Looking for a name...

[indutrial]

I remember not too long ago reading about some British pianist/composer who had completed something crazy like 100-110 sonatas in the late 20th century. Does anyone know who this is?

[mattgreenecomposer]

this may be way off but I'll give it a shot...
Are you sure your not thinking of D. Scarlatti?  He had great success with his sonata's in London and he composed over 500 of them.  Of course, he was born in 1685, but some people think his music has a modern sound.
mattgreenecomposer.com

[dnephi]

Scarlatti was Italian.

Anyways, I remember reading in Hinson's book about a modern composer who had written more like 18 or 20 sonatas. I can look for that later.

[indutrial]

I found out who it was. Guy's name is John White. He's done over 100 sonatas now, though many are very short in length. Ian Pace has played a lot of his stuff.

[invictious]

Pssh.

Post some recordings or videos of his compositions? It's quality, no quantity.

[indutrial]

I don't think many of them have been recorded at all, at least from a cursory search on the net. I agree that quality is everything, but I've been impressed by so many quality composers who manage to somehow write their asses off. Denmark's Neils Viggo Bentzon comes to mind as a twentieth century pianist whose sonatas remained interesting and intelligent after he surpassed writing 20 of them (alongside 9-10 concertos and 15-18 books of modern preludes and fugues). At the same time, a great composer like Bartok or Henri Dutilleux can blow your mind with one sonata a piece. I feel like most of the worst quantity-over-quality composers came from past centuries, when the pieces adhered to more rules. For that reason, while I certainly appreciate Scarlatti and Haydn, I tend to blank out after hearing 3 or 4 of their sonatas. In the twentieth century, there is certainly a fair share of prolific composers (like Darius Milhaud and Shostakovich), but their 'quantity' boasts some real wealth.

[ahinton]

Jonathan Powell has played some of them and participate in John White's 70th birthday celebrations last year; he will be including White's Sonata No. 138 in his 22 June 2007 recital at St. John's, Smith Square, London, along with Skryabin's Sonata No. 8, Ives's The Celestial Railroad, Alkan's Symphonie, Albeniz's Azulejos, the world première of Sorabji's piano transription of the closing scene from Strauss's Salome and my own 3rd and 4th sonatas.

White has written about 165 piano sonatas as of now, I believe.

Best,

Alistair

[soliloquy]

I randomly don't really like White's piano sonatas.  They're sort of boring, in my opinion.  A lot of nothing.

[indutrial]

to the best of my knowledge from searching around on the net, less than 25 of those numerous pieces have been recorded. Is White's music published through any typesetting outfit? For someone with an output that vast who can attract piano-playing mavericks like Powell and Pace, it'd be a shame if his music remained so far below the radar.