168 thoughts on “How Your Life Changes After You Start Listening To Classical Music”

1. I can suggest ” Le quattro stagioni ” from ” Nigel North. ” for beginners.

2. Watch and listen Wagner’s tetralogy.
   And his Parsifal.
   You’ll feel like a norse god or a saintly knight afterward.
   Watch the faithful version directed by James Levine, not the crappy ones with stage directors who think they’re edgy by dressing Wotan like a buiseness man or a Star Wars character.

   1. I played in a little community orchestra a while back. The second violin part of Wagner’s Rienzi overture was a tough as anything I’d ever tried to play.

   2. Wagner was the original hippy.

   3. I only know Wagner from films. Parsifal from John Boorman’s Excalibur and err. is it Ride of the Valyries from when those neo-nazi’s are airborne in their car in the Blues Brothers. Should probably get down to Bayreuth

      1. Don’t, nowadays in Bayreuth it’s always like I described it above : the fag stage director wants to “modernize” everything.
         You can buy the dvd’s on amazon for your next Christmas.
         “I’ve always loved you”.

         1. think I read there was a battle within the wagner family for control or something? Obviously didn’t turn out well. Shame

         2. By the way I love Excalibur from Boorman, one of my all time favorite movies.

         3. Grim, bloody but very cool movie

         4. This movie has a very strong symbolism and carries so many traditional “red-pill” messages about men, women, loyalty…

         5. Definitely. For a start Guinevere working her way round the cock carousel. Sorry I mean round table

3. I highly recommend Bach and Ludovici

4. You’ll notice the “Baby Mozart” entry has no sources, because there is no evidence for the claim that listening to classical music increases intelligence.
   As for the rest, my guess is that you’d see all the same effects from listening to ANY music that lacks vocals and drums, particularly if it is of a lower tempo and has quiet instrumentation (pianos, wind or strings) in regards to the effects on falling sleep and anxiety. First, because the sound of a human voice is automatically engaging to our minds, which is why it is so hard to read when someone is talking to you. Second, because the human heart locks into steady beats, which is why you turn on something fast and loud if you’re falling asleep at the wheel or working out at the gym…it gets your heart going.
   Basically, anything that most people would consider “background” or “elevator” music will have all the effects you’re talking about, it’s just that elitists single out classical music as though it’s some sort of magic. It’s not!
   The only reason Beethoven or Bach used vocals and percussion sparingly was volume limitations of their time. Before amplifiers, in any venue of substantial size, voices tended to be too quiet, while drums tended to be too loud. Loud bass of any kind was also impossible.
   Some works of classical music are truly genius and worth listening to, but modern elitists misinterpret the template as being artistic choice, rather than inevitabilities of a time before microphones and amplifiers. Had they access to modern technology, I think these guys also would have been churning out stuff a lot more like you hear today.
   While I agree it’s worth checking out classical music if you’ve never tried it before, don’t expect it be some sort of enlightening, life-changing experience. Classical music has its place, just like rap or country, and none of the forms are superior.

5. I’ve been a fan of Chopin for years. Kept me calm when I was working in corporate hell.

   1. I took percussion performance for 1 2/3 years at a local state Uni. Some marimba, timpani, concert ensemble, symphonic band, etc. At that time, we had some of the most talented – not surprisingly – Asian female pianists in the state. The entire music department was required to attend Thursday noon performances juries. Chopin Piano Concertos, Liszt, et al.. are simply some of the best pieces of music you’ll ever hear performed live from a human. Utterly astounding when accurately played. Level of difficulty = extreme.

6. This is as good as it gets: Kurt Moll singing O Isis und Osiris from Mozart’s The Magic Flute: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2eQkgZ-pz1A Anything by Kurt Moll is great, but this is my favorite piece of his.

7. I’m proud to say that I can play one of his piano concertos. No music ever composed is more masculine.
   
   Damn he had big hands
   

   1. which one – they’re all hard. I have a go at the famous one no 2 sometimes, but I doubt I’ll ever get that far. I’m scared to even look at 3

      1. Number two. They are harder without an orchestra.

         1. good stuff. Its a great piece. I’ve only really looked at the first movement. I find the fingering in the first movement difficult to get round. How long did it take you

         2. I use extensions as in the second video. hehe.
            I’m still mastering it to be honest (it’s been 10+ years already). I know I’m slow. That’s Earl Wild in the video. I sound nothing like that. Still I’d recommend you to persevere at it – it sends me into another dimension.

         3. Haven’t played the video yet, but should be interesting. I’ve been learning the first movement for the best part of a year, and its slow work, but rewarding in parts. Like you I don’t have Rachmaninov hands but its more the key signatures he goes to that makes the fingering pretty nasty, more so I think than in the later movements. Works like Rachmaninov’s are gargantuan pieces – unless you’re a professional or are prepared to dedicate most of the day to the task – then I’d say ten years is fine. I’ve dipped into some here and there for years – its for pleasure or diversion, but I don’t expect to achieve anything more than personal pleasure from it. In fact I don’t expect to get onto the 2nd or 3rd movements any time soon.

         4. I was joking about the extensions. My hands are quite big actually. But just keep on keeping on, man – it’s like rock climbing.

         5. I thought you meant you couldnt stretch for all the chords – many can’t. Yep, its a long term under-taking. I wish I’d tackled it earlier, as I bought the music years ago

   2. I only got as far as some of his preludes, and performed a few of them back in the day. Yes, he had an enormous span and wrote for it. The last, and greatest, of the composer-performers.

