Pop songs with melodies from classical music

Kate Bush's song "The Sensual World" is the exact melody from this CD:

track 2 : "Edi Be Thu, Heven-Queene"

 

I'm just listening to Yes's 1st Album ("Yes") and in I See You, Peter Banks plays a guitar solo which is from Bach's Well Tempered Clavier, Book 1 (Fugue No 2, in C minor).

 

If it's already in this thread, it's not labeled, but here's one I just discovered while listening to my CD of The Best of the Tymes...

Their hit "Somewhere" is not a cover of the West Side Story song, but was based on Mozart's Piano Sonata No 15 in C major, K 545:

 

sad news yesterday that Roger Quigley passed away aged just 51. Left behind a small but perfectly formed discography of beautiful music as Quigley, At Swim Two Birds, and The Montgolfier Brothers

 

Here you go!

The Rapsody: Warren G. featuring Sissel (based on Borodin's Prince Igor). [Offensive language warning for anyone sensitive to such things.]

 

If you're in the mood for some serious power-belting with multiple escalating key changes over a Giazotto/Albinoni Adagio...

Lara Fabian: Adagio

 

Great rock duet using Delibes' Flower Duet as a core part of the production:

David Usher (featuring Julie Galios): Black Black Heart

 

Last one I can think of (for now).

Wendy Matthews: Ruins (Jesu, Joy Of Man's Desiring) - recorded in the crypt of Sydney's St. Mary's Cathedral

 

I'm curious about this since the song The Sensual World is credited to Kate Bush alone, though part of the chorus is inspired by the Macedonian piece Nevestinsko Oro. Does the CD you referenced include credits for that piece?

 

All Together Now by The Farm was a massive number 1 hit based on Pachelbel's "Canon in D Major"

 

In live performance of other songs, there were quotes and excerpts from Beethoven Piano Sonatas at various times. Sorry, can't specify exactly which ones off-hand.

Their "Song for all Seasons" takes something of the melodies from Tchaikovsky's "Romeo and Juliet" suite

 

Italian prog rockers PFM did a version of Rossini's William Tell Overture, and threw in quotes from the opera aria "Funiculi, Funicula" as a bonus ...

 

Strawberry Switchblade - Since Yesterday - fanfare from Sibelius's Symphony No. 5.

 

Probably been posted but, if not, The James Gang's The Bomber: Closet Queen/Bolero/Cast Your Fate To The Wind.
Epic, one of my favourite rock songs.

 

The Wombles - Minuetto Allegretto. Based on Mozart's Symphony No.41

 

The disco genre spawned a ton of those, maybe more than prog! It would probably deserve a thread of its own.

 

Let's not forget "Cecilia Ann" by The Surftones, written by our host and Frosty Horton!

Inspired by Gabriel Fauré's "Sicilienne".

 

The Rhapsody feat. Warren G. and Sissel - Prince Igor