Favorite Composers

[soliloquy]

Easy one that everyone can answer


Dutilleux, Roslavets, Prin, Mosolov, Scriabin, Sorabji, Ferneyhough, Finnissy, Boulez, Penderecki, Lutoslawski, Bartok, Liszt, Alkan, Schnittke, Ginastera, Varese, Sciarrino, Xenakis, Donatoni, Vine, Rzewski, Rautavaara and Britten.

[jre58591]

ill see if i can keep my list short.

alkan, barber, beethoven, bolcom, bortkiewicz, chopin, dohnányi, ginastera, kapustin, ligeti, liszt, lutosławski, medtner, messiaen, prokofiev, rachmaninoff, rautavaara, ravel, respighi, scriabin, szymanowski, vine, vladigerov.

its a bit of a mixed bag which changes almost daily.

[beethoven2]

TOP 3:

First: Beethoven
Second: Chopin
Third (changes quite frequently): Liszt

[burstroman]

Bach
Schubert
Mozart

[kreso]

Bach, Mozart, Beethoven, Shubert, Schumann, Chopin, Brahms, Liszt, Chopin, Rachmaninov, Grieg, Tchaikovsky, Scirabin, Schostakovich, Prokofiev, Ravel...

[ahinton]

Easy one that everyone can answer


Dutilleux, Roslavets, Prin, Mosolov, Scriabin, Sorabji, Ferneyhough, Finnissy, Boulez, Penderecki, Lutoslawski, Bartok, Liszt, Alkan, Schnittke, Ginastera, Varese, Sciarrino, Xenakis, Donatoni, Vine, Rzewski, Rautavaara and Britten.

Interesting that you include Roslavets in your list; it also prompts me to ask if you have yet heard the relatively recent Hyperion disc (CDA67484) of the early orchestral symphonic poem In the Hours of the New Moon and (as the main work) the world première of the recently discovered Chamber Symphony (BBCSSO/Volkov). The latter work, which comes from the mid-1930s (i.e. at around the time that Shostakovich was writing his Fourth Symphony) is a fascinating piece occupying almost an hour and whose frequent recourse to what someone once described as "neuræsthenic counterpoint" makes parts of it sound almost as though it might be Schönberg's Kammersymphonie Nr. 1½. I'd be interested to know if you've gotten this yet and, if so, what you make of it; it's scandalous that music of this quality has lain almost entirely ignored for so long and it is certainly in many ways quite unusual for a Russian composer of the time.

Best,

Alistair

[mephisto]

Scandalous in what sense?
1. The music is so great it. Why shouldn't be more well known?
2. Musicians are so lazy, why not play Roslavets instead of another Chopin(Bach, Debussy, Mozart, Beethoven.....) piece?

The way I see it no2 can not be justified. Since most classical musicians would not even know who Roslavets is - and I wouldn't blame them for it. Pluss the fact that so many people find music without clear tonality difficult to listen to. Roslavets if I remember correctly was send to Siberia or some other remote place, and was made some kind non-person. His music was never played after some of his music was considered "art for the sake of art". Since so few people played Roslavets how could people now if his music was great? Through scores, yes, but his scores were very very rare. The other opption was through recordings or live performances. Sadly they were of course non-existent.

The only not-so-reasent Roslavets recording I am aware of is of his Sonata for viola & piano (1930) by Mikhail Muntian and Yuri Bashmet. That is one recording, so you can't really blame musicians for not knowing about his music. I.M.O, that basicly rules out no1 to. Because extremely few people would know that his music is great.

So in my oppinion the fact that his music is so rarely played is not scandalous, but much more sad. You can't really blame musicians for the fact that his music is so little known. Of course I wish that his music should become more well known.

Back to the real questions:
Best living composer: Rautavaara
Dead: There are so many of them I couldn't care less to list my favourites.

[xire]

Classical:

- Scriabin
- Felix Blumenfeld
- Chopin
- Rachmaninoff
- Ravel



Non-classical:

- Nobuo Uematsu
- Koji Kondo
- Jan A. P. Kaczmarek
- Yann Tiersen

[ahinton]

Scandalous in what sense?

Simply in that so much of it was so studiously ignored for so long, even in the immediate aftermath of the late-Soviet and immediate post-Soviet thaw.

most classical musicians would not even know who Roslavets is - and I wouldn't blame them for it.

They'd have considerably less excuse not to know these days, since Hamelin has recorded the complete available piano music and others of his chamber works have also been recorded, including violin sonatas and piano trios.

Pluss the fact that so many people find music without clear tonality difficult to listen to.

