# Definitive music biographies



## RogerWaters (Feb 13, 2017)

Hello dear forum members. I am seeking your help with classic books on the following composers. Thank!

Bach
Mozart
Beethoven
Brahms


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## consuono (Mar 27, 2020)

Bach: _Johann Sebastian Bach: The Culmination of an Era_ by Karl Geiringer; _Johann Sebastian Bach: The Learned Musician_ by Christoph Wolff; _Bach: Music in the Castle of Heaven_ by John Eliot Gardiner.

Mozart: the only ones I'm familiar with are the ones by Alfred Einstein and Maynard Solomon, so caveat lector I guess

Beethoven: _Beethoven: Anguish and Triumph _ by Jan Swafford

Brahms: don't know any


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## Guest002 (Feb 19, 2020)

I've found a "definitive" biography of Bach hard to come by, presumably since the biographical minutiae are harder to come by. John Eliot Gardiner's "Music in the Castle of Heaven" is probably the best I've got.

For Mozart, I enjoyed Piero Melograni's "Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart" (translated by Lydia Cochrane), University of Chicago Press, 2007.

For Beethoven, I only have the New Grove's "Beethoven" by Joseph Kerman and Alan Tyson (1980). It is basic 'fact-ticking' stuff, but good enough for what I needed it for.

I don't have a recommendation for Brahms, because I try not to let his music in the house  (I joke, but only just).


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## pjang23 (Oct 8, 2009)

For Brahms, check out his biography by Jan Swafford.


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## flamencosketches (Jan 4, 2019)

pjang23 said:


> For Brahms, check out his biography by Jan Swafford.


Came in here to suggest this. I'm about 1/3 of the way through and wow, I am extremely impressed. What a bio!


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## Animal the Drummer (Nov 14, 2015)

pjang23 said:


> For Brahms, check out his biography by Jan Swafford.


Absolutely. Marvellous book which actually predates the Beethoven one by several years.


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## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

Just reading Swafford on Beethoven. Highly recommended!


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## RogerWaters (Feb 13, 2017)

Thanking you.

So far I’m thinking Swafford for Beethoven and Brahms (easy to remember the one author), Wolff for Bach (as i’d heard of it previously, in addition to present recommendation). 

Looks like three seperate recommendations for Mozart with nothing to break the symmetry yet!


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## MarkW (Feb 16, 2015)

For Beethoven:

If you only want one: Louis Lockwood

Facts only: Thayer (2 volumes)

Interesting but with curious predispositions: Swafford, Solomon

A large compendium of various excerpts of opinions and analysis about life and works: Biancolli, "A Beethoven Companion'


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## Rogerx (Apr 27, 2018)

Perhaps this thread can help you also

https://www.talkclassical.com/composer-guestbooks/


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## RICK RIEKERT (Oct 9, 2017)

For Mozart it's Hermann Abert's _W.A. Mozart_, translated from the German by Stewart Spencer and edited by Cliff Eisen. Abert's monumental work is "the fullest account of the composer's life and a detailed analysis of his operas, symphonies, concerti and chamber music. But what makes it stand above all others is its forensic examination of Mozart's personality and its relation to his music."


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## Caroline (Oct 27, 2018)

If you are starting with Beethoven - something that is interesting and under 400 pp is the Solomon book. He has a bit of psychoanalysis in it - but it helps give perspective. It is a nice combination of biography and music.

For the biography on which 20th century bios have been based, look at Elliott Forbes Thayer's Life. It is 1100 pages and has a lengthy history, which I can (as others can likely) provide if you want. 

Lewis Lockwood's "Life and Music" alternates chapters with bio/music/bio/music and leaves the reader wanting if you want a good bio. 

The Swafford book is wonderful.

For two 19th century books - considered reliable - and written by people who knew Beethoven: "Beethoven Remembered: The Biographical Notes of Franz Wegeler and Ferdinand Ries" - foreword by Hogwood. Another book is "Memories of Beethoven" by Gerhard von Breuning (Solomon, ed.). 

Primary sources: You might also enjoy reading excerpts from Beethoven's letters and conversation books (see Dr. AC Kalilscher and also Hamburger).

For Mozart, Davenport is I think considered a benchmark. Solomon has done one, but I haven't read it. You might also enjoy some of Mozart's letters, as well.


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## 1996D (Dec 18, 2018)

Caroline said:


> The Swafford book is wonderful.


Swafford is a wretched man, what exactly do people see in him? Is it that he makes it seem as though Beethoven could've lived as his contemporary?

He transposes too much of his own life and his own society into what was such a different time, and understands nothing of the social and political atmosphere of Beethoven's time, nor of the mentality of the artist.


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## wkasimer (Jun 5, 2017)

Another vote for Swafford's biographies of Beethoven and Brahms. And I believe that he's working on a bio of Mozart.


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## MarkW (Feb 16, 2015)

1996D said:


> Swafford is a wretched man, what exactly do people see in him? Is it that he makes it seem as though Beethoven could've lived as his contemporary?
> 
> He transposes too much of his own life and his own society into what was such a different time, and understands nothing of the social and political atmosphere of Beethoven's time, nor of the mentality of the artist.


I was never blown away by Swafford either, but was hesitant to launch myself against the near universal approbation which those on this site shower him with. Luckily there was a deal on Amazon and I was able to get the Kindle edition for only a couple of bucks.


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## 1996D (Dec 18, 2018)

MarkW said:


> I was never blown away by Swafford either, but was hesitant to launch myself against the near universal approbation which those on this site shower him with. Luckily there was a deal on Amazon and I was able to get the Kindle edition for only a couple of bucks.