      1. Yes, he was the last one. I doubt anything remotely great will be produced again. People have become too Jewish/feminine/soft/yin.

   3. that’s huge.. am a great fan

   4. Impressed. The internet allows me to see Vladimir Horowitz playing Rachmaninoff. I think even Rachmaninoff said his stuff was too difficult for him and only Horowitz did it justice.
      

   5. I was trying to leave this on in the background as I work, but it’s too powerful and distracting. Masculine indeed. Also, I’ll add classical music is one of the few places where non-pc redpill truths can be freely and openly stated. Take a look at the lyrics to Carl Orff’s O Fortuna some time…..

      1. Will check it thanks.

         1. http://www.classical.net/music/comp.lst/works/orff-cb/carmlyr.php#track8
            Specifically part 8 and onwards is telling..
            The round dance is simply the ancient cock carousel.
            And then in part 15 comes the wall:
            “The girl without a lover misses out on all pleasures, she keeps the dark night hidden in the depth of her heart; it is a most bitter fate”
            This entire work is an ode to red pill truths.

8. I haven’t read the studies, re baby intelligence or therapeutic benefits but I wonder whether all classical music is equal in this respect. Usually when I hear about studies like this (as in this article) the name that pops up is mozart (or very similar in terms of style / time period). Literally ‘classical’ music (as opposed to baroque or romantic) tends to produce a very harmonious sound without the deliberate tension and lack of resolution that you get with say wagner (or the complete lack of it with later – corrupt – atonal / serial music) which I imagine may produce an equally harmonious state of mind / body.
   If listening to classical music can increase intelligence I would imagine no such limitation to the classical period would matter, although bach might be better than say mozart on account of complexity for example

9. Another win for patriarchy!

10. Type in Google “effect of music on plants” and start reading.

11. One thing I noticed along with shifting to more classical and orchestral work is – while I still dearly love traditional, especially celtic, folk – that my musical listening has skewed back to metal (especially symphonic), and classic rock as well as a handful of alternative rockers that really put effort in the craft of their music.
    Why?
    Rush, Dire Straights, Led Zep, Pink Floyd, and others had far more complicated song structures than the typical pop of today, no matter how densely layered.
    A fair amount of trance and deep house has deeply layered lyrical structures.
    And metal? Yngwie Malmsteen’s “Rising Force” had some awesome work on it, especially the Icarus Dream Suite. Satriani’s “Surfing With the Alien” had an eclectic mix of stuff that would never get pop play. Iron Maiden, from the past (Powerslave, including their take on Rime of the Ancient mariner) to the present knows the craft of weaving a song. As over the top as they are, Dragonforce shows technical skill and both simple and complex songs. Then you get into my favorites like Nightwish and Within Temptation on the symphonic end with thematic albums of life and death.
    What do they all have in common? Musical craft and skill developed by dedication. A willingness to be simple where it is necessary, and complex where needed. Songs that follow more than a simple in, stanza, refrain, s,r,(solo?) r,out sequence but develop multiple themes, especially as part of a thematic album.
    In short, everything I love about classical.
    Give me Night on Bald Mountain, give me Danse Macabre, give me the WIlliam Tell overture, or Greig, or Holst’s “Mars”.
    Ditto Hanz Zimmer, or Klaus bedelt’s “Pirates” soundtrack.

    1. Many of the really good rock bands of the 1970s that you mentioned like Led Zep and Iron Maiden often took motifs and ideas over from the classical music world. I suppose we shouldn’t find it surprising as they as real and authentic musicians as Mozart and Vivaldi were in the day, unlike Atomic Pussy who are doing a follow up tour after their golden age around 2009. God were they memorable.
       

       1. If I ever lose my vocal chords, I’m taking up guitar
          

    2. In addition to Rush, Floyd, Zep, and all those greats–
       –I’d also recommend some of Deadmau5’s work in the world of electronica. He’s practically a classical composer in his layering and his use of motifs.
       Check out the arrangement on this one, esp when it really kicks in at 3:13:
       

       1. 1. Meh, generic slowed down DNB.

       2. look at my comment above.

    3. Suicidal Tendencies-how will I laugh today Album is a masterpiece. It’s not quite metal and not punk, it’s just the right tempo

    4. I would also recommend the Beach Boys stuff from 65 and onward. Today!, Summer days (& summer nights!), Pet Sounds, Wild Honey, Friends, 20/20, Surf’s Up, Holland, and the Smile Sessions are all AMAZING, albums. I would suggest you keep an open mind though, a lot of people get turned off by the more experimental stuff such as Cabinessence, but if you really stay open to it Brian Wilson is a genius with his arrangements, even on the stuff he was half @$$ing. Even the other beach boys all made amazing stuff (and don’t get nearly the credit they should). https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Th0plpktoM

       1. Beach Boys are amazing. They’re stuff from the 70’s is almost as good as their 60’s stuff.

          1. yeah, it’s a shame how under rated they are.

    5. For a Latin American take on power metal, I recommend Argentina’s Rata Blanca and Spain’s Mago de Oz.
       
       

    6. Saw Nightwish the other night. Just incredible.

    7. Some of these rock bands are downright satanic. “Stairway to Heaven” is a prime example, with satanic lyrics when played backwards. Check this out:
       

12. I was raised on classical, and took both violin and piano lessons long enough that I could play some of the simpler violin concertos and piano concert repertoire. It enriches your life in ways that are difficult to describe. My only regret is that my instrumental skills have faded and I haven’t the time (or discipline) to regain them.

