Yes, as a matter of fact, Pachelbel wrote more than one Canon in D Major. He wrote over two hundred pieces for the organ, his instrument, and hundreds of pieces for all other instrumentation and voices. He was one of Bach’s major idols, and Bach studied his works voraciously. Consequently, a lot of Bach’s fugues sound similar in construction and methods.

This fugue is the lister’s favorite of those that YouTube has to offer, but he could find no opus number for it, and Pachelbel is sure to have written dozens of fugues over the years in C Major, as well as all the other keys. This is a light, fun one, with repeated notes in the melody.

Shostakovich was a close student of Bach’s work, as any self-respecting musician of any kind of music ought to be (heavy metal musicians routinely praise Bach), and as such, this fugue bears a few striking similarities to the high Baroque style. The theme is deceptively simple but promises many elaborations, and the whole piece is superbly logical, with a steady build in polyphonic complexity. Yet, the “mood” of the piece, for lack of a better word, places it squarely in the late Romantic era, being distant, slightly sad, perhaps a little expressive of the Russian countryside in a bleak rain.

As is the case of all music, but especially post-Romantic, 20th Century music, describing this one is almost impossible. The entire piece, in four movements, is written without key signature, but, while it is strictly atonal, the strictness of its adherence to the Baroque traditions of a fugue make it intensely arresting, and not difficult to follow. If you were to describe an impression the music gives you, you might say it sounds like some hideous monster sneaking up on you slowly, ever patiently, until about two-thirds of the way through, you, the audience, turn and see the monster, and have to decide what to do next. In the end, you cautiously back away from it. Of course, that’s only this lister’s impression. Its almost unbearable intensity, however, cannot be ignored.

As is typical of Wagner’s operas, he employed all the polyphonic music he could manage, in order to add layer on layer of complexity to the titanic music that his epic stories required. The end of Act 1 of Lohengrin is another fine example of his grandiose, Romantic polyphony. But he outdid himself with Die Meistersinger. In scene 6 of Act 2, Beckmesser, a mastersinger, attempts to serenade Eva at her window, but is interrupted by Hans Sachs, another mastersinger, who strikes the soles of a pair of shoes with a hammer each time Beckmesser makes a mistake. By the time Beckmesser finishes his song (to Magdalena, disguised as Eva), Sachs has finished repairing the shoes.

Their ruckus wakes up David, who jealously attacks Beckmesser, which wakes up the entire neighborhood and nearly starts a riot. All this chaos on stage is held together magnificently by the fugue Wagner has the characters sing and the orchestra play.

One of Mozart’s finest efforts, and an obvious show of skill in composing complex polyphonic music. This movement is a double fugue, combining both the Kyrie Eleison and the Christe Eleison into one piece of music. These two texts have almost always been separate, because the Greek/Latin text reads, “Kyrie elision. Christe elision. Kyrie elision.”

The tones of these texts are popularly interpreted as “foreboding/scary” for the Kyrie and “plaintive” for the Christe. The idea is that the Kyrie invokes God the Father, who will destroy all sinners in the last days, while the Christe invokes Christ, who pleads for all sinners to convert. Mozart’s version is, more or less, no exception. The movement begins with a strong statement from the bass voices, “Lord, have mercy!” immediately answered by the altos, “Christ, have mercy!” in a desperately rising staccato, as if time is short.

The fugue is not particularly long, but it demonstrates a mastery of the polyphonic techniques in which you must be fluent in order to maintain the theme and development in a fugue. Double fugues are much more difficult to compose than single fugues, and because Bach wrote several, the most notable of which are in his monumental Art of the Fugue, many later composers have felt the pressure to prove themselves. Verdi practically failed, writing a technically accurate, but very academic double fugue for the Sanctus of his Requiem. Mozart, however, is able to toy with the intricacies, which is necessary for the proper exploration of the subjects.

Buxtehude was Bach’s most direct idol. He found in Buxtehude’s work that divine complexity Baroque music always sought, and finally found in Bach. If Bach can be said to be the culmination, the pinnacle, of the Baroque, then Buxtehude laid most of the foundation for Bach’s pedestal.

As such, Buxtehude’s music is not nearly as heavy or robust as Bach’s, but this fugue, especially, possesses a cheery lightness that he elaborates into a rainbow of polyphonic textures and colors, and it was perfectly suited to his intent: a refreshing break from a monotonous sermon during a four-hour church service. It is not very long, compared to many others on this list, but Buxtedhude got in, said all he needed to say, and got out. A slender, fair-haired dance of a fugue.

This list would be grossly incomplete without mentioning Handel. He was Bach’s greatest contemporary, and Beethoven and Haydn both considered him the greatest composer of all time (they only had a fraction of Bach’s manuscripts at their disposal in their times). Handel’s most famous work, the titanic oratorio, Messiah, ends with a suitably titanic fugue on the single word, “Amen.”

Handel was the second greatest master of the Baroque fugue, and that’s especially impressive since fugues were a central theme of Baroque music, more so than of Classical or Romantic music. He was by far more well known throughout Europe than Bach, and very wealthy, as he was employed by King George II of England. Bach had no such luck, being employed exclusively by churches, which could barely afford everything besides music. Bach’s income was supplemented by trusses of firewood and bags of corn. He couldn’t even raise the money to take a solo trip to England to meet his greatest contemporary.

Handel’s “Amen” has to wrap up “the greatest story ever told,” as it were, and to this end, he scores the entrance of the trumpets for a marvelous, bombastic fanfare, a final storming of Heaven, as some have said. The complexity of the fugue is on par with some by Bach, leading some musicologists to argue that the “Amen” chorus is an even higher achievement than the “Hallelujah” Chorus.

Beethoven loathed writing counterpoint. Contrapuntal music did not come naturally to him, but given his never-give-up attitude toward just about everything, he refused to yield to the fugue’s enormous technical difficulties. After an arduous career of writing a lot of human history’s almightiest music, along with a number of fugues and fugal sections to larger works, he cemented his place among the finest contrapuntal composers with his fugal finale to this sonata.

It is notoriously difficult for many classical pianists because it so huge a movement, with three voices in triple meter, lasting 12 solid minutes. It is no easy feat to memorize it. The whole sonata was, for most of the 1800s, the longest solo piano work. Three voices, not four, comprise the fugue, on a theme concerned with the exploration of dissonance, a very modern, even heretical, idea at the time. Beethoven, though, was never one to be afraid of what people thought of his work.

Like most of Beethoven’s piano work, this one employs extensive trilling. Sviatoslav Richter likened its composition to Noah’s construction of the Ark: there was only one man on Earth who could build the Ark. And God called him to do it. It begins simply, methodically laying a foundation, then reflecting on how to proceed, before finally hitting on the idea of raising the rounded walls of the ship.

Mozart wrote this entire symphony in about a month, in the summer of 1788, at the same time as he worked on Symphonies 39 and 40, his last three, along with dozens of other large and small works. The last movement is classic Mozart, cheerful, ebullient, full of laughter and euphoria.

This lister thinks he might have cheated a bit in including it, because in the strict sense of the other entries, this one is “fugato,” not a fugue. A fugato piece is written in the style of a fugue but makes so many moderations here and there it becomes too loose a piece to be a fugue. Usually, it turns into multiple fugues, one after another, rapid-fire, with a lot of intertwining. That is what Mozart does with the four-note theme of this one. It can be said to have five voices, each of which alters the theme in a different way, and each of these mariations is treated throughout the orchestra to its own development, until the coda brings all five voices together for a big finish. It is supremely scientific, but you have to study it on paper to get the full effect of what Mozart achieved.

Beethoven was, at the time of this composition’s public debut, still not universally accepted as a titan of contrapuntal music. Today, we know better. His “grand fugue,” originally published as the final movement of his gigantic String Quartet, Op. 130 in B-flat Major, was not as well received as he would have liked, because no one understood it. He based the theme on dissonance, like #3, which to the mainstream was still a very new and strange concept at the time. But he wrote it like he heard it in his head, and was never afraid to try anything. If it sounded good, he kept working with it.

He withdrew it from the quartet and substituted a movement easier to get along with, but published the fugue by itself. It was debuted by the Schuppanzigh Quartet, led by Ignaz Schuppanzigh himself, one of the finest violinists ever. Afterward, Schuppanzigh mentioned to another member of the quartet that he did not have the slightest understanding of the fugue, but didn’t dare question “the Generalissimo.”

It is a double fugue, with four voices developing two subjects simultaneously. Beethoven, like Mozart, Haydn, et al., had a number of Bach’s fugal works to draw from, but painfully few. He studied the fugue primarily from Bach’s Well-Tempered Clavier. It is especially impressive that Beethoven was able to take the next leap from the Baroque, since the best, most thorough treatise on fugal composition, Bach’s “The Art of the Fugue,” was unknown to anyone until Felix Mendelssohn rediscovered it in 1829.

If you ever take a class in music appreciation or music history, you will study or at least learn an overview of the fugue, its history, its most famous composers, and at least an elementary comprehension of how one is written, and every single music book on the subject will use Bach’s “little” fugue in g minor. It is so nicknamed because he wrote a fugue about twice as long, BWV 542, also in g minor, which is equally legendary. The little fugue is, and likely will ever remain, the most concise, technically and musically expert fugue of human history. This does not deem it necessarily Bach’s best, which would be an impossible decision. But all fugal composition after Bach refers, whether deliberately or not, to the techniques that culminated in him, and this fugue is the most clear-cut, straightforward example of them.

Pink Floyd Pig Disappears During Concert, Safely Returned.

Starting off the list rather light, this concert was surely messed up (at least for one man); during Coachella 2008, Roger Waters of Pink Floyd unveiled his floating, politically-charged, Obama-endorsing pig during a rendition of the Floyd song “Pigs,” from the anti-greed album Animals. Soon thereafter, the pig floated away into the night with waters telling the crowd “that’s my pig.” It obviously meant a lot to Waters as the owners of two driveways on which the pig found its way and ultimately landed were offered a $10,000 reward. The irony of the matter is, who else could afford to offer such a large sum of money but someone directly benefited by a capitalist society? To be fair, it is a pretty sweet-looking pig.

Kings of Leon Cancel Show Due to Inclement Bird Droppings.

On July 23rd at the Verizon Ampitheater in St. Louis Missouri, The Kings of Leon had to cancel their show due to an intolerable torrential downpour – not of rain – of bird poop. And try as they did to trudge on, bassist Jared Followill threw in the towel after he claims some droppings found their way into his mouth. He said, “I was hit by pigeons on each of the first three songs. We had 20 songs on the set list. By the end of the show, I would have been covered from head to toe.” While concert-goers were reimbursed, it seems this kind of unforeseeable circumstance was rather unprecedented. How many pigeons could there possible have been? Followill said, “The last thing I was going to do was look up … but if that was only a couple, we must have caught them right after a big Thanksgiving dinner.”

Big Valley Jamboree Stage Collapses.

August 2009 during a Canadian country music festival called Big Valley Jamboree, a gush of wind blew down the main stage, like the Big Bad Wolf were merely blowing down a house of sticks. The result, one death by a falling speaker and upwards of 60 injuries. Also, a handful of lawsuits against contractors who failed to ensure a proper level of safety. What’s most surprising is how few people were actually killed, given how dramatic and terrifying the whole scene was, at least according to the video footage. But you’ll also notice how fast concert-goers fled at the first signs of collapse, only to fall back in to assist any possible victims.

Hell’s Angels Do Security Detail for Rolling Stones, Goes Awry for Some Reason.

The date is December 6th, 1968. The place, Altamont Speedway Free Festival, which along with the Stones, featured some Woodstock notables. The show, less than about peace and free love, turned nasty however in the middle of the Stones’ performance of “Under My Thumb.” Hired as a form of rudimentary security and paid with $500 worth of beer, the Hells Angels got into a scuffle with one individual who attempted to rush the stage. The Angels saw to it, through the use of violence, that he didn’t get very far, and when he – while high on meth at the time – went to pull out a revolver, they stabbed and stomped him to death. Other incidental deaths and property damage took place, but nothing was quite as gruesome as this scene. Meanwhile on stage, the Stones finished up their set as if nothing had happened. The Grateful Dead however, scheduled to perform right after them, decided to pull out. (It seems they weren’t so interested in becoming grateful.)

“Dimebag” Darryl Murdered Onstage by Deranged Concert-Goer.

