I love music; it is to me a medium unique in its ability to capture and communicate emotion. In its variety, I perceive the spirit of creativity that I attribute to the
imago Dei. In its theory, I learn to appreciate a side of the natural world that seems entirely created for enjoyment, technical aspects and all. In my time on this forum, I've been continuously introduced to new music genres I didn't know existed, while also being given fresh views on genres I'd previously written off. Many of these experiences are still chronicled on the site; you've probably already seen the
Share Music You Like thread, but if you haven't I'd recommend you do so. Off the top of my head, I can think of several albums that I either found through posts there or featured there myself.
For instrumental albums, Kitaro's
Kojiki, V.K's
Our Story, and The Piano Guys'
Uncharted are all represented in part on that thread. My personal collection also includes Phil Keaggy's
Lights of Madrid and Frank Klepacki's
Rocktronic. In some cases, I can't point to a specific album, but would still recommend the general work of
Louie Zong or
maritumix. Don't discount classical music, either; if one considers the modern album equivalent to a symphony, then Beethoven's
Symphony No. 9 in D minor, Op. 125 and Mozart's
Eine kleine Nachtmusik both deserve consideration, to say nothing of Vivaldi's
The Four Seasons, imo one of the greatest musical accomplishments in history. If you consider soundtracks acceptable for casual listening, then my favorites are Yasunori Nishiki's
Octopath Traveler and Pascal Michael Stiefel's
A Hat in Time (and perhaps I'll throw in Alkis Livathinos's
Hue, too). Finally, I'll list World Beyond's
Mindshell separately, because I'm not entirely sure whether to consider it a soundtrack or not.
If you prefer vocal music, the aforementioned thread includes songs from The High Kings'
self-named album (
I wish the industry didn't do this so often, the resulting albums are always confusing to reference), Masayoshi Oishi's
Entertainer, and David Meece's
Learning to Trust; Steve Taylor is also there I think, but the specific album I'd recommend from him is
On the Fritz. I remember Michael W. Smith's
Change Your World fondly, though I don't listen to it as much these days. Some of my favorite artists (for whom no particular album comes to mind) are
Michael Card,
Steve Camp, and
Casting Crowns; I suppose their respective best-of albums would be ideal recommendations, but that seems like cheating.
Make sure you check out the other music threads on the forum as well;
Odd Music Discovery and
National Music! don't get much traffic, but are ideal for facilitating the discovery of especially obscure music. On the other hand,
Other Game Music and
Musical Discoveries in Touhou Fandom represent years worth of exploration into the art of music; they may be a bit less personal then you're looking for, but exploring them a little could still be rewarding.
