Classical Music Compositions from 1940 and later - Vinyl only

Thanks, kmccarty. Excellent recommendation. I have the  Schwartzkopf Szell performance on EMI and it is indeed beautiful.

Schubert, I'll have to keep an eye out for Rorem's Violin Concerto - one never knows. I have his Eleven Studies for Eleven Players, String Symphony, Sunday Morning, and Symphony No. 3. I like them all and have always particularly enjoyed the Eleven Studies.

Kmccarty, also +1 for the Strauss Oboe Concerto. LP: Edo de Waart/NPO, Holliger -ob, Philips 6500 174

Great suggestions, frogman! Thanks. The Berg is a bit earlier than the time frame we've set, but love the music. Also, I like the performances you're recommending. All good recordings, too.

jetrexpro, you make me consider that our next music gathering should cover works from the 1st half of the 20th century. So much great music to explore from that very formative period.

frogman, I have a number of works by Takemitsu, but not the music for the film "Ran". Thanks for the suggestion. I find his music always intriguing.

Thanks, schubert and kmccarty, for the Richard Strauss suggestions. Both are nice works.

And I greatly enjoy the Lutoslawski works I've heard, but I've not heard the Concerto for Orchestra so I shall have to seek it out. Thanks, schubert.

So much wonderful music. Too little can be covered in just several hours with friends, but I hope to expose them to composers who are not so familiar. Any particular favorite works from among the following?

Malcolm Berkeley (the son of Lennox Berkeley)
Attila Bozay
John Corigliano
George Crumb (Vox Balaenae, or Black Angels, or one of the Makrokosmos)
Mario Davidovsky
Jacob Druckman
Irving Fine
Alberto Ginastera
Andrew Imbrie
Joonas Kokkonen
György Ligeti
Frank Martin
Nicholas Maw
Andrzej Panufnik
George Perle
George Rochberg
Ned Rorem
William Schuman
Roger Sessions
Sir John Kenneth Tavener
Eduard Tubin
Charles Wuorinen
Ellen Taaffe Zwilich

learsfool, I agree with you completely about including  Lou Harrison, Elliot Carter,  Roy Harris, Walter Piston, Carl Ruggles and Charles Ives in any list of great 20th Century American composes. All should be explored by music listeners with any interest in recent classical music.

As you can see from my lists, my focus is not just American composers. I'm really interested in exposing some friends to some of the less well known composers from the second half of the century. But many of the names you've listed are not well know and should be better known.

... you might want to consider Hyperion A66050, Roger Sessions’ "Concerto for Orchestra" + Andrzej Panufnik’s "Sinfonia Votiva" (Symphony No. 8)...

Hi almarg, thanks for the suggestion. I have this LP but haven't listened to it in years. I'll have to pull it out and listen to it again. I've long been a fan of Hyperion's recordings, particularly those engineered by Tony Faulkner.

Thank you, tostadosunidos. I have only one piece of music by Brouwer, his Homenaje a Falla, played by Alice Artz on a Hyperion LP. I'll pull this out to listen to again and I'll look forward to exploring more of his music.

The mention of Ives by Learsfool really got me thinking about who  is the best expositor of America in his music and in what work does he express the American reality best.

I suppose so many think of Ives in this respect because so many of his compositions were explicitly "Americana", like:
From the Steeples and the Mountains
Holidays Symphony
Thanksgiving
The Fourth of July
Three Places in New England
Variations on "America"

But, the composer who has always captured the American reality best for me is Aaron Copland, with his compositions like these:
Appalachian Spring
Billy the Kid - Ballet Suite
Fanfare for the Common Man
Lincoln Portrait
Quiet City
Rodeo
Symphony No. 3
The Red Pony
.

Jetrexpro, thank you for offering the names of three contemporary composers whose music I don't know. I'm stuck in this time warp of very few new music recordings since the advent of digital recordings because I've continued to maintain a vinyl-only listening room. Sigh... This simply points out that I'll have to look at how to supplement my listening. Streaming media, I suppose - will have to sort out how I want to do that. 

By the way, I offer a big "Thank you" to all who've participated in provided suggestions and engaging in some conversation about MUSIC for a change. How refreshing is that!?!

However, Ives actually used quite a bit more of American folk tunes than Copland did, and was very original, experimenting with bi-tonality pretty much before anyone else did, and with quarter-tones, etc.