13. Great article. I’ve been an avid listener to classical music my whole life long. Brilliant music just like sublime literature seems to choose their listeners and readers at the most propitious moments in our lives.
    I find, J.S Bach (and indeed his son CPE Bach) Haydn and Mozart’s music to be treasure troves that I continually return to via Richter, Gould, Brendel who allow my mind to ponder and understand the piece in completely different “frame” which has the capacity to vivify and dislodge one’s mind out its lazy complacent habits. The baroque and formal classical styles of the above composers are like marble that’s been polished to perfection and this is why I agree that such music does indeed confer a hugely harmonious and beneficial influence on our bodies and minds when really listened to without any distractions.
    Yet, it’s still true that it’s often the great romantic composers that appear to be the most relevant companions to the “disinherited mind and spirit” of the times we are unfortunate custodians of. Who can match the spacious horizons of Bruckner’s 3, 4 and 8 symphonies that just don’t evoke, but, resonate with the alpine spirit, like sunlight illuminating the valley edges in the Tyrolean foothills? Or the Nordic spirit of the fjords and forests populated with a unique array of mythical entities captured in Grieg’s Lyric Suite or Peer Gynt Suite? In music like this you understand something about the soul and spirit of a Nation, that cannot be “deconstructed” by the cultural relativists who’ve ripped apart so much our classical literature and revised it for cheap and false ideological narratives that are completely nonsensical. Music is immune from this parasitical disease germinated by post modern academia. It doesn’t lie, it’s compelled to tell the truth, perhaps that’s why feminists and their fellow travelers always attack it as being privileged and elitist.
    Even, America has produced great classical music like Charles Ives, Howard Hanson and John Adam’s whose Opera Nixon in China is a fantastic piece of satirical writing. I think Hanson is a much underrated composer, his Nordic Symphony No.1 is a really accomplished piece of writing, his second Symphony “The Romantic” is truly sublime and the last movement was used as the closing score in the 1979 film, Alien.
    Roll over Lady GAGA.

    1. Ironically I saw Stefani Germanotta doing an Xmas commercial with Tony Bennett (Where they sang “Baby it’s cold outside..”) and thought she looked very classy and sang very nicely in it…she should focus on doing a few albums where she does Jazz/Lounge music and take a long break from all that outlandish ‘fag hag’ stuff…show off that she has real talent vs just continuing to be a one trick pony.

       1. Ah yes, I saw Lady Gaga and Tony Bennett perform on PBS. Impressive. And once I stumbled on this early preGaga performance. Once can see why she went the drag route, but it is still pitiful that she did.
          

          1. she actually is talented. If she wasn’t such a cunt and a whore she might have actually been a valuable asset to the world.

       2. Maybe she can do an add for Home Depot….”I am classing it up with Tony Bennett and I need new walls…..”

    2. Charles Ives was an oddbod – I seem to remember his concorde sonata is strangely mesmeric, but I’m not sure it would be listening of choice. Glenn Gould never fails to produce something unique when he plays – absolute genius – even if not to everyone’s taste

       1. Gould, yes, I used to find his humming off putting on recordings, but, I couldn’t listen to one now without the obligatory overlay of his voice. Ives is quite unique in that his music appears to be reminiscent of a different country and era than the US in which he lived. But, if you listen and it took me a while to appreciate it, you’ll see what he’s referencing in urban america in a piece like Central Park in the Dark.
          https://youtu.be/1qPZbHNuZzI

          1. I quite like it. It’s not as discordant as I remember Ives music as being. Quite a contrast to Copland – both quite american but the difference between dark and light. There’s something noirish about it, no doubt intentionally

          2. I think he captures that sense of enclosed dark eerie space at the periphery of all the lights, yet, the darkness is the central theme. Is he saying something more about America?

          3. of the dark heart / rotten underbelly variety? Perhaps. Quite menacing if sparing use of the piano. Like anti-Gershwin

          4. No, I didn’t actually mean it in that particular sense at all. It’s more reminiscent of a state not quite at ease with itself, despite, the progress, the affluence, the lights. I think the darkness is more primordial- the darkness in the space that was once uncivilized earth, a kind of tranquil menace that lingers on from a land before it was ever America? Very anti-Gershwin alright.

          5. Nicely put. It’s that same uncertainty about itself / its permanance – if that’s what it’s depicting – that perhaps has driven the US forwards during an era when older nations were starting to stagnate. I imagine that sense of insecurity would have been all the greater when Ives was composing

          6. Copland’s Appalachian Spring is one of my very favorites. Such a moving, emotional piece. And written in the 1940s. One of the last decades where western civilization wasn’t completely immoral.
             I hear parts I think John Williams has borrowed.. maybe some Jurassic Park?
             

          7. Its a fantastic piece. Very fresh, and probably the best evocation of the america wilds you could get despite or perhaps because of Copland being from immigrant stock. I couldn’t remember for a moment whether it was appallachian spring where you get the lord of the dance theme – the writing is every bit as fine as something like prokofiev’s lieutenant kije where two themes are playing at once – in fact, although they’re a million miles apart that’s what it reminded me of in a way
             Also I’ve heard a great vocal version of the ‘dance’ theme, which might also have been copland’s own adaptation – although I can’t seem to find it

    3. I hear what you’re saying, and agree with all your points. And kudos on the good taste, though I myself mainly listen to Beethoven’s last works, especially the late string quartets, opus 110 and 111 piano sonatas among other late piano works, as well as other post-1818 gems like the Diabelli variations and bagatelles. I would not recommend these works to new listeners, that’s for sure, and they ought to be approached only when one has mastered Bach, Mozart, and Haydn.

