5 Worst Composers Ever!!

[snyprrr]

Richard Nanes?

[Archaic Torso of Apollo]

Richard Nanes?

Recently I found out that Mr. Nanes is no longer with us, having passed on to the great self-subsidized Concert Hall in the Sky. Since then his Wikipedia page, which I recall as having been rather neutral, is no longer subject to the rules concerning living persons, and is now more lively and opinionated in style. An excerpt:

Nanes is known as a controversial figure in the classical music world. Reviews of his recordings at amazon.com are extravagantly laudatory or equally extravagantly denunciatory, with little in the middle. The critical picture is clearer in Internet discussion groups, where the consensus appears to be that the quality of his music is inversely proportional to the vigor with which he promoted it, and where he is frequently called "Richard Inanes".

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Nanes

BTW, does anyone know anything about the "seven consecutive International Angel Awards" he received from the "Excellence in Media Foundation"?

[Brian]

Recently I found out that Mr. Nanes is no longer with us, having passed on to the great self-subsidized Concert Hall in the Sky. Since then his Wikipedia page, which I recall as having been rather neutral, is no longer subject to the rules concerning living persons, and is now more lively and opinionated in style. An excerpt:

Nanes is known as a controversial figure in the classical music world. Reviews of his recordings at amazon.com are extravagantly laudatory or equally extravagantly denunciatory, with little in the middle. The critical picture is clearer in Internet discussion groups, where the consensus appears to be that the quality of his music is inversely proportional to the vigor with which he promoted it, and where he is frequently called "Richard Inanes".

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Nanes

BTW, does anyone know anything about the "seven consecutive International Angel Awards" he received from the "Excellence in Media Foundation"?

You didn't mention the dry humor at the bottom of the page:

See also: Florence Foster Jenkins

[ElliotViola]

My top (bottom?) 5 are:

Michael Torke
Elizabeth Maconchy
John Rutter
Will Todd
John Cage

[Christo]

My top (bottom?) 5 are:

Michael Torke
Elizabeth Maconchy
John Rutter
Will Todd
John Cage

Don't know Will Tod - for good reasons, apparently - but Elizabeth Maconchy is terrific, try her music again, she deserves it.

Rutter is a better option, even if he's surpassed in all respects by Karl Jenkins, perhaps my nominee No. 1. Another nominee is Richard Nanes. And of course Richard Strauss (talking about Nanes) :-)

[Cato]

Richard Proulx, who apparently received a music degree from Larry's School of Fine Composition, is the name at the top of a card with "music" for the Mass which Catholics in my diocese are supposed to try to sing. 

Boring, boring, boring: I have seen more interesting harmonization exercises, and to make it worse, he manages to misplace accents, to place long syllables on the wrong beat, to put the word "God" on an 8th-note as part of a series of 8th notes going down the scale, etc. etc.  It is so awful that the congregation has unconsciously altered the notes to make them more sensible, e.g. changing the notes for a long accented syllable from an 8th to a quarter or longer, which forces our organist to make some adjustment.  She tried to follow the music and force the issue, but the result was a mess.

Our diocese is notorious for such feeble-minded and incompetent decisions.   

A follow-up: recently our organist unveiled that she had tried to improve the terrible Gloria dribbled by Proulx's pen by trying an antiphonal approach and by punching up the harmony with arpeggiated chords of more interest.  It helped, but she still did not address the core clumsiness in the very awry union of text and music.

[ElliotViola]

Don't know Will Tod - for good reasons, apparently - but Elizabeth Maconchy is terrific, try her music again, she deserves it.

Rutter is a better option, even if he's surpassed in all respects by Karl Jenkins, perhaps my nominee No. 1. Another nominee is Richard Nanes. And of course Richard Strauss (talking about Nanes) :-)

HOW COULD I FORGET ABOUT KARL JENKINS? Palladio is possibly the most irritating piece ever composed in the history of Music. Strauss isn't great either.