“Dimebag” Darryl Abbott, co-founding guitarist of the recently split up heavy metal band Pantera, was performing with his new band Damageplan on December 8, 2004 in Columbus, Ohio. While doing so, a member of the audience leapt onstage, gun in hand and shot Abbott three times in the head, the third immediately fatal. This individual, who from written accounts appeared to believe from their lyrics that the members of Pantera could read his mind and were laughing at him, continued firing, killing three more people (including the band’s head of security who had leapt upon him) and wounding seven more, as he had brought an ample supply of ammunition for the occasion. Ultimately, he was subdued by way of a shotgun blast to the face after cops rushed in.

Korn Concert Attendee Beaten Brain-Dead.

On the Atlanta, Georgia date of Korn’s 2006 Family Values Tour (irony), a man asked some excessively drunk moshers to be careful around his pregnant girlfriend (as a well as a mentally-impaired child who was with them), only to be slammed headfirst onto concrete and left unconscious and bloody. While declared dead (being effectively brain-dead and on life support to preserve organs for donation), police launched a full-on homicide investigation as they deemed the incident a proper murder.

Death, Destruction, and Sexual Assault at Woodstock ’99.

The return of Woodstock led countless baby boomers to believe their day had come once more; flashbacks deep in their spinal chords to the days of peace, love, and understanding …and being trampled to death? Out was the love-promoting sounds of Jefferson Airplane and the Mamas and the Papas, in was the fear and hatred of Nine Inch Nails, Limp Bizkit, Korn, and Bush. Especially during Limp Bizkit’s set, utter and primal chaos ensued; during the song “Break Stuff,” people did just that, and it was reported that a bodysurfing woman had been gang raped. Aside from myriad counts of sexual assault, rapists running free, bonfires and unrestrained carnage and humans being trampled to death ensued, as if the stage for the apocalypse had a distinct grunge and nu-metal tinge.

Pearl Jam Concert-Goers Crushed to Death.

June 30th, 2000, Roskilde rock and dance festival in Denark. Several fans slipped on the muddy earth only to be steamrolled by an overzealous mob. About 8 or 9 died, while 26 more where injured by the human avalanche. Upon hearing of this, Pearl Jam stopped their set abruptly and the Cure, scheduled to follow, canceled as well.

Who Fans Crushed, Unable to See Show.

In December of 1979, the Who played the Riverfront Coliseum in Cincinnati, Ohio to fans who were way to eager to get in the door. While general admission seating was on a first come, first serve basis, several fans rushed the doors (which were closed to prevent concert stowaways) as they mistook a soundcheck for the beginning of the show. As layers of humans compressed before the hermetically-sealed entrances, so did the lungs of those who were trampled beneath the impending wall-ward stampede. Eleven fans were literally dying to see the showing (many others injured).

Great White Pyrotechnics Misfire, Fans Suffer.

Just a few days ago (May 18th), Great White released an album called Elation, which goes to show that the band can still find pleasure in the face of great tragedy. Great White are an prototypical eighties trash rock band, with the hair and stage theatrics to match. Unfortunately on one night back in 2003, their insistence upon flashy visuals ended in panic and horror at Station nightclub. A fire was caused by some unruly – not to mention indoor – pyrotechnics which ignited the highly flammable sound insulation which enveloped the place. With blocked exits, thick smoke, and a veritable hellfire, 100 people died, while 230 more were injured. In spite of one of Great White’s comeback venues becoming a literal deathtrap, the band presses on, releasing albums and touring as if it never happened. They still, as it turns out, have a capacity for elation, some might drown to self-loathing guilt and alcohol. Well, they might still do the latter, as that goes with the territory: rock and roll! (That is, after you “stop” and “drop” first.)

Possibly Rachmaninoff’s most famous piece, along with his Prelude in C# minor (which he actually got tired of performing in public). Rachmaninoff is one of the few classical composers in history who was a genuine triple threat: world-class composer, performer, and conductor. Thus, when it came to composing for his own instrument, he didn’t pull any punches. He knew what a classically-trained pianist should be able to do, and with gigantic hands that could stretch a 13th on the keyboard (the average man’s hand can barely manage a 10th), he incorporated a lot of equally gigantic chords in his music. This concerto begins with a driving, very atmospheric, almost dirge-like melody. As is typical of his works, the last movement winds up with a pulse-pounding moment of elation.

These 10-fingered chords are one of the primary calling cards of his music, one of the reasons you can recognize his music after only a few measures. His 2nd concerto was his first outstanding work in a long time, after a series of mediocre efforts, and this mediocrity was driving him to depression because he knew he was much better than the critics would have him believe. They lambasted his 1st concerto. His 1st symphony was notably derided by Cesar Cui, of the Russian “Big Five,” who claimed it could only be enjoyed by terrible musicians who died and went to Hell where they would have to listen to it forever.

Rachmaninoff was sensitive to criticism, and such comments, echoed by Leo Tolstoy (who also considered Beethoven horrible), coupled with the sudden suicide of Rachmaninoff’s mentor and friend, Tchaikovsky, drove him into 3 years of clinical depression and writer’s block. He finally overcame it with the help of Nicolai Dahl, who hypnotized him and repeated over and over, “You are a great composer. You will compose great music.”

It is not a bit of a cheat to include this one, since although Bach wrote it for the harpsichord (because the piano had only recently been invented and was not yet a very good instrument), it is today played at least as frequently on piano. That is one of the most amazing aspects of Bach’s music, and a brilliancy no other composer can claim: his music can be played just as effectively on any instrument combination; no musicality is lost; his is, thus, the purest music anyone has ever written, and if the percussive quality of the piano were not taken into account, this one would top the list.

Bach originally scored it for solo violin, and later re-scored it for keyboard. As is typical of his music, it is extremely complex, with polyphonic harmony of the highest order, and severe technical demands, which Bach could dash off with polished artistry. It also deserves a spot on the list because it is the first truly solo concerto, at least in the spirit of the soloist being able to show off.

This one has the distinction of being first played by Franz Liszt himself. Not in public, but when Grieg brought it to him for his approval. Liszt and he met in 1870 in Rome, and Liszt asked him to play it, but Grieg said that he had not yet practiced it, so Liszt sightread the entire thing, even playing the orchestral parts.

Liszt immediately complimented him highly, especially for the g-sharp in the final scale run at the end of the 1st movement. It is one of the most popular concerti today, being fairly easy to perform compared to the others on this list, and in the relative minor of C Major. This key enables the music to make excellent use of the lowest note on the piano. The 2nd movement is one of the most beautiful ever written, and a piece of which Grieg was particularly proud. He intended it to remind the listener of a verdant waterfall.

Even today, there are quite a few critics and musicologists, as well as performers, who consider this Beethoven’s finest concerto. This lister is not so convinced, but what Beethoven does brilliantly in this one is pristine balance of melody, development, technique, musicality, and balance between soloist and orchestra.

Beethoven is known for short motif-like themes, which he could develop into the highest form of music better than just about anyone. He made much out of little. But now and then, as with his his “Ode to Joy,” he could dream up a melody just as lyrical as those of Mozart. The same is true of this concerto, and yet proper development of such lyrical melodies is extremely difficult for composers to muster, as the history of music bears out. Mozart was of the opinion that if you can compose a good melody, the hard part is over. Whenever excellent melody and excellent development meet, it’s a masterpiece, and that is precisely why this concerto is one.

The most notable moment in it is in the cadenza at the end of the 2nd movement. Beethoven wrote this one himself, but left the cadenza of the 1st movement to be improvised by the performer. He marked the 2nd movement’s cadenza “una corda.” On today’s pianos, we call this the soft pedal, which shifts the hammers from all three strings of each note to just one of each. But in Beethoven’s day, this pedal actually shifted the hammers to one or two of each note’s three strings, at the composer’s discretion, and he indicated the cadenza to make full use of this ability, “due e poi the corde (two and then three strings)” during the opening trill, and “due poi una corda (two then one string)” during the end. Today, it can only be done on a period piano of Beethoven’s time.

Today, this may possibly be the most famous concerto on this list, ever since Liberace practically used it as his theme song for years, even playing the opening overture on giant piano keys around the side of his swimming pool. Tchaikovsky could play the piano, but was not well-practiced enough to perform this piece. For a supreme composer, this is no crutch. Like all the greats, Tchaikovsky wrote at a writing desk, not seated at a piano.

This concerto was very daring for its day, especially since Tchaikovsky dedicated it to his friend and magnificent piano legend Nikolai Rubinstein, the brother of an even greater pianist, Anton. Nikolai was an absolute master of Mozart’s piano music, and his playing style could not have been more perfectly suited to such cheerful, technically refined works. Anton was the one who broke strings when he practiced.

This concerto would have been perfect, therefore, for Anton to premiere, but Tchaikovsky was closer to Nikolai and Nikolai almost always premiered his new works. Unfortunately, when he read the score, he threw it down in disgust and proceeded to criticize Tchaikovsky harshly for what he termed “a concerto against the piano.” It was far too bombastic for his taste. Tchaikovsky was, of course, offended by this, but years later Nikolai approached him and asked for forgiveness, explaining that it had taken him that long to warm up to it. After that, he performed it all the time.

It has the single most famous passage of octaves in the piano repertoire, in the 1st movement. It takes a true musician to play them correctly but not to show off by rushing through them. There is a second octave passage in the 3rd movement. The most famous part of the entire piece, though, is the opening, an ecstatic revelry of ultra-romantic music from one of the most romantic of the Romantic era. And this overture doesn’t even have the 1st melody in it. It leads to the 1st melody. The 1st movement also ends extravagantly with one of the very few instances of a 1-4-1 cadence, when 1 chords (tonic) and 5 chords (dominant) are almost all you ever hear at the end of a piece of music. The 4 chord is called the subdominant.

In terms of musicality, this one would rank second on this list behind #9, but we are equally examining all aspects of the piano concerto, and in terms of pianistic power, this concerto is quite a sweetheart. Mozart is not known for bombastic music, though he certainly wrote some. The phrase often thrown around (if you’ll forgive the God reference) is, “Bach gave us God’s Word. Mozart gave us God’s laughter. Beethoven gave us God’s fire.”

This concerto is typical of that carefree, happy quality for which Mozart is legendary. Nevertheless, the technicality and musicality of this one require a pianist with a finished technique, especially in presto legato fingering. The 2nd movement is used to great effect in the film “Elvira Madigan,” and now the concerto is sometimes nicknamed that. Beethoven, Haydn, and Hummel were in attendance for one or more of Mozart’s own performances of this piece, and all agreed that his technique, especially in the right hand, was faultless, with the running passages in the 3rd movement as unbroken as a river.

By far the most technically difficult concerto ever written for any instrument, requiring extreme pianistic power. Vladimir Horowitz, one of its finest recorded performers, called it “elephantine.” Just as in his 2nd Concerto, the music in this one reflects his hands, with many of the chords great big and fat.

His original cadenza for the 1st movement is filled with these massive chords and the pianist must bang the piano to death to deliver it with the proper leonine character. One of the best recordings of it is that of Lazar Berman, who did not shy away from its demands. The 1st movement builds to multiple climaxes, then dies away quietly to a lush, windy 2nd movement. Then, per his reputation, Rachmaninoff revs it up for a storming finish at the of the 3rd movement.

One of the most finely polished of this list’s entries, and the quintessential work of the Romantic piano concerto repertoire. The entire work is based on a 4-note theme. It descends in minor as the main theme of the 1st movement. In the 2nd, it ascends in major. Schumann further varies it in the third. It is, thus, something of a cyclic work, intending to explore fully all the possibilities of a melody. The most monumental cyclic work ever composed is the Art of the Fugue, by Bach, who heavily influenced Schumann.

His wife, Clara, the greatest female pianist in history, premiered this one on 1 January 1846. Grieg may have been influenced directly by it in composing his own piece, #8. Both are in the same opening key, and both begin with an orchestral chord, followed by the descending soloist. This one ranks at #3 because of its pure Romantic character, the archetype of all the 1800s, and extreme musical complexity. Combine the two and you require, as Artur Rubinstein once said, “No one younger than 40,” if you want it played effectively.

Unfortunately, Brahms himself was never recorded playing this one, but his mighty performances always brought the house down. He was short, but he was brawny and could easily impart his ample body weight into the strong passages. This concerto is today considered possibly as difficult as Rachmaninoff’s 3rd, not because of technique so much as because a diminutive pianist is at a severe disadvantage in overcoming the full orchestra.

It’s a thunderous piece all the way, in 4 movements, not 3. The 1st movement has a passage in it that sounds a lot like the Battle Hymn of the Republic, which is a total coincidence, and then it ends with a double trill flourish, in which the pianist adds another finger, then another, louder and louder as the orchestra swells, and the piano must be heard over it the whole time.