He's a modernist thinker and a boomer, and manages to add the flaws of both constructs to artists of a completely different time and mentality. The best biographies will always be those that are written shortly after the death of a person, without exception. Otherwise the political and social biases of a different era will disfigure all genuine essence.


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## Brahmsian Colors (Sep 16, 2016)

wkasimer said:


> Another vote for Swafford's biographies of Beethoven and Brahms. And I believe that he's working on a bio of Mozart.


Agree on the Swafford/Brahms book. Malcolm MacDonald's _Brahms_ is another good one, but Florence May's _The Life of Brahms_ in two volumes is the most personal. The author was both a piano student and friend of Brahms and Clara Schumann. She also socialized regularly with their closest friends.

I'm also looking forward to and have pre-ordered Swafford's new work, _Mozart:The Reign of Love_, scheduled for arrival in early December.


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## 1996D (Dec 18, 2018)

Brahmsian Colors said:


> I'm also looking forward to and have pre-ordered Swafford's new work, _Mozart:The Reign of Love_, scheduled for arrival in early December.


I'm hoping he emphasizes how Mozart wrote entire symphonies in days and not make assumptions about his personal life as he did with Brahms and Beethoven. Or do people buy his books for the gossip?


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## Mandryka (Feb 22, 2013)

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## flamencosketches (Jan 4, 2019)

Any thoughts on Judith Chernaik's _Schumann: The Faces & the Masks_? It looks quite well-rounded, though I'm not sure what else is out there on the subject.

What about Alan Walker's _Fryderyk Chopin_? Stephen Walsh's _Debussy_?

I think the next bio I pull the trigger on will be either Gardiner's Bach book, or one on Beethoven: either Swafford or Lockwood, though Solomon sounds interesting too-despite that I've heard some say he's a bit pushy with the psychoanalysis.


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## MarkW (Feb 16, 2015)

flamencosketches said:


> Any thoughts on Judith Chernaik's _Schumann: The Faces & the Masks_? It looks quite well-rounded, though I'm not sure what else is out there on the subject.
> 
> What about Alan Walker's _Fryderyk Chopin_? Stephen Walsh's _Debussy_?
> 
> I think the next bio I pull the trigger on will be either Gardiner's Bach book, or one on Beethoven: either Swafford or Lockwood, though Solomon sounds interesting too-despite that I've heard some say he's a bit pushy with the psychoanalysis.


Solomon really is interesting. Especially his identification of the "Immortal Beloved" as Antonie Brentano, which is convincing. But he does go overboard on the psychoanalysis, which you can ignore if that's not your cup of tea.


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## mbhaub (Dec 2, 2016)

1996D said:


> The best biographies will always be those that are written shortly after the death of a person, without exception. Otherwise the political and social biases of a different era will disfigure all genuine essence.


That's sort of true, but flawed simply because a lot of facts about composers don't come to light until long after they're dead. And people who actually knew the composer are often biased and hide the naughty bits. My favorite Brahms bio was written by Richard Specht and published in 1928 - over 30 years after the composer's death. But close enough that many people who knew the master were still alive and the writer makes an attempt to be honest and direct. Add to it Specht's own personal and first-hand knowledge of the events makes it a "You are There" kind of history, something Swafford can't do, for obvious reasons.


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## SanAntone (May 10, 2020)

*Alan Walker*'s three volume biography of *Liszt *is excellent.


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## Ethereality (Apr 6, 2019)

Why The Big 3 and Brahms? Brahms was not even in the Top 10 of the critical list. How about a biography on Ligeti or Stravinsky?


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## SanAntone (May 10, 2020)

Ethereality said:


> Why The Big 3 and Brahms? Brahms was not even in the Top 10 of the critical list. How about a biography on Ligeti or Stravinsky?


*Stephen Walsh*'s two volume biography of *Stravinsky* is very good.


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## EdwardBast (Nov 25, 2013)

1996D said:


> He's a modernist thinker and a boomer, and manages to add the flaws of both constructs to artists of a completely different time and mentality. The best biographies will always be those that are written shortly after the death of a person, without exception. Otherwise the political and social biases of a different era will disfigure all genuine essence.


There are no rules of thumb about biographies and it's intellectually lazy to think there are. Some nearly contemporary accounts are highly suspect bordering on nonsense. (Like Schindler and whatever cranks claimed Mozart wrote symphonies in days.)  Political and social biases are just as likely to warp contemporary accounts as much later ones. Genuine essence? 



Ethereality said:


> Why The Big 3 and Brahms? Brahms was not even in the Top 10 of the critical list. How about a biography on Ligeti or Stravinsky?


He wants to read about Brahms. What's it to you?


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## Botschaft (Aug 4, 2017)

Ethereality said:


> Why The Big 3 and Brahms? Brahms was not even in the Top 10 of the critical list. How about a biography on Ligeti or Stravinsky?


Brahms is one of the three Bs, and will remain rightfully celebrated as one of the very greatest and unsurpassed artistic geniuses in human history long after all those nobodies are all forgotten.


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## Ethereality (Apr 6, 2019)

Brahms has been fading out more and more. Both the mainstream Classical community and the top composers give higher ranks to Debussy, Mahler, Stravinsky and Ravel. In fact Debussy has kind of been #4 for a long while now. It's funny how boxed in this forum is into its little world.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Ethereality said:


> Brahms has been fading out more and more. Both the mainstream Classical community and the top composers give higher ranks to Debussy, Mahler, Stravinsky and Ravel. In fact Debussy has kind of been #4 for a long while now. It's funny how boxed in this forum is into its little world.


