5 best classical arrangements for testing your headphones

Tom's Guide

5 hours ago

I love classical music. I was raised on a diet of Mozart, Bach, and Mendelssohn. Giant orchestras that fill concert halls, pianists whose fingers dart across keys, brass sections that make your gut rumble. Classical music is huge — and I think it's a great way to test the best headphones.
There's nothing like classical music to put a pair of headphones through a trial by fire. There's a lot going on, and it can be easy for finer details to get lost. The soundstage is generally super wide, given the physical width of an orchestra. There's plenty of depth, and instrument separation is important so that you can hear every part of the ensemble.
But what classical music tracks and recordings do I use to test out the headphones that land on my testing table? From Holst to Stravinsky, let's find out.
(Please note — not all of my favorite recordings are available on YouTube, so you can listen through Apple Music Classical with the links I've attached. Not that YouTube does any of these pieces of music justice anyway. Bon Appétit!)
Qobuz is the testing streaming service that we use here at Tom's Guide. It features the best sound quality of any streaming service that we've tested, and it works out to be cheaper than Spotify if you pay for a year's subscription all at once.
Part 1 of Bach's "Kyrie of the Mass in B minor" is a piece for orchestra, solo singer, and choir. The result is a moody, moving, and involving piece of classical music that can really put a pair of headphones to the test. I could write thousands of words about the piece itself, but instead, I'll just go over why it's so good for testing headphones.
The most obvious and noticeable testing element is the multi-layered choir that sings the piece. It's a mixed gender choir, so a pair of headphones needs to be able to place each voice and their harmonies well enough that you can tell each section is composed of multiple individual voices. The orchestra needs to be similarly separated so that you can hear each instrument, from the strings to the woodwind.
Depth is important too, as is dynamic range. It's a track that changes volume frequently, and covers the entirety of the hearable frequency range to reveal a pair of headphones' weaknesses. It's also a stunningly beautiful piece of music.
Listen on Apple Music Classical
Anyone who watched Fantasia as a kid (which I assume is almost everyone) is going to recognize "Night on Bald Mountain." It's the moment a mountain transforms into the devil, ushering souls into the underworld as the sky swirls and lava bubbles. The piece itself is a tour de force of late 19th-century orchestra, with incredible swells and changes in pitch and volume for even the most devilish of dancefloors.
This particular piece is very good for showcasing dynamic range. There are quiet moments that counterpose the louder moments, giving them more impact. I need to be able to feel the change as well as hear it. The drums and crashing cymbals should be impactful and scary, the great horn swell unnerving.
There's a lot to get wrong for a pair of headphones here, but when it gets it right, it's wonderful. I profess to a certain amount of devilry — and I can't get enough of Bald Mountain's orchestral might.
Listen on Apple Music Classical
Copeland's "Billy the Kid" feels like you're watching a movie. It's just a few lines of dialogue away from being a motion picture in and of itself — but that doesn't make it any less capable of telling a story. From the moment the "Allegro Molto" begins to the second it finishes, you're whisked away to the wild west, on the road with Billy the Kid and his gang of miscreants.
That means there's all the more detail for a pair of headphones to get stuck into, but also a lot to trip them up. I want the string sections to feel effortlessly smooth, and the brass section needs to feel triumphant. There's delicacy needed here too, and the headphones have to be able to let me hear every part of each playful wind note.
Once the 7:45 are up, I should be ready for the next piece, and the third leg of Billy's journey. Headphones that lack energy will make me want to switch over or give up.
Listen on Apple Music Classical
The deeply unnerving style of Igor Stravinsky's "Rite of Spring" is one of my favorite pieces of music. It moves and shifts like sand in a bowl, with plenty of short solos for a pair of headphones to relish. I love the sudden tonal shifts as the ballet continues, from calm and unsettling to big and brash. Headphones that can't keep up make the experience feel flat and boring.
This is a recording that does well with a big soundstage. The orchestra is deep and wide, and in order to get the full effect, the headphones need to be able to give you great spatial imaging. I want instrument separation to be excellent as well — otherwise, the track feels like one bed orchestral mush as the instruments and the sections are squished together.
Listen on Apple Music Classical
What list of classical music would be complete without something from Beethoven on it? And yes, before you ask, I did have to put it number 5 on this list, because, you know. It's the fifth symphony. It's also excellent for testing out headphones.
This particular recording of Beethoven's most famous work is great for testing soundstage and instrument separation as well. There's a lot going on in any one part of the symphony, and your headphones need to make sure that it's not being blended up by bad audio tuning or less-than-stellar hardware. It's a stunning symphony from start to finish, and only the best headphones can do it justice.
Listen on Apple Music Classical