# Classical music and travel/movement.



## Albert7 (Nov 16, 2014)

I do a lot of commuting and yes I don't drive.

So I am always on the move.

What pieces remind you of travel or movement or something relaxing like a good car ride or relaxed plane flight?

Or pieces that inspire you to travel to new places?


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## Cosmos (Jun 28, 2013)

I tend to listen to music on the go a lot. If I'm just taking a walk, or in the car for a long drive, I'll put something on. But I never really plan what I'm going to listen to, I just play whatever I happen to be in the mood for.

A lot of Reich's music makes me think of traveling. I think it's the nature of his style where the music sounds like it's rolling, that it has its own momentum. A few times I've listened to Different Trains while on the train going through the city


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## brotagonist (Jul 11, 2013)

When I listen to music on the go, it becomes background music. The car's engine, the whistling wind, the chatter on the bus or in malls or in parks: I cannot and dare not—for the sake of my hearing—turn up the volume enough to counteract the noise.


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## Dr Johnson (Jun 26, 2015)

I find the car an excellent place to listen to classical music, possibly because I _do_ (foolishly or not) turn up the volume to drown out the engine.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

I find the Brandenburg Concertos to be perfect highway music. The volume level is fairly even so you don't miss anything, and the unflagging rhythmic energy makes driving almost as pleasant as it was when I was young and driving actually _was_ pleasant (not so many damned trucks on the road and idiots passing simultaneously on your right and left going 80).


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## Weston (Jul 11, 2008)

No music on the go for me, except sometimes on the bicycle greenway home. Then it is whatever is on my iPod played at random. The wind still interferes though at my astonishing athletic speed, , so mostly I listen to podcasts and audiobooks. 

I can't think of any music that reminds me of travel except for the obvious ones, Honegger's Pacific 231, Sibelius' Nightride and Sunrise, and so forth.


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## Dr Johnson (Jun 26, 2015)

There is the obvious John Adam's "Short Ride In A Fast Machine".


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Pacific 231... and of course Strauss's Pleasure Train Polka. Another: Villa-Lobos, Little Train of Caipira.


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## Marsilius (Jun 13, 2015)

Long haul flights are the ideal opportunity to catch up with two or three full length operas or ballets on the iPad. Far better than the in-flight movie selection.


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## ArtMusic (Jan 5, 2013)

Albert7 said:


> I do a lot of commuting and yes I don't drive.
> 
> So I am always on the move.
> 
> ...


Bach,* Brandenburg #6, first movement*. For some reason, when played fast that movement just sounds like fast travelling. Maybe the viola da gambas have something to do with it.


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## Arsakes (Feb 20, 2012)

The right thing on the road in a travel is to fully take over the car, bus etc. audio system, insert your device and play your music!

By my experience Johann Strauss waltzes and polkas, Joseph Hayden works (Qaurtets, Trios and Symphonies) and Baroque works are the best music to listen while have the least negative reaction from others!


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## jtbell (Oct 4, 2012)

KenOC said:


> Pacific 231... and of course Strauss's Pleasure Train Polka. Another: Villa-Lobos, Little Train of Caipira.


Lumbye's "Copenhagen Steam Railway Galop".

John Adams's "Judah to Ocean" in "John's Book of Alleged Dances": a reference to the N-Judah streetcar line in San Francisco.

http://nycsubway.org/perl/show?34422

"A piece of vehicular music, following the streetcar tracks way out into the fog and ultimately to the beach, where I used to rent a two-room cottage behind the Surf Theater and listen to the N-Judah reach the end of the line, turn round and head back to town."

(from Adams's notes for Nonesuch 79465-2)


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Thanks jtbell, almost forgot that Adams wrote another train piece, seldom heard but I like it: Hoodoo Zephyr. That's a reference to several trains in the old days with "Zephyr", meaning wind, in their names.


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## Xaltotun (Sep 3, 2010)

Bruckner 4th, 1st movement. A new world opens.


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## techniquest (Aug 3, 2012)

I listen to classical music in the car all the time, whether on CD or on the radio.
If you're going on a flight, how about listening to Marc Blitzstein's Airborne Symphony?

I first heard Grofe's 'Grand Canyon Suite' when I was a kid and it inspired me to want to visit the place some day. I realised this ambition 15 years ago and bought a new recording of the suite while I was there


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## Guest (Jul 15, 2015)

Dr Johnson said:


> I find the car an excellent place to listen to classical music, possibly because I _do_ (foolishly or not) turn up the volume to drown out the engine.


I think my tinnitus is getting worse from doing the same...I'm having to turn it down now, making Sibelius hard to hear!


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## Dr Johnson (Jun 26, 2015)

(more details here)

While I wouldn't necessarily suggest that either of these concertos are ideal driving music I thought I would give them a go in the car. I downloaded this CD as an mp3 file a couple of years ago but it failed to grab me. I've seen it flagged up in "Current Listening" recently so I thought I'd dust it off and see if it beguiled a tedious journey today.

Once again I couldn't get into the Finzi but found myself really enjoying the Leighton.


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