Here's a top-ten list from the old Amazon forum:

1 - Beethoven
2 - Bach
3 - Mozart
4 - Haydn
5 - Mahler
6 - Schubert
7 - Brahms
8 - Stravinsky
9 - Handel
10 - Tchaikovsky

And here's another from right here at Talk Classical, with 261 voters:

1 - Beethoven
2 - Bach
3 - Mozart
4 - Wagner
5 - Mahler
6 - Tchaikovsky
7 - Schubert
8 - Stravinsky
9 - Brahms
10 - Haydn

Mahler and Stravinsky do well, as of course does Brahms. But I struggle to find Debussy or Ravel…


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## Ethereality (Apr 6, 2019)

See my further written response on the next page.


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## Botschaft (Aug 4, 2017)

Ethereality said:


> Brahms has been fading out more and more. Both the mainstream Classical community and the top composers give higher ranks to Debussy, Mahler, Stravinsky and Ravel. In fact Debussy has kind of been #4 for a long while now. It's funny how boxed in this forum is into its little world.


All of the above is utterly and blatantly false, making that last sentence laughably ironic.


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## Ethereality (Apr 6, 2019)

No other composer outside of Bach, Beethoven and Mozart ranks so high as Debussy.

1,647 voters gave their opinion from a much larger Classical community.

174 of the world's greatest composers gave their opinion, a now canon source of predictive value.

Debussy, who has only been growing in popularity, as most people used to not even know the name wha-- "Debu.." who? or pronounce it or remember it, now is seated firmly at the Top 4 position and may in the years to come surpass the most anciently-seated Mozart. To lovers of Classicism and Brahms, your genre has been proven not to represent the only ultimatum of quality. Debussy could outcompose Brahms, but he mostly created his own genre, which to this day is perhaps the most successful musical innovatation by a single individual of all time.


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## SanAntone (May 10, 2020)

flamencosketches said:


> Any thoughts on Judith Chernaik's _Schumann: The Faces & the Masks_? It looks quite well-rounded, though I'm not sure what else is out there on the subject.
> 
> What about Alan Walker's _Fryderyk Chopin_? Stephen Walsh's _Debussy_?
> 
> I think the next bio I pull the trigger on will be either Gardiner's Bach book, or one on Beethoven: either Swafford or Lockwood, though Solomon sounds interesting too-despite that I've heard some say he's a bit pushy with the psychoanalysis.


I've got most of those: the Chernaik Schumann was good; I haven't read the Choin book yet; Gardiner's Bach book is excellent and very informative; I read the Swafford Beethoven book, also good. Swafford's Brahms book is excellent.

View attachment 141938


I don't remember if I have Walsh's Debussy - I must have 5-6 books on him, one might be the Walsh book. Debussy is a favorite of mine and I've read a bunch about him, but not for some time, like a year or more since.



> Brahms has been fading out more and more. Both the mainstream Classical community and the top composers give higher ranks to Debussy, Mahler, Stravinsky and Ravel. In fact Debussy has kind of been #4 for a long while now. It's funny how boxed in this forum is into its little world.


I wouldn't place much importance on a small sample size of living composers rating dead composers. And anyway, we all have our favorite composers, and I would guess only a few us, sounds like you, place emphasis on these kinds of lists instead of trusting your own internal judgment.


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## Botschaft (Aug 4, 2017)

Ethereality said:


> No other composer outside of Bach, Beethoven and Mozart ranks so high as Debussy.
> 
> 1,647 voters gave their opinion from a much larger Classical community.
> 
> ...


Debussy could compose pretty little trivial piano pieces perfectly suited for simpletons. Brahms is on another level completely and simpletons hate him for it.


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## Ethereality (Apr 6, 2019)

SanAntone said:


> I wouldn't place much importance on a small sample size of living composers rating dead composers. And anyway, we all have our favorite composers, and I would guess only a few us, sounds like you, place emphasis on these kinds of lists instead of trusting your own internal judgment.


This is NOT a small sample size my friend. Plus (a) although I am not a successful composer, I am one of those sample of ~2,000 mainstream who do trust their own judgement on this, and (b) we dug up quotes from all the greatest composers of the late Romantic and Contemporary eras. *They on average preferred Debussy over Brahms too*. See here. The trends however, show that Debussy may eventually come into the new Big 3, not remain at number 4.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Ethereality said:


> No other composer outside of Bach, Beethoven and Mozart ranks so high as Debussy.
> 
> 1,647 voters gave their opinion from a much larger Classical community.
> 
> 174 of the world's greatest composers gave their opinion, a now canon source of predictive value...


The first reference is to a post "by a guest - over 2 years ago...The results after 23956 people voted:" No mention of where this rather huge poll was conducted, or how. My spidey-sense is tingling...

The second is to a poll of "174 contemporary composers" by BBC Magazine. I wonder how they dug up 174 contemporary composers, or why we should suppose that their aggregate tastes have any connection with the preferences of the music-listening public.


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## hammeredklavier (Feb 18, 2018)

Ethereality said:


> 174 of the world's greatest composers gave their opinion, a now canon source of predictive value.


27. Glass
31. Cage
34. Feldman

And where are Mendelssohn and Handel?

