Top 25 Favorite Composers

Started by Winky Willy, March 01, 2012, 12:52:34 PM

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vandermolen

Quote from: k a rl h e nn i ng on October 05, 2016, 04:15:57 AM
Both of them perhaps the best each composer has done IMO.  Though (forgive me if I make myself at all tiresome on this point) I greatly prefer the sextet version of the Loops.
I agree with you Karl. I'll look out for the sextet version.
"Courage is going from failure to failure without losing enthusiasm" (Churchill).

'The test of a work of art is, in the end, our affection for it, not our ability to explain why it is good' (Stanley Kubrick).

Madiel

Quote from: Florestan on October 05, 2016, 03:59:42 AM
Doesn´t matter, post them anyway, it´s just for fun. :)

Nah, I'll stick with my previous list of 17 names.

There's a long list of composers I think about expanding my collection for, and that might start happening a bit more with the next shopping expedition. But really, I have this tendency to want to explore in more depth those composers I'm already interested in.

One thing I've noticed is that I sometimes seem to hit veins of music that even GMG'ers aren't very familiar with. While everyone is talking about the orchestral music of this or that composer I know nothing about, I mention some piece of Beethoven's early chamber music for a relatively novel combination of instruments and get greeted with silence.
I am now working on a discography of the works of Vagn Holmboe. Please visit and also contribute!

Florestan

Quote from: ørfeo on October 05, 2016, 04:32:41 AM
I mention some piece of Beethoven's early chamber music for a relatively novel combination of instruments and get greeted with silence.

I must have missed that. What was it again?
Every kind of music is good, except the boring kind. — Rossini

Madiel

Quote from: Florestan on October 05, 2016, 04:51:44 AM
I must have missed that. What was it again?

Oh, I don't mean recently. When I've talked about the string trios, or the op.25 Serenade. At some point I asked about the works for piano duet (which I haven't heard, but want) and there wasn't a big reaction.
I am now working on a discography of the works of Vagn Holmboe. Please visit and also contribute!

Brian

These deliberately eccentric new performances by Mustonen:



Very staccato, very resistant to traditional far-sighted phrasing, with plenty of power but a lighter, flintier, more percussive kind. Will appeal to Bartók enthusiasts, maybe. I'm not sure if I like or recommend it, except to people who think they've heard every possible Prokofiev concerto interpretation and want to discover something totally different.

Mirror Image

Quote from: Brian on October 05, 2016, 06:41:03 AM
These deliberately eccentric new performances by Mustonen:



Very staccato, very resistant to traditional far-sighted phrasing, with plenty of power but a lighter, flintier, more percussive kind. Will appeal to Bartók enthusiasts, maybe. I'm not sure if I like or recommend it, except to people who think they've heard every possible Prokofiev concerto interpretation and want to discover something totally different.

Wrong thread, Brian. :)

Reckoner

Quote from: vandermolen on October 04, 2016, 11:36:48 AM
BBC Music Magazine has as their freebie CD this month 'Desert Music' by Reich and 'Shaker Loops' by Adams which I greatly enjoyed earlier today.

Nice one - I hadn't checked out this month's mag. Both of those works are solid.  8)

A few personal favourites:

Adams
Nixon in China (Act I, mainly)
Doctor Atomic (aria, "Batter my heart")
Harmonielehre
Naive and Sentimental Music
Christian Zeal and Activity
Dharma at Big Sur
Absolute Jest (first movement)
Grand Pianola Music

Reich
Music for 18 Musicians
Different Trains
Proverb
Nagoya Marimbas
City Life
Triple Quartet

vandermolen

Quote from: Reckoner on October 05, 2016, 08:23:14 AM
Nice one - I hadn't checked out this month's mag. Both of those works are solid.  8)

A few personal favourites:

Adams
Nixon in China (Act I, mainly)
Doctor Atomic (aria, "Batter my heart")
Harmonielehre
Naive and Sentimental Music
Christian Zeal and Activity
Dharma at Big Sur
Absolute Jest (first movement)
Grand Pianola Music

Reich
Music for 18 Musicians
Different Trains
Proverb
Nagoya Marimbas
City Life
Triple Quartet
Thanks for that. I have 'Different Trains' which I like very much and will look out for those I don't know.
"Courage is going from failure to failure without losing enthusiasm" (Churchill).

'The test of a work of art is, in the end, our affection for it, not our ability to explain why it is good' (Stanley Kubrick).

