Top 5 Non-European, Non-USA Composers

[Florestan]

Have at it!

[Mirror Image]

I think you're going to need more specific here, Andrei.

[Brahmsian]

Eckhart-Gramatte - Canada
Villa-Lobos - Brazil
Revueltas - Mexico
Gubaiduilina - Asian part of Russia
Estacio - Canada

[Mirror Image]

Alright, since Ray chimed in, I think I have a better understanding of what is meant by non-European (incl. Russians), so here are my picks:

Villa-Lobos (Brazil)
Ginastera (Argentina)
Revueltas (Mexico)
Chávez (Mexico)
Takemitsu (Japan)

[Florestan]

Alright, since Ray chimed in, I think I have a better understanding of what is meant by non-European (incl. Russians), so here are my picks:

Villa-Lobos
Ginastera
Revueltas
Chávez
Takemitsu

You got the idea alright, John.

[ritter]

Juan José Castro (Argentina)
Alberto Ginastera (Argentina)
Antônio Carlos Gomes (Brazil)
Heitor Villa-Lobos (Brazil)
Carlos Chávez (Mexico)

[amw]

Honestly, never thought about this much before. Provisional "country favourites" might include:
Alberto Ginastera (Argentina)
Liza Lim (Australia)
José Antônio de Almeida Prado (Brazil)
Chiyoko Szlavnics (Canada)
Jo Kondo (Japan)
Unsuk Chin (Korea*)
Julio Estrada (Mexico)
Denis Smalley (New Zealand)
Charles Uzor (Nigeria)
Samir Odeh-Tamimi (Palestine*)
José Maceda (Philippines)
Zeynep Gedizlioğlu (Turkey)

...but a top 5 would probably double up on Canadian composers: Ginastera, Lim, Kondo, Szlavnics and Claude Vivier. Linda Catlin Smith (also Canada) would be the next runner-up.

If you exclude the Americas altogether it becomes more interesting.

[Brian]

To make this deliberately harder, I'm going to count Samuel Coleridge-Taylor as European and count 100% European ancestry people in non-European countries (e.g. Mignone, Piazzolla, Ginastera, Sculthorpe) as being European as well. And I'll make my fellow Turks European.

This is not to make a statement or critique others, just to set myself an extra hard challenge and bend my brain around a bit.

1. Qigang Chen
2. Agustín Barrios Mangoré (I think; biographies online are spotty, but one says Guarani was his native language rather than Spanish)
3. Carlos Chávez
4. Elena Kats-Chernin (Uzbek-Australian-Jewish)
5. Reza Vali

Additionally a number of Japanese composers have left good impressions, including Komei Abe, Toru Takemitsu, and Hiroshi Ohguri.

Borderline cases excluded to avoid controversy:
Gabriela Lena Frank (half Eastern European, half Peruvian-Chinese, but also American)
Avner Dorman (Israeli, now employed by a USA music school)
Thomas Oboe Lee (fully Chinese, longtime USA resident)

[Florestan]

My list

Ernesto Lecuona
Agustin Barrios
Heitor Villa-Lobos
Ernesto Nazareth
Carlos Guastavino

Honorable mentions: Juventino Rosas, Enrique Oswald, Alberto Williams

[The new erato]

Reynaldo Hahn was born in Venezuela....

[Florestan]

Reynaldo Hahn was born in Venezuela....

...and spent most of his life and his whole career in France. Nope, doesn't qualify, sorry. 

[Symphonic Addict]

Villa-Lobos
Revueltas
Ginastera
Yoshimatsu
Saygun

[The new erato]

...and spent most of his life and his whole career in France. Nope, doesn't qualify, sorry. 

Ok, so if country of birth don"t matter, then Paul Ben-Ham.

Villa-Lobos and Ginastera as well. Carl Vine.

Would Ahmet Saygun be admissible (ie are you a fan of the Turks    )?

[SimonNZ]

Denis Smalley (New Zealand)

Interesting. I was unaware of this composer.

[springrite]

Gubaidulina
Takemitsu
Isang Kim
Revueltas
Tan Dun

(I also considered Sorabji, Chen Yi (and her husband Zhou Long) and Ginastera)

[Maestro267]

Alberto Ginastera (Argentina)
Heitor Villa-Lobos (Brazil)
Toru Takemitsu (Japan)
Carlos Chavez (Mexico)
Brett Dean (Australia)

[Florestan]

Ok, so if country of birth don"t matter, then Paul Ben-Ham.

Born and raised in Europe, fully formed there as a composer and conductor... I'd rather let you have Hahn than Ben-Haim.

Would Ahmet Saygun be admissible (ie are you a fan of the Turks    )?

I have no problem whatsoever with the Turks, why would you ask that?

And yes, Saygun is admissible, given that most of the Turkish territory lies in Asia.

[Brian]

Born and raised in Europe, fully formed there as a composer and conductor... I'd rather let you have Hahn than Ben-Haim.

I have no problem whatsoever with the Turks, why would you ask that?

And yes, Saygun is admissible, given that most of the Turkish territory lies in Asia.

Surely he was jokingly referring to the political debate of whether Turkey belongs in Europe. Saygun is from Izmir, which makes him officially Asian. 

[Florestan]

Surely he was jokingly referring to the political debate of whether Turkey belongs in Europe.

Geographically speaking, Turkey is an Asian country, most of its territory is in fact called Asia Minor. Politically though I've never seen it refered as such; it's considered as belonging to Europe. They even tried to join the EU until a few years ago but I don't know if they still want it.

Saygun is from Izmir, which makes him officially Asian. 

Exactly. 

[The new erato]

OK, then I guess Sculthorpe would be my 5th.

I have little experience with Japanes/Korean composers.