There are two stories of how it got its nickname, “Emperor.” One is that during its Vienna premiere, a French army officer remarked in the audience, “C’est l’empereur de concerti!” or “This is the emperor of concerti!” The other story, and likely the correct one, is that Beethoven’s London publicist, Johann Cramer, gave it the name.

It was premiered first on 28 November 1811 at the Gewandhaus in Leipzig with Friedrich Schneider at the keyboard. By this point, Beethoven was too deaf to perform it himself, but he certainly wanted to. He tended to play too fast from excitement. A few months later, 12-year-old Carl Czerny, pupil of Beethoven and later teacher of Franz Liszt, premiered it in Vienna. Czerny is reported to have played magnificently, and this is supported by the fact that Beethoven would not have allowed him to butcher it.

To play such a supremely difficult work of art at 12 years old is, today, almost unheard of. This was one of the first concerti, along with Beethoven’s 4th, to break with the Classical tradition of a long orchestral introduction preceding the soloist. Instead, it begins with the orchestra declaring the key and the piano fearlessly joining in with cadenza scale runs and trills.

The 3rd movement is, of course, just as fantastic as the 1st, but the 2nd is one of the most beautiful, poetic pieces of music ever written, unadulterated romance, the piano and orchestra as lovers, and by far the finest slow movement of all concerti. Rudolf Serkin has, under Leonard Bernstein’s conducting, a claim to the finest recording of it.

As a lover of contemporary and modern classical music I felt it only fitting that I add to Flamehorse’s list of concerti by including a piano concerto by my favorite composer, Alfred Schnittke. Schnittke composed in a very eclectic manner – using quotes from other great composers from the past but always adding his own flair. This concerto demonstrates that the art of concerto composing is far from dead. It is an incredibly moving and emotional piece of music. If you like this you will love everything by Schnittke. I definitely recommend you listen to more of his music.

Samples: Daydream in Blue by I-Monster

Lupe Fiasco’s third single off of his first album, Daydreamin’ was not a huge Billboard success, but did go on to win a Grammy. The chorus is taken directly from I-Monster’s Daydream in Blue, and comparing the two feels like listening to the same song. It’s no mystery why this sample led to the song’s success; the melody is extremely catchy, and will easily get stuck in your head. Jill Scott’s vocals on the track are equally beautiful and passionate. Interestingly enough, Daydream in Blue itself samples Daydream by the group Wallace Collection almost as heavily.

Samples: “Fast Cup Stacking, Oh My God!” from Youtube

Call him Dubstep or otherwise, it’s obvious at this point that Skrillex’s popularity goes beyond whatever genre you place him in. This sample is unique in that it’s the only one on this list that came from something other than older music. Instead, this sample is from a popular YouTube clip. While the sampling isn’t extensive throughout the song, it does come at what any Dubstep fan will tell you is the most important part of the track: the drop. And if anyone knows how to drop the bass, it’s Skrillex. The shrieking vocal sample is followed by an over the top heaviness. It would be hard to suspect a YouTube clip could have the same intensity as Skrillex’s ridiculous synths and baselines, but this sample delivers.

Samples: Jack and Diane by John Mellencamp

Anyone who has heard the original Mellencamp tune will know it immediately when listening to Jessica Simpson’s reuse. The extremely catchy mixture of the simple riff and the hand claps during the bridge can get stuck in your head for days, which of course makes it a perfect sample for a dance pop single. While Jack and Diane made it to number 1 on the U.S. charts, Simpson’s rework topped out at number 21. Mellencamp has stated that originally, the claps were only recorded to help keep tempo and weren’t meant to be included in the final song, but he realized the song didn’t work without them. Jessica and her producers would probably agree.

Samples: Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger by Daft Punk – Cola Bottle Baby by Edwin Birdsong

Many fans of Daft Punk were upset to hear one of Daft Punk’s most famous tracks, Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger used as the hook on Kanye West’s single Stronger. This is pretty ironic considering how heavily Daft Punk themselves sampled Cola Bottle Baby for their track. In fact, Daft Punk is known for their heavy use of samples, sometimes to the point of simply taking a hook and adding a heavier dance drum beat (such as the direct use of the Release the Beast hook by Breakwater for Robot Rock). Kanye West is equally known in the Hip Hop world for his own use of samples in production, which is why it shouldn’t come as a surprise that he would use a hook as catchy as the one sampled from Daft Punk. This is a case of “Sampleception”: a sample within a sample. While Daft Punk used much of Cola Bottle Baby for their sample, Kanye’s sample is of the lyrical portion of Daft Punk’s track, and doesn’t really include any of Edwin Birdsong’s original sound.

Samples: In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida by Iron Butterfly

Nas’s single Hip Hop is Dead sampled Iron Butterfly’s track heavily, sporting the opening synthesizer riff, the baseline, and the drums. While they’re spruced up a little to get that strong Hip Hop sound, listening to the original song you can practically hear Nas rapping over it. Both songs hit the charts, but topped out at 30 and 41, respectively. While In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida is undoubtedly Iron Butterfly’s most famous song, Nas saw much more success with other tracks. Unlucky for him that his first album, Illmatic, is considered one of the greatest Hip Hop records in history. That’s a hard act to follow, no matter how memorable the sample you use.

Samples: Piano Sonata No. 2 in B-flat Minor, Op. 35 by Frederic Chopin

Deadmau5 has been outspoken in his dislike for DJs that don’t produce original work, and while he certainly produces his own tracks, it doesn’t stop him from sampling now and again. At least he’s keeping it classy, though, reaching all the way back to 1839 to grab a few piano bars from the legendary composer and pianist Frederic Chopin. This sample is fairly minimal, as it is only the opening few strands of music from this amazing Sonata, but it is notable for the incredible popularity of Deadmau5’s track and the unbelievable pianist it is sampled from.

Samples: Under Pressure by Queen and David Bowie

Of course this one made the list. Perhaps best known for Vanilla Ice’s weak defense that he didn’t sample Under Pressure (their track goes dun dun dun du du dun dun; his track goes du du dun du du dun dun), it’s obvious that the same smooth baseline is featured in both songs. While Queen and David Bowie hit number one in the U.K., they topped out at 29 on the U.S. charts. Vanilla Ice, on the other hand, rode that funky bass to number one in both countries. Obviously it takes more than a great baseline to top the charts, and with some…interesting…rhymes and a catchy chorus, Vanilla Ice had a hit.

Samples: You Got What I Need by Freddie Scott

Somewhat of a one-hit wonder, Biz Markie earned huge popularity with the simple and humorous track Just a Friend. A large part of the success of the song has to be credited to the simple piano melody of Freddie Scott’s original tune, along with Biz’s amazingly bad rendition of Scott’s own lyrics in the chorus (with a small twist). Some would say that Biz butchered a classic, while others accept the comedic Hip Hop tale of love as an homage to the lat great Freddie Scott. Whichever point of view you take, Biz’s horribly off-tune chorus will be the life of karaoke bars for years to come.

Samples: Bring It Here by Wild Sugar

The first 10 seconds of the 1981 Wild Sugar track Bring It Here became the basis for one of The Beastie Boys’ best known tracks. If you started both tracks simultaneously, you would have no idea which was which. As a sample, those 10 seconds were perfect: A catchy, repeating groove to rap over as well as a quick hit to switch up the tempo and supply an outro. Wild Sugar never gained too much popularity with Bring it Here, but the sample certainly lives on. While Brass Monkey may not have been as successful as other Beastie tracks on the charts, it had huge radio play and has you whistling the tune in seconds.

Samples: 75, Brazil Street by Nicola Fasano vs. Pat Rich – Street Player by Chicago

Here again, we have a sample within a sample. Given Pitbull’s penchant for sampling latin flavor for his own songs, there’s a good chance he never even knew that Nicola Fasano and Pat Rich had sampled Chicago’s Street Player in the first place. I Know You Want Me samples the up tempo dance beat directly from 75, Brazil Street, but the memorable horn hits are the very first notes played off of the original Chicago track. Pitbull certainly wasted no time capitalizing on Fasano and Rich’s own sampling success, releasing his track less than a year after 75, Brazil Street came out. This trend would continue for Pitbull, with his 2010 track Bon Bon sampling the 2010 track We No Speak Americano by Yolanda Be Cool and DCUP. Even quicker on the draw, his 2011 track Latinos in Paris came right on the heels of Kanye West and Jay-Z’s success with N***az in Paris.

Dame Elisabeth Schwarzkopf was one of the greatest opera singers that lived to recording age. She performed her first opera Orfeo ed Euridice at age 13 in Germany. In an ironic turn of luck, her father was censored by the Nazis, resulting in her inability to study medicine. Her beautifully lyric sound made her ideal for Classical operas, such as Mozart and the operettas of Johann Strauss Jr. and Jacques Offenbach. Her lyricism also made her perfect for the German Lieds. Aside from the regular Schubert, she also shared affinity with the works of Hugo Wolf.

Nicolai Gedda, a Swede, was discovered after his performance of Mussorgsky’s Boris Godunov. After a short period as a moderately successful performer, his shot to fame with the aria “Mes amis, écoutez l’histoire” by Adolphe Adam. This most difficult tenor aria to date reaches an incredible high D, whereas other singers and tenors view the famous top C as the limit of the tenor’s range. Performing a great range of operas, he continues to perform due to his unusually long life. In 2003, he recorded Mozart’s Idomeneo, aged 78.

One of the first African-Americans to be accepted to be a “proper” opera singer, and a little unfortunately still known for her performances in the American opera (debatable) Porgy and Bess. Though the opera seems made for her, the other operas in her repertoire should not be forgotten. Her spin to genre of voice makes her extremely suitable for the rather melodramatic sopranos of Verdi and Puccini. That said, her rendition of Summertime from Porgy and Bess is still a highlight of the entire operatic repertoire.

Fritz Wunderlich probably has the sweetest and most lyric voice in all the tenors. The purity and cleanliness of his voice is instantly recognizable, and made him a superstar early on in his career. His light voice is a stark difference to the German tastes in music then; they preferred heavy Wagnerian voices. However, it allowed him to pursue the Italian operas of Mozart and Verdi. Most of the recordings of him are German translations of the text, due to a common norm of the time to perform in the local language. His work in Lied is perhaps only second to number 1.

Wagner’s operas sought to break away from the Italian/French traditions, and thus sat in a genre of his own. The singers demanded are also of a rather different variety. They are almost all of the dramatic strain in the Fach (voice categories), making them powerful and loud (some called in the Wagnerian Bark). These are qualities not associated with sopranos. Flagstad, however, has a beauty in the roughness of delivery, showing the dramatization of Wagner’s fairytales and yet maintain the dignity and gracefulness of a diva.

The most well-known, Pavarotti has crossed boundaries with his art, becoming a global superstar. His early performance of the aria Pour mon âme, with a breathtaking 9 high Cs gave him the title “King of the High Cs”. His early career included many operas, ranging from the bel canto-styled operas of Donizetti to the modern works of Richard Strauss. The year of 1990, however, would turn out to be one of the highlights of his career. The FIFA World Cup was held in Italy that year, and Pavarotti’s rendition of Nessun Dorma! was chosen to be the theme song of news coverage. It immediately appealed to thousands of non-music listeners, allowing that aria to become part of popular culture.

Responsible for bringing Pavarotti to fame, Sutherland is probably one of the most important sopranos of our times. Her early fame and popularity was due to her gifted high notes, reaching wonderfully soaring notes with ease. Whilst most coloraturas are merely bright and loud, Sutherland was able, when the drama required it, to insert some lyricism into the coloratura arias. A slight complaint some had with her was her unclear words, heeding which she studied the languages of Italian and German to better her pronunciation. She regularly added a wide range of operas into her repertoire, most successfully the bel canto operas. Without doubt, she deserved the nickname “La Stupenda.”

Performing more roles than any other tenor (136 as of July 2011), Domingo has taken a role of a Godfather for modern tenors. His decision to sing the title role of Verdi’s Otello drew much criticism from his management, who were inclined to believe Domingo’s voice was not suitable for the highly powerful and dramatic Othello. Nevertheless, the performance turned out to be legendary and the short opening speech Esultate! has become one of the greatest highlights of his career. Domingo’s versatile voice suits him to many roles, ranging from Wagnerian roles in Die Walküre to Verdi’s Rigoletto, to the operettas of Lehár and even Mahler’s song-cycles.