(btw, I still think contemporary music isn't classical music. You can name them whatever way you want, "Old classical music vs New classical music", they'll always be seperate genres in my book. I also find it weird music is the only area of art where "classical stuff" is still being created.)



hammeredklavier said:


> I still think that a lot of contemporary music is a different genre from classical music as much as jazz is from classical music. Different timelines, different philosophies, different approaches to creating music. Take John Cage, for example. He considered the sound of traffic noise his ideal, and disowned the classical music tradition. ("If you listen to Mozart and Beethoven, it's always the same. But if you listen to the traffic here on Sixth Avenue, it's always different.")
> MR said that Cage still belongs in the classical practice because he studied with Schoenberg.
> But a jazz musician can be classically-trained, yet can still pursue a musical career in jazz and not classical.
> That's what a lot of contemporary composers have done. They belong in a genre separate from classical music.





Ethereality said:


> *the top composers* give higher ranks to Debussy, Mahler, Stravinsky and Ravel.


"The top composers" - How many of them actually belong to "classical music"?


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## Ethereality (Apr 6, 2019)

KenOC said:


> The first reference is to a post "by a guest - over 2 years ago...The results after 23956 people voted:" No mention of where this rather huge poll was conducted, or how. My spidey-sense is tingling...


Right, so the largest poll that's ever been done on a documented thread, from the Reddit Classical Community, that's been performed _thrice_ in the past, is somehow a conspiracy against our little Classicist polls we make here.



KenOC said:


> The second is to a poll of "174 contemporary composers" by BBC Magazine. I wonder how they dug up 174 contemporary composers, or why we should suppose that their tastes have any connection with the preferences of the music-listening public.


Did you _read_ this article, and how would you justify not using it as a main source? Note, nobody is saying Debussy is one of the Top 4 composers of all time. It's being said that he has ranked this way overall in the public and Classical elite for the past 30-40 years now. I don't know if I can take this last paragraph seriously, if you're not even familiar with this epic document.



hammeredklavier said:


> 27. Glass
> 31. Cage
> 34. Feldman
> 
> And where are Mendelssohn and Handel?


This may seem like a fair point, but note: (a) 'BBC's 174 Greatest Composers Polled' is only one of the sources used to show the case of Debussy, but more accurately (b) Mendelssohn and Handel aren't usually in the Top 10 or 15, so it's fine to see an occasional composer or two discluded from a more educated and creative professional industry, especially from data representing 174 of these guys (who have each been listed.)


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Just to give a voice to the great unwashed, Brahms was programmed at 151 concert series in the US in the latest year for which I have data. Debussy was programmed a third as often at 49 series – and 16 of those were Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun! :lol:


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## Ethereality (Apr 6, 2019)

Yes and Verdi is programmed more than Brahms and more money is spent on his operas than all categories of Brahms, ya-da ya-da. Tchaikovsky. Let's talk about him. No. Let's stick with the communities and opinions of those who listen to and study Classical predominantly. If anything, popularity 'bias' is a clear 1 negative point against a composer's worth, as it crosses over into young students and they have to spend time 'unlearning' it.

So let's recap.
(1) Most of the old greats from Late-Romanticism and Contemporary preferred Debussy more
(2) Most of the mainstream today prefer Debussy a lot more
(3) Most of the new greats prefer Debussy a lot more
(4) Debussy's fame has been improving immensely in the past 70 years
(5) Debussy is currently estimated in the Top 4 in a combined effort by most online Classical communities and the most famous composers today, and by trend may surpass Mozart in the future. It's easy for many to see this ie:



KenOC said:


> Just to give a voice to the great unwashed, Brahms was programmed at 151 concert series in the US in the latest year for which I have data. Debussy was programmed a third as often at 49 series - and 16 of those were Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun! :lol:


 It's interesting that compared to concerts, online listening of Debussy has been growing so exponentially that it's on par with Mozart.

I'm sure I would only convince like 1% of this forum today of the reality, and I don't really care enough to try. He doesn't need to be this old-fashioned forum's favorite right away, but the data is the most vast it can be, from the critical side and the mainstream side. People like Debussy more.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Ethereality said:


> ...If anything, popularity 'bias' is a clear 1 negative point against a composer's worth.


Sorry Ludwig, you're toast!


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## Ethereality (Apr 6, 2019)

No, I said 1 or a few negative points, and I definitely believe that. No way would this effect Beethoven's rank by much, but someone like Verdi who is ranked low will send him even lower. Someone like Messiaen will bring him up higher. For this forum in particular, the best music has to follow Classical traditions of Beethoven, Schubert, Brahms, Bach, and frankly that's not the reality of this community in 2020, but it comprises a larger part of this forum. For this forum, it's unacceptable to you. And that's okay; to have your older set of exclusive tastes, I'm with you in part. Just be familiar with the data.


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## Marc (Jun 15, 2007)

Ethereality said:


> [...] It's funny how boxed in this forum is into its little world.


It's funny to read comments like these and the debate afterwards in a thread where a member just asked for recommended biographies about 4 composers.

Why not a biography about Hildegard von Bingen?
She was a great composer and a very interesting person. Much more interesting than Debussy and Brahms together.

Sheesh... you are all so boxed in your little world.

ut:


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## RogerWaters (Feb 13, 2017)

As creator of this thread, I'd like to know what the hell Debussy vs Brahms has to do with the price of fish.


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## RogerWaters (Feb 13, 2017)

Ethereality said:


> Why The Big 3 and Brahms? Brahms was not even in the Top 10 of the critical list. How about a biography on Ligeti or Stravinsky?


How about you start your own thread?