Ken B

Quote from: Reckoner on October 05, 2016, 08:23:14 AM
Nice one - I hadn't checked out this month's mag. Both of those works are solid.  8)

A few personal favourites:

Adams
Nixon in China (Act I, mainly)
Doctor Atomic (aria, "Batter my heart")
Harmonielehre
Naive and Sentimental Music
Christian Zeal and Activity
Dharma at Big Sur
Absolute Jest (first movement)
Grand Pianola Music


That covers most of my favorite Adams too. Can't say I like Atomic though. Better when he was younger.

Gaspard de la nuit

Vaguely in order:

Olivier Messiaen
Béla Bartók
Witold Lutosławski
Maurice Ravel
György Ligeti
Alban Berg
Sofia Gubaidulina
Leoš Janáček
Igor Stravinsky
Jean Sibelius
Henri Dutilleux
Sergei Prokofiev
Kaija Saariaho
Benjamin Britten
Heitor Villa-Lobos
Ferruccio Busoni
Ralph Vaughan Williams
Alberto Ginastera
Claude Debussy
Gustav Mahler
György Kurtág
Luciano Berio
Paul Hindemith
Grażyna Bacewicz
Hans Werner Henze

Though, the second half could look radically different in just a few days.

San Antone

#170
Not in order of preference

1.   Alban Berg
2.   Anton Webern
3.   Arnold Schoenberg
4.   Claude Debussy
5.   Elliott Carter
6.   Francis Poulenc
7.   Gabriel Faure
8.   Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina
9.   Guillaume de Machaut
10.   Guillaume Dufay
11.   Igor Stravinsky
12.   Johann Sebastian Bach
13.   Johannes Brahms
14.   Johannes Ockeghem
15.   John Cage
16.   Josquin Des Prez
17.   Karlheinz Stockhausen
18.   Krzysztof Meyer
19.   Maurice Durufle
20.   Morton Feldman
21.   Mieczyslaw Weinberg
22.   Olivier Messiaen
23.   Othmar Schoeck
24.   Pierre Boulez
25.   Tomas Luis de Victoria

Honorable mentions: Dmitri Shostakovich, Ernest Bloch, Hildegard von Bingen

Maestro267

OK...in the order I think of them

1. Mahler
2. Tchaikovsky
3. Brian
4. Lloyd
5. Elgar
6. Penderecki
7. Bliss
8. Alwyn
9. Britten
10. Schnittke
11. Bax
12. Prokofiev
13. Shostakovich
14. Messiaen
15. MacMillan
16. Villa-Lobos
17. Ginastera
18. Bantock
19. Mathias
20. Holst
21. Berlioz
22. Corigliano
23. Ravel
24. Daugherty
25. Arnold

amw

I have a list of "most important composers to me" (quoted) but figured I should try making a list of the 25 I love the most, which is slightly different.


  • Schubert
  • Mozart
  • Dvořák
  • Poulenc
  • Schumann
  • Tchaikovsky
  • Haydn
  • Sciarrino
  • Bach
  • Beethoven
  • Bartók
  • Martinů
  • Cage
  • Brahms
  • Ligeti
  • Mendelssohn
  • Janáček
  • Nono
  • Saunders (R)
  • Machaut
  • Holliger
  • Fauré
  • Chopin
  • Prokofiev
  • Berlioz

Quote from: amw on October 03, 2016, 02:29:53 AM

  • Beethoven
  • Schumann
  • Schubert
  • Brahms
  • Bartók
  • Bach
  • Mozart
  • Haydn
  • Chopin
  • Dvořák
  • Cage
  • Debussy
  • Stravinsky
  • Ligeti
  • Holliger
  • Sciarrino
  • Barrett (R)
  • Finnissy
  • Webern
  • Stockhausen
  • Martinů
  • Ferneyhough Machaut
  • Fauré
  • Grisey
  • Feldman Nono

SymphonicAddict

In no order:

Shostakovich
Brahms
Dvorak
Tchaikovsky
Martinu
Vaughan Williams
Janacek
Nielsen
Langgaard
Puccini
Saint-Saens
Sibelius
Tubin
Schnittke
Beethoven
Respighi
Strauss
Mahler
Ravel
Atterberg
Lutoslawski
Prokofiev
Villa-Lobos
Schubert
Bruckner

kyjo

In some sort of order:

Sibelius
Atterberg
Rachmaninov
Dvořák
Shostakovich

Brahms
Mahler
Ravel
Vaughan Williams
Braga Santos

Prokofiev
Saint-Saëns
Arnold
Nielsen
Barber

Elgar
Schubert
Martinů
Hanson
Poulenc

Respighi
Ginastera
Bruckner
Grieg
Janáček
"Music is enough for a lifetime, but a lifetime is not enough for music" - Sergei Rachmaninoff