14. Got a local radio station that plays Classical all day, I can truthfully say it relaxes me and I feel more focused listening to it.

    1. Especially when it’s in the other room and it seems as if it’s calling you from a distance. Always focuses me.

15. I did not read the article, but last time I listened to classical music I got a 250€ fine and lost my drivers license for a month for speeding.

    1. It’s funny you say that. I used to listen to a lot of Beethoven when I drove and some of his symphonies, especially his 2,4 and 7 used to make me drive like a demon on the road. I’d just put my foot on the accelerator when on the open road and drive way above the limit for the hell of it.

16. These days I find myself listening to military marches.

    1. Cant go wrong with John Phillip. I often find when I’m in a good mood, I like to make up a Souza melody with its fast ascending and descending lines while I work.

17. I had a paper on the Mozart Effect last semester. I chose the subject. I listened to classical music while writing it. I aced the paper. I am not convinced completely, but it is interesting.
    I own a record player and many records. They are fun to listen to and fantastic conversation pieces. Every girl I know has commented on it. Listen to it while with a girl, or during sex.

18. I don’t know what it is, but the first 20 seconds or so of this is like a switch going on in my head. It’s something you can actually feel, like warm light spreading over your brain.
    

    1. The Cello Suites are my personal fav.
       YoYo Ma is the obvious go to for them and for good reason.For my money, however, rosterpovich is the man.

       1. Rostropovich is your man? You should learn to spell his name correctly.

          1. Thanks for the point out. Those wacky Russian names are tough.

19. I think that “Mozart Effect” has been debunked, at least as far as making infants more intelligent goes

    1. Yeah, it has. That was all marketing. But playing music, no matter what instrument, makes you smarter — that’s proven.

       1. I’m having a hard time believing that playing rap music increases intelligence.

          1. Love your comments here, but it sounds like you’ve got a bit of old white guy syndrome re: music.
             Watch this Eminem video (ignore the couple foul-mouth moments). Anybody who can memorize and recite these lyrics *at speed* has improved his her neural circuitry:
             

          2. Rap was around when I was a teen. I disliked it a lot then too. The first time I heard it I thought “Hey, neat, this is original”. The second time I thought “Well, ok, he’s playing off the first guy”. By the 100th time I wondered “Um, that’s it?”
             Memorizing and reciting lyrics at speed for any kind of rock song is no less difficult. Try to let rip “Immigrant Song” at speed and see if it doesn’t tongue tangle you.

          3. There are no rock vocals that are as complex as Eminem’s above. He’s sui generis.
             Old-school rap, like Kool Moe Dee, was stupid simple. Not musical at all. When it finally became more musical in the nineties, it turned into “hip-hop”, which today in 2016 nobody can define, because it now borrows from jazz, rock, funk, reggaeton, electronic dance music, you name it.
             That said, I’m not really a fan of any of it, not unless the vocal is sensational, as in Eminem above, or Kendrick Lamar. Much prefer every other genre — except opera. I’ll still take hip-hop over opera.

          4. Eminem is a sharp guy, and has great lyrics. He tends to have some rhythms / melodies that are catchy as well, which is quite rare. I think KRS-one is a really talented, bright lyricist (black rapper) but I can’t stand to hear him rap. Looking at the written lyrics, however, (same with Eminem) shows some serious creativity and wit.

20. At least classical music can’t be faked. Any retard can smear paint on a canvas and call it art but you can’t bullshit a cello.
    JacksonPollock paintings look as if a chimp throw shit against the wall yet the art faggots will claim that it has great meaning.

    1. Just checked out Jackson Pollock paintings on Google. What the fuck? And I thought Picasso art looks like Picasso himself used slave child labor to paint them. Jackson Pollock paintings look like chicken scratches made by a chicken afflicted with Parkinson’s. And don’t get me started on this thing that looks like a coat hanger orgy by a dude named Alexander Calder. This shit was appraised on Antiques Roadshoe at $400000 retail, $1,million auction. Seriously, WTF!
       http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/roadshow/season/15/miami-beach-fl/appraisals/alexander-calder-mobile-ca-1950–201003A30

       1. Not all art is easily accessible. Sometimes these things take a long time and a lot of study for people to understand what is going on.
          This idea that art and music should appeal to everyone is part of the predicament of modern man.
          What expertise do you have to judge these works of art? Have you spent an extensive amount of time researching the history of art, understanding the dialogue which has been going on between artists, generation to generation, for thousands of years? It is the same arrogance displayed in the hipster mentality that people think “if I don’t like it then it is not good”
          I won’t deny that there is a lot of bullshit art out there. But stuff like Calder and JP is genuinely important. It wasn’t created for mass consumption and takes a lot of time to truly understand.
          However, in my opinion, it is worth knowing a little about why the art world finds them so special, where they fit in in the history of art and why people have been talking about them and will continue to talk about, analyze and dissect them for years and years to come.
          Remember, just because something isn’t immediately understandable to you doesn’t mean it is bullshit. It might, but not necessarily.

          1. In addition to the reply above, other elements to be considered are how the art was created. JP was an intense artist who would create works by being on the floor near the canvas and drip paint to feel closer and connected to his art.
             Going through museums and seeing classical art, some will speak to you and some will not. There are things where the blurb attached is very high concept and erudite in expression, however the piece is very basic and their seems to be a disconnect in how they are trying to communicate complex issues with simple representations.
             One thing from my own experience has been, seeing the real thing is much more impressive than what google shows. Walking through several museums, when you view great art paintings they really can draw you in and leave you breathless as you contemplate the imagery and meaning that is being put forward from the artists point of view.

