Any list of choral works I favor would have to include the final movement of Beethoven's 9th. If there ever was a piece of music that made you feel that humankind might be worth something after all, this is it.
A couple of notes about this performance, conducted by Lorin Maazel (and fair warning, it's an excerpt, which starts and ends abruptly). Maazel seems to a bit non-chalent, at least at first. Hey dude, you're conducting one of the greatest works ever composed. Wake up. However, someone must have slipped him a Red Bull before the fugue section, where he perks up considerably. He manages to get a great deal of discord out of the final tutti orchestral chord before the first soloist entrance than is usually heard. And the molto ritard he takes in the transition from the orchestral fugue back into the choral recapitulation of the Joy theme is powerful and unexpected-- and I don't remember that being in the score. I'll have to pull my copy down and take a look.
The second chair flute player is cute. I wonder what cracked him up at the end of the fugue? Watch for the over-enunciating tenor. And I hope someone remembered to wake up the bass drummer before the Turkish march.
Enjoy.
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