I'm not a classical musician, just a very interested classical music
listener.  However, I hope to become a capable amateur classical pianist,
as soon as I can take it up as a hobby.

For a long time I listened to just hard rock and heavy metal, before I
discovered classical music.  The best violin solo is worlds better than a
great electric guitar solo with tapped-on harmonics.  Also classical music
has so much variety -- from the room-filling pipe organ, to easy going
woodwind, somber cello, to awe-inspiring arias.

The first classical music I bought was The Well Tempered Clavier performed
by Glenn Gould.  Then I bought more Bach, Beethoven's Sonatas by Richard
Goode, some Paganini, Schuman, Sibelius, Satie, Liszt, and others.  I'm
looking to expand my collection to include more living artists and Romantic
and Modern period composers.

Heavy metal still gets a lot of my listening time, mainly because I lack
the $$$ to build up my little classical CD collection, but I'm working on
it.  Also I'm eagerly awaiting a standard format to succeed the CD --
either SACD or DVD/Audio.

"Richard Yasko" <[log in to unmask]>