30 Greatest Orchestral Works

American composer Robert Greenberg has produced numerous excellent programs on Western classical music for the Great Courses series. "The 30 Greatest Orchestral Works" is one of them. Using excerpts from each of the works, these informative lectures take us from Vivaldi through the mid-20th century.

Below is Dr. Greenberg's list. I've added links to YouTube videos of the complete works.

Bach: Brandenburg concerto no. 2

Bach: Violin concerto in E major

Mozart: Piano concerto no. 24 in C minor

Mozart: Symphony No. 41 in C major, "Jupiter"

Beethoven: Symphony no. 3

video has a brief informative introduction to "Eroica"; music starts at 06:30 mark

Beethoven: Piano concerto no. 4

Mendelssohn: "Italian" symphony (No. 4 in A Major)

Tchaikovsky: Violin concerto in D Major

Richard Strauss: Thus spoke Zarathustra

Nearly all of the videos in this section ("30 Greatest Orchestral Works") contain live performance videos. Not this one. For Mahler's 5th, I've chosen an uploaded recording conducted by Rudolf Barshai. Barshai is the conductor whose recording was selected as the best of all the recordings of Mahler's 5th in this analysis and survey by Tony Duggan.

Rachmaninoff: Symphony no. 2

Debussy: La mer

Stravinsky: The rite of spring

Ives: Three places in New England

There is an informative Wikipedia entry for "Three Places." It describes how Ives wrote the music to give a feel of being actually at three (actual and specific) locations in New England.