I'm really interested in classical music and I'd like to study composition in the future but I don't get too many feelings out of orchestral music.

Ironically I feel that I got into classical by listening to Bartok's first piano concerto and his music for strings, percussion and celesta, which I still enjoy a lot.

After that I got into piano lessons and started listening to impressionist piano music A LOT; Satie, Debussy, Ravel, Messiaen, etc. I really got into it. I also love Beethoven's Piano Sonatas and Chopin's Nocturnes.

And I feel that I understand this piano music to some extent, I can recognize pattern, memorize parts and melodies, and be able to recognize specifically what I like.

But I cannot get into orchestral music to the same degree other than Bartok's Music for strings, percussion and celesta. I just feel that I dont get it, maybe its so convoluted that nothing is able to catch my attention, or that I don't know in what to focus.

I love Debussy, I have listened to Piano Works Vol. 1 by François-Joël Thiolier and also to his Preludes, and at the beginning it was completely alien to me, I had heard nothing like that at all and I honestly didn't get it at the beginning, I had to listen to them 3 or 4 to kind of understand what was going on but now I'm completely in love with all those pieces.

The thing is that I have tried to listen to La Mer by him quite a few times already, and I don't get the same feeling as with his piano pieces, I kind of feel that there's too much going on and everything is connected together in a weird fashion that doesn't make sense to me, I don't feel the same structure as with piano music.

I also listened to the nutcracker, and other than the pieces that were are embedded in my head already, it gave me almost no feeling at all.

The only thing that I feel that I'm being able to really appreciate is the texture posibilities that an orchestra gives.

Do you guys have any listening tips to be able to understand orchestral pieces more? I feel that I'm missing out on a completely new and amazing world.