Learsfool, you make some very instructive observations about Ives' music. Thank you. I would not disagree with your and frogman's comments. And, I think I still enjoy listening to Copland! :-)

jetrexpro, no, I don't think anyone has mentioned Messiaen's Quartet For The End of Time. An amazing work with tremendous impact.

As to labels still making new classical recordings and pressing on vinyl, there are two small interesting labels whose expanding catalog I follow. Both record on analog tape and then release in multiple formats.

Yarlung Records - www.yarlungrecords.com
Fone Records - http://www.fone.it/

Yarlung was recently recognized with a Brutus Award for 2015 by David Robinson, Positive Feedback Online:
http://positive-feedback.com/audio-discourse/impressions-robinsons-brutus-awards-for-2015-part-3/

Here’s a new classical recording on vinyl just being released from Yarlung Records. It’s in the mail and I’m looking forward to hearing this:

Krzysztof Penderecki - String Trio (1991)
Jason Barabba - String Trio (2006)

Performed by the Janaki String Trio and recorded by Yarlung in 2007.
http://positive-feedback.com/industry-news/yarlung-records-announces-new-45-rpm-lps/

frogman, the Rachmaninoff "Symphonic Dances" are certainly worthy of inclusion in any list of outstanding music from the second half of the twentieth century. One of the additional criteria for me in pulling selections to play will be that the composer is not so well known. So, not including Rachmaninoff among my selections for this coming listening group session is no slight to his immense contribution.

Thanks for so many good suggestions. The selections I currently have under consideration for our upcoming listening session, which prompted the original post, will come from among the following works:

Zwilich: Symbolon or Concerto Grosso, Mehta/NYP, New World NW 372
Larrson: Concertino for Db & Str Orch, Wedin/OskarshamnEns, Fredin-db, Opus 3 8502
Rochberg: String Qt #3, Concord Qt, Nonesuch H 71283
Takemitsu: Rain Tree, Sugahara/Percussion Museum, Super Analogue 9207
  or Piano Distance, Serkin, RCA ARL1-4730
Lutoslawski: Concerto for Orchrestra, Kletzki/OSR, London CS 6665
Bozay: Improvisations No 2, Bozay/Perenyi/Papp/Perenyi, Hungaroton SLPX 12058
Druckman: Aureole, Slatkin/StLouisSO, New World NW 318
Duarte, John: Idylle pour Ida, Alice Artz-gui, Hyperion A66146
Maw: Sonata for strings and two horns, Del Mar/EngChmOrch, Civil-hn, Argo ZRG 676
Wuorinen: Speculum Speculi, Speculum Musicae, Nonesuch H 71300
Kokkonen: Symphony No. 3, Berglund/Finnish Radio SO, Decca SXL 6432
Martin, Frank: Concerto for seven wind instruments, timpani, percussion, and string orchestra, Ansermet/OSR, London CS 6241
Imbrie: Three Sketches, Dempster-trmb, Aanerud-pf, New World NW 254
Tubin: Sym 4 (Sinfonia lirica), Jarvi/Bergen, BIS LP 227
Piston: Symphony No. 7 or 8, Mester/LouisvilleO, Louisville LS 746

Of course, we can't play everything and all is subject to change upon reflection. As usual, we will at least play whole movements if not entire works. My goal, as I've said, is to expose my friends to some music and composers they've perhaps not yet heard.

learsfool, I am delighted to share something new for you! Nicholas Maw is a very interesting composer and well worth exploring. The Sonata for Strings and 2 Horns is from 1966 and the score is available from Boosey & Hawkes: http://www.boosey.com/cr/music/Nicholas-Maw-Sonata-for-Strings-and-2-Horns/1479

More information about Maw can be found in Wikipedia:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicholas_Maw
He was actively composing until near his death in 2009.

I had the pleasure of hearing his Concerto for Cor Anglais and Orchestra (2004) performed for the first time with the Philadelphia Symphony Orchestra with Maw in the audience back in 2005. The PSO had commissioned it. http://www.fabermusic.com/repertoire/concerto-for-cor-anglais-4219

frogman: that LP of the "Chamber Music" for oboe, clarinet, horn, bassoon and piano (Argo ZRG 536) was also my first introduction to Nicholas Maw.