Just wanted to start a new thread and hear what everyone's faves were.

For me
Favorites
-"Velocities," It sounds really awesome to me, and anyone who can play it is probably marimba jesus.
-"Chasing the Caribou," First ever 4 mallet piece I learned (I played the 1st part).
-"Shadow Chaser," Was really fun for me to play, but also difficult.

Least Favorites
-"Yellow After the Rain," It's a great piece to learn, but I simply hate the sound and the fact that many people think they know how to play it, even though they only know the first few measures.
-"Flight of the Bumblebee"

Well, Velocities is a good one, but my favorite is
Ranson by Mark Ford.

Other favorites are:
Memories of the Seashore by Abe
Ilijas by Zivkovic
Reflections on the Nature of Water by Druckman
Virginia Tate by Smadbeck
Nancy (however overplayed, it's still a lovely piece) by Sejourne
Rotation IV by Sammut

Since you didn't specify solos, I'll also add to the list:
Blue Motion by Whible
And Legions Will Rise by Puts, and
Wind Sketch II by Abe

Just a few of my favorites.

As for least favorites?
I don't think I really have any.

Yellow After the Rain is kinda annoying, but I don't hate it or anything.

Favorites:

Vinao's Khan Variations
Lansky's Three Moves
Schwantner's Velocities
Miyake's Chain
Druckman's Reflections on the Nature of Water
Ewazen's Northern Lights
Thomas's Merlin
Montovani's Moi, jeu...
Aldridge's From My Little Island

Least Favorite:

Abe: Frogs
Rosauro's Marimba Concerto
The second movement of Maslanka's My Lady White
Milhaud's Marimba/Vibraphone Concerto
Schuller's Marimbology
Miki's Marimba Spiritual (just because so many people butcher it)
Stout's Astral Dance, the first Mexican Dance, Rumble Strips

Hmm... I'll probably think of more later.

RhythmSong: I'm curious about why you don't like Rumble Strips.

Personally, I just don't get the piece. I don't understand what it's trying to say. Or perhaps I should say that I'm not sure I like the way in which the material is presented and developed. Also, it's just too "marimba-ey" for me. If I hadn't heard the piece before and heard it played on a piano, I would think "Wow, that sounds like it's written for the marimba" because it includes so many idiomatic techniques for the marimba. I feel that the music of the piece is an outgrowth derivation of the technique, as opposed to a piece of music that is just performed through the channel of technique.

Obviously, if someone piece plays the piece well then it's still impressive, but I just wouldn't choose to listen to it in my spare time.

I haven't really gotten into any advanced pieces, although Irish Washerwoman is really fun at about 186, though it is really easy. It has a fun, natural hand motion sequence.

That is true.

I am mainly a pianist, so I am most familiar with piano music. There are a couple different extremes found in piano music. Ravel is a wonderful composer who wrote a number of pieces for piano. Most people find Ravel's music very difficult to play simply because it is very uncomfortable to play. Ravel makes the fingers and hands do things that are very awkward. On the other hand there are piano composers like Chopin where the music is quite comfortable to play but the music suffers some in the limitation of making it pianistic. Then there are others like Medtner where you're not sure if the musical idea or the piano conception came first, the music does not suffer at all because of it being on the piano, and the music is very comfortable to play.

Most of the music for marimba that I've seen or played has seemed very bounded by marimba technique. I look at a passage and I just see technique after technique being exploited. I guess I just got used to it and never thought about it much. I'm curious if you sometimes see marimba solos that are kind of like the Ravel of marimba. I admittedly don't know that much of the marimba repertoire.

You make some great points. I really love a lot of Chopin's music, but you can definitely tell when he didn't know what he was doing (for example, look at the orchestration of his Piano Concerto).

Marimba repertoire is at an odd turning point right now because more and more composers are starting to take the instrument seriously, and to write solo marimba works, whereas twenty years ago, almost always the only people who wanted to write solo marimba pieces were... people who played marimba. That's not to say that these pieces aren't worth keeping in the repertoire, it's just to say that we shouldn't limit ourselves to only semi-satisfying music just because it's idiomatic or written well for the instrument.

EDIT:

Marimba solos that are like the Ravel of marimba... hmm... well, I suppose here I can really only speak of pieces that I've played. Velocities has a couple passages in the middle of the piece that are incredibly awkward but don't really sound so. Ewazen's marimba concerto doesn't sound that difficult because it's so tonal, but it's also got some very awkward passages, especially in the first movement. Also, Lansky's "Hop(2)" from "Three Moves for Marimba" just sounds like a little funky improvisation but has some incredibly difficult leaps.