Her voice has a coarseness and impurity which most would not think to be desirable. However, her rough voice has a magical quality that causes so many generations of listeners to fall in love with it. Her vocal timbre can be described, in its barest, as grainy and strained. Perhaps it is this ‘imperfection’ that imbued a kind of soul into her singing, a uniqueness that no other can remake. Callas mainly focused on the bel canto operas. However, she is also extremely at home with the standard Italian repertoire, contributing much to the pantheon of opera recordings in the early days of commercial classical CDs. Whilst in her time she was embroiled in many scandals, she is remembered today for her wonderful voice. She is rightfully “La Divina.”

A note should be made here that this is my personal favorite singer, and that many others would naturally put him in the top 1. Fischer-Dieskau’s appeal stems from his intricate interpretations of all the roles and pieces he sings. This is especially true in his recordings of Lied, where he is unsurpassed (Look for Der Erlkönig on Youtube, there has not been a singer able to eclipse his performance). He seems to prefer lighter roles, such as in Lieds, Mozartian operas or Masses and other sacred pieces. However, his voice is capable of the heaviness demanded of most operatic baritones, as seen by his performances as Wolfram in Tannhaüser and Scarpia in Tosca. Boasting a huge repertoire, he sings music from Bach in the 1800s to works of his contemporaries. Whilst he is usually associated with Lied, his operatic œuvre is nonetheless impressive.

This is a song uniting despair and hope. Tupac goes to a great length to pay homage to all his friends doing time or killed. He overtly makes it sentimental, pouring out all his emotions in the track. As the song’s title suggests, Pac suggests that it is the best for everybody to move on but not forget the past, as some of the memories you form are indelible. Perhaps, this is the best example of Pac’s realism; living through his own struggles, even immersing himself and identifying with the struggles of others; but quietly moving on at the same time, expecting better days to follow. This is only one of the very few of his hit songs in which he sings the chorus; which isn’t normally an attribute of Pac’s songs.

For his last album before his death, Pac had changed his stage name to Makaveli, and hence Makaveli raps this song. The album though released posthumously, was finished before Pac’s demise and it features this gem. The song is distinguished for its straightforward intro and outro. The intro blurts out what every critic judging a rap song had always wanted to say. You wonder how Makaveli will combat the overly simplified allegations, and so he starts talking about what he explains best, hardship. And even within that realm of poverty and crime, he raps about his success and the general California rap scene, mentioning some other cliques. The outro contains a playful slant at Dr. Dre, claiming that this song is “California Love” part 2 without his services. (Not his exact words, listen to the track to find out). And I tend to agree, this was a better and more hardcore song than the more famous “California Love”; just the way Pac liked it.

Tupac was a social activist, no doubt, but a true Pac aficionado would never dream of leaving this song out. The matter of fact is, Tupac could be mean if he wanted to, and though the escalation of feud with fellow rapper Biggie was unnecessary, even mislead, you cannot withhold credit from the man who created what many rap critics consider the best diss track ever. (A slant track) The chorus is extremely catchy, and you also get to hear the remarkable talents of the rap group “Outlawz” a brainchild of Pac’s. Also, be sure to check out the very militant “Letter to the president” to get a sense of what Tupac and Outlawz could do together. Everybody is straight to the point, mercilessly using their words to tear apart Biggie and his east coast clique. If there was ever a pinnacle moment during the rap coastal rivalry, this was it. And from a marketing point of view, Tupac might have had the right idea, using controversy to sustain fame for both sides, elevating the commercial potential of the rap game. But this was no act, Pac was dead serious.

“Brenda’s got a Baby” reflects a strong cornerstone of Tupac’s rapping theme, i.e., social injustice. It is a wonderful piece because of its specificity. While the best of rappers, Tupac included, usually don’t stick to a story in their verses, incorporating many themes at once, “Brenda’s got a baby” is different. It solely sticks to the 12 year old Brenda and her struggle with pregnancy, violence, misjudged love and finally prostitution. Tupac is very unselfish in highlighting Brenda’s woes only, not mentioning himself once in the song. The song’s structure is atypical, with one big verse from Pac stacked between the intro and outro. There is no defined chorus.

This is lovely piece on camaraderie by Tupac. He is reminiscent about his life, describing a whole series of activities he used to do with his friends, mentioning a friend who had converted to Islam and turned his life around, leaving the drug game forever. The chorus implies that Pac might be holding a grudge, but the truth is that there is no hint of such feelings throughout the whole song. It was intended to be a melancholic piece, more about missing out on friendship. It’s just Pac intending to state how some childhood friends had now strayed apart, doing their own thing, managing their own individual lives. It is definitely a very soothing track, the chorus and verses combined providing a very calming effect.

Tupac might have done more than any other music artist to raise awareness on the plight of women in society. With songs like “Brenda’s got a Baby”, and “Dear Mama” which was an ode to his mother, Pac had a knack for creating hits with social awareness songs; very hard to imagine these days as the majority of hits are dance anthems. While I’m no fan of reiterating themes, “Keep ya head up” has to be included for its sheer popularity amongst fans despite propounding the same message in “Brenda’s got a Baby”, just in a wider context. While the underlying message of the lyrics is for men to respect women more, and women staying robust amidst all the unfairness; the inspiration the song provides it uniquely unisex. Both male and female Pac fans rejoice the added motivation it gives to face and deal with all obstacles.

This song is great because it is a fine blend of the good and bad in Pac’s life and thoughts. While a majority of his songs are contemplative and lean more towards the darker things in life, Pac really lavishes it out in this piece enjoying himself, while reminding us that with the fame comes problems. A great part of the song is sexual in nature, Pac obviously reaping the benefits of easy philandering which comes with being a major hip hop superstar. And yet because of his unique recitation styled prose, not enunciating all the syllables, zipping through the words while keeping his flow at a medium pace; this song like many of his others still has an eerie pious feel to it, as if coming from scripture.

There are some who say Tupac relied heavily on mysticism and poetic abilities for songs, and that his flow wasn’t the coolest. This song begs to differ. 2pac annihilates each of the three verses in a song which basically deals with police brutality. The chorus is kept very simple, and yet is melodious. The verses are more upbeat than usual, and Pac somehow manages to make it not seem like a sulking case and rather talks about such a grime topic in a lighthearted way, poking fun at the law enforcement’s hypocrisy. He seems to take the upper hand through his verses, mocking the whole penal system, treating it like a cat and mouse game.

“Shed So Many Tears” is Tupac’s most haunting song. He slowly builds on his prophetic doomed end in the three verses, and seems to accept his fate wholeheartedly as if he already has crossed the point of no return. The instrumental of the chorus is made very melodic with a harmonica sample from Stevie Wonder’s “That Girl”, and Pac’s verses tell a tale of grave insecurities but also surprisingly a calming solace which can only come with the true admittance of one’s mistakes, circumstances and ultimately death. The chorus itself is about others, i.e mourning the loss of his close friends, but makes no mistake; the verses are about him. He is very successful in expressing the feeling of too little, too late. But strangely, you also seem to be happy for him, feeling he has suffered enough, such is the suggestive power of this song.

Considered one of the greats, if not the greatest Tupac song. Most of you are familiar with the later version released in 98, which really isn’t a problem as the difference is minimal and can be disregarded altogether. “Changes” deals with societal injustice and poverty. Pac raps about the pent up anger and frustration, and the song also contains a huge element of inexplicable grief with its chorus stating “things will never be the same”. The chorus is soulful, but is kept relatively austere as with most of choruses of Pac’s songs; maybe done intentionally to keep the messages and clean and effective. Most importantly, the song calls for change to come within you much like MJ’s “Man in the mirror”. Pac only blames the system a couple of time, and the rest of his lyrics function as wake up call to get more educated about the important issues and to show more empathy to fellow human beings. A truly touching rap song which sticks to you for a very long time.

Paul Baribeau is placed at the ten position because he is the only contemporary folk musician on this list. His style might be described as folk-punk or anti-folk. If you know him, it is likely because of his friendship with the more popular Kimya Dawson. Aside from his relative obscurity, I think Paul belongs on this list because of the passion, pain, and sincerity that come through in his bare performances.

Above is a video of Paul, Paul’s beard, and Paul performing one of his fan favorite songs.

I’m still trying to get my hands on more of Patrick Sky’s music. Ironically, I found the easiest album of his to acquire was also his most controversial – Songs that Made America Famous. Patrick Sky was a contemporary of Bob Dylan in the Greenwich Village folk scene. He played with some other, better known musicians (including number 3 on this list). He became disillusioned with the music business and his politics became radical which led him to record the controversial and satirical 1973 album named above. Just take a look at some of the song titles off the album: “Vatican Caskets,” “Child Molestation Blues,” and “Our Baby Die.” He also, of course, had some great, non-controversial songs.

Above is one of the first Patrick Sky songs I heard. He is performing it on a short-lived television show called Pete Seeger’s Rainbow Quest.

Sandy Denny was an English folk musician who, aside from a solo career, sang for the bands Fairport Convention, The Strawbs, and Fotheringay. She was also the only guest vocalist to appear on a Led Zeppelin studio album when she sang a duet with Robert Plant on the song “The Battle for Evermore.” Her best known song is perhaps “Who Knows Where the Time Goes?” which has been covered by Judy Collins, Nina Simone, and Cat Power.

Denny had many substance abuse issues. She apparently drank and took cocaine while pregnant. A friend claimed that the child was premature and that Denny would crash her car and leave the baby in the pub and “all sorts of stuff.” She died at the age of 31 only a month after having suffered a fall down a staircase which resulted in her hitting her head against concrete.

During her lifetime, she only developed a cult-following. Posthumously, however, she has had a growing reputation. She has been called, “the pre-eminent British folk rock singer,” for instance. She might also be noted for having had a romantic involvement with the musician listed at number one on this list, whose songs she covered.

Peter La Farge was a Native American folk singer from the Greenwich Village scene of the 1960s. He was also son to Pulitzer Prize winning author Oliver La Farge. Peter is perhaps best known for having an association with Bob Dylan and Johnny Cash. La Farge wrote a song, “As Long As the Grass Shall Grow” about the then current violation of a Native American treaty with the building of Kinzua Dam on the land of the Seneca tribe. Dylan wrote the music to this song while La Farge wrote the lyrics. Dylan never recorded the song but he did perform it live at Carnegie Hall in 1962. La Farge recorded the song which was later covered by Johnny Cash on his Native American themed album Bitter Tears: Ballads of the American Indian.

Another one of La Farge’s best known songs is “The Ballad of Ira Hayes.” The song tells the story of the Pima Indian who was one of the five U.S. Marines to raise the American flag on Iwo Jima, but who when returning to the U.S. experienced prejudice and became an alcoholic. This song, too, was covered by Johnny Cash on the Bitter Tears album.

Although these are probably La Farge’s best known songs, he also recorded several songs about love, blues, and cowboys. What stands out to me about La Farge’s music is the way he often talks rather than sings on verses. The guitar also seems to take a backseat to his voice. Above is a video of Johnny Cash performing “As Long As the Grass Shall Grow” on Pete Seeger’s Rainbow Quest.

Linda Perhacs is regarded as a psych-folk singer. She has only ever released one album, Parallelograms. It was first released in 1970 with little commercial success. Discouraged with the lack of sales and poor promotion from her label, Perhacs returned to her job as a dental technician. Over the next 30 years, the album gained a cult following thanks in large part to the internet and young listeners who valued the subtle instrumentation and delicate harmonies.

It took Folk label Wild Places two years to locate Perhacs. Once they did, they used tapes from her personal collection to re-release the album with an improved sound quality and several previously unreleased demos and tracks. Her song “If You Were My Man” was featured in Daft Punk’s film Electroma. She also sang on the song “Freely” by Devendra Banhart.

Vashti Bunyan’s first album, Just Another Diamond Day, was written while traveling the English countryside in a horse drawn carriage with her partner. After the album’s poor sales, Vashti Bunyan abandoned her musical career until a rediscovery in the 2000s. Her resurgence is at least partly due to the interest contemporary musicians have had in her music. Devendra Banhart and Joanna Newsom are two such fans. She has even been featured in Banhart’s song, “Rejoicing in the Hands” as well as a few songs by Animal Collective. After a 35 year absence, her second album Lookaftering was finally released in 2005.

What stands out to me, is her unique and elegant voice and her simplistic lyrics. My favorite song is the rough sounding demo song “Winter is Blue” with its heartbreaking tone and lyrics.

Kath Bloom started to record music in 1976 when she met Loren MazzaCane Conners. Their collaboration and subsequently Kath Bloom’s musical recording ended in 1984 with the small release of their final album, Moonlight. Only 300 copies were pressed. A period of financial hardship followed for Bloom. As a single mother, she focused on raising her children instead of her music although she would sometimes play shows in her hometown of New Haven.

