DG: The History Of Classical Music On 100 CDs (or 1 Playlist) - From Gregorian Chant To Górecki

Introduction from Presto Classical:

OVERVIEW

• It starts with Gregorian Chant and Machaut chansons and ends with Gorecki and the Minimalists.

• The greatest composers have as many as five CDs devoted to them (Bach, Mozart, Beethoven).

• 20th-century music is well represented with no fewer than 20 CDs.

• Operas and major choral works are represented by highlights, but otherwise the edition presents, as far as possible, only complete works throughout.

• Altogether, there are more than 80 composers in the set, with over 400 works for a total of around 120 hours of music.

REPERTOIRE

As the box is intended for the non-expert, the repertoire is centrally based around the Classical and Romantic composers.

Here's the rundown:

CD 1 – 20 take us from Gregorian Chant to the sons of Bach, Carl Philipp Emanuel and Johann Christian, with the great names of the Baroque – Monteverdi, Purcell, Charpentier, Rameau, JS Bach, Handel and Vivaldi all featured.

CD 21 – 33 are devoted to the Viennese Classics: Haydn, Mozart and Beethoven.

CD 34 – 49 cover the early Romantic composers, from Schubert, Paganini, Berlioz, Chopin to Liszt and Schumann.

CD 50 – 69 comprise the later Romantics – Brahms, Bruckner, Dvořák, Grieg and Tchaikovsky, plus Verdi and Wagner highlights.

CD 70 – 78 bring together turn-of-the-century composers, including Mahler, Debussy, Richard Strauss and Puccini.

CD 79 – 100 includes 20th-century masterworks from Stravinsky to Messiaen, Boulez and Gorecki, taking in Holst, Rachmaninov, Sibelius, Ives, Janacek, Ravel and many others on the way.

HIGHLIGHTS

It reads like a cornucopia of the great, good and glorious. Look out for:

• the Orlando Consort’s forays into Gregorian Chant and Machaut;

• John Eliot Gardiner’s Bach;
• Minkowski’s Charpentier and Rameau;
• Trevor Pinnock’s Handel and Vivaldi;
• Karajan’s Creation;
• Anda’s Mozart Piano Concertos;
• Beethoven at the hands of Bernstein and Karajan;
• Rossini with Abbado;
• Chopin and Liszt Concertos with Argerich;
• Fischer-Dieskau’s Schubert and Schumann;
• Barenboim’s Chopin Nocturnes;
• Gilels’ Brahms Second Piano Concerto;
• Kubelik’s Dvořák;
• Mravinsky’s Tchaikovsky “Pathétique”;
• Karajan’s Mahler Five;
• Kleiber’s La Traviata highlights;
• Abbado’s Ravel, Prokofiev and Stravinsky;
• Boulez’s Schoenberg and Webern
• the Messiaen Turangalila Symphony and Gorecki’s Symphony no. 3!

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Get this collection in one Spotify playlist here: DG - The History Of Classical Music - From Gregorian Chant To Górecki (1388 tracks, 115 hours). More info on the official site. A few tracks are missing due to transcoding issues; they should be fixed soon.

My previous playlist 1200 Years of Women Composers: From Hildegard To Higdon is a good companion since no female composer was included in this DG set.

To navigate huge playlists more easily: 1. select the playlist, 2. press Ctrl (CMD) + F, or scroll up in iOS, to bring out the filter bar, 3. type in composer/performer/composition, e.g. Bizet or Abbado or Carmen.