There are literally thousands of composers whose music may not necessarily fall into the category of "clearly tonal" but who nonetheless have long been far better represented on disc and in the concert hall than Roslavets.

Roslavets if I remember correctly was send to Siberia or some other remote place, and was made some kind non-person.

Siberia is almost always the place where most people's minds turn in such instances; Roslavets spent time not in Siberia but in Uzbekistan, actually.

His music was never played after some of his music was considered "art for the sake of art". Since so few people played Roslavets how could people now if his music was great? Through scores, yes, but his scores were very very rare. The other opption was through recordings or live performances. Sadly they were of course non-existent.

Roslavets was indeed made to suffer appallingly and treated perhaps even worse than was Shostakovich (except that he didn't live quite as long as Shostakovich and state pillorying of him did not begin until he was well into his 40s, whereas Shostakovich fell foul of his governmental "masters" before he even attained the ago of 30). Roslavets's reputation was nevertheless kept alive, as best it could be, by those distinguished musicians in the Soviet Union who knew at least something of what he was about.

The only not-so-reasent Roslavets recording I am aware of is of his Sonata for viola & piano (1930) by Mikhail Muntian and Yuri Bashmet. That is one recording, so you can't really blame musicians for not knowing about his music. I.M.O, that basicly rules out no1 to. Because extremely few people would know that his music is great.

As I mentioned earlier, the last decade or so has witnessed quite a revival of his work on disc and also a considerable amount of valuable research and score editing (particularly by the composer Raskatov).

So in my oppinion the fact that his music is so rarely played is not scandalous, but much more sad. You can't really blame musicians for the fact that his music is so little known. Of course I wish that his music should become more well known.

In addition to my other comments here, I still say that the neglect of Roslavets in the West was scandalous in the sense that the Soviet "masters" could not have prevented his work being played and recognised abroad, provided that it were made known outside Soviet Russia; Shostakovich himself was, after all, a figure with an immense international reputation that was already well established before the first Soviet clampdowns on the artistic achievements of Russian composers - and it never wavered at any time during the remainder of Shostakovich's life or since his death.

Best,

Alistair

[pianistimo]

interesting.  i think i've only seen roslavet's name in passing.  i really don't recall ever hearing any of his music. will have to go listen.

my favorite's in no particular order:

poulenc (this is listening - more than playing)
mac dowell
leroy anderson


i am particularly driven to listen to things that do seem to 'resolve' and yet have interesting harmonies and 'open' sounds.  my favorite music to play is probably different than to listen to.  i mean - i can barely play barber's nocturne - but i love it immensely.  i can, however play tonal music much easier.  therefore - mozart is most easily learnt and memorized.  and beethoven. 

it's funny though.  after many years - i can almost pick out notes that i do hear from the keyboard that are odd intervals in barber's music and not have to rely soley on reading the music.  i think to memorize well - one has to start challenging themselves to find the notes on the piano first - as much as possible.  it sort of 'sets' it in your mind.  where it is on the keyboard instead of 'on paper.'  even though we translate quickly.  to have a quick 'one step' is faster.

one last thing - i LOVE choral composers.  benjamin britten, charles ives, brahms, beethoven, poulenc, mozart - all the composers that write music for chorus, too - hold a facination for me.  to me - the voice is the most basic of all the instruments.  if you understand voice - you can do pretty much anything with melodies.  although - somehow chopin (did he write for voice?) seems to give the piano it's own voice.  that beautiful tenor voice.

[jre58591]

interesting.  i think i've only seen roslavet's name in passing.  i really don't recall ever hearing any of his music. will have to go listen.

do have a listen. before you run into trouble, his name is nikolai roslavets. dont leave that last s off.

[ahinton]

do have a listen.

Yes - do!

before you run into trouble, his name is nikolai roslavets. dont leave that last s off.

It would seem that they have the same grocer's apostrophes in Pennsylvania as they have in the old country - but then one may suppose that some of the actual groceries are the same or similar, too...

Best,

Alistair

[phil13]

Funny, I remember answering this at least twice before...

Beethoven, Chopin, Bowen, Scriabin, and Rachmaninoff share the No.1 spot.

Phil

[ahinton]

to have a quick 'one step' is faster.

Yikes! She's dancing again, folks!

to me - the voice is the most basic of all the instruments.  if you understand voice - you can do pretty much anything with melodies.  although - somehow chopin (did he write for voice?) seems to give the piano it's own voice.