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## Guest (Aug 25, 2020)

EdwardBast said:


> There are no rules of thumb about biographies and it's intellectually lazy to think there are. Some nearly contemporary accounts are highly suspect bordering on nonsense. (Like Schindler and whatever cranks claimed Mozart wrote symphonies in days.)  Political and social biases are just as likely to warp contemporary accounts as much later ones. Genuine essence?
> 
> He wants to read about Brahms. What's it to you?


I can't praise this post nearly enough. Thanks Edward.

I've only read Siepmann and Lockwood on Beethoven. I enjoyed both.


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## Marc (Jun 15, 2007)

RogerWaters said:


> How about you start your own thread?


If he does... should I ask him again why he doesn't feel the urge to read a biography about Hildegard von Bingen?


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## consuono (Mar 27, 2020)

Ask for biographies of four composers, a discussion of about 50 more ensues. :lol:


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## Marc (Jun 15, 2007)

RogerWaters said:


> Hello dear forum members. I am seeking your help with classic books on the following composers. Thank!
> 
> Bach
> Mozart
> ...


I don't think that Hildesheimer monography about Mozart has been mentioned.

https://www.amazon.com/Mozart-Wolfgang-Hildesheimer/dp/0374522987

It still is a thought-provoking book, despite its flaws (mostly for being outdated i.c. some facts).
I would advice though to read it after one has already read a more solid and chronological biography about Mozart.


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## mikeh375 (Sep 7, 2017)

This is good Roger...

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Mozart-Documentary-Biography-Otto-Deutsch/dp/0671710133/ref=sr_1_1?dchild=1&keywords=mozart+a+documentary+biography&qid=1598343818&sr=8-1


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## flamencosketches (Jan 4, 2019)

SanAntone said:


> I've got most of those: the Chernaik Schumann was good; I haven't read the Choin book yet; Gardiner's Bach book is excellent and very informative; I read the Swafford Beethoven book, also good. Swafford's Brahms book is excellent.
> 
> View attachment 141938
> 
> ...


The Walsh Debussy is fairly new, 2018 I think. I ordered Chernaik's Schumann because I found a very cheap copy, looking forward to reading it. I'm about 1/3 of the way into Swafford's Brahms. I concur, it's excellent.

Any thoughts on Peter Gay's Mozart bio? It's quite brief, probably <150 pages, and mostly focuses on the different roles the composer played in his life (with chapter titles like "The Son" and "The Virtuoso" etc etc). Worth a read I think if not exactly a comprehensive bio. Most could knock it out in a week or so.


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## SanAntone (May 10, 2020)

flamencosketches said:


> The Walsh Debussy is fairly new, 2018 I think. I ordered Chernaik's Schumann because I found a very cheap copy, looking forward to reading it. I'm about 1/3 of the way into Swafford's Brahms. I concur, it's excellent.
> 
> Any thoughts on Peter Gay's Mozart bio? It's quite brief, probably <150 pages, and mostly focuses on the different roles the composer played in his life (with chapter titles like "The Son" and "The Virtuoso" etc etc). Worth a read I think if not exactly a comprehensive bio. Most could knock it out in a week or so.


_A Painter in Sound_ - yes, I do have it on my Kindle but haven't read it, I don't think, of if I have - I've forgotten it  . Since I am not very interested in Mozart, I haven't read the book you mention. It's been a while since I've read anything about Mozart and not a biography, analysis of the works, the concertos mostly. For a while I was interested in the Haydn-Mozart-Beethoven period and bought some really very good books by *Daniel Heartz*, but they were more about the period, the historical context, the style.


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## Brahmsian Colors (Sep 16, 2016)

1996D said:


> I'm hoping he emphasizes how Mozart wrote entire symphonies in days and not make assumptions about his personal life as he did with Brahms and Beethoven....


I assume you will wait for the reviews on Amazon and elsewhere.


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## 1996D (Dec 18, 2018)

EdwardBast said:


> There are no rules of thumb about biographies and it's intellectually lazy to think there are. Some nearly contemporary accounts are highly suspect bordering on nonsense. (Like Schindler and whatever cranks claimed Mozart wrote symphonies in days.)  Political and social biases are just as likely to warp contemporary accounts as much later ones. Genuine essence?


Mozart wrote the Linz symphony in 5 days, and almost all his works in terms of days and weeks rather than months. Your ignorance is like Swafford's, believing what you want to believe and making up what doesn't make sense to your narrow view.


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## 1996D (Dec 18, 2018)

mbhaub said:


> That's sort of true, but flawed simply because a lot of facts about composers don't come to light until long after they're dead. And people who actually knew the composer are often biased and hide the naughty bits. My favorite Brahms bio was written by Richard Specht and published in 1928 - over 30 years after the composer's death. But close enough that many people who knew the master were still alive and the writer makes an attempt to be honest and direct. Add to it Specht's own personal and first-hand knowledge of the events makes it a "You are There" kind of history, something Swafford can't do, for obvious reasons.


Swafford reads history but he doesn't understand it; he hasn't the empathy or artistic imagination to put himself in a different time and understand how these people thought. Instead he imposes his world view and projects his experience, typical of the arrogant American boomer--thinking there is no greater than what he lived.


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## EdwardBast (Nov 25, 2013)

1996D said:


> Mozart wrote the Linz symphony in 5 days, and almost all his works in terms of days and weeks rather than months. Your ignorance is like Swafford's, believing what you want to believe and making up what doesn't make sense to your narrow view.


