Contemporary composers who've made an impression on you

[TheGSMoeller]

Pascal Dusapin

https://www.youtube.com/v/KZn8ATNyM1M

Galim, flute concerto

Awesome. Dusapin is definitely one of the best composing today.

[Ken B]

All the known minimalists. A few lesser known too

Ten Holt if not in the above. Koehne. Rautavaara, Sallinen. Boulez in a bad way. Anyone left from Darmstadt, in a bad way. Sondheim. Bach, who is immortal.

[San Antone]

Awesome. Dusapin is definitely one of the best composing today.

I agree.  Dusapin and G.F. Haas are two composers who are, I think, doing some really good work in the last few years. 

[San Antone]

Georg Friedrich Haas - limited approximations (2010)

https://www.youtube.com/v/1KAskQC5wgA

limited approximations does not tell a story. As with all my compositions, there is also no formal development or traditional formal structure. Contrasting elements alternate with one another -- moments of smoothness and friction. "Pseudo-glissandi" in the pianos arrive unexpectedly at overtone chords. Apparently stable constellations of intervals begin to falter as the twelfth-tones merge.

The spectral, telescoping chords of the pianos are taken up by the orchestra, over and over again. In my early works I had to limit myself to a few basic tones, out of respect for what was practically realisable: in vain makes do with only the 12 tones of the traditionally tuned scale. Natures mortes uses only six different overtone chords, of which four are based on tones found in the traditionally tuned system. In limited approximations, thanks to the pianos, the whole world of sound is open to me. A microtonal countermovement is composed into the final third of the piece: from the fifth C'-G' to the neutral second between the E sharp raised by a twelfth-tone and the F lowered by a sixth-tone. Thus 10 different intervals arise, each of which becomes the centre of an overtone chord. This section last more than 100 bars. Or: an overtone chord, starting fortissimo, rings out, is picked up in the orchestra, swells again to a crescendo, which masks the start of a new overtone chord in the pianos, only the reverberation can be heard, it rings out, is taken up by the orchestra, swells ... etc.

Or: two different overtone chords, based on tones that sound entirely warped next to one another, fade in and out ... etc.
Melodies recur again and again, wandering from piano to piano -- as tremolo, as individual tones, as overtone chords.
Or: an interval (for example the fifth C-G) sounds in all octaves -- but some of these octaves are expanded by a twelfth of a tone. The ear corrects the chord (or tries to correct it) -- looked at horizontally, the intervals oscillate in twelve-tone steps, but stay in the same place after all ...

Towards the end of the piece (after an "aria" of overtones) the principle that the traditional 12-tone system makes overtone scales sound flat is reversed: the overtones are intoned (approximately) correctly -- but the bass tones are blurred together in a twelfth-tone cluster. The string instruments then maintain the overtone chord built up in the "aria" -- uninterrupted by the "intermezzo" that follows, in which the pianos adjust the chord in parallel twelfth-tone intervals.

As central as the work with overtone chords is for limited approximations, at first it is built out of processes of diffusion, clouding, friction. As the piece progresses, the music returns to this initial situation, as if by accident -- reminiscences, relapses, contrasts.

At the end, a quotation from Ivan Vishnegradsky's harmonies (against the relics of an overtone chord in the strings) -- not with the clarity of his composition "arc-en-ciel" (I was able to première this work for 6 pianos tuned in twelfth-tone intervals in 1988) but in the clouding over of twelfth-tone chords gliding gently towards the heavens. Even this approximation is only a limited one.  ~ Georg Friedrich Haas

[not edward]

Georg Friedrich Haas - limited approximations (2010)

https://www.youtube.com/v/1KAskQC5wgA

Great piece, and the microtonally tuned pianos produce some staggering sonic effects.

If it's not been posted already, I'd like to add Natures Mortes, which I think is an even finer work:

https://www.youtube.com/v/7W1FbNmNwbwhttps://www.youtube.com/v/LVl-d8nE9ckhttps://www.youtube.com/v/YjgVxKeTL_g

(It's posted in three segments, hence the three links above.)

[Ken B]

Agree. Though the mention of John Cage on any music board tends to flame up. Which I think is a inevitable result of his fundamental music aesthetic. Just realize that the guy was yanking you around, either you find it amusing or you hate it, and go on.....

Yup. I was surprised how much I liked the prepared piano stuff. The discs on Naxos are fantastic.
I also think the country would be served by having the president perform 4'33" in place of the SOTU.

[jochanaan]

Yup. I was surprised how much I liked the prepared piano stuff. The discs on Naxos are fantastic.
I also think the country would be served by having the president perform 4'33" in place of the SOTU.

Or better yet, have it performed in place of The Star-Spangled Banana at ball games!

[Ken B]

Lubomyr Melnyk, KMH

I progammed that when I was in radio.

This is from a scratchy vinyl
http://m.youtube.com/results?q=lubomyr%20melnyk%20kmh&sm=3

Available on cd

[Brahmsian]

Lubomyr Melnyk, KMH

I progammed that when I was in radio.

This is from a scratchy vinyl
http://m.youtube.com/results?q=lubomyr%20melnyk%20kmh&sm=3

Available on cd

I've listened to several of his works, especially some of the string quartets.  Many of his CDs are available from our local library.

A lot of Ukrainian folk themed music.  Great stuff! 

[San Antone]

No longer living but Aldo Clementi is a composer who has made a deep impression on me

http://www.youtube.com/v/tIrPsSyUelo

Aldo Clementi (25 May 1925 – 3 March 2011) was born in Catania, Italy. He studied the piano, graduating in 1946. His studies in composition began in 1941, and his teachers included Alfredo Sangiorgi and Goffredo Petrassi. After receiving his diploma in 1954, he attended the Darmstadt summer courses from 1955 to 1962. Important influences during this period included meeting Bruno Maderna in 1956, and working at the electronic music studio of the Italian radio broadcaster RAI in Milan.

In 1983 David Fanning described Clementi's style of decelerating canons as "sharing in the widespread post-serial depression of the 1970s", while in 1988 Paul Griffiths referred to the "Alexandrian simplicity of his solution to the current confusion in music. Clementi himself described his works as "an extremely dense counterpoint, relegating the parts to the shameful role of inaudible, cadaverous micro-organisms"

[Cato]

My brother sent me an audio-file a few years ago of Requiem for Icarus by Lera Auerbach.

http://www.youtube.com/v/Zyp3YwUYlK8

[Ken B]

Robert Moran

Here's a fairly recent piece http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uZ5nTzv--k4

[Christo]

Completely overwhelmed by the symphonies (ten, at the moment) by Octagenarian John Kinsella (b. 1932). Ranging from Bruckner and Sibelius to rich orchestrations that remind us of Dutilleux, even. The most impressive cycle I encountered since Tubin, Braga Santos, Bates, Englund, and worthy of a comparison with the other great symphonists. 

[Brian]

My brother sent me an audio-file a few years ago of Requiem for Icarus by Lera Auerbach.

Her Cello Sonata and 24 Preludes for cello are remarkable works!

[EigenUser]

I've mentioned this before, but seeing Steven Mackey's string quartet Ars Moriendi: Nine Tableaux on the Art of Dying Well made a very profound impression on me when I was in 10th grade (2007). An extremely personal piece for me since it was about his father dying of a heart attack (my father survived a heart attack when I was 8 years old).