OK, so now we're off dancing and on to a Pole - sorry, I mean on to singing. Yes, Chopin was a most vocally oriented composer; his love of Bellini's music was just one example of what singing meant to him, although his only known actual vocal music was a series of songs (some 17 of them) which are of comparatively little significance in his output (Liszt did not entirely ignore his friend's material when transcribing, however)...

Best,

Alistair

[pianistimo]

thanks jre, for the spelling of n. roslavets.  i shall remember that.

ahinton, you did it again!  must you remind me at every turn.  or should i not use the word turn.  i cannot say anything anymore that remotely sounds pol -ish.  and, yet...you add so much spice to the music conversation.  bellini.  seventeen songs that liszt transcribed.  there's so much i haven't seen yet.  excepting of course jake's little contribution to the 'say something interesting' thread.  oh. yes - jake.  have at it.  count the number of posts to that really scandalous reply you made there.  i was peering through squinted eyes.  wondering how we got from pyramids to chicks and kitties. 

[ahinton]

ahinton, you did it again!  must you remind me at every turn.

That depends on how - and how often - you turn when - oh, never mind!

i cannot say anything anymore that remotely sounds pol -ish.

That would rule out your ever mentioning any of Chopin's Polonaises - or even that wonderful piece by the same composer with which Jonathan Powell opened his recital in which he premièred my Sequentia Claviensis - in other words, the Polonaise-Fantaisie. This would surely be a pity!

and, yet...you add so much spice to the music conversation.

One can but try...

Best,

Alistair

[pianistimo]

and how did that polonaise-fantasy go?  i would have really liked to hear the entire concert.  alas.  my son needing four wisdom teeth out - greatly impacted my planned trip.  i had already gotten the necessary passport picture and the airplane reservations.  just needed the ok on the money - which it was pretty cheap $425. or something for a trip to glasgow.  truly, i was a bit relieved to find out that i wasn't going though because november weather can be a bit cold in britain - and i don't like travelling alone.  when you mentioned south america - that sounded a bit better.   you know, some warm weather.

how warm does it get in the summer in london?  maybe this summer my aunt and i will attempt some sort of an escape.  too hard to travel with a five year old.  on the other hand - she might well enjoy it - as the other two.  the 18 year old would be looking for a place to bury his report cards - the 12 year old - for anything artsy  - and the 5 year old for anything musical and artsy.  yes.  my girls are trained well.  my son is probably the only one that could read the maps well enough to get us from A to B.  my husband?  well, he might or might not have to stay home.  it depends.  sometimes i get him excited about travelling.  other times he just wants to stay home and keep his work schedule.  (he's already been to france two or three times).

favorite composer:  alistair hinton  - i know this because you put so much personality into yourself - that your music must surely be full of personality, too.

[ahinton]

and how did that polonaise-fantasy go?

I guess the correct answer would be to put the entire score of it here, but I can't do that. No, seriously - it went exceptionally well.

i would have really liked to hear the entire concert.  alas.  my son needing four wisdom teeth out - greatly impacted my planned trip.  i had already gotten the necessary passport picture and the airplane reservations.  just needed the ok on the money - which it was pretty cheap $425. or something for a trip to glasgow.  truly, i was a bit relieved to find out that i wasn't going though because november weather can be a bit cold in britain - and i don't like travelling alone.  when you mentioned south america - that sounded a bit better.   you know, some warm weather.

No, I know that you couldn't make it for family reasons, so don;t worry about it.

how warm does it get in the summer in london?

It can get close to 40 degrees, but the main thing about London in the height of summer is humidity.

favorite composer:  alistair hinton  - i know this because you put so much personality into yourself - that your music must surely be full of personality, too.

It's very sweet of you to say so - but I really do think that you ought to hear at least a couple of things of mine before you can be sure!

Best,

Alistair

[jre58591]

pianistimo: do hear some of mr. hinton's work. i particularly enjoyed his massive variations and fugue on a theme of grieg.

[phil13]

Do you have a link to a sample of that? Or is it only available through a recording?

Phil

[jre58591]

Do you have a link to a sample of that? Or is it only available through a recording?

hah i knew that would tickle a few grieg lovers' fancies. i dont have a link. i have the actual recording. donna amato recorded it. if you check online, im sure you can find a small sample.

[ahinton]

hah i knew that would tickle a few grieg lovers' fancies. i dont have a link. i have the actual recording. donna amato recorded it. if you check online, im sure you can find a small sample.

Thank you for your kind words - which, since you have posted them, prompt me to mention that I have just heard that they are scheduled for performance on 13 November this year in a recital at the Royal Academy of Music in Esbjerg, Denmark by Jørgen Hald Nielsen.

