Masterpieces of contemporary (art) music. Recommended popular pieces.

Eight Pieces for PianoKurtág György

Kurtag Eight Piano Pieces Op. 3

This piece, which starts with a sudden same-note trill that seems to split a microscopic atom, was composed by the Hungarian composer György Kurtág.

He is often introduced as a post-Webern figure, but his music—unconstrained by fixed methods or techniques and freely plucking fragments from the cosmos—holds infinite possibilities.

Chorale VI-Cantus-Song of AeolusKarl Jenkins

Adiemus-Chorale VI-Cantus-Song of Aeolus

For anyone hearing it for the first time, the mystical chorus sung in a fictional language called “Adiemus,” based on African languages, coupled with expansive rhythms and grand orchestration that seem to evoke a kind of religious experience, may well have been astonishing.

This piece—also known by its Japanese title “Kaze no Kami no Uta” (Song of the Wind God), used in a 2017 Toyota Prius PHV commercial featuring Satomi Ishihara—is included on the 1997 album Adiemus II: Cantata Mundi by the group Adiemus.

Adiemus is a musical unit formed around Welsh-born Karl Jenkins.

Jenkins received academic musical training at a conservatory and, after graduating, joined jazz-rock groups such as Nucleus and Soft Machine.

It was in the 1990s that he launched Adiemus.

As an avant-garde classical music unit, they can be regarded as one of the forces that sparked a worldwide healing-music boom, including in Japan.

expand_lessRaise the rankingexpand_morelower

KOH-1

Report a problem

Electric CounterpointSteve Reich

Steve Reich – Electric Counterpoint (full)

Steve Reich, a master of contemporary music, has a catalog full of masterpieces.

People who aren’t familiar with minimal music often say it all sounds the same, but once you get hooked, it’s hard to get out.

That’s how addictive Reich’s music is, and there’s a kind of ecstasy you can only experience through his work.

Boulez : Le Marteau Sans MaîtreCallithumpian Consort

Le Marteau Sans Maître – Boulez – Callithumpian Consort – FULL VIDEO

A representative work by Pierre Boulez, who, not only as a conductor but also as a composer and critic, had a major influence on post–World War II contemporary music.

Rather than simply presenting three types of music labeled 1, 2, and 3, the piece is composed as a groundbreaking experiment that offers the audience a combination of several parts divided and interwoven.

Adagio for Strings for String EnsembleSamuel Barber

Samuel Barber – Adagio for Strings

The title may sound very simple, but the music itself overflows with profound emotion.

From the very beginning (the einsatz), it not only captures your heart, but also allows you to converse—through the music—with someone who isn’t here.

Is that person yourself, or a stranger? I’ve heard the piece was inspired by a poem by the poet Virgil.

Anton Webern – Seis Peças para Orquestra, Op. 6Zubin Mehta

Webern: 6 Pieces for orchestra, Op. 6b / Mehta · Berliner Philharmoniker

It is more often cited as a representative work by Webern than his later Symphony.

Except for the fourth piece, which is the pinnacle, each presents only the bare minimum of sonic elements—like a haiku—to create an entire world.

A work to revisit and savor repeatedly.

Honegger – Pacific 231Marc Andreae

Rediscovery of interesting orchestral music by the forgotten Swiss composer Volkmar Andreae

A work that depicts, through sound, the steam locomotive, which at the time was the latest state-of-the-art high-speed railway.

Incidentally, the second piece that followed this one was “Rugby.” As one of the signature works of the Swiss composer Arthur Honegger, it has long appeared—along with his name—on elementary school lists of composers.