The German verbs schreiben (to write) and komponieren (to compose), when translated into English, tend to be read as synonyms by English speakers. Mozart didn't use them that way. When he wrote schreiben, he was referring to the copying work-creating a fair score and parts-for a work he had already composed. When he used komponieren he didn't mean quite what we mean by compose either. He would say he had completed composing a symphony when he had produced a short score, often if he had not actually realized the inner parts yet. So to say he wrote the Linz Symphony in five days most likely meant that he was working from an already completed short (or incomplete) score that included the essential melody, the bass line (perhaps with figures where it wasn't obvious), and other prominent obligato lines for the whole symphony, and that he was filling in the accompanying parts and creating a fair score and a set of parts. That is still a lot of work for five days, of course, but "writing the Linz" doesn't mean what you think it means. The same confusion surrounds the composition of the last three symphonies. Saying he composed them in six weeks doesn't account for the writing time, which included a good deal of what we today would call composition work. These issues were discussed in a thread on Mozart in which I made an estimate of the actual composition time for these three symphonies based on documents and his "writing" of other works. I forget what the estimate was, but it was considerably longer than six weeks.

One should also consider that 90% or more of Mozart's sketches don't survive, so it is likely we will never be able to establish if he included any such gestative sketch work in the composing time of individual works. By contrast, we know how long Beethoven (or, for example, Prokofiev) were working on the ideas that ended up in their compositions because they preserved their sketch books.


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## 1996D (Dec 18, 2018)

EdwardBast said:


> The German verbs schreiben (to write) and komponieren (to compose), when translated into English, tend to be read as synonyms by English speakers. Mozart didn't use them that way. When he wrote schreiben, he was referring to the copying work-creating a fair score and parts-for a work he had already composed. When he used komponieren he didn't mean quite what we mean by compose either. He would say he had completed composing a symphony when he had produced a short score, often if he had not actually realized the inner parts yet. So to say he wrote the Linz Symphony in five days most likely meant that he was working from an already completed short (or incomplete) score that included the essential melody, the bass line (perhaps with figures where it wasn't obvious), and other prominent obligato lines for the whole symphony, and that he was filling in the accompanying parts and creating a fair score and a set of parts. That is still a lot of work for five days, of course, but writing the Linz doesn't mean what you think it means. The same confusion surrounds the composition of the last three symphonies. Saying he composed them in six weeks doesn't account for the writing time, which included a good deal of what we today would call composition work. These issues were discussed in a thread on Mozart in which I made an estimate of the actual composition time for these three symphonies based on documents and his "writing" of other works. I forget what the estimate was, but it was considerably longer than six weeks.


He wrote the main idea with its integrated form in 5 days and generally worked at that level. His orchestration being as practised as it was did not take him long, he was always fast. Mozart had been composing at a high level since childhood and such repetition leads to near unconscious flow - it's not at all surprising that he composed at such speed when all is considered.

The sheer volume of what he wrote in his short life proves that he composed at this speed, there is no other possibility.


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## Ethereality (Apr 6, 2019)

RogerWaters said:


> How about you start your own thread?


My first comment was meant as a provocative joke/kidding only, I thought someone would get it. But instead a few people dimwittedly took it seriously and I simply provided some information to correct them. It's funny that even while Late-Romantic and Contemporary Greats preferred Debussy over most composers like Brahms, and the big modern composers _today_ prefer Debussy as well, and _mainstream_ polling and online data prefers him, that members on the last page still ignorantly side with the side of misinformation on a simple factual post, because they just can't handle some information that goes against this strictly cliquey Classicist Brahms/Schubert forum.

See click here. *Nobody* was at all arguing Debussy is a better composer, or provoking anyone. Some clear facts were stated and people decided to ignore them. Which goes to show how unopen members of this forum are to anything. I did say I would _not_ start a thread on this topic, because of how stuck people are: Just don't post misinformation and you won't hear about the topic. Simple. Which I'm sure this forum will be enthralled at!


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Ethereality said:


> ...Which goes to show how unopen members of this forum are to anything.


I admit to some surprise that you hang out with such bad company.


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## Botschaft (Aug 4, 2017)

At least you realize you’re a nobody, Ethereality. The distinction between serious listeners and less serious ones goes above your head however.


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## 1996D (Dec 18, 2018)

Waldesnacht said:


> At least you realize you're a nobody, Ethereality. The distinction between serious listeners and less serious ones goes above your head however.


Where did that come from? Such unwarranted aggression.


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## Ethereality (Apr 6, 2019)

Waldesnacht said:


> The distinction between serious listeners and less serious ones goes above your head however.


Oh yes, those serious listeners  I totally forgot about them.

I always liked the argument that Brahms is superior because he converges with some peoples' simplistic take on music theory and analysis. He sounds related to Beethoven and Mozart! He must be as great!

Beethoven and Mozart were the most brilliant of innovators and had purely expansive minds. Brahms thought by working mostly backwards to these traditions, he could achieve the essence of their composition, but unlike Debussy, he fully didn't, understand this essence of sound they were seeking after--the great expanse of tonal inspiration.


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## 1996D (Dec 18, 2018)

Ethereality said:


> Oh yes, those serious listeners  I totally forgot about them.
> 
> I always liked the argument that Brahms is superior because he converges with peoples' simplistic take on music theory and analysis and mimics the craft of Classical composers.


Atonal composers do that too, to a far greater degree, mimicking craft by spending 10x the amount of time on a work than Mozart did. Brahms did take 20 years to write his first symphony though, but I think self-consciousness is behind such extreme amount of delay.


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## Botschaft (Aug 4, 2017)

Ethereality said:


> I always liked the argument that Brahms is superior because he converges with peoples' simplistic grasp on music theory and analysis. He sounds related to Beethoven and Mozart! He must be as great!