Luckily, like many of the artists on this list, Kath Bloom’s music has experienced a bit of a resurgence or rediscovery. Director Richard Linklater featured Bloom’s song “Come Here” in his film Before Sunrise with Ethan Hawke. As a result, Bloom started writing music again. She recorded her first album in over ten years, Come Here: The Florida Years, in 1999. Since then, a tribute album was released with various artists covering Bloom’s songs, including covers by Devendra Banhart, Mark Kozelek, Bill Callahan, and The Dodos.

Her beautifully sad voice often accompanies simple folk melodies. I love the quivering emotion of her singing in the song “Come Here.” Every time I listen to it, I swear it must be the most beautiful song I’ve ever heard. It is above, featured in a scene from Linklater’s great film Before Sunrise.

Buffy Sainte-Marie has quite the list of accomplishments: recorded songs later covered by Elvis Presley, Neil Diamond, Barbara Streisand, and Donovan, won an Oscar for Best Original Song, and was a cast member on Sesame Street. For those reasons, I assume she is the most well-known artist on this list. Yet whenever I’ve mentioned her to my musically-inclined friends, they have never heard the name before. While the term “obscure” might not apply to her, she is certainly a less-known and under-appreciated musician from the Greenwich Village scene. If you haven’t heard of this great Native American musician until now, you likely know at least one of her songs.

Perhaps you know her famous song “Up Where We Belong” recorded by Joe Cocker for the film An Officer and a Gentleman, for which she won an Oscar. Or her love song “Until It’s Time For You To Go” covered by the likes of Elvis Presley. Or her anti-war song of the 1960s, “Universal Soldier,” made popular by the English folk musician Donovan.

In my opinion, some of her best songs are also the ones least likely to ever broadcast over radio airwaves. These are her songs about Native American issues and concerns. “My Country Tis of Thy People You’re Dying” isn’t a catchy song you’ll ever get stuck in your head, but you just can’t beat the anger and bitterness that comes across in her shaky voice and passionate lyrics.

Above is a video clip of her performing that song on Pete Seeger’s Rainbow Quest. I played the first half of this video during my college presentation.

Although a close friend of Townes Van Zandt, Blaze Foley never got much recognition himself in his lifetime. Some of his songs did become famous, but only when covered by others. Merle Haggard made “If I Could Only Fly” a hit. John Prine covered “Clay Pigeons,” Lyle Lovett covered “Election Day” and Lucinda Williams supposedly wrote her song “Drunken Angel” about him.

Blaze seemed to have everything against him in getting a studio album released. The master tapes of his first album were confiscated by the DEA when the executive producer was caught in a drug bust. Another album disappeared from the station wagon Foley lived in when it was broken into. His third studio album, Wanted More Dead Than Alive, was thought to be lost until after Blaze died and a friend found it while cleaning out his car. He does, thankfully, have a few live albums which still perfectly capture his beautiful, smooth voice and emotional lyrics.

A memoir written by one of Foley’s former lovers titled Living in the Woods in a Tree is a great source for learning more about this artist and his struggle to fulfill his dreams.

Jackson C. Frank belongs at the top of this list because of his tragically short career which seems undeserving given his incredible songwriting talent. Bert Jansch, leading figure of the 1960s’ British folk scene, referred to Jackson as, “an absolute genius.” He even credits Jackson with having a large influence on the music of that period and the songwriting of today. Jackson’s most popular song that no doubt influenced the folk musicians of that time is “Blues Run the Game.”

As a child, the furnace at Jackson’s school exploded killing several of his classmates and injuring him. While in the hospital, he learned to play the guitar. By the time he was sixteen, Jackson was playing covers in the States. But he heard that London was the place to be for folk music so he traveled there, eventually meeting and playing for Paul Simon. Simon offered to produce Jackson’s record, which would become Jackson’s first and only record – a self-titled release in 1965.

Sadly, after this initial release, Jackson struggled with money, writer’s block, and nervousness about performing. Years later, Jackson took off in search of his old friend, Paul Simon, only to end up homeless in New York. He was in and out of mental institutions and on various meds that left him bloated, dazed, and confused while continuing to live on the streets. A fan and friend of a friend named Jim Abbott found Jackson despite his lack of a resemblance to his old album cover. Jim helped Jackson find shelter and medical care. He sorted out a backlog of royalties and got Jackson a guitar so he could write songs again. His nineties career consisted of some home-recordings and open-mic work at coffee shops.

I love Jackson’s downbeat melancholia that feels as though it truly comes from a man who has lived through the emotional pain and defeat he sings about. I highly recommend the two-disc CD anthology Blues Run the Game which includes essentially everything Jackson ever recorded including several songs from the 1990s. His songs have been covered by Simon & Garfunkel, Counting Crows, John Mayer, Laura Marling, and Bert Jansch. They have also been featured in the films Electroma and Brown Bunny.

Above is Jackson’s song “Dialogue” as it appears in Daft Punk’s Electroma.

Akron’s most famous band is undoubtedly the blues rock band The Black Keys, but the city also features a large indie music scene. The largest and most powerful genre in Akron though, is the Garage Rock scene. It has two annual festivals, Akron Summer Music Festival and Lock (which just wrapped up).

Popular Akronite Artists: The Black Keys, James Ingram, Devo, Len Chandler

Cape Town, South Africa’s second most populous city, has a jaw-droppingly huge electronic scene in which almost all electronic sub-genres are represented. You can hear New Age to Dubstep to Trance. The electronic scene flourishes along a traditional African music scene. It features one Jazz Festival held every summer.

Popular Cape Town Artists: Tidal Waves, Kinetic, Rattex, Yunique

Houston has a rap scene unrivaled in the region. Just going to downtown and uptown shows how large the rap scene is by the sheer number of music venues and nightclubs. Houston is isolated from many rap hubs so it has developed a unique, one-of-a-kind style. Many artists have very choppy and repetitive beats and lyrics creating a sound that is rare in rap music. The city also features several music festivals and many non-music festival events feature a concert or two.

Popular Houston Artists: Alicia James, Psyguy, Marx De Lux

In Minneapolis’ music scene nearly all genres are represented. With indie, underground, rap, electronic, and even a unique and thriving spoken word/poetry scene. The city also boasts around ten music festivals of many genres. With the largest being Bella Music Festival, which is primarily a local music festival.

Popular Minneapolis Artists: Soul Asylum, The Replacements, Bob Dylan (once based in Minneapolis)

Omaha has a history of music dating back to the early 1920s. It was one of the driving cities of African American music in the 1920s and 1930s. It was also a driving city of surf rock in the 1960s. Currently though, it has several scenes ranging from metal to hip-hop and several in-between including country, jazz and indie. It also features three annual music festivals.

Popular Omaha Artists: Bright Eyes, The Faint, 311

Iceland’s most famous artist is by far Bjork. Iceland features many other genres of music though, ranging from a very large indie scene to folk to electronica. It even features a SXSW-esque festival in Reykjavik called Iceland Airwaves in which all clubs in Reykjavik are filled with local and international artists. Iceland also has a number of niche music festivals. The most unique of these being Viking-themed, LBGT artists in a Gay pride festival and, a young artists-based festival.

Popular Icelandic Artists: Bjork, Sigur Ros, Mum, Esja

Denver is a very up-and-coming music scene. It includes many genres although metal and punk are the dominant ones. One of the rising genres though is the offspring of the metal scene and the small, yet vibrant jazz and funk scene. It is now one of Denver’s staple genres. Denver also features many music festivals.

Popular Denver Artists: Judy Collins, John Denver, Kyuss, 16 Horsepower

Ireland has a long history of music with its earliest (known) artist living in 920s A.D. The traditional Irish music still is relatively popular today, despite the large amounts of emigration in the area in the 19th and 20th centuries. Traditional Irish music still influences many Irish artists today. Today though it has several thriving genres including: indie, rock, and folk. Ireland also has dozens of music festivals.

Popular Irish Artists: U2, The Cranberries, Enya, Snow Patrol

Vancouver has a large and flourishing indie music scenes that is starting to throw out some big names in indie rock. Vancouver also has a small but very acclaimed hip-hop scene that has had some success. The electronic/industrial scene of Vancouver is not as strong as it used to be, but it is still relevant. Vancouver has a couple of music festivals, most notably the Vancouver International Jazz Festival.

Popular Vancouver Artists: Dan Mangan, The New Pornographers, Hot Hot Heat, Japandroids, Said The Whale

Denton is a Texas town located about 50 miles northwest of Dallas. The University of North Texas has one of the best music colleges in America. Denton has a music scene that is beginning to rival that of Austin’s. Denton has hundreds of artists in which every genre is represented. Its music scene has rapidly developed in the last decade. Indie music is the primary staple of Denton music. Denton also has a a festival that is made to rival SXSW, called 35 Denton. It also features a popular Jazz festival.

Popular Denton artists: Bowling For Soup, Fishboy, Meat Loaf, Neon Indian, The Riverboat Gamblers

Nick Mason is the longest running member of Pink Floyd, from the Barrett era to the times of the dehydrated Floyd (i.e. without Roger Waters). In his time with Pink Floyd he rarely ventured out of his comfort zone of percussive instruments, taking failed violin lessons and providing special effects and sounds. But how did the band acquire him as a drummer? According to Mark Blake, author of “Comfortably Numb: The Inside Story of Pink Floyd,” Nick Mason was looked well upon as a drummer because he could provide the funds and transport to buy instruments and get them to gigs. Despite this oversight by the band, Mason proved to be an effective drummer, and contributed to the composition of such songs as Time, Echoes, and Speak to Me (solely credited to him). His voice is also featured on the track One of These Days.

Associated with two similar quotes, the song Any Colour You Like from Dark Side of the Moon seems to reference Henry Ford’s quote: “You can have it any color you like, as long as it’s black.” While the title’s concept does concern the lack of choice in the modern world, the origin of the title does not come from Henry Ford’s quote, it comes from an observation Roger Waters made while living in Cambridge. As the inspiration for this list this excerpt was and can be found in an essay titled “Which One’s Pink?” by musicologist Phil Rose.

“In Cambridge where I lived, people would come from London in a van – a truck – open the back and stand on the tailboard of the truck, and the truck’s full of stuff that they’re trying to sell. And they have a very quick and slick patter, and they’re selling things like crockery, china, sets of knives and forks. All kinds of different things, and they sell it very cheap with a patter. They tell you what it is, and they say ‘It’s ten plates, lady, and it’s this, that, and the other, and eight cups and saucers, and for the lot I’m asking NOT ten pounds, NOT five pounds, NOT three pounds . . . fifty bob to you!’, and they get rid of this stuff like this. If they had sets of china, and they were all the same color, they would say, ‘You can ‘ave ‘em, ten bob to you, love. Any color you like, they’re all blue.’ And that was just part of that patter. So, metaphorically, ‘Any Colour You Like’ is interesting, in that sense, because it denotes offering a choice where there is none. And it’s also interesting that in the phrase, ‘Any color you like, they’re all blue,’ I don’t know why, but in my mind it’s always ‘they’re all blue,’ which, if you think about it, relates very much to the light and dark, sun and moon, good and evil. You make your choice but it’s always blue.”

In addition to the title of the song, the work in progress had various names, such as Scat or Scat Section, and has also been known as Breathe (2nd Reprise) due to its similar beat and chord sequence.

Staying on the topic of what is considered to be Pink Floyd’s magnum opus, Dark Side of the Moon makes use of voices throughout the album. These voices were generated by questions Roger Waters had written up on cue cards and were subsequently asked to roadies, doormen, members of the band Wings, and anyone available at Abbey Road. The approximately twenty questions ranged from “When was the last time you were violent and were you in the right?” to “What does the phrase ‘The Dark Side of the Moon’ mean to you?” The laughter that can be heard on Speak to Me and Brain Damage is that of Peter Watts, a road manager for Pink Floyd. In addition to the voices, at the end of the album, faint music can be heard, which is presumed to be an instrumental version of Ticket to Ride by the Beatles in the background. It has been proposed that while recording doorman Jerry Driscoll’s response (“there is no dark side of the moon really, as a matter of fact it’s all dark”) that somewhere in Abbey Road, Ticket to Ride was playing and was picked up by the microphones.