          2. “One thing from my own experience has been, seeing the real thing is much more impressive than what google shows. Walking through several museums, when you view great art paintings they really can draw you in and leave you breathless as you contemplate the imagery and meaning that is being put forward from the artists point of view.”
             Seconded. You have not seen Michelangelo’s David until you are standing at his feet in the Uffizi, the Florence museum that is his home. It is almost a religious experience when you contemplate the sheer artistry and attention to detail alone. David is on a circular dais, so he can be viewed from every angle. He’s a good fifteen feet high, which is itself an odd experience since the Biblical story says to us that David was tiny compared with his legendary enemy Goliath. Michelangelo carved him with such fidelity to biological detail you can see David has just drawn in a deep breath preparatory to unleashing his sling, which lies over his shoulder.
             His face has a mixed look of faith and fear, the face of a fourteen-year-old boy about to take on Goliath, a boy without a scrap of clothing on him, perfect in every way. Even his hands – careful observers note that the size of his hands are out of proportion to his body, but even that is said to be intentional: they aren’t David’s hands, they’re the hands of God. And Michelangelo carved David out of a single, inferior block of marble.
             And that’s the smallest of the treasures in Italy’s art museums. Michelangelo’s Pieta in the Vatican is heartbreaking to contemplate (and his later Pietas — he did four of them over his life — are almost modern art, a confirmation of the truth that the great artists mastered their forms and then experimented.) Rome and the Vatican are absolute treasurehouses of art.
             Similar for the Louvre in Paris. Indeed its glass pyramid itself is a work of art: go beneath it in the museum, and you find the pyramid above is mirrored by an inverted pyramid below, suspended just above a tiny pyramid made of stone and affixed to the floor. This is the location Dan Brown gives to the location of Mary Magdalen’s tomb in The Da Vinci Code, but as a work of art it is strangely disturbing in its own way: as if the heavens are streaming up from the point of the pyramid. It is not something you can easily describe without being there.

          3. Omg wow. Your description makes me want to see everything in person so bad! Maybe someday.
             Taryn

    2. Yes, it can be faked. You can have all that, and more, with KRATOM

       1. This article does not give the real reason to listen. The real reason is that it is beautiful. Listen to the music of Gustav Mahler. If you go away unmoved, you have no soul or spirit.

          1. Mmm yes, especially his 9th Symphony. His world had fallen apart, nearing death. His final symphony is full of sorrow and beauty.

    3. Oh music can certainly be faked, here are two pieces of prog garbage:
       https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zY7UK-6aaNA
       

       1. The first one is the Jason Pollock of music & the second one a quite good imitation of a kennel …..

       2. just woke up, watch that shit, just wanted to go back to sleep and wake up when patriarchy will return.

       3. … and they said women couldn’t be funny.

          1. If you think that they were doing it actually trying to be taken seriously, it makes the whole thing even funnier.

          2. 00:14 – 00:16 is just hilarious! That face … 😄

       4. Oh if only it was acceptable to still throw rotten fruits and vegetables at performers… this shit was just fucking terrible.

       5. 4’33” is absolutely my favorite John Cage composition!

    4. There are people doing some atonal music out there that a lot of people think is just people faking it.
       The truth is, like everything else, some of these guys are faking it and some of them are truly geniuses that see things that most people just don’t understand.
       People were so outraged at Stravinsky that there was a riot in Paris because of his 12 tone shit.
       Likewise with painting. Yes, agreed, a lot of this stuff is just art school monkeys wiping feces on stuff, but I will argue that Jackson Pollock did amazing and ground breaking things.
       I don’t want to say that all avante guarde music or art is good…in fact most of it is bullshit like you suggest, but there are some true standouts.
       As it turns out, time generally weeds out the bullshit. There is a reason for Pollocks continued endurance. He, as well as his art, was genuinely special.

       1. My painter friend was rhapsodizing about a piece of contemporary abstract art. I said, “Come on, look at it — I mean, I could’ve done that.”
          She turned to me and said very clearly, “But you didn’t. He did.”
          That shut me right up.

          1. Ha. I guess that is a good retort.
             The question Pollock always brought up for me was “how did he know when he was done?”
             The fact is, at one moment that painting was a work in progress and at another he saw something that made it complete. What was that thing. There are some really interesting correlations between that chaos and randomness in Pollock’s paintings and fractal geometry and some people argue that when he looked he saw that there was something in perfect discord.
             Between that and the different textures and materials (sometimes glass or ashes or whatnot) there is just so much going on. I remember the first time I sat in a museum and looked up at some enormous Pollock in person. It was so big, so frightening and so chaotic that it seemed to basically convey exactly that feeling of being a very tiny person in a very big and complicated universe. Truly amazing stuff.

          2. Mussorgsky once said that art is a means of communication. Looking at most modern paintings, what exactly is the painter trying to communicate? That
             1. He’s lazy?
             2. He’s incompetent?
             3. He has nothing but contempt for the audience?
             I suppose one could make the argument that JP is telling us that order derives out of chaos but I think an actual fractal image does a much better job at that.

          3. In that light, isn’t Pollock’s work a true representation of modern society? Big, frightening, chaotic, lacking any form or sense of reason, but still, it continues to exist.

          4. That’s a good point. It even translates into architecture. Look at, say, Budapest and compare it to Toronto, a soulless shitpile. If the people are degenerate, it gets reflected in their art and architecture.

