Jeffrey Hall:

>I know what you are talking about.  As a relative newbie to CM (4 years),
>I listen to very little Bach.  I know, I know, this is sacrilege.  But I
>_love_ melody, and Bach just doesn't do it for me (not yet).

For my money, Bach's a great melodist.  In fact, there are often too many
wonderful melodies going on at once.

>I started the thread about "Your Favorite Movement".  Look at one of my
>picks: piano concerto 20 by Mozart, first movement, Beethoven cadenza.
>If more powerful, beautiful melody can be crammed into a single movement,
>somebody please let me know.

I avoided the favorite movement thread, because everything I could think
of depended on other movements.  On the other hand, it got me thinking
about one-movement works.  One of my all-time favorites is Nielsen's Helios
Overture.  Nielsen doesn't work with melodies as such, but with fragments
that combine and recombine into different melodies.  To me, it's one of the
most beautiful works in existence: it starts out beautiful and becomes
ever more beautiful as it progresses - a kind of heavenly "Can You Top
This?"

Oh yeah, and then there's always Vaughan Williams's Tallis Fantasia.

Steve Schwartz