We definitely agree on Rutter, Christo. Will Todd writes music that is possibly yet more cheesy than Rutter does. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R53ucTjPihA

I will give Maconchy another try soon, I have looked at some of her solo Viola Music, and was not particularly keen at all. Any recommendations?

[Mirror Image]

Strauss isn't great either.

So the man who wrote such masterpieces as Eine Alpensinfonie, Elektra, Salome, Der Rosenkavalier, and Four Last Songs isn't great? You should definitely listen to these works again.

[dyn]

Strauss has isolated moments of greatness mixed in with heaps and heaps of mediocrity. That's my carefully calculated opinion as a mature adult

[Karl Henning]

Don't worry. It's just a youthfully brash thing to say... a way to postulate for positioning oneself in a certain way. Think of Gould and the moronic things he said, if you gave him enough time and a microphone. Gould, admittedly, never grew out of that juvenile phase, but most will. Even Simon Rattle has said stupid things about Richard Strauss... and then, everyone who loves Richard Strauss and knows his music well also knows about all the aspects that make Strauss' music open to such broad-brushed criticism, even if we ultimately think that that criticism is 99% rubbish. 

Well said.

[DavidRoss]

Well said.

+1

[TheGSMoeller]

Don't worry. It's just a youthfully brash thing to say... a way to postulate for positioning oneself in a certain way. Think of Gould and the moronic things he said, if you gave him enough time and a microphone. Gould, admittedly, never grew out of that juvenile phase, but most will. Even Simon Rattle has said stupid things about Richard Strauss... and then, everyone who loves Richard Strauss and knows his music well also knows about all the aspects that make Strauss' music open to such broad-brushed criticism, even if we ultimately think that that criticism is 99% rubbish. 

My personal experience (this is not a knock on anyone here on this thread) is having to explain to people that Strauss wrote more than just the 6 or 7 tone poems that are frequently recorded or performed. Some wonderful music can be found in Metamorphosen, Oboe Concerto in D major,
Duett-Concertino, for clarinet and bassoon with string orchestra and the lovely Lied later in his life.

[Mirror Image]

Well said.

+2

[The new erato]

Nobody here seem to mention Strauss' greatest work; the Metamorphosen, a work that in my mind alone elevates him to a great composer, though there admittedly is lots in his oeuvree I don't listen to much. But some of his best music have been mentioned by others here, and very fine some of it is.

[TheGSMoeller]

Nobody here seem to mention Strauss' greatest work; the Metamorphosen, a work that in my mind alone elevates him to a great composer, though there admittedly is lots in his oeuvree I don't listen to much. But some of his best music have been mentioned by others here, and very fine some of it is.

Hey, Erato,

I did mention it a few posts ago because I completely agree with you. I remember hearing Metamorphosen for the first time being coupled with Ein Heldenleben on a Blomstedt recording. And it did just that, elevated my already highly regarded view of Strauss. Its a mesmerizing piece.

And we could go on and on about his operas, including the single most impressive, and challenging role, for a soprano. 

[dyn]

Gould also always sat on the same chair when performing/recording. Clearly being a musical genius he knew something we didn't about that chair, and all pianists should follow his practice.

[snyprrr]

Gould also always sat on the same chair when performing/recording. Clearly being a musical genius he knew something we didn't about that chair, and all pianists should follow his practice.

Did it fold?

[TheGSMoeller]

Gould and his chair...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hlAg-yL-FfY

[petrarch]

Hey, if argumentum ad verecundiam is good enough for you, who am I to argue. No offense and all.

Trouble is that some authorities are conveniently more equal than others...

[kishnevi]

Gould was in many ways a contrarian and meant to be provocative--and that attitude may be widespread among juveniles, but some mature adults share it in spades.

And being a contrarian often means that in challenging the consensus,  one overemphasizes one's differences from the consensus.  Gould thought that Mozart's best work was done in Salzburg--but he still cared enough about Mozart's music to record the full complement of sonatas.