I wouldn't consider Webern at the level of Stravinsky, Schönberg, Bartok or Debussy. All these composers were more diversified and to me with a much greater creative dimension.
But Webern is, no doubt, one of the composers I would put immediately after those four, with Berg, Hindemith, Prokofiev, Ravel, Enescu, Frank Martin and some others.
I love above all his music for string quartet: the opus 5, 9 and 28, very pure but also very expressive, with the power of the silence, the art of the allusion.
His works for orchestra, like the opus 6 or 21, although never far from the expressionism, have a purity of colours, even an elegance, that seem very fresh when we compare them to Strauss, Mahler or Shostakovitch. The purity of crystal, but always human, with a strange poetry.
And some of his Choral Works, like the two Cantatas or Augenlicht are on the top of Choral music in the 20th century.
The only part of Webern's production I cannot like are the Lieder. He seems to compose with total indifference for the text. So, why chose an extraordinary poet like Trakl? Why not chose only sounds with no words, no meaning?
This said, after listening to works like Heldenleben or Shostakovitch's 7th, hearing Webern's Symphony opus 21 it is like to feel fresh and pure water, after being submerged in a swamp.