Pioneering the Pink Floyd’s sound, Barrett has widely been viewed as a musical genius for his contributions to the 1960s’ underground psychedelic scene. Little seems to focus on the man behind the music aside from his mental meltdown that ultimately led to the band abandoning him while on the way to a gig in 1968. Slowly, he reverted from Syd Barrett to his given name of Roger Barrett as he slipped into ever-increasing obscurity after departing the band. He would continue to release two solo albums with the help of David Gilmour, but eventually succumbed to a private life in Cambridge. Media outlets and fans sought him out in the later years of the Floyd, a concept that Barrett did not understand; he lived firmly in the present and did not take advantage of his past. Becoming more aware of the materialism that surrounded his artistic creations as he tried to live as privately as possible, he began to practice a form of self-destruction on his artwork.

Barrett himself had studied and practiced with paint, ink and pencil while in the band’s oldest incarnations. He would continue this throughout his time with Pink Floyd and after his era as front-man. With a strong disinterest in materialism and utter disbelief behind why people sought him out, he continued painting and creating works of art with a new-found method to deal with the clamor. He took on a ritual of photographing his completed works and then destroying the canvas, sometimes by burning his own work. As the metaphor that it unintentionally is for the development of the band, Barrett has managed to encapsulate the aspect of how he deals with the pressure of attention and demand in the industry (and earlier in time, the presence of drugs) with this damaging and brash act. [Source] http://www.sydbarrett.com/biography.htm

Pink Floyd’s album art is as legendary as the band itself, addressing the themes in their music with visuals as impressive as the content itself. Gerald Scarfe and Storm Thurgeson, two artists often associated with Pink Floyd, are behind much of the 1970s era Floyd artwork. Scarfe drew content for The Wall album and Thurgeson designed the album artwork behind The Dark Side of the Moon and Wish You Were Here. On the DSOTM’s iconic sleeve is a prism that represents the band’s stage lighting, the record’s lyrical themes, and keyboardist Rick Wright’s request for a simple and bold design. Of the seven designs presented to the band, the prism was unanimously chosen. As the band could afford to be pickier however, things became more complicated.

Wish You Were Here’s cover image consists of two businessmen meeting in the street, greeting each other with an empty handshake, one man on fire. The image was inspired by the idea that people tend to conceal their true feelings, for fear of “getting burned.” This was a common phrase in the music industry, used often by artists denied royalty payments. In the image, two stuntmen were used, one dressed in a fire-retardant suit covered by a business suit. His head was protected by a hood, underneath a wig. The photograph was taken at the Warner Bros. studios in Los Angeles. Initially the wind was blowing in the wrong direction, and the flames were forced into the stuntman’s face, burning his mustache. This was easily remedied, however, with the two stuntmen changing positions. The photograph was later reversed.

For the Animals’ cover image, they were careful with how they planned to orchestrate a pig on the wing. After commissioning a German company Ballon Fabrik (who had previously constructed Zeppelin airships) and Australian artist to build a porcine balloon, known as Algie, the balloon was inflated with helium and maneuvered into position with a trained marksman ready to fire if it escaped. Unfortunately, inclement weather delayed work, and the band’s manager neglected to book the marksman for a second day. The balloon, obviously testing Murphy’s law, broke free of its moorings and disappeared from view. It landed in Kent and was recovered by a local farmer, who was furious that it had “scared his cows.” The balloon was recovered and filming continued for a third day, but as the early photographs of the power station were considered better, the image of the pig was later superimposed onto one of those.

This is a short summary of a greater and much more in-depth analysis of the album The Wall and its many moving parts, courtesy of Bret Urick. While the album itself is full of symbolism, literary devices, themes and other items of significance – hammers, bricks, walls, worms – the song Another Brick in the Wall, Part 2 is full of oxymoronic and contradictory statements throughout despite its unifying stance against the way institutions stifle creativity in today’s classrooms. As Waters, Wright, and Gilmour sing a choir of restless schoolchildren to rebel against the harsh and cynical treatment of their teachers, there is a certain antithesis in the air that is apparent in the lyrics.

While fighting for individuality, the lyrics of Another Brick in the Wall, Part 2 ironically are saturated with references to conformity. There is no ‘I’, or singular driven character as with the rest of the album, there is a ‘we.’ This plurality is identity-robbing, as evidenced by the kids’ actions while under the teacher’s rules and while ransacking the school in the film based on the album. The children in the second verse sing lyrics of personal revolution, yet it is accompanied with their symmetrical lockstep rhythm, both musically and physically. Notwithstanding their rebellious tendencies, they have become as comparable as when they were clones of one another. Moreover, one could delve into the effects of mass psychology and the pressure from amongst peers to contribute to the violence and chaos that is the literal tearing-down-of-the-school-walls. It is a momentary victory for Pink in his struggle against his figurative wall, which explains the expressive guitar solo amidst the rigid disco structure of the song.

Most agree or are of the opinion that Syd Barrett had a breakdown in early 1968 due to the increasing notoriety of the band and his drug use. Rob Chapman, author of “Syd Barrett: A Very Irregular Head,” however, argues that Syd’s madness was a misunderstanding of his artistic intent. He claims the motive behind the other band members abandoning Syd is that when the band was on the verge of becoming financially successful, Barrett wanted to turn to a different form of sonic experimentation. He attributes Barrett’s actions (such as playing one untuned string during a whole performance) as acts of defiance against the band members who disagreed with him.

Chapman takes it even further by analyzing Syd’s Pink Floyd songs and work from his solo years. He reasons that had Syd had a mental breakdown, that his writing would have suffered as much as he had. Like in his years with Pink Floyd, Chapman finds references and quotes spread throughout, from Huff the Talbot and our Cat Tib (Mother Goose rhyme), Thomas Nashe’s Summer’s Last Will and Testament (an Elizabethan masque play), Shakespeare’s King Henry VI Pt. 1, Kenneth Grahame’s The Wind In The Willows, poems from: Anonymous (Mr Nobody), John Clare (Fairy Things), Sir Henry Newbolt (Rilloby-Rill) and William Howitt (The Wind in a Frolic) – all in the song Octopus from the album The Madcap Laughs. How near or how far into this we delve, his music remains influential.

In 1972, Pink Floyd released a live performance album recorded from the amphitheater of Pompeii and a studio in France. While the location of Pompeii’s amphitheater without an audience served as an excellent statement against the live recordings of the time in which bands were shown alongside their adoring fans, it most importantly was symbolic of the history of Pompeii.

The initial idea behind Live at Pompeii wasn’t Pompeii at all, but was, as conceptualized by the director, combining the Floyd’s music with contemporary art. In a meeting with David Gilmour and the band’s manager the band declined this idea, agreeing to talk about it at a later date. Adrien Maben, the director, went on holiday to Italy in early summer 1971. It was in Pompeii that Adrien Maben lost his passport, and retracing his steps, was surprisingly let back into the ancient city. There is no better way to sum up the spirit of the Live At Pompeii recordings than what Maben described seeing in the empty amphitheater:

“I returned alone, retracing my steps along the empty streets of Pompeii, back to the amphitheater of stone walls and seats.

“It was strange. A huge deserted amphitheater filled with echoing insect sounds, flying bats and the disappearing light which meant that I could hardly see the opposite side of this huge structure built more than two thousand years ago.

“I knew by instinct that this was the place for the film. It had to be here. It somehow all came together that evening in the ancient city. Film the empty amphitheater, resurrect the spirit of Pompeii with sound and color, imagine that ghosts of the past could somehow return.”

It is a complete myth that Italian authorities would only let Pink Floyd play in Pompeii as long as there wasn’t an audience; the Soprintendenza of Naples (the official board that controls the site of Pompeii) was skeptical of a rock group playing at a site of cultural value, but the idea that there would be no audience was not imposed by the Soprintendenza.

The Publius Enigma is a mystery surrounding the Division Bell album, and is suspected of being both an early example of a viral marketing campaign and a puzzle that was eventually abandoned by its creators. Whether or not the enigma is an officially solvable puzzle still remains unclear but has been confirmed by Mason in his book “Inside Out: A Personal History of Pink Floyd” as being a marketing ploy of EMI and that ‘Publius’ was not a fictitious spokesperson for the band, but rather, an actual person coordinating an orchestration of events geared to stir and stimulate Floyd fans for the Division Bell Tour.

Publius promised an unspecified reward for solving the riddle and further claimed that there was an enigma hidden within the artwork, music and lyrics of the album. Outcries from skeptics soon followed, only to be shushed when Publius affirmed his appearance at a live venue: “Monday, July 18, East Rutherford, New Jersey. Approximately 10:30pm. Flashing white lights. There is an enigma.” Sticking to his promise, the words ENIGMA and PUBLIUS appeared in bold white lights during the song Keep Talking. Further authenticating Publius’s existence during the televised and recorded concert at Earl’s Court, London, the word ENIGMA was projected onto the backdrop during the song Another Brick in the Wall, Part 2. On the P•U•L•S•E DVD of that concert, extra markings were also added with the clue L = mc², only to be quickly overlaid with E = mc².

Adding to the validity and perpetuation of the Publius Enigma are further clues from Pink Floyd paraphernalia: “Publius Enigma” can be heard spoken just before the song One of These Days on the 2003 DVD release of Pink Floyd: Live at Pompeii. Page 13 of the The Division Bell’s CD booklet contains an anagram of the word “enigma,” hidden in the third column from the right of the lyrics to Wearing the Inside Out. The following are wild and often irrational associations to other significant events, but keep in mind this was EMI’s brainchild.

“The page numbers of The Division Bell’s CD booklet are written in various languages and printed on silhouettes of the head statues shown on the cover of the album. Page 11 shows two head silhouettes. Printed on either one is the German word for eleven, ‘elf,’ resulting in ‘elf elf,’ or, ‘eleven eleven.’ The trailer for the 2009 film 11:11 features the song High Hopes. High Hopes is the 11th track on The Division Bell. The release date of David Gilmour’s On An Island, March 6, 2006, is exactly eleven months and eleven years after the U.S. release date of The Division Bell, April 5, 1994.

On June 11, 1994, Publius made his first enigma post to the Pink Floyd newsgroup. Eleven years later, on June 11, 2005, Roger Waters, David Gilmour, Nick Mason, and Richard Wright agreed to reunite as Pink Floyd for Live 8. During the broadcast (and as seen on the Live 8 DVD), the band took the stage just shortly after 11:00 p.m., and by 11:11, Pink Floyd were playing together as a four-man lineup for the first time in twenty four years.”

Dark Side of the Rainbow, or the Dark Side of Oz, is an alleged purposeful synchronization (though sometimes claimed as an unintentional collaboration of creative souls) of the album The Dark Side of the Moon with the film The Wizard of Oz. The rumors surfaced around 1994 that the album was a soundtrack for the movie, with connections being made between actions by the characters and lyrics on the album. For instance, Dorothy balances on a tight-rope fence during the line “balanced on the biggest wave” in the song Breathe and she begins to jog when the words “no one told you when to run” are sung during Time. Tracks also transition when scenes change, and songs such as The Great Gig in the Sky play for the entirety of Dorothy’s house caught in the Kansas twister. The culmination of the lion’s second roar concludes with a heartbeat, a tin man, and the previously mentioned faint music, making for quite a convincing argument for those who are compelled to believe that this is a stroke of Floyd genius. The members of the band deny the claims however and the producers recall no mention of the movie during recording of the album.

Another interesting synchronicity (a phenomenon in which coincidental events “seem related but are not explained by conventional mechanisms of causality,” as explained by Carl Jung) is 2011: a Pink Floyd Odyssey. The final segment, Jupiter and Beyond the Infinite, is of a similar length of Pink Floyd’s song Echoes. Stanley Kubrick originally offered Pink Floyd a part producing the music behind the film, but Waters would decline as he was trying to distance the band from the space-rock genre. The theory from fans is that after seeing Kubrick’s masterpiece, they (or Waters individually) regretted missing out on the offer and set out to create a piece of music that would fit the movie. While there are parallels to Dark Side of the Rainbow, such as scenes changing with the music, it is ultimately a lesser journey in coincidence.

Unlike in my last list, not all of the musicals these scenes are from were successful or memorable, but the scenes themselves are classic, innovative or showcase great talent. I’ve been confident enough to go into far more detail this time around, though I’ve also tried to make certain not to repeat anything that was already visited in the last list. I can assure you that my misguided enthusiasm for musicals is sufficient to fill two lists. Perhaps three. Hmmm.

A perennial classic, Singin’ in the Rain produced a star in 19-year-old Debbie Reynolds, while further cementing the brilliance of Gene Kelly. It also produced his co-star Donald O’ Connor’s most memorable and popular dance sequence, “Make ‘Em Laugh,” where he showcased his strenuous, acrobatic dancing abilities. The scene has been recreated many times since, on shows like Glee (regrettably), and the Oscars.