Christo

Quote from: kyjo on December 23, 2018, 03:02:36 PM
In some sort of order:
Dvořák
Shostakovich
Mahler
Ravel
Vaughan Williams
Braga Santos
Saint-Saëns
Arnold
Nielsen
Barber
Martinů
Respighi
Ginastera
Bruckner
Grieg
Janáček
Quote from: SymphonicAddict on December 19, 2018, 11:54:49 AM
In no order:
Shostakovich
Dvorak
Tchaikovsky
Martinu
Vaughan Williams
Janacek
Nielsen
Saint-Saens
Tubin
Beethoven
Respighi
Mahler
Ravel
Prokofiev
Villa-Lobos
Bruckner
The ones that I absolutely share, plus at least some other names, like:

Bartók   
Berkeley
Brian
Debussy
Falla
Gershwin
Guarnieri
Holmboe
Holst
Honegger
Kinsella
Kodály
Pärt
Pierné
Stravinsky
Vasks
... music is not only an 'entertainment', nor a mere luxury, but a necessity of the spiritual if not of the physical life, an opening of those magic casements through which we can catch a glimpse of that country where ultimate reality will be found.    RVW, 1948

SymphonicAddict

Quote from: Christo on December 23, 2018, 03:23:27 PM
The ones that I absolutely share, plus at least some other names, like:

Bartók   
Berkeley
Brian
Debussy
Falla
Gershwin
Guarnieri
Holmboe
Holst

Honegger
Kinsella
Kodály
Pärt
Pierné
Stravinsky
Vasks


Quote from: kyjo on December 23, 2018, 03:02:36 PM
In some sort of order:

Sibelius
Atterberg
Rachmaninov
Dvořák
Shostakovich

Brahms
Mahler
Ravel
Vaughan Williams
Braga Santos

Prokofiev
Saint-Saëns
Arnold
Nielsen
Barber

Elgar
Schubert
Martinů
Hanson
Poulenc

Respighi
Ginastera
Bruckner
Grieg
Janáček

I could/should have included those highlights, but just 25 is unfair!

musicrom

I keep track of my Pandora and Spotify likes, and based on that, here are my top 25:

1.   Ludwig van Beethoven
2.   Jean Sibelius
3.   Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov
4.   Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky
5.   Antonín Dvořák
6.   Frederic Chopin
7.   Sergei Prokofiev
8.   Felix Mendelssohn
9.   Dmitri Shostakovich
10.   Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
11.   Johann Sebastian Bach
12.   Camille Saint-Saëns
13.   Bedřich Smetana
14.   Sergei Rachmaninoff
15.   Gustav Mahler
16.   Edward Elgar
17.   Igor Stravinsky
18.   Johannes Brahms
19.   Franz Schubert
20.   Max Bruch
21.   Gioachino Rossini
22.   Mikhail Glinka
23.   Robert Schumann
24.   Alexander Glazunov
25.   Niccolo Paganini

I don't know that this is the list I would have come up with myself, but it's much easier to do it this way, haha.

vandermolen

#178
New Year List:

Vaughan Williams
Shostakovich
Walton
Miaskovsky
Popov
Tubin
Rosenberg
Braga Santos
Alwyn
Bax
Arnell
Bate
Glazunov
Ivanovs
Rootham
Diamond
Sibelius
Bliss
Honegger
Tournemire
Pettersson
Rawsthorne
Madetoja
Havergal Brian
Copland
"Courage is going from failure to failure without losing enthusiasm" (Churchill).

'The test of a work of art is, in the end, our affection for it, not our ability to explain why it is good' (Stanley Kubrick).

Florestan

#179
Quote from: Florestan on October 04, 2016, 02:36:50 AM
In chronological order

Bach
D. Scarlatti
Vivaldi
Haydn
Boccherini
Mozart
Beethoven
von Weber
Schubert
Berlioz
Mendelssohn
Schumann
Chopin
Liszt
Brahms
Tchaikovsky
Dvorak
Mahler
Debussy
Rachmaninoff
Ravel
Medtner
Enescu
Bartok
Villa-Lobos
Prokofiev
Shostakovich

That´s 27 but really couldn´t decide which one to exclude --- actually, I could have added at least 25 more.  :D

Two years later: here is my Top 25 non-Austrian & non-German, in batches of five (more or less):

Vivaldi
D. Scarlatti
Boccherini
Clementi
Paganini

Chopin
Tellefsen
Saint-Saens
Vieuxtemps
Faure
Debussy

Tchaikovsky
Rachmaninoff
Arensky
Liadov
Medtner
Bortkiewicz
Moszkowski

Field
Ireland
Bax
Moeran
Bowen
Cyril Scott

Grieg
Dvorak
Sibelius
Granados
Albeniz


8)













Every kind of music is good, except the boring kind. — Rossini