Basically, I'm 17 and still don't have a very broad view of all the marimba music out there. But for now, here are my favorites and least favorites.

Favorites:

Velocities- Schwantner
Astral Dance- Stout
Sedimental Structures- Stout
Libertango- Sammut

Least Favorites:

Of course you have Yellow After the Rain- Peters
and I'm getting kind of sick of Rain Dance- Gomez/Rife

Personally, Rain Dance Is my favorite solo I've heard/performed so far in my limited career. It has a flowing melody like...well...like rain. I also enjoyed Blumen Cuban, though it is very repetitive.

I don't have much in my repertoire but i like rhythm song, ransom, and prism. playing those was sweet.

I haven't played many pieces, because I only started seriously playing marimba this year, however I have listened to a few pieces that stick out in my mind.

Favorites in no particular order

Virginia Tate-Paul Smadbeck
Cameleon-Eric Sammut
4 Rotations-Eric Sammut
Restless-Rich 'O Meira (sp?)
Tune for Mary O-Rich 'O Meira
Rhythmic Jumbalaya-Kevin Bobo
Echoes-Kevin Bobo
Polaris-Mark Ford
Ransom-Mark Ford

Least Favorite in no particular order
Frogs-Keiko Abe
Yellow After the Rain-Mitchell Peters


Some of you will hate me for saying yellow after the rain, and if you really want me to explain why, I will. Otherwise, I'm out

Trust me dude, nobody hates you for including Yellow After the Rain in your least favorites. That piece is just...agh.

Favorites:

Reflections on the Nature of Water
Marimbasonic
Dream of the Cherry Blossoms
Libertango


Least favorites:

This isnt exactly a keyboard piece, but Through The Fire and Flames by Dragonforce arranged for marimba has to be the most annoying piece in the world.
Two kids did it as a duet for solo+ensemble this year..
I wanted to kill myself every time I heard it. SO annoying.

Yellow After The Rain gets quite maddening after a while too.

Favorites:
Dream of the Cherry Blossoms
Libertango
Cameleon
Rhythm Song
Caritas
Northern Lights
Etude in e minor
...just to name a few

Least Favorite:
Monograph IV
Rain Dance (way overplayed)
Yellow After the Rain (although great for devolping 4-mallet fundamentals)

Favorites:

Vertical River by Blake Tyson (haha def. a duet, but the marimba part is one of my favorites)
Ghanaia by Matthias Schmitt (pretty easy but fun to play)
Etude in C by Claire Omar Musser (a standard)
Transformations of Pachelbel's Canon by Nanae Mimura (brilliant)
Three Movements For A Solo Dancer, Part II by E. Kopetzki

Marimbaist: Whose etude in e minor? O.o Cheung? I just started on that one. His Nocturne is also gorgeous. He also just released an arrangement of Flight of the Bumblebee which is incredible.

Noticed no one has mentioned Cangelosi. Did anyone else see him at PASIC? He killed it. I love his music, though. I played Character #4 on my junior recital and I am currently working on etude in a minor #2 and plato's cave.

Other than that?:
Sammut - Cameleon
Ewazen - Northern Lights
Schmitt - Ghanaia
Schwantner - Velocities
Thomas - Merlin
Lansky - Three Moves
Abe - Wind Over Mountains
Klaskow - Dances of Earth and Fire
Burritt - Two Mexican Dances
Bach - Goldberg Variations
Bach - Any of the Violin Sonatas/Partitas or Cello Suites
Vinao - Khan Variations
(too lazy to look up) - Variations After Vinao
Green - Frivolity

Least favorites:
Druckman - Reflections on the Nature of Water (sorry)
Peters - Sea Refractions
Ford - Stubernic
Miyake - Chain

I'm surprised no one has mentioned to escape velocity yet, that piece is awesome!

Thank You, I`ll try that one! Always looking to improve my Library.

The version I found is an ensemble with 3 keyboards, is that the one? Who is the composer?

Dave Hall! That is a percussion quartet.

Yep it's the quartet

My most favorites are:
Monograph IV
Dream of the Cherry Blossoms
Ghanaia
Nancy
Dragonfly

My least favorites are:
Rain Dance- it's sounds awesome, but it's so overrated..
Can't really think of anything else that i least favor hehe.