A friend recently asked me my 10 favourite pieces of music. The first eight to pop into my head (grouped by period and composer) were:
- Bach's Toccata and Fugue in D minor
- Bach's Brandenburg Concerto No. 3
- Mozart's Clarinet Concerto
- Mozart's Symphony No. 41 (esp. last movement)
- Beethoven's Piano Concerto No. 5 (esp. first movement)
- Mendelssohn's Overture to A Midsummer Night's Dream
- Prokofiev's Toccata in D minor
- Prokofiev's Violin Sonata No. 1
If I thought about it more, they might not really all be in my top 10 but they'd all be close. In a larger list I'd include some Ligeti, Stravinsky, Copland and Glass.