          5. But, is modern society in western countries these days really that frightening and chaotic? I know people will talk about immigrants and all that, but, I mean in the existential sense of a citizen living Stalin’s Russia or living in a country like Spain during the civil war, where Picasso created some artworks that captured the terrible carnage of war in all its grotesque brutality.
             I wonder about this sense sometimes. I think our society has become the opposite, very stable, controlled, rational, almost sterile and conformist to the point of monotony at times. It’s preferable to a society at war, but, I think modern artists often try to “construct” society as frightening when in fact it’s really the opposite in truth.

          6. Perhaps not frightening and chaotic in the sense of fear of death or harm, but in terms of cold, solitude, lack of humanity, and complete lack of organization, planning, or cohesiveness, I’d say yes. And to many, this lack of a soul would be more frightening than being placed in the middle of a war, where at least one had comeraderie and knew one’s place in the grand scheme of things.
             It’s the “Bowling alone” epidemic, and I can’t remember how Adam Curtis describes it in Power of Nightmares but something like.. all these silly people obsessed with their lawns and hiding behind their picket fences.

          7. You should have told her you’re too decent a person to engage in such a con.
             Besides, modern art was funded by the C.I.A., in an attempt to show up the Soviet Union. Try that one on her.

       2. Stories like this just prove the drastic changes in society. I haven’t heard that Stravinsky piece, but I heard another piece (forget which–my modern brain is dumbed down) that supposedly had the audience at the premiere storming out and throwing things. My reaction to it was nothing near that severe.
          I don’t know exactly what to make of that, whether people of that time were much more intelligent and discriminating, whereas I lack the musical knowledge to understand what was being done with this piece, or whether tv and the internet and modern media had dulled my imagination (the piece was supposedly meant to inspire ideas of revolution whereas to me it lacked any sort of vivid imagery and was just music), or whether today I am just used to accepting and not challenging things, from anal marriage to trannys to slutwalks etc. whereas back then there were clear right and wrongs and people responded appropriately when their society was challenged. But either way, it points out a vast difference between the stronger society of the past and the weaker society today.

          1. I think it is a mixed bag of everything you say and probably some other stuff.
             We are so saturated with entertainment now that it all becomes less important. There is a narrative in music. These big guys are huge points in a very long tradition that for an exceptionally long period of time was one of the very few forms of entertainment to the world.
             Imagine living in a world where your entertainment options were, essentially, books, theater and music (for the later two it had to be live and for the former it was only for people with significant money). You think these whores today know all about a Kardashian’s life? An upper middle class gentleman in 18th century Germany could have told you more about music than most current professors on the topic.
             Add to that all the other things you mention as well as the attention span problem.
             I will put this out there, I think the beatles just plain stink. Bad music. Total rubbish.
             However, they really solidified the idea of a 3 minute song with verse, chorous verse.
             What is the longest song you listen to with any frequency?
             Picking up on the long lines of melody through a 50 minute piece and then understanding it in context and relation to what came before it…not just recently but over the last 1000 years is required for fully enjoying this stuff and we are simply too fucking stupid to do that now.

          2. So true. When Bach released a new symphony, it was an *EVENT*. Everyone was scrambling to hear it, know where it would be played and when, what people’s reactions were, etc. It would be talked about, discussed, wished for, by hundreds of thousands all over Europe.
             Today, if someone wrote another masterpiece of similar quality, it would at best be enjoyed that night by those who went, written up in a few niche publications, and never given any mainstream media attention. Entertainment is less important today, as you say, and a great work that took years of training, persistence, and study will be forgotten as quickly as the last twitter microaggression hashtag by 99.9% of the public. And more importantly perhaps, is that 95% of the public would never even care about or hear this piece, where it was likely the preeminent entertainment of the year in the past.
             As far as the Beatles, I like, but never loved them. But I heard it said one time that they were diligent and would practice over and over again to get a certain sound, and that their music has a huge range of different sounds, ie Yellow Submarine sounds nothing like A Day In The Life. And to that I give them credit. They would make every song different, incorporating odd and different instruments, using reverse tape playback, etc. Being creative.
             But yes when you put it in the context of an hour long musical piece it’s garbage.

          3. “When Bach released a new symphony…”
             I assume you’re NOT referring to J.S. Bach. He wrote no symphonies.

          4. Shit, I told myself to look that up before I posted it. Haha.. You are correct.

          5. I think one the greatest crimes committed against classical music was it appropriation by the advertising, hospitably and costumer service trades. Mozart’s adagio from PC No. 23 in the elevator going down and Bach’s Brandenburg Concertos intermixed with the Carpenters wafting over the hotel breakfast table before my speech at a recent convention was just so distracting and comical (in the absurd sense) first thing that particular morning!

          6. J.C. did though …

    5. I was told in college, Jackson Pollock once took a drip-stick, and signed his name with it. Which utterly destroyed his theory of his own painting. Because it was legible. As a result, he fell off the wagon, and died in a car wreck.
       By the way, modern art was funded by the C.I.A., in an attempt to make the Soviet Union look bad, because they knew the communists would suppress it. In this country, the communists championed modern art, in an attempt to destroy art, and critical judgment. And it worked. Too bad Jackson Pollock never found out he was a C.I.A. flunky.

