Ask HN: Your all time favorites, three pieces of music? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: Your all time favorites, three pieces of music?

8 pointsjacquesm13 comments

Hello there HN'ers,

Everbody that meant something in my life has influenced my taste in music somehow, either by introducing me to stuff I had never heard before or by making me listen again to music that I knew about but did not find interesting, and making me look at it with new eyes (or, better, hear it with new ears).

What are your favorite pieces of music?

I promise I'll go and hunt them up and I'll listen to them without prejudice. Popular, classical, jazz, anything goes, as long as it is really special to you.

To kick it off, here are mine:

Pat Metheny, The Dream of the Return

October Project, Ariel

Ralph Towner, The Silence of a Candle

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The "Intermezzo in A major. Andante teneramente" from opus 118, Six Piano Pieces, by Brahms.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Six_Pieces_for_Piano,_Op._118_%...

The track "All Blues" from the album Kind of Blue by Miles Davis (which I think is the best-selling jazz LP of all time).

http://www.amazon.com/Kind-Blue-Miles-Davis/dp/B000002ADT

The Piano Sonata in E major, Op. 6 by Felix Mendelssohn (as performed by Murray Perahia on the linked recording).

http://www.amazon.com/Mendelssohn-Prelude-Variations-S%C3%A9...

There is so much more, but you asked for three.

> There is so much more, but you asked for three.

I know, but it would get out of hand, given the size of the HN audience I figured three would be a nice start. Feel free to cheat :)

And thanks!

On the classical front (let the cheating begin) Dinu Lipatti, last recital, Besancon 1953.

In a different genre of music, I find I keep coming back to Joni Mitchell's most successful album, Court and Spark.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Court_and_Spark

I especially like the track "Help Me," a big hit as a single.

Subtranean Homesick Blues, Bob Dylan. The anthem of my youthful rebellion, and the marching tune of my cynical advancing age.

The Soviet national anthem. Still nothing moves me like the Hymn. I will wake up to it on the 9th to celebrate Soviet victory over the Nazis :-)

Everything in Zeppelin I-IV. Best years of my life. I drank to them, woke up hungover to them, and made love to them.

-Nusrat's 'Sanu ik pal chain na aawe'

-4th movement of Beethoven's fifth

-Procol Harum's 'Whiter shade of pale'

Mozart - Requiem Mass in D Minor

Mike Oldfield - Tubular Bells

Bob Marley - No Woman No Cry

Weirdly enough, when I was younger I thought 'No Woman, No Cry' was saying to a man that he wouldn't be miserable once he got rid of a bad woman, rather than a song from the point of view of a man who is comforting a woman. I guess you could read a lot into that.

Late to the party but, but just one suggestion: Aerial Boundaries by the late Michael Hedges - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YaIN13aDbCc

Pretty much anything by him is superb IMO.

The Mountain Goats - "Prana Ferox" (and about 400 other songs)

Coil - "The Dreamer is Still Asleep"

Neutral Milk Hotel - "In the Aeroplane Over the Sea" (the song, but also the whole album. perfection.)

Roy Buchanan - You're Not Alone

Benny Goodman - Sing, Sing, Sing (the Live at Carnegie Hall version)

The Beatles - The End

- Shostakovich #11

- Abbey Road side B

- The End (The Doors)

This is a tough one. It depends how I feel.

When nostalgic I love: Youssou Ndour "Bayekou", Phil Collins "True Colors".

When I want to feel good sad: Coldplay "Talk", Garry Rafferty "Right Down the Line".

When I am in party mode: Tupac "Still balling",Ludacris "Southern Hospitality".

When I want to feel gangster (Yes, I said it): Clipse "Gangsta Lean" and sometimes, sometimes Blue Magic "Jay z".

And off course how could I have forgotten the one and only Edge, Bono and 'em in "Sunday Bloody Sunday".

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