But the scene that is most famous is undoubtedly the title song, because of the unforgettable image it conveys of Gene Kelly, umbrella in hand, dancing in the rain. It’s hard to pick what will become an instant classic, but since its inception, this scene has been recreated, honored, referenced and spoofed more times than perhaps any other scene in cinema. It was also remixed quite recently in a remarkable Volkswagen advertisement.

One of the most captivating things about this scene is how polished and strictly choreographed it seems, while behind the scenes it was anything but. Many people are aware of the story of Gene Kelly being extremely ill while shooting this scene. Refusing to leave the set until he could run through the scene at least once, the legend is that it was shot in one take, with very limited blocking. The notion of such a classic piece of cinema being created in one cursory take is very romantic and has captured the imaginations of actors and audiences alike since.

The rain itself was made of water and milk in order to make it thicker and more visible on screen. The tapping of Gene’s shoes was also dubbed later, and this was also done to much of Debbie Reynolds’ tapping in the film. Despite these clunky technical details, the viewer would never know what effort had been made to make the scene work. The song, paired with Gene Kelly’s undeniable talent, created a classic scene in cinema, and one of the greatest in dancing history.

While not a particularly great example of either Marilyn Monroe or Jane Russell’s best singing or dancing, this song was the opening scene in Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, the film that launched Marilyn Monroe to stardom. Marilyn had appeared in a few successful movies before this production, such as Monkey Business (1952) and Niagara (1953), but it wasn’t until Gentlemen Prefer Blondes that she garnered widespread attention. At this time, she was still considered a less famous actress than Jane Russell, and her name is therefore billed below Jane’s in the opening credits.

By the time Gentlemen was filmed, she had modeled a persona of smoldering sex appeal, wrapped in an almost naive, wide-eyed innocence. Marilyn was reputedly told during the filming of Gentlemen that she needed to tone down this sexual magnetism, which could sometimes become a little too intense for the sweet, likable (though slightly conniving) role that she was playing (Jane Russell was reputedly told to tone it up). However, she was just beginning to strike a chord with the movie-going public with this calculating sexuality, and it remained a popular aspect of her acting.

In this famous scene we are introduced to Jane Russell and Marilyn Monroe’s characters in dazzling Technicolor. It was only the second time the audience had heard Marilyn sing, (the first was in a 1948 B movie called Ladies of the Chorus) and one of the early glimpses of her with the platinum blonde locks that were to become her signature (before Monkey Business, she’d tried several different shades of blonde; in Don’t Bother To Knock (1952) her hair is more a yellowy, golden shade than the white-blonde we’re familiar with).

It must have been clear to moviegoers, when they saw this blonde bombshell explode onto the stage in her flashy red sequins, that they were watching a true star, a woman of unfathomable beauty, and sadly underrated talent. She easily keeps up with her more experienced co-star, and flaunts the breathy, dreamy singing voice that was to become one of her famous trademarks.

Throughout her quite short career, Marilyn was usually typecast as beautiful but idiotic sexpots. Despite this on-screen persona, she had a deep interest in psychoanalysis, very liberal beliefs (especially about equal rights), and was said by third husband (and writer of the play The Crucible), Arthur Miller, to be a devoted buyer of books. There is a recurring rumor that she had an IQ of over 160, which, if true, would make her much more than averagely intelligent. Certainly much more intelligent than a certain American president she’s rumored to have romanced on the sly. But the ‘IQ rumor’ is just one of many that continued to surface in the years after Marilyn’s death, some more controversial than others. Her often very shrewd remarks suggest that she was far from unintelligent, once quipping: “Speaking of Oscars, I would win overwhelmingly if the Academy gave an Oscar for faking orgasms. I have done some of my best acting convincing my partners I was in the throes of ecstasy.”

However, she could never quite fight the frequent typecasting, though she managed to deviate from her blonde ditz role in a few of her movies, like Niagara, Bus Stop (1956), and The Misfits (1961). Despite her success, Marilyn’s life was also very troubled. Towards the end of her life she was very ill, and suffered two miscarriages. Throughout her life, she suffered from depression and spells of wild self-destruction. She would turn up to filming late, dazed, addled by pills, and sometimes wouldn’t turn up at all. She was widely blasted as being a nightmare to work with, because of her unprofessional behavior and problems with alcohol and drugs.

One of these instants was on the set of The Prince and the Showgirl (1957) where esteemed actor Laurence Olivier frequently attacked Marilyn for her tardiness and for forgetting her lines. Marilyn felt she was made to feel inadequate and undesirable by the English great (though after her death he would express his distaste for how she was ruthlessly exploited by the industry). But she also recounted, more light-heartedly, of how she had appeased him when, one day, he had “given her hell” about “screwing up”: “I soothed him by telling him I thought his Hamlet (1948) was one of the greatest films ever made. You know he won an Oscar for it.”

This scene, from the movie The Band Wagon, is a small slice from the movie’s climax. The movie centers on languishing Hollywood actor Tony Hunter (Fred Astaire), who feels his star is waning and that his fame is drying up. He’s persuaded into starring in a light-hearted musical that his two writer friends have created. They misguidedly employ Jeffrey Cordova (Jack Buchanan), an actor and director with numerous shows running simultaneously on Broadway, to help in the production.

Melodramatic, and slightly pretentious, Cordova immediately turns the quaint musical into a stormy drama, complete with complex mechanical sets that eventually malfunction and ruin the premiere of the show. He also employs the statuesque ballet dancer Gabrielle Gerard (Cyd Charisse) to star beside Tony. The two initially clash, but come together in the end to make the show a success.

After Cordova’s production collapses, Tony convinces him to revert back to his friends’ original songs. These include a montage titled “Girl Hunt,” which is a spoof of crime fiction and the “hardboiled” detectives that often appear in it. In this scene, Fred Astaire’s character plays a gruff detective on the hunt for the tormenters of a delicate blonde, played by Cyd Charisse’s character Gabrielle. Gabrielle also plays a sultry, “dangerous” brunette, who attempts to seduce the detective.

Cyd Charisse and Fred Astaire were both extraordinary dancers, as this scene undoubtedly shows. Cyd Charisse was, literally, bred to be a dancer and held it in esteem over even acting. Her legs were insured for $5 million, and she is one of the few women to have danced with both Fred Astaire and Gene Kelly, others include Rita Hayworth, Debbie Reynolds, and Judy Garland.

Fred Astaire was known for his incredible grace, his perfectionism and lightness of foot. Gene Kelly was often noted for his vigor and strength, while Fred Astaire was more precise, and sometimes considered more coordinated. However, even Cyd Charisse herself stayed very diplomatic on the matter, commenting in her autobiography: “It’s like comparing apples and oranges. They’re both delicious.”

To jump forward some sixteen years, Sweet Charity was not lucky enough to be born in the 1950s, where questionable plots and sweet-to-a-fault heroines were generally forgiven if the musical numbers successfully atoned for it. Sweet Charity starred dancer, singer and actor Shirley MacLaine, who took one of the film’s songs “If My Friends Could See Me Now” as her trademark.

The film also carries another perennial favorite, “Hey, Big Spender.” The film itself follows the misadventures of Charity Hope Valentine (I told you she was sweet), a naive dancer-for-hire, aka prostitute. Despite being constantly taken advantage of in life and falling on hard times, she remains hopeful. Her dreams seem to have come true when she leaves the seedy dance hall she works in, and meets Oscar Lindquist (John McMartin), who seems to be understanding of her ex-profession, though he later struggles with the idea.

Made in the late ’60s, this musical could dare to tackle issues that earlier musicals couldn’t. Prostitution was often hinted at in movies in the ’30s, ’40s and ’50s, as was sexual promiscuity (Bette Davis’s Jezebel (1938), and Joan Crawford’s The Damned Don’t Cry (1950) spring to mind), but the morally dubious women was usually ultimately punished by humiliation or heartbreak, or were killed off (Bette Davis’s 1931 Waterloo Bridge is an example of the latter).

Sometimes sexuality was hinted at wordlessly to avoid the wrath of the censor. Cyd Charisse and Marilyn Monroe were often “victims of the censor,” meaning that they were watched closely to make sure that no inappropriate amounts of skin were shown or that they overstepped the mark when it came to their sex appeal. Cyd Charisse expressed her amusement at this attention, saying: “The censors were always there when I was on the set. When I was held up, in a lift, they were up on ladders to see if I was properly covered.”

However, in Sweet Charity Charity all but states that she sleeps with men for money, but is never shamed, or killed for her actions. How to handle this issue made even the filming of the movie quite contentious. Ross Hunter (producer of the 1967 Thoroughly Modern Millie) was originally set to be producer but dropped out due to disagreements with director Bob Fosse on how to handle the delicate matter of prostitution. Ross Hunter wasn’t known for his liking of gritty realism, so it’s possible that he didn’t wish for Charity’s profession to be mentioned at all.

Storms in teacups aside, “Rich Man’s Frug” is an exceptionally well-choreographed and jaunty scene, in which Charity accompanies a celebrity to an exclusive club, and watches the floorshow. The music number also seems to satirize the nature of celebrity and the well-to-do, creating a scene that is quite bizarre and outlandish, complete with cheetahs in cages and elaborate marble statues. The scene also practically drips with the sixties, remaining very faithful to the style and look of the time, and for that reason alone is very memorable and enjoyable to watch. You almost expect Austin Powers to walk out at any moment.

To jump forward another nine years, Grease again pushed the envelope when it came to taboo subjects. In this film, teenage sex, drinking and smoking feature strongly in the storyline (though the lyricist makes certain to mention that Sandy and Danny are “eighteen,” and therefore at least the age of consent). Rather than shy away from the facts, the musical number “Summer Nights” paints a realistic picture of a high school: the boys are almost all fascinated with sex, the girls can be petty and two-faced. There is an obvious rivalry between Sandy and Rizzo, who doesn’t share the other girls’ interest in Sandy’s summer romance with Danny, while Danny’s friends are more interested in “how far” Danny got with Sandy than anything else.

This well-loved musical was adopted from the stage and altered to fit around the fact that Olivia Newton-John was Australian (perhaps she couldn’t do a convincing American accent?), making Sandy not an all-American girl, but an Australian exchange student. Depending on the production, performances of this musical since have opted to either retain this change or not, (the production in my high school chose to keep Sandy’s Australian heritage, unsurprisingly).

The censors still sunk their teeth into the film’s many sexual references, making certain that some of the more crude references were cut. Perhaps for fear of unnecessarily baiting the censors, the producers decided against casting Harry Reems as Coach Calhoun, due to his overturned conviction for “conspiracy to distribute obscenity across state lines”, and his ties to adult movies. Stockyard Channing, who played the promiscuous Rizzo, claimed in an interview that the hickeys on her neck in one of the scenes were real, and that Jeff Conaway “insisted on applying them himself.” Though personally I think that claim more exemplifies Stockyard’s acidic wit than any unusual acting methods used.

The “Summer Nights” scene occurs early in the movie, and is arguably the best-known and best-loved of all the Grease scenes. “You’re The One That I Love” and “Greased Lightning” are also recurring and lasting favorites, but “Summer Nights” is the only song to appear in an insect repellent commercial so it clearly tops the list. It provided, in one quite brief number, a great insight into the 1950s school atmosphere that the film wanted to create. It introduced and distinguished the characters of shallow Marty, prickly Rizzo and sweet, bubbly Frenchy, and those of Danny’s womanizing “T-Bird” friends.

Olivia Newton-John showcased her strong singing voice, if not strong acting skills, while John Travolta followed up his popular role in Saturday Night Fever (1977) with an equally acclaimed role, and began a very long and successful career in film.

I am one of those soulless people who prefer the terrible 2005 remake of The Producers than the classic, groundbreaking original. I feel unclean for admitting it, but there it is. It’s Nathan Lane, and he’s fabulous, and I’m weak. But, confessions aside, this musical number is perhaps one of the most hilarious, most beautifully satirical numbers ever made. It is dripping with Mel Brooks’ rambunctious wit.

Mel Brooks felt that the best revenge we could take on Adolf Hitler, for inflicting such hatred and misery on the world, was to mock him, mercilessly, and he does. In the 1983 remake of To Be or Not To Be he appears as the fuehrer himself, asking: “What do they want from me!? I’m good-natured! I’m good-hearted! I’m good-looking!” when he discovers what the foreign newspapers are calling him, and goes on to sing that he doesn’t want war, he wants peace! A little piece of every country in Europe.

