Handel’s Messiah

However you like your Messiah - big or intimate, modern or period, authentic or interpreted - when you listen you become part of an almost 300-year tradition of what may be classical music's most beloved masterpiece.

Britten's War Requiem

Benjamin Britten's War Requiem was an anguished cry for peace in the midst of the Cold War. Its combination of the sacred and the secular sends a message that is as powerful today as it was in 1962.

Copland's Symphonic Ode

Copland's Symphonic Ode was booed at its first performances, but the qualities that made it a failure would pave the way for his later successes.

Lutosławski's Concerto for Orchestra

Witold Lutosławski was one of the great cultural figures of 20th century Poland, and his Concerto for Orchestra - based on a simple folk tune - was one of his first great successes; perhaps because his personal history mirrored that of his native land.

Mendelssohn's A Midsummer Night’s Dream

Felix Mendelssohn's music to Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream is a sparkling accompaniment to one of the most magical plays ever written. And he began it when he was just 17!

Mahler's Symphony No. 9

Mahler's Symphony No. 9 could be seen as his farewell statement, but he actually began work on a 10th as soon as he finished the 9th. Despite his fascination with death and the hereafter, Mahler always chose to embrace life, and in this last completed symphony, he managed to express just how thin the line between them actually is.

Schubert's Symphony No. 3

Schubert’s Third Symphony is a concise, clearly plotted work, characterized by prominent use of the clarinet, that recalls the scale, and something of the flavor, of Haydn. Schubert was just eighteen when he composed the piece, during a celebratory period in Vienna prompted by the pacifying effect of the Congress of Vienna.