21. Here’s something rare – a black female symphonic composer
    

    1. somewhat off message, but it isn’t half bad. Sounds like a film score though

    2. Very good.

22. My top 5, in no particular order:
    1. Rachmaninov’s 2nd
    2. Smetana, The Moldau
    3. Asturias by Isaac Albeniz (classical flamenco; rock fans CHECK this one out)
    4. Samuel Barber, Adagio for Strings
    5. Anything by Bach

    1. no. 4: platoon wasn’t that relaxing

23. Ride of the Valkyrie’s makes me want to eat nails , piss lead , and parachute into the middle of an Isis raiding party with a m 249

    1. Charlie don’t surf.

       1. I love the smell of napalm in the morning

          1. Smells like victory.

          2. I just want my board back Lance , It was a good board .

24. Perfect timing, I have been having problems concentrating in work due to my ADD/ruminating brain (self diagnosed, don’t touch meds), and need something to help me focus. I’ve used classical music in the past with great success but had drifted away from it for some reason. Will give it a go tomorrow morning. Thanks for the article.

25. I’m not at all into classical music from a listening standpoint. It bores the living hell out of me and I find the structure in most of it nerve wracking.
    However, one of my hobbies is location recording for local musicians in my area. Recording good classical music is a welcome change from rock and hipster folk. The classical mucisians are tight in their arrangements and skill and recording them really forces you to use some skills that you don’t normally use with rock.
    Also, the dynamics of the loud and quiet parts, especially if they’re conducted well is more noticeable.

    1. I used to have the same problem with finding structures when I was young. I found that if you listen to something that is more simple, and then move to the more complex stuff, and then stuff that is more and more complex, you can start to appreciate it much more.

26. Great article, if I had a daughter I would try and get her into classical and playing an instrument, think it would be harder for KULCHA to influence her after access to so much beatyBest thing a red pill man can listen to, it’s one of the best things humans have created.
    Quickest way to deprogram your mind from a whole lifetime of silly kids mush.
    The frequencies they use in todays music makes people stupid plus it’s all lower base chakra jumping up and down, banging, screaming like animals.
    Bacchic versus Orphic.
    There’s a lot of sacred geometry mathematics in classical hence it’s profound effect.

27. It’s a shame that most classical people who have the ability to make classical music have been indoctrinated and abandoned great classical styles such as Baroque and Romantic and are obsessed with horrible horse sh!t such as Jazz and “atonal” music.

28. Nothing like Ravel’s Bolero to pump me up.

29. This writer has obviously never seen A Clockwork Orange.

    1. & ???????????

30. My first classical concert was the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. I had no idea a classical concert could rock, like a Rammstein concert…
    The first song was Elgar’s cello concerto in E minor. The opening notes blew my mind.
    
    But then something even grander came: Shostakovich Symphony No.4 . This symphony was thrilling, written by a dissident Russian during the Soviet period, you can practically feel the Commies marching through this symphony.

    1. Yes, you can feel the cold, menace, power, fire, resilience, resignation, hope, the dead of winter, the thaw after Stalin, the Nazis at Saint Perterburg’s gates in nearly ever fiber of Shostakovitch’s oeuvre. I remember only at few years ago seeing performances of the monolithic Symphony No.7 (The Leningrad) and Symphony No.10 at the Mariinsky in Saint Petersberg, Russia http://www.mariinsky.ru/en/. What a venue, it’s so central to the idea of that wonderful city.
       Classical music is the life blood of this city and it’s respected by everyone there, so never insult it, as it was this very beacon of culture that got them through some dark and terrible times in the past . I have to admit that their production values relating to the “standard” western repertoire is exceptional. The Russians understand western pieces in manner they we’ve never comprehended, and I don’t mean they make pieces “PC” and have women playing the lead role that are done by male performers. It’s much more intelligent and creative than that. What they can do with the great Italian and German operatic masterpieces leaves the western productions in the bargain basement in many cases.
       Anyway, here’s a favorite of mine. The andante from his second Piano Concerto, a piece for a clear cold winter’s day.
       

31. Awesome article, I’m happy to see the positive reinforcement of rich culture opposed to the negative reinforcement RoK dishes out to the ridiculous, emasculating, degenerative culture that is so apparent in this day and age. Well done

    1. It’s quite different than the type of content one might read on a feminist blog, eh? 😉

       1. yeah, I fucking love this site

32. “After just 18 months, robberies had dropped by 30%” Hahahahahahah. This happens because classical music creates a hostile environment to the people who most indulge in crime so they don’t hang out where its playing and opportunistic crime dissapears.

    1. Well, there was a situation in a shopping mall, were they started paying classical tunes on loud speakers… Result all the yobbos left the area & are not coming back.. Classical music to yobbos is like holy-water to the devil…..

       1. yobbos? lol

          1. Ooops sorry,…Should have said sensitive, respect requiring & seeking yobbos !

          2. Ahh.. we don’t use that word across the pond. I understand now:
             Yob is a slang word used in the UK. The term denotes a loutish, uncultured person, and is published in dictionaries in the United Kingdom. In Australia and New Zealand, the word yobbo is more frequently used, with a similar although slightly less negative meaning.

          3. Well, you do have them over-there as well, maybe you are calling them with a different name ??
             What s in a name that which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet?

33. Back before there was electricity Beethoven, Wagner and Tchaikovsky WERE metal.

34. I highly recommend a modern composer/pianist, Ludovico Einaudi. Particularly his album Le Onde.

    1. Second that,thats some sweet chillout shit there.

35. Classical music is superb, and so is Led Zeppelin me thinks.

36. A typical reaction to classical music nowadays:
    
    A valid representation of Deutsche Angst if there ever was one.

