Welcome to Week 57 of The Works! Start with this week's podcast episode.

The pieces for this week are listed below, along with links to scores, opera libretto and synopsis, and other helpful information. Here is the Spotify playlist for Week 57.

Hector Berlioz
Les Troyens - score - libretto and synopsis
     recommended audio recording: Covent Garden conducted by Davis with Vickers, Veasey, Lindholm
     video recommendation: Met conducted by Levine with Troyanos, Norman, Domingo

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Piano Concerto No. 19 - score
     recommended recordings: Perahia with English Chamber Orchestra; Bilson with English Baroque/Gardiner

Franz Liszt
Piano Sonata in B minor - score
      recommended recordings: Arrau; Brendel; Richter

Olivier Messiaen
Des Canyons aux Etoiles
      recommended recordings: Loriod with Ensemble Ars Nova/Constant; Hardink with Utah Symphony/Fischer

Louis Armstrong and His Hot Seven (or his Hot Five; or his Orchestra)
Selected 78 rpm singles from 1927-28

Welcome to Week 48 of The Works! Start with this week's podcast episode.

The pieces for this week are listed below, along with links to scores and other helpful information. Here is the Spotify playlist for Week 48.

Rodion Shchedrin
Carmen Suite (After Bizet)
     recommended audio recording: Russian National Orchestra/Pletnev
     video: this video appears to be the original choreography

Guillaume DuFay
Selected Motets:
  Vasilissa ergo gaude - score
  *O sancte Sebastiane - score
  O gemma, lux et speculum - score
  Apostolo glorioso - score
  Rite majorem Jacobus - score
  *Ecclesie militantis - score
  Balsamus et munda cera - score
  Supremum est mortalibus - score
  *Nuper rosarum flores - score
  *Salve flos Tusce gentis - score
  Magnanime gentes laudes - score
  Fulgens iubar ecclesiae dei - score
  Moribus et generae
     recommended recordings: Huelgas Ensemble (all of the above); Hilliard Ensemble (* selections)

Franz Liszt
Tasso: Lamento e trionfo - score
      recommended recordings: Orchestre de Paris/Solti; Budapest Symphony/Joo
Les preludes - score
     recommended recordings: Philadelphia Orchestra/Muti; Berlin Philharmonic/Karajan

Sergei Prokofiev
String Quartet No. 1 - score

Miles Davis
In a Silent Way
Bitches Brew
A Tribute to Jack Johnson

Week 4 of The Works! Here's the new podcast episode, in which I review last week's pieces, talk about listening to music in other languages, and preview the works coming up this week.

Here is the Spotify playlist containing the recordings for Week 4.

Here are the works on this week's list, including some links to the scores (and other relevant information) where available:

Paragon Ragtime Orchestra
Album: On the Boardwalk (read the liner notes here)

Eubie Blake
I wanted to listen to his appearance on Marian McPartland's Piano Jazz, but I don't have access to it. If you do, listen to it this week! Here's information about the album, and here's one piece from it.

Dmitri Shostakovich
Music (Op. 116) from the film Hamlet (not to be confused with the incidental music he wrote for the play)
Watch the film or listen to the recording of the suite (Op. 116a) conducted by Yablonsky (alternate recording conducted by Sinaisky)

Gustav Mahler
Symphony No. 2
This symphony includes vocal parts. The texts and translations can be found here.
Recommended recording: Philharmonia Orchestra conducted by Klemperer (alternates: City of Birmingham Symphony/Rattle; New York Philharmonic/Bernstein; NYPO/Walter)

J. S. Bach
15 Two-Part Inventions
15 Three-Part Sinfonias (or Inventions)
Recommended recording on piano: Angela Hewitt (alternates: Glenn Gould; Andras Schiff) and on harpsichord: Ton Koopman

Week 3 of The Works begins with the new podcast episode, in which I review last week's pieces, share a little bit about my experience with opera as a non-opera-buff, and preview the works coming up this week.

Here is the Spotify playlist containing the recordings for Week 3.

Here are pieces on this week's list, including some links to the scores where available:

Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina
Missa Papae Marcelli
Missa Inviolata - this video is the only performance I could find.

Franz Liszt
Transcendental Études

Aaron Copland
Dance Symphony
Short Symphony

Giuseppe Verdi
Rigoletto - here is the libretto with an English translation, and here is a synopsis of the opera.