The Canon: 10 Classical Works Every Listener Should Know

Premiered in Prague in 1787, Don Giovanni is the opera that defined the genre for two centuries. Mozart and his librettist Da Ponte turned the Don Juan legend into something philosophically rich — a work that is simultaneously comedy and tragedy, seduction and punishment, pleasure and dread. Its overture alone contains enough drama for a full evening.

Written across two books in 1722 and 1742, Bach's Well-Tempered Clavier is the Old Testament of keyboard music — a complete survey of all twenty-four major and minor keys, each explored in a prelude and fugue. It is simultaneously a teaching tool and a monument of musical thought, and every pianist's relationship with Bach begins here.

Composed around 1720, Vivaldi's four violin concertos are perhaps the first example of programme music — instrumental pieces that explicitly depict a subject, in this case the seasons of the year. The birdsong of Spring, the thunderstorm of Summer, the drunken peasants of Autumn, the frozen landscape of Winter: three centuries later, they still sound like exactly what they are.

Schubert's 1827 song cycle for baritone and piano is among the most profound explorations of grief ever composed. The twenty-four songs trace a solitary winter journey — ostensibly a lover's heartbreak, but the emotional landscape is bleaker and more universal than that. Schubert wrote it the year before his death at thirty-one, and the foreknowledge haunts every bar.

Beethoven's Piano Sonata No. 14, nicknamed "Moonlight" by a critic who compared its first movement to moonlight on a lake, has become one of the most universally known pieces of Western art music. Its opening Adagio — all arpeggiated triplets and sustained melody — is the sound of a certain kind of solitude, and its storming final movement is among the most technically demanding of his piano works.

Nigel Kennedy's 2000 concerto-length treatment of The Doors' catalogue is a boundary-defying work that brings the classical violin tradition into dialogue with rock and jazz. Kennedy's virtuosity is matched only by his fearlessness, and the album demonstrates how the classical tradition can absorb and transfigure music from outside its own lineage.

David Garrett's 2007 crossover album demonstrated that classical violin technique could find a home in a pop-rock context without sacrificing musicianship. His treatment of both original compositions and arrangements of pop standards showed a musician comfortable moving between worlds, and the album introduced classical performance to audiences who had never previously considered it.

Welsh baritone Rhydian's 2009 debut album made Carl Orff's Carmina Burana accessible to a mainstream audience while losing none of its power. The album's centrepiece, the "O Fortuna" chorus, is one of the most recognisable pieces of choral music ever written — and Rhydian's operatic baritone gives it the scale and authority the composition demands.

Sarod virtuoso Alam Khan's 2020 album Solace presents the North Indian classical tradition through a lens of emotional directness that makes it immediately accessible without diluting its depth. The son of the legendary Ali Akbar Khan, Alam brings his father's mastery of the sarod to contemporary contexts, and this album stands as a testament to the living vitality of the Hindustani classical tradition.

Premiered in Prague in 1787, Don Giovanni is the opera that defined the genre for two centuries. Mozart and his librettist Da Ponte turned the Don Juan legend into something philosophically rich — a work that is simultaneously comedy and tragedy, seduction and punishment, pleasure and dread. Its overture alone contains enough drama for a full evening.

Written across two books in 1722 and 1742, Bach's Well-Tempered Clavier is the Old Testament of keyboard music — a complete survey of all twenty-four major and minor keys, each explored in a prelude and fugue. It is simultaneously a teaching tool and a monument of musical thought, and every pianist's relationship with Bach begins here.

Composed around 1720, Vivaldi's four violin concertos are perhaps the first example of programme music — instrumental pieces that explicitly depict a subject, in this case the seasons of the year. The birdsong of Spring, the thunderstorm of Summer, the drunken peasants of Autumn, the frozen landscape of Winter: three centuries later, they still sound like exactly what they are.

Schubert's 1827 song cycle for baritone and piano is among the most profound explorations of grief ever composed. The twenty-four songs trace a solitary winter journey — ostensibly a lover's heartbreak, but the emotional landscape is bleaker and more universal than that. Schubert wrote it the year before his death at thirty-one, and the foreknowledge haunts every bar.

Beethoven's Piano Sonata No. 14, nicknamed "Moonlight" by a critic who compared its first movement to moonlight on a lake, has become one of the most universally known pieces of Western art music. Its opening Adagio — all arpeggiated triplets and sustained melody — is the sound of a certain kind of solitude, and its storming final movement is among the most technically demanding of his piano works.

Nigel Kennedy's 2000 concerto-length treatment of The Doors' catalogue is a boundary-defying work that brings the classical violin tradition into dialogue with rock and jazz. Kennedy's virtuosity is matched only by his fearlessness, and the album demonstrates how the classical tradition can absorb and transfigure music from outside its own lineage.

David Garrett's 2007 crossover album demonstrated that classical violin technique could find a home in a pop-rock context without sacrificing musicianship. His treatment of both original compositions and arrangements of pop standards showed a musician comfortable moving between worlds, and the album introduced classical performance to audiences who had never previously considered it.

Welsh baritone Rhydian's 2009 debut album made Carl Orff's Carmina Burana accessible to a mainstream audience while losing none of its power. The album's centrepiece, the "O Fortuna" chorus, is one of the most recognisable pieces of choral music ever written — and Rhydian's operatic baritone gives it the scale and authority the composition demands.

Sarod virtuoso Alam Khan's 2020 album Solace presents the North Indian classical tradition through a lens of emotional directness that makes it immediately accessible without diluting its depth. The son of the legendary Ali Akbar Khan, Alam brings his father's mastery of the sarod to contemporary contexts, and this album stands as a testament to the living vitality of the Hindustani classical tradition.