list five recordings that changed my perception of music, but I can't think of one that changed my life. I'm not sure that I'd want to be that influenced by something so external,

[djealnla]

Never mind: There is one piece which changed my life. But I'm not going to mention it here (for personal reasons).

[ahinton]

Hearing them do what? Speak? Play the banjo?

Hearing them "performing either Opus Archimagicum or Sequentia Cyclica", as I implied (and not on the banjo).

Best,

Alistair

[ahinton]

Horowitz playing the banjo would have changed my life.

Into what?

Best,

Alistair

[djealnla]

Hearing them "performing either Opus Archimagicum or Sequentia Cyclica", as I implied

You did not.

[ahinton]

You did not.

Really? I wrote "Who can say what Horowitz, Petri or anyone else might have said or thought about performing - or hearing anyone else who might actually have been up to performing either Opus Archimagicum or Sequentia Cyclica?" so, in what I take to be the somewhat unlikely event that the missing dash (for which all due apologies) which should have appeared between the adjacent words "performing" and "either" threw you off the scent, it seems pretty clear to me that I did.

Not that any of this matters all that much, methinks...

Best,

Alistair

[djealnla]

missing dash

That's not what I mean. Your sentence does not specify what they were supposed to hear. And if I had meant that, then you would have to specify what person(s) X might have been up to performing.

[nanabush]

Again, back on topic:

I'm going to add a few more.

-"Eruption" by Eddie Van Halen.  The 'Fantasie Impromptu' of rock guitar haha.  I honestly heard that when I was about 10 and loved it!

-Stephen Hough playing the Rachmaninoff Concerti.  Once when I had to cut my lawn, I had the time to listen to all four of them (my lawn is gigantic), and that was an experience... needless to say I got side tracked and the lawn didn't look too great

[costasimpson]

Celibidache conducting Brahms' German Requiem
Isabelle Faust playing Bach Partitas and Sonatas for solo Violin
Miles Davis' Kind of Blue
Martha Argerich playing Beethoven's Piano Concerto No.3 in C Minor
Igor Markevitch conducting Stravinsky's The Rite of Spring

But I think every CD I have ever listened to has affected me musically and emotionally. These 5 have probably influenced my musicality the most.

[richard black]

Igor Markevitch conducting Stravinsky's The Rite of Spring

Good call! Any of the three (at least) available recordings, indeed, from 1951, 1957 and 1961. I believe Stravinsky's personal favourite, towards the end of his life, was the 1951 recording. Damn fine conductor, Markevitch.

[countrymath]

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[jimbo320]

One major wow-factor in my life was the album 'Dark Side Of The Moon' by Pink Floyd.
Any solo by Rick Wakeman totally amazes me. Rodger Hodgson, Jim Brickman, Yanni, and John Tesh in that order...

[williampiano]

1. Kevin Cole- Rhapsody in Blue by Gershwin
2. Quatuor Ludwig- Piano Quintet movement 3 by Franck
3. Vladimir Horowitz- Etude op. 8 no. 12 by Scriabin
4. Van Cliburn- Prelude op. 23 no. 7 by Rachmaninoff
5. Georges Cziffra- Sabre Dance by Khachaturian

[pianoplayjl]

Cziffra-Gnomenreigen
George Li- Liszt tarantella, Rachmaninoff concerto 2
Pollini- Chopin etudes
Janis- Rachmaninoff concertos 2 and 3
horowitz-Scriabin etude op 8 no 12

[pianoplayjl]

No 6: Moonlight sonata by wilhem kempff