The Most Bittersweet Composer?

[Que]

Bittersweet?  Brahms, obviously... 

[Roasted Swan]

Noel Coward

[kyjo]

I'm not sure about "most bittersweet" as this is an emotion that many composers seem to have conveyed in many of their works, but two that come to mind immediately are Barber and Fauré.

Like, for example, Must the winter come so soon? from Barber's Vanessa:

https://www.youtube.com/v/XDZxeq61ZNs

Great choices, John! So many of Barber's slow movements, in particular, have a wonderfully nostalgic, bittersweet quality to them.

[kyjo]

Fartein Valen

Uhhhh, I think you have a different definition of "bittersweet" than the rest of us in this thread, Cesar! To me, "bittersweet" describes music that is quite beautiful and melodic but tinged with melancholy/regret/nostalgia/etc.

[Mirror Image]

Great choices, John! So many of Barber's slow movements, in particular, have a wonderfully nostalgic, bittersweet quality to them.

Absolutely, Kyle.

[Symphonic Addict]

Uhhhh, I think you have a different definition of "bittersweet" than the rest of us in this thread, Cesar! To me, "bittersweet" describes music that is quite beautiful and melodic but tinged with melancholy/regret/nostalgia/etc.

Haha I was wrong with good reason.

Ok, for me that is Rachmaninov. No contest.

[Florestan]

Uhhhh, I think you have a different definition of "bittersweet" than the rest of us in this thread, Cesar! To me, "bittersweet" describes music that is quite beautiful and melodic but tinged with melancholy/regret/nostalgia/etc.

Exactly.

[amw]

Honestly the first composer that comes to mind is Poulenc. Particularly Dialogues des carmélites, the organ and piano concertos, the late wind sonatas (and the cello sonata), the sonata for two pianos... also a good number of the mélodies. Schumann is my second option and I would highlight in that case most of the 1840 song cycles (especially the Kerner-Lieder op. 35 and Eichendorff-Lieder op. 39), the Humoreske and the Davidsbündlertänze. In fact if I had to explain the concept of bittersweetness to someone unfamiliar with it I would play through the Humoreske for them.

[LKB]

George Butterworth.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Butterworth

There was a time when l might have programmed A Shropshire Lad for one of my recitals back in the '90's. But the simple fact is that l respond so emotionally to the songs that an acceptable performance would probably have been impossible, such is the effect this doomed composer has upon me.

The loss of Butterworth occasions disagreement, with some maintaining that he would have established himself as the equal of Vaughan Williams, and others opining that he was losing interest in composing before he was killed, and wouldn't have been much of a factor in the development of 20th Century music.

I only know this much: when l hear a worthy recording of The Banks of Green Willow, I recognize it as the work of a master.