Yeah, we all know by now that baseless and moronic ideas are your thing. Now stop derailing every thread about Brahms.


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## Ethereality (Apr 6, 2019)

Waldesnacht said:


> Yeah, we all know by now that baseless and moronic ideas are your thing.


Nobody cares. Post something factual or useful, or cut it out, because your Brahms-buddy clique won't save you from your account being moderated. Try practicing some respect.



Waldesnacht said:


> At least you realize you're a nobody, Ethereality.


Also, we need to let them get back to the thread topic, but in any case, Brahms is great.


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## Botschaft (Aug 4, 2017)

I have given you perfectly useful advice.


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## 1996D (Dec 18, 2018)

Waldesnacht said:


> Yeah, we all know by now that baseless and moronic ideas are your thing. Now stop derailing every thread about Brahms.


Do you wear a shirt with his face in your sleep? I never understood the fanaticism of how some feel life threatened by comments on another man.


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## JAS (Mar 6, 2013)

1996D said:


> Atonal composers do that too, to a far greater degree, mimicking craft by spending 10x the amount of time on a work than Mozart did. Brahms did take 20 years to write his first symphony though, but I think self-consciousness is behind such extreme amount of delay.


It may have been 20 years before Brahms wrote his first symphony but that is not the same as taking 20 years of working on the task.


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## 1996D (Dec 18, 2018)

JAS said:


> It may have been 20 years before Brahms wrote his first symphony but that is not the same as taking 20 years of working on the task.


His began in 1855 and finished in 1876. He worked like a mule on the symphony in extreme contrast to Mozart's 5 days of work. Both wrote many pieces simultaneously so that's no excuse.

It's very important that a work come naturally and honestly, not stumbling note by note, copying others, coming up with formulaic ways to reach an effect. Great composers were all innovating, self-developed, young composers, that wrote extremely fast by today's standards.

Brahms wrote his 3 piano sonatas in this way but later succumbed to anxiety and self-criticism. It's such a shame that he never triumphed.


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## EdwardBast (Nov 25, 2013)

1996D said:


> His began in 1855 and finished in 1876. He worked like a mule on the symphony in extreme contrast to Mozart's 5 days of work. Both wrote many pieces simultaneously so that's no excuse.
> 
> It's very important that a work come naturally and honestly, not stumbling note by note, copying others, coming up with formulaic ways to reach an effect. Great composers were all innovating, self-developed, young composers, that wrote extremely fast by today's standards.
> 
> Brahms wrote his 3 piano sonatas in this way but later succumbed to anxiety and self-criticism. It's such a shame that he never triumphed.


He wasn't composing the same symphony from 1855 and 1876. And Mozart didn't compose the Linz in five days. You know nothing of Brahms' working methods. Having forty or more works that hold the stage and are regularly performed 120 years after ones death is a triumph of the first order. Why don't you make a list of all the "great … innovating, self-developed, young composers" who accomplished this and get back to us?


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## 1996D (Dec 18, 2018)

EdwardBast said:


> He wasn't composing the same symphony from 1855 and 1876. And Mozart didn't compose the Linz in five days. You know nothing of Brahms' working methods. Having forty or more works that hold the stage and are regularly performed 120 years after ones death is a triumph of the first order. Why don't you make a list of all the "great … innovating, self-developed, young composers" who accomplished this and get back to us?


It took him 21 years - he laboured 21 years over one work. It's true he completed many other works over that period, but that doesn't erase the fact that he began in 1855 and finished in 1876. He said so himself that he knew of no other composer that worked on a single piece that long.

Brahms could've been Beethoven. He could've cast a shadow so large that Wagner would've never risen, but instead he became the past, and allowed German culture to degrade into what would become the Nazis. He was a conservative that failed, as do all conservatives.


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## annaw (May 4, 2019)

1996D said:


> It took him 21 years - he laboured 21 years over one work. It's true he completed many other works over that period, but that doesn't erase the fact that he began in 1855 and finished in 1876. He said so himself that he knew of no other composer that worked on a single piece that long.
> 
> Brahms could've been Beethoven. He could've cast a shadow so large that Wagner would've never risen, but instead he became the past, *and allowed German culture to degrade into what would become the Nazis. He was a conservative that failed, as do all conservatives.*


Let's better avoid this .


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## EdwardBast (Nov 25, 2013)

1996D said:


> It took him 21 years - he laboured 21 years over one work. It's true he completed many other works over that period, but that doesn't erase the fact that he began in 1855 and finished in 1876. He said so himself that he knew of no other composer that worked on a single piece that long.
> 
> Brahms could've been Beethoven. He could've cast a shadow so large that Wagner would've never risen, but instead he became the past, and allowed German culture to degrade into what would become the Nazis. He was a conservative that failed, as do all conservatives.


Hey 1996D. This is another one of those put up or shut up moments. Give us a list of "great … innovating, self-developed, young composers" who have anything close to the number of works Brahms does in the standard rep 120 years after their death. Put up or shut up.


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## 1996D (Dec 18, 2018)

EdwardBast said:


> Hey 1996D. This is another one of those put up or shut up moments. Give us a list of "great … innovating, self-developed, young composers" who have anything close to the number of works Brahms does in the standard rep 120 years after their death. Put up or shut up.


Mozart, Bach, Beethoven, Schubert, Schumann, Haydn, Handel. All above Brahms, yet he had the talent to be better than all of them.


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## 1996D (Dec 18, 2018)

annaw said:


> Let's better avoid this .


