This is one of those wonderful resources that make the Web so addictive: an almost-scholarly collection of pop songs influenced by classical pieces, written by a musicologist going by the pseudonym of “Ostin Allegro”, and complete with MP3 snippets. (For younger/non-UK readers this is an Austin Allegro, a not-inherently-terrible small car let down by shockingly poor British manufacturing.)
Ostin’s site is the place to go if you want, as I did, to remind yourself of the name of the 70s soft rock song inspired by the second movement of Rachmaninov’s Piano Concerto Number 2: Eric Carmen’s All By Myself. If you browse around you’ll notice that plenty of other composers have borrowed from Rachmaninov too; whatever else you think about his work, the man had some top tunes.
I was also pleased to find artistic justification for my childhood addiction to Strawberry Switchblade’s Since Yesterday.
At one point I threatened to walk down the aisle to Sibelius 5 for that very reason. Unfortunately the idea was not a popular one.