    1. Fucking culture destroying scum who make shit like this. I hope they all rot in hell. Destroying and defecating on beauty should be a sin.

       1. Uh, yeah…

37. I wish I knew more about it. Listen in my car on the way to work. That’ss about it

38. When I really need to concentrate and my mind is not cooperating, Mozart or one of the Baroque masters puts me back on track.

39. Modern music is sorely lacking harpsichord.

    1. I was just thinking that one of the things that bores me about rock is that the guitar is almost exclusively the lead instrument. In Classical it can be anything – lute, mandolin, oboe, clarinet, bassoon…
       

    2. I’m actually rather fond of the harpsichord.

       1. I’ve been a fan since 5th grade when we were learning about instruments in music class. Heard a Mozart number the other day on the radio that got me on a kick. It’s amazing that an instrument that old has almost an electronic tone to it. Then again, I’ve always thought that a Les Paul through a Marshall sounds like violins.

       2. You can get a similar effect from electric guitar, by tapping the strings to the frets, to produce notes, much like a Chapman Stick or Warr Guitar. We did this in my band. I played Warr Guitar and frontman played tap electric guitar.

    3. Modern music is sorely lacking in music.

40. How the fuck you gon write a classical music article with ZER recommendations or videos/links?
    Bruh…

41. – “Like a bird of rarest spun heaven-metal”
    

42. Almost every metropolitan area has some sort of orchestra and/or symphony around. It is well worth your time to subscribe and regularly attend these performances. Yeah some play some modern junk too, but most still stick to the classics for most pay bills. I have subscribed for the last dozen years or so and always get two seats. If a date or girlfriend can’t go I invite a friend. You would be amazed at how many friends have become regulars after just attending once or twice.
    Outside of really expensive metro areas such as New York ticket prices are not exorbitant either especially if you subscribe and sit in the higher up seats. For 8 shows to a major metro orchestra the cost comes out to about $20 a ticket per seat per show.

    1. There are often young adult programs that can get you significant discounts as well. Sometimes these are “new member clubs” or something similar. I’m a member of one and I’m in my 30s.
       You know, it’s funny whenever they play the modern stuff it is laughably bad, with the exception of one unique double bass piece I heard performed by Edgar Meyer. Also, I LOVE sitting up close, and for some reason the front couple of rows are the “cheap seats”–I suppose you can’t see all the instruments or something but that’s my favorite place to be, and if I’m a little bored sitting in the rear, I’m always constantly engaged sitting up front.

       1. Yes, true, the “Young Friends of…” clubs are a great way to get involved and get discounted tickets. The cut off age for the club I am a member of is 40 so don’t think merely because you aren’t a recent college grad you don’t qualify. (Unless you are 60 trying to join it is not like they ask for ID anyway…most are just happy you are showing up these days).

43. Lol can’t bullshit a cello ,true man 🙂
    Classical music is dreary for me but I do like chill-out type music and film soundtracks, that one from Inception called Time is awesome, esp the version with the dictator speech on it.

44. PBS has some great performances check out “All Star Orchestra”. If you have ever loved a woman, then had her fall asleep in your arms listening to something like this.. you have not lived…. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IkD-6N_1xek

45. Wny Beethoven? Because it’s f*cking Beethoven!

46. I listen to classical music sometimes when I fall asleep. This is one point I can vouch for.

47. Love Vivaldi. It’s a shame they don’t even teach about him in schools anymore; I started listening to him a few months ago. Don’t regret it.
    Meanwhile, Tumblr fanatics and other degenerates with facial piercings and neon-colored hair listen to dubstep, AKA X-treme robot sex. Familiar with the song that goes “VVVRRGWUBUBDUDUB?”
    Shame.

    1. Oh you mean that band called SkrilleWUBWUBWUBBADAWUBBADAWUBWUBWUBWUBWUBWUBBADAWUBBADAWUBWUBWUB

       1. Yeah that one too. I heard he works at McDonald’s now, trying to serve burgers with an extra side of degenerate.

48. Feh. I listen to classical music. But there’s only one good reason to listen to classical music — because you like it. If you prefer death metal, stick with that.

49. Intersteller theme and Hans Zimmer is some awesome shit, I listen to the Forrest Gump themetoo .
    Forrest the ultimate Beta chasing fucking jenny whilst the cunt shits all over him,going alpha and running all over the place,setting up a business etc,then oneitis still got him,he marrie’s her .Luckily for him the bitch dies cos in real life she woulda taken it all and never let him see his kid.

50. Been listening to classical and playing the violin for 20 years. I can attest that it is the one genre that has never failed me. I have yet to find any trashy tunes in it, unlike some of today’s music. Why do you think some artists rip classical beats for their degenerate tunes? Try playing it in the background while you sleep. I guarantee you will wake up feeling refreshed, and quite sophisticated.

51. I always think of the legend of King Midas – beyond his problem with the golden touch, King Midas was turned into an ass for abandoning the sublime music of Apollo and instead handing himself over to the thumping, grinding, whirling music of the degenerate satyrs.
    Men should pride themselves on a culture of excellence; (most) Classical music is the music of excellence. It expresses what is noble and sublime in man, and the man of substance and strength will cultivate an interest in it.

52. Jazz and some progressive rock provide similar benefits. I support my local classical and jazz stations. Ad-free and pumping out greatness 24/7.

53. I can’t find any of the articles. Whenever I click on a title, it takes me directly to these “comments” pages.

54. Excellent, from a returned convert. Thank you.

55. Serenade for Winds by THE Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart.
    The movie portrays him well. A man of priorities putting his woman second.

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