Let's play Desert Island Discs!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Agathon]

Let's play Desert Island Discs since everything else is so boring.

The rules are

Desert Island Discs is one of Radio 4's most popular and enduring programmes. The format is simple: each week a guest is invited to choose the eight records they would take with them to a desert island.

The discussion of their choice is a device for them to review their life. They also choose a favourite book (excluding the Bible or other religious work and Shakespeare - these already await the "castaway") and a luxury which must be inanimate and have no practical use.

No "best ofs" or box sets are allowed.

Here's mine:

1 - Bartok: Concerto for Orchestra/Music for Strings Percussion and Celesta - CSO, Fritz Reiner.

2 - Mahler: Symphony No. 2 "Resurrection" - Auger. Baker, CBSO, Simon Rattle.

3 - Janacek: Glagolitic Mass (revised version) - DNRSO & Chorus, Sir Charles Mackerras.

4 - Barbirolli Conducts English String Music (Elgar/Vaughan Williams), Sir John Barbirolli

5 - Beethoven: Symphonies 5 & 7 - VPO, Carlos Kleiber

6 - Mahler: Symphony No. 1 - BRSO, Rafael Kubelik

7 - Stravinsky: The Firebird (Complete) - LSO, Antal Dorati

8 - Shostakovich: Symphony No. 5 - Stadium Symphony Orchestra of NY, Leopold Stokowksi.


Book: The Dialogues of Plato (in Greek).

Luxury item: The Parthenon (repaired: statue and everything).

(I so wanted to break the rules and have Pamela Anderson - she's of no practical use, and barely animate).

[Immortal Wombat]

// for inspiration and optimism
1. Beethoven's 9th
2. The Ride of the Valkyries

// for chilling
3. Sigur Ros - Untitled (#3)
4. Don McLean - Starry Starry Night
5. Muse - Feeling Good (or Bliss... )

// for dancing
6. Nightwish - Wanderlust
7. Electric Six - Dance Commander

// to remind me how crap life is off the island
8. NOFX - The Decline


Book: The Book Of erm

Luxury: Difficult. Most things I'd take would have some sort of practical use. My penny whistle. I dunno.

[Boris Godunov]

Originally posted by Immortal Wombat
2. The Ride of the Valkyries

Ummm, the Ride is only about 4 minutes long. Sure you wouldn't just take all of Die Walkure to get maximum play time?

[Immortal Wombat]

yeah, ok whatever.

[Agathon]

Originally posted by Boris Godunov

Ummm, the Ride is only about 4 minutes long. Sure you wouldn't just take all of Die Walkure to get maximum play time?

Stop ******* about and post yours, then.

[monkspider]

Hey, Boris. I have been meaning to ask you. Which recordings of Brahms symphonies are the best? I bought Karajan's 2nd and 3rd, and while enjoyable, I am looking for versions with a bit more passion.

[Inverse Icarus]

musak:

1. Linkin Park - Meteora (best cd ever made, imho)
2. Spineshank - Strictly Diesel
3. Spineshank - Height of Callousness
4. Mudvayne - L.D. 50
5. Mudvayne - The End of All Things to Come
6. NoFx - The Decline
7. NoFx - The War On Errorism
8. Bad Religion - Recipe For Hate
9. Slipknot - Slipknot
10. Slipknot - Iowa

book: erm, to behonest i don't read all that much, and i dont think having something i've read would occupy me. my friend has been pressing me to read Xenocide et al by, whats his name? somethign scott card? i'll take that.

luxury: the cd player to play the cds? durrr? a generator to power it? if those are included i'd like a laptop preloaded with software of my choosing before i leave.

[Boris Godunov]

Ag: That's like asking me to choose among children. I can't!

Originally posted by monkspider
Hey, Boris. I have been meaning to ask you. Which recordings of Brahms symphonies are the best? I bought Karajan's 2nd and 3rd, and while enjoyable, I am looking for versions with a bit more passion.

Karajan is turgid. Rule of thumb: avoid him, always.

Depends on your tastes and requirements for sound quality. Bernstein is certainly passionate, but has an annoying tendency to slow down so he can speed up later. Get his earlier recordings with the NY Phil over his 1980s ones with the Vienna Phil. The typical slurriness of the Vienna Phil doesn't flatter Bernstein's conducting.

For modern recordings, perhaps Abbado's set with the Berlin Phil. Certainly passionate, though far more grand, I think, than Brahms would have invisioned.

If you can stand old recordings, any remastering of Furtwangler with the Berlin Phil will be unbeatable in terms of passionate interpretation. Don't expect tight precision or traditional performances, though--Furtwangler conducted each piece as his own and in the moment, and took a good deal of liberties. They are still magnificent. Too bad they are mono. Oh, to have heard them live!

If you want an unbeatable price on all 4 symphonies together, there is a release of the Toscanini studio recordings. Again, these are old (1950s), but the remastering is fantastic, and it is in stereo. It's a 2-disc set and is usually $15.

[Imran Siddiqui]

Toughie...

1) Johnny Cash - American IV
2) Alan Jackson - Drive
3) Garth Brooks - No Fences (I assume 'Double Live' would be a 'best of' )
4) Garth Brooks - Ropin' the Wind
5) Dixie Chicks - Home
6) The Who - Who's Next
7) The Who - Tommy
8) Led Zeppelin - IV
9) Led Zeppelin - Physical Graffiti
10) Led Zeppelin - II

Book: The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams.

Luxury: I guess my watch, even though the person that gave it to me isn't quite fond of me right now .

[Agathon]

Originally posted by Boris Godunov
Ag: That's like asking me to choose among children. I can't!

I managed it, although it took a while.

Karajan is turgid. Rule of thumb: avoid him, always.

Oh come on... He's a great Strauss conductor and his Prokofiev isn't bad either.

[Agathon]

I can't believe you don't have Quadrophenia on your list, Imran.

[Inverse Icarus]

Originally posted by Boris Godunov
Ag: That's like asking me to choose among children. I can't!

i'm sorry there are no reproductive organs in the large intestine or tonsils.

[Boris Godunov]

Originally posted by Uber KruX
i'm sorry there are no reproductive organs in the large intestine or tonsils.

Yet somehow you got through, didn't you?

[Sava]

Yet somehow you got through, didn't you?

OH BURN I SMELL YOUR ROTTING FLESH UBER HAHAHA HE GOT YOU GOOD!

[Inverse Icarus]

Originally posted by Boris Godunov


Yet somehow you got through, didn't you?

if thats a shot at my father, i'll drag you from a truck.

edit: a quality burn though sava, i concur