What pieces can you identify in just a few seconds?

[ardcarp]

Following almost instant identification of Wagner's Flying Dutchman overture on last night's University Challenge, what pieces can you identify from just a snatch...less than a second... of the opening?

Mozart's 40th and (oh dear) Grieg's Piano Concerto to start the ball rolling?

[cloughie]

O

Following almost instant identification of Wagner's Flying Dutchman overture on last night's University Challenge, what pieces can you identify from just a snatch of the opening?

Mozart's 40th and (oh dear) Grieg's Piano Concerto to start the ball rolling?

Ten more

Richard Strauss - Till, DJ, Also, Heldenleben
Rach - PC2, PC3, Sym 2
Elgar - Sym 2, Sym 1, CC

[LMcD]

Elgar: Introduction and Allegro
Beethoven: Symphony no. 3
Beethoven: Violin Concerto
Beethoven: 'Spring' Sonata
Schubert: String Quintet
Vaughan Williams: 'London' Symphony
Mozart: Symphony no. 40
Carl Orff: Carmina Burana
Tippett: Fantasia Concertante on a Theme of Corelli
Handel: Zadok The Priest
Sibelius: Symphony no. 2
Sibelius: Karelia Suite
Britten: 4 Sea Pictures from 'Peter Grimes'
Nielsen: Symphony no. 3
Shostakovitch: Symphony no. 5
Schubert: Die Forelle
etc...etc...

[Dave2002]

Following almost instant identification of Wagner's Flying Dutchman overture on last night's University Challenge, what pieces can you identify from just a snatch...less than a second... of the opening?

Why restrict this to the opening? I "annoy" SWMBO (not) by identifying pieces from fragments in different movements. A few days ago - Mozart 21 piano concerto - not even the start of the slow movement - somewhere in the middle. Usually by turning on the car radio.

Sometimes I identify pieces I've not even heard before based on what I know about the pieces and the composer's work.

[rauschwerk]

Beginnings are ok. With absolute pitch I can identify key almost at once, which helps in telling (say) one Haydn symphony from another.

Middles are much harder. Prokofiev's Scythian Suite is very familiar to me (no other piece I know begins quite like that!), but yesterday I turned on in the radio the middle of the last movement and failed to identify it by the end beyond a vague feeling that it was Prokofiev's work.

[pastoralguy]

I used to amaze my friends by being able to identify musical works almost instantly. However, now I'm getting older it takes a wee bit longer.

[cloughie]

I used to amaze my friends by being able to identify musical works almost instantly. However, now I'm getting older it takes a wee bit longer.

[Dave2002]

... I turned on in the radio the middle of the last movement and failed to identify it by the end beyond a vague feeling that it was Prokofiev's work.

I had a slightly odd experience a few days back with this concert - http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b09m17xk
I went out to the shops, and on the way heard the end of the Mozart flute concerto - I didn't identify the performer from the performance - James Galway. I think I've heard him play better than that, though I liked the tin whistle encore a lot. On the way back I turned the radio on again and couldn't figure out the composer ..... maybe Glazunov ... I thought. But not quite. Finally, before the announcement after the Scherzo Fantastique I thought ... maybe Stravinsky - before the Firebird. This hunch turned out to be correct - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scherzo_fantastique - Op 3 - dated from 1908. That is a piece I may never have heard before.

[Beef Oven!]

Smoke On The Water - Deep Purple

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

For starters:-

Bach: B minor Mass; Brandenburg 3
Handel: Messiah; Water Music; Royal Fireworks
Haydn: Symphony 104
Mozart: Symphonies 29, 40; Figaro; Magic Flute; Oboe Concerto; Clarinet Concerto
Beethoven: Symphonies 1, 3, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9. PC 3, 4, 5. Violin concerto.
Wagner: Mastersingers, Tannhäuser.
Tchaikovsky: Symphonies 2, 4, 5; 1812; Swan Lake; Nutcracker; PC 1; Violin Concerto
Elgar: Enigma; Violin Concerto; Cello Concerto; The Kingdom; and lots more . . .
VW: Symphonies 1, 3, 4, 5, 7, 8.
Rachmaninov: PC 2
Puccini: La Boheme; Tosca;
Mahler: Symphony 4.

I should add that I usually won student competitions, playing this particular game.

[Bryn]

Just for starters, any of the 7 Paragraphs of Cardew's The Great Learning, Hindemith Cello Concerto of 1940, Walton Symphony No. 1, Cage Sonatas and Interludes , Feldman SQ2, For Christian Wolff, For Philip Guston, Triadic Memories, . . . oh, too many to go on listing.

[ardcarp]

by identifying pieces from fragments in different movements

Very impressive Dave and others. Despite the thread title, I really meant a fraction of a second (a few seconds is quite a long time in music!) as in UC yesterday.

[Bryn]

Very impressive Dave and others. Despite the thread title, I really meant a fraction of a second (a few seconds is quite a long time in music!) as in UC yesterday.

Just what I thought you intended, hence the works I listed. All instantly recognisable from the first note/chord/sound.

[Serial_Apologist]

I can usually name anything I've known for many years from just hearing a bar, even advanced modern works, if one can thus call the Schoenberg VC. What I can also do is singing the opening measure of a piece that has just been announced, and finding I've hit the right pitch. This facility seems to have autorrected recently, after slipping by a pitch or pitch and a half for a couple of decades, and is one of several totally useless skills I possess!

[MrGongGong]

http://www.timsteiner.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2007/09/a-z-riffs.mp3