Best,

Alistair

[soliloquy]

Interesting that you include Roslavets in your list; it also prompts me to ask if you have yet heard the relatively recent Hyperion disc (CDA67484) of the early orchestral symphonic poem In the Hours of the New Moon and (as the main work) the world première of the recently discovered Chamber Symphony (BBCSSO/Volkov). The latter work, which comes from the mid-1930s (i.e. at around the time that Shostakovich was writing his Fourth Symphony) is a fascinating piece occupying almost an hour and whose frequent recourse to what someone once described as "neuræsthenic counterpoint" makes parts of it sound almost as though it might be Schönberg's Kammersymphonie Nr. 1½. I'd be interested to know if you've gotten this yet and, if so, what you make of it; it's scandalous that music of this quality has lain almost entirely ignored for so long and it is certainly in many ways quite unusual for a Russian composer of the time.

Best,

Alistair

Nope.  I've actually heard an embarrassingly small amount of his work, although I love almost everything he's done.

[jre58591]

id love to hear that new hyperion disk. the sample of the scherzo from the chamber symphony on the website was stunning. i too have loved almost everything ive heard by roslavets. are there any new projects that are in progress that you know of, alistair? his chamber music is some of the most interesting i have come across.

[ahinton]

id love to hear that new hyperion disk. the sample of the scherzo from the chamber symphony on the website was stunning. i too have loved almost everything ive heard by roslavets. are there any new projects that are in progress that you know of, alistair? his chamber music is some of the most interesting i have come across.

Not at the moment - although that's not to say that no such projects may be under way. It has taken an embarrassingly long time for Roslavets to be recognised as what he seems to me to be - the most gifted of all of those immediate post-Skryabin Russian so-called avant-garde composers whose music fell foul, to greater or lesser degree, of the Soviet authorities. Myaskovsky, who more or less successfully put himself through all maner of hoops for the purpose of trying to maintain a safe distance between his work and Soviet wrath, admired Roslavets's work and knew him parsonally - Shostakovich is reported as having told all his students about Roslavets in glowing terms (although this would almost inevitably have had to be on a "you didn't hear that from me", basis, so much was Roslavets persona ingratissima in Russia).

Some of Roslavets's chamber music has already been recorded and there is also, of coruse, the CD of what is thought to be his complete surviving piano music played by Marc-André Hamelin. The works on the recent Hyperion CD are both first recordings and recent discoveries; one wonders what more as yet unknown work by Roslavets might surface, for it is undoubtefly the case that a fairly substantial amount of his music has been "lost").

Personally, I find the close of the first movement of the Chamber Symphony, as well as the somewhat similar close of the entire work, disappointingly prosaic and rather bland, in stark contrast to just about the whole of the remainder of it which is so remarkable it would have given the young Schönberg a run for his money; what a pity, indeed, that Schönberg appears not to have known about this piece (or other works by Roslavets)! - indeed, one might even be tempted to wonder if he actually DID know about it and that it motivated him to return to his own Second Chamber Symphony...

Best,

Alistair

[moi_not_toi]

Baroque:
Vivaldi
Bach
Telemann

Classical:
Mozart
Beethoven
Haydn
Handel

Romantic and Whatever else:
Verdi
Liszt
Chopin
ALKAN!!!!!!
Thalberg
Rachmaninov
Scriabin
DEBUSSY!
Ravel

Modern:
Glass
Adams
Cage
Sorabji
Whatisname that wrote PIr^2 and Requiem for a Dream
Mucizynski
Rochberg

& Last but not least

Alistair Hinton!


there are tons more, but I can't remember them all.

[musique_lover]

chopin, debussy, beethoven, liszt (:

[imbetter]

The Alistair Hinton string quintet is a phenomenal piece of music.

[amelialw]

Mozart
Haydn
Beethoven
Chopin
Mendelssohn
Schumann
Debussy
Rachmaninoff
Prokofiev

[ctrastevere]

I'll narrow it down to a few: Mahler, Beethoven, Sorabji, Ives, Rachmaninoff, Liszt, Ravel, Alkan.

It's good to see all the mentioning of Sorabji on this forum -- apparently I've done my job.

[mcgillcomposer]

1) Beethoven
2) Bartók
3) Brahms
4) Kagel

[pianochick93]

Hmm...To play:

Debussy (THE BEST!!!!!)
Grieg (died 100 years ago today)
Mozart (almost the best)
Bach
Beethoven

To listen:

The same as above but Mendelssohn as well, and other classical composers, all of them
I will listen to almost anything though, so long as it's not boring, and it doesn't clash/have brass instruments.

[thalberg]

My fav is Bach.