The Producers was one of his most successful and loved comedies, teaming Gene Wilder with Zero Mostel, and creating one of the funniest, most offensive numbers in musical history. Brooks later adapted the film for the stage, turning it into a musical. Nathan Lane appeared as Max Bialystock in the stage production, earning his second Tony award. His experience on the stage is perhaps why he fared better than Mathew Broderick in the remake, and is so funny as the sleazy Max Bialystock.

The 2005 remake is actually more a faithful remake of the stage musical, than the original movie, which didn’t have any of the musical numbers later written for the stage (“We Can Do It,” “Keep It Gay,” “You Never Say Good Luck On Opening Night,” “Betrayed,” etc), and differing characters to the remake. For example, in the 2005 remake Hitler is depicted as being very effeminate, while in the original he is depicted more as being a drug-addled pothead.

The film and musical both centre on Max Bialystock (incidentally, ‘Bialystock’ is also the Polish town Brooks’ ancestors lived in, and which was devastated by the Nazis during WWII), who teams up with the mousy accountant Leo Bloom to make the greatest flop in history, in the hope that the money they raise for the production will be far more than what is needed. They choose “Springtime For Hitler,” a play certain to offend people everywhere, and employ a kitschy director, the insane, Nazi-sympathizing playwright and inept actors to make sure the musical has the shortest run on Broadway in history.

Turning Nazi Germany into a stage musical is just about the most offensive thing anyone could attempt, but, with its outlandish, over-the-top insanity, “Springtime for Hitler” is nothing but brilliant in its intentional tastelessness. Both the 1968 and 2005 versions of the “Springtime for Hitler” scene strongly encompass Brook’s satirical humor, but the original has the advantage of being, well, the original. And of having Brooks dub one of the dancers’ lines (“Don’t be stupid, be a smarty. Come and join the Nazi Party!”), but in the 2005 version we watch as scantily dressed soldier women take the pins off invisible grenades with their teeth, while a blonde John Barrowman (Torchwood) dons a German uniform. It’s a tough one.

Though not necessarily a particularly memorable movie in itself, RENT did produce one truly excellent scene and that was accompanied by the song “La Vie Boheme.” Based on the stage production of the same name, RENT centers on the lives of impoverished bohemians living in New York. Among them is a filmmaker, a musician, a drug-addicted exotic dancer, a transsexual and a philosophy professor (both of whom have AIDS), and a bisexual performance artist.

It seems like a crowded and slightly bewildering premise for a musical, but RENT is not about light-hearted comedy or romance. It tackles numerous controversial issues, and centers particularly on the AIDS panic of the late 1980s and 1990s. It is also based on the Puccini opera La Boheme, which has a similar story of struggling artists and musicians.

The film is more or less a series of gritty, hard-hitting numbers, concerning numerous issues, like sexuality, and heroin addiction. The stage production fared far better than the film, winning the Tony for Best Musical, while the film suffered from that “staginess” that so often alienates audiences from musicals. Its (sometimes overwhelmingly) grim material is not enough to make up for the fact that there is very little dialogue, and some of the numbers seem awkward and unrealistic off the stage. Some of the scenes of the disheveled bohemians suddenly breaking into song are very clunky.

But, flaws aside, “La Vie Boheme” is one of the lighter, funnier numbers, providing much needed relief from the sober drama. Rather than focusing on the difficulties of the bohemians, “La Vie Boheme” embraces their various differences and takes a strong stand against convention, conservatism and prejudice. The number is jaunty and witty, taking particular aim at the bohemians’ ex-roommate Benny Coffin III (Taye Diggs), who they feel has betrayed and deserted them. Benny takes a more realistic approach to their situation, pointing out that they are starving and living in a dangerous, filthy neighborhood, but seems ruffled by the displays of sexuality and defiance.

The song also references The Wizard of Oz in the line: “Why Dorothy and Toto went over the rainbow to blow off Auntie Em. La Vie Boheme!”

In 2001, after a limited release in the United States, Moulin Rouge embarked on a slow, but sure domination of box offices worldwide. Baz Luhrmann, with his erratic, gaudy trademark, created a film of tremendous power and appeal, and took the notion of “jukebox musicals” to greater extents than any other movie had before. It referenced a huge selection of artists and music, most notably in the song “Elephant Love Melody” where a majority of the song is created out of single lyrics from famous love songs from artists like The Beatles, Whitney Houston, David Bowie, Elton John, and U2.

“El Tango De Roxanne” (based on the song “Roxanne” by The Police) takes place towards the end of the film. Christian and Satine are lovers, but the duke is aggressively pursuing Satine and makes no secret of what will occur if he discovers that Satine is being unfaithful to him. As the number begins, Satine has been coerced into spending the night with the Duke, and Christian is intensely jealous. Sitting in broody silence with the other residents of the Moulin Rouge, he takes out his rage on one of the other prostitutes, prompting her lover, the unconscious Argentinean (Jacek Koman), to retaliate against Christian, accusing him of bringing it on himself for falling in love with a woman who sells herself: “When love is for the highest bidder there can be no trust. Without trust, there is no love.”

The number is almost a throwback to ‘Golden Age’ cinema, in the way that it centers largely on traditional, partnered dancing. This was common in older musicals: “Pick Yourself Up” from Swing Time (1936),”You Were Meant for Me” from Singin’ In the Rain, “Girl Hunt” from The Band Wagon (1953) are examples, among countless others. But it seemed to lose popularity as time wore on, and became increasingly rare, perhaps because it was increasingly difficult to convince the younger, more cynical audiences of a realistic situation when a couple would sporadically burst into dance together. Contrastingly, chaotic, improvised dancing, like that in “La Vie Boheme,” is far easier to integrate.

But in Moulin Rouge, the image of the rows of couples dancing in “El Tango De Roxanne” worked spectacularly, despite the difficult task of sewing this together with the secondary plot of Satine and the Duke. It is an example of flawless musical cinema. There is no seam between the spoken dialogue and the music, it melts together perfectly.

Laced between the tango of the men and women of the Moulin Rouge, we see scenes of the Duke and Satine dining together. The Duke believes that Satine is smitten with him, and is lavishing gifts on her, but his mood soon sours when he realizes that it isn’t him that Satine is in love with.

Incidentally, the principal dancer in this scene (“Roxanne”) is played by Caroline O’ Connor, a celebrated Australian actress, best known for her role as Velma Kelly in the stage production of Chicago.

I read recently that one critic, on reviewing Chicago, had believed that “Cell Block Tango” had played out in the movie much like it had on the stage, and I can tell you that nobody who has seen both the movie and the stage production could make such a claim. The stage production is centered strongly on minimalism, and the acts are staged much like the acts of a vaudeville show, the type of show that Renee Zellweger’s character Roxie Hart desperately wants to star in.

The Ziegfeld Follies are often described as a “higher class” of the vaudeville variety shows that ran from the late 1880s to the 1930s. Vaudeville shows were made up of a wide range of acts, everything from ‘freak shows’ to song and dance. It usually had the archetypal beautiful, costume-clad chorus girls present as well. To keep with this vaudeville flavor, Chicago’s stage production presents both classic dance numbers, like “All That Jazz” and “I Can’t do it Alone,” and other performances, like the “Hungarian Disappearing Act.”

The film also kept the vaudeville flavor of some of the numbers, but was obviously able to create much more intricate, complex scenes that the stage production. Much like “El Tango De Roxanne,” where cutaway scenes of Satine and the Duke are shown, “Cell Block Tango” uses cutaway scenes of Roxy in prison to create two plots, one that is occurring in Roxy’s mind and the second that is the reality. There are other examples of this. Particularly notable is the scene when one of the imprisoned women is hanged. The hanging scene is laced between shots of a “magic act” called the “Famous Hungarian Disappearing Act”. The scene is less effective on stage, because the focus of the audience is split between watching the “disappearing act,” and the actual hanging.

The critic is correct in that, arguably, the movie’s take on the “Cell Block Tango” could have been translated to the stage, as no CGI effects were used in the scene. But it would have to be a production of Phantom of the Opera sized proportions to achieve such a feat.

Despite the added advantages of cutaway scenes (and a huge budget), the film’s take on the “Cell Block Tango” is otherwise quite simple. It is, in essence, an extremely sleek, large-scale vaudeville act. The concept involves each murderess in Cook County Jail recounting the murder she committed, using a red scarf to emulate “where the blood would have been”.

The stage production on which the movie is based is itself actually based on a movie (actually, two movies), which are in turn based on the two very public trials of two murderesses in 1920s Chicago. The story has been taken to the screen twice before, once in a silent 1927 film of the same name, and again in Roxie Hart (1942), in which Ginger Rogers (Fred Astaire’s partner of choice) appears as Roxie.

I decided to add this as a sort of extra, because it does have obvious differences to the other scenes. Most obvious is that it contains no dancing. But an oversight would certainly be made if this classic scene was omitted (yay for agent less sentences). The Wizard of Oz launched a 17 year-old Judy Garland into stardom. Before this film, she had appeared in several small, unremarkable films and it wasn’t until she performed “You Made Me Love You” at the birthday party of Clark Gable that her company MGM seemed to realize her potential.

The Wizard of Oz turned Judy into a household name, and she afterwards appeared in several successful musicals: Meet Me in St. Louis (1944), beside Fred Astaire in Easter Parade (1948), and beside Gene Kelly in The Pirate (1948). At age three, her daughter, Liza Minnelli, also appeared beside her in The Good Old Summertime (1949).

Much like Marilyn, Judy’s life was extremely troubled, and checkered by five marriages, and numerous affairs (some of her alleged lovers included Frank Sinatra, Yul Brynner, and Orson Welles), as well as several attempted suicides. She often accused MGM of making her feel inadequate about her looks and treating her badly. Like many movie figures of her time, she suffered from an alcohol problem, and a prescription drug addiction, and this may have led to her overdose and death in 1969, at age 47.

Judy is still one of the most widely recognized and celebrated actresses of all time. This status is aided by The Wizard of Oz’ enduring popularity, and the song “Over The Rainbow,” which made her a star and brought her contralto singing voice widespread admiration. The song snagged #1 on The American Film Institute’s list of the “Greatest Songs” over the past 100 years. The song’s wistful sadness is strongly associated with Judy and her ultimately tragic life.

Judy was often very open about the troubles in her life, and her words often hinted at deep unhappiness. She was quoted in the biography Judy (1999) as saying: “I wanted to believe and I tried my damnedest to believe in the rainbow that I tried to get over and couldn’t. So what? Lots of people can’t…”

Less a film than a series of individual music acts, Ziegfeld Follies boasts a slew of stars: Fred Astaire, Gene Kelly, Judy Garland, Cyd Charisse, Lucille Ball, Lena Horne, and one of the original Ziegfeld Follies girls, Fanny Brice.

The Ziegfeld Follies were lavish theatrical shows that ran from 1907 to 1937, and mostly showcased women singing, dancing, or just showing off their looks and figures. The Ziegfeld Follies were known for their extravagance. The creator, Florenz Ziegfeld Jr., conceived the idea of taking the popular vaudeville premise of unrelated musical acts and then surrounding them with grand sets and costumes. He also had scenes where beautiful women would simply pose in different ways, and called these “living pictures.”

The history of the Ziegfeld Follies is extremely interesting, and controversial, but far too long to discuss here. It provides, nonetheless, any extremely rich canvas for any film. Unfortunately, Ziegfeld Follies’ premise is fairly weak, and consists of Florenz Ziegfeld sitting in heaven and mentally conjuring up the scenes that follow. Despite this flimsy storyline, “The Babbitt and the Bromide” is truly remarkable. Side by side are two legendary dancers: Fred Astaire and Gene Kelly. It would be the only time the two would dance together in their careers, except for That’s Entertainment Part II (1976), 31 years later.

The act itself consists of a “Babbitt” and a “bromide” meeting on the street and embarking on a pointless and shallow discussion. A “Babbitt” is a, fairly obscure, word for a complacent, narrow-minded middle-class man, and a “bromide” is a word for an unoriginal or insincere figure of speech, suggesting that Fred Astaire’s character is also both of these characteristics (assuming that Astaire’s character was the bromide, I don’t think that was ever addressed). Fred Astaire’s grace and precision, Gene Kelly’s physical strength and remarkable choreography skills make for a classic, unforgettable scene.

It is also memorable because it is seen as the meeting of two geniuses, especially as the two men play themselves and not characters. They tease each other at the beginning of the scene, Gene making a reference to Fred’s frequent dance partner Ginger Rogers, and Fred doing the same to Gene’s dance partner Rita Hayworth in the 1944 movie Cover Girl.