I did say that all of them fail. We move in one direction and nothing can stop it, though worshipping what lead to destruction is problematic. It shows that some cannot tell white from grey, and such blindness is disturbing.


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## flamencosketches (Jan 4, 2019)

SanAntone said:


> _A Painter in Sound_ - yes, I do have it on my Kindle but haven't read it, I don't think, of if I have - I've forgotten it  . Since I am not very interested in Mozart, I haven't read the book you mention. It's been a while since I've read anything about Mozart and not a biography, analysis of the works, the concertos mostly. For a while I was interested in the Haydn-Mozart-Beethoven period and bought some really very good books by *Daniel Heartz*, but they were more about the period, the historical context, the style.


Right; I meant to separate that question from the quote as that was more so meant as a general question to anyone reading the thread rather than a specific question for you, as I've never seen you post anything about Mozart. In any case I am interested in that period, so I'll have to look into Heartz and his books on the matter!


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## JAS (Mar 6, 2013)

1996D said:


> . . . It's very important that a work come naturally and honestly, not stumbling note by note, copying others, coming up with formulaic ways to reach an effect. Great composers were all innovating, self-developed, young composers, that wrote extremely fast by today's standards. . . .


However different their methods might have been, I have no complaints about the results of both composers. It has often been suggested that Mozart seemed to compose spontaneously, but that final act is often the end result of much thought. It can be like an actor who becomes an overnight success, after 20 years on the stage and doing small roles.


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## flamencosketches (Jan 4, 2019)

Who'd have thought that this of all threads would become a hotbed for vitriolic discussion. No one even brought up a Wagner bio yet. :lol:


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## 1996D (Dec 18, 2018)

JAS said:


> However different their methods might have been, I have no complaints about the results of both composers. It has often been suggested that Mozart seemed to compose spontaneously, but that final act is often the end result of much thought. It can be like an actor who becomes an overnight success, after 20 years on the stage and doing small roles.


Mozart was excellent from his very fist work as a child. His Divertimenti for string quartet written at 16 years old are absolutely wonderful; his symphonies no. 25 and 29 written shortly after remarkable.


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## JAS (Mar 6, 2013)

flamencosketches said:


> Who'd have thought that this of all threads would become a hotbed for vitriolic discussion. No one even brought up a Wagner bio yet. :lol:


Now you've gone and done it . . . you mentioned that W... guy

Is Brahms somehow controversial, in a way that I have not previously been aware?


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## Logos (Nov 3, 2012)

Brahms was quite controversial from a political angle since, _To be politically liberal in Brahms's Vienna meant to be artistically conservative. As Jan Swafford points out in his biography of the composer, the city was immersed in a struggle between an ascending political right wing and a waning left. Wagner had declared the work of Bach, Mozart, Haydn, and Beethoven superseded by the new music, and the more powerful right embraced Wagner's revolutionary call for a new wave. "For the right wing," wrote Mr. Swafford, "the exigencies of form proclaimed by the old liberals were to be swept away by a music of passion and blood-instinct."_

Brahms was closely associated in listeners' minds with Jewish liberalism: _The charges against Brahms of being too cerebral, dry, and complex - too chamber-like even in the symphonies - were made in the context of a culture war that pitted the masses against a small group seen as elitist and, not coincidentally, too Jewish in their tastes._

_"For the right wing," wrote Mr. Swafford, "the exigencies of form proclaimed by the old liberals were to be swept away by a music of passion and blood-instinct."_ That is to say, the music of Wagner.

_One critic complained of Brahms's use of "Jewish-temple triplets." Another lumped him with Eduard Hanslick (whose book, "The Beautiful in Music," argued that music was a pure form, not directly expressive of emotions), Karl Goldmark, and Adalbert Goldschmidt as "the music-loving and music-making Jewry." Popular support for Bruckner - a composer scorned by Brahms - was, wrote Mr. Swafford, "identical with the struggle to form a new society purged of the Jew-ridden liberals." Brahms, who was not Jewish, found the trend repugnant. "I can scarcely speak of it," he said. "It seems so despicable to me."_

Quotations taken from 'Brahms the Beleaguered': https://www.nysun.com/arts/brahms-the-beleaguered/3016/


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## 1996D (Dec 18, 2018)

Logos said:


> Brahms was quite controversial from a political angle since, _To be politically liberal in Brahms's Vienna meant to be artistically conservative. As Jan Swafford points out in his biography of the composer, the city was immersed in a struggle between an ascending political right wing and a waning left. Wagner had declared the work of Bach, Mozart, Haydn, and Beethoven superseded by the new music, and the more powerful right embraced Wagner's revolutionary call for a new wave. "For the right wing," wrote Mr. Swafford, "the exigencies of form proclaimed by the old liberals were to be swept away by a music of passion and blood-instinct."_
> 
> Brahms was closely associated in listeners' minds with Jewish liberalism: _The charges against Brahms of being too cerebral, dry, and complex - too chamber-like even in the symphonies - were made in the context of a culture war that pitted the masses against a small group seen as elitist and, not coincidentally, too Jewish in their tastes._
> 
> ...


A perfect example of how Swafford transposes his own society into a vastly different one, his specialty. Wagner was the liberal, Brahms the conservative.

It just so happened that in this case the liberal hated Jews, which is unlike today when most Jews in the West are liberal. Swafford gets very confused - he is unable to leave his own society and immerse himself in history.


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## Logos (Nov 3, 2012)

1996D said:


> A perfect example of how Swafford transposes his own society into a vastly different one, his specialty.


I don't know of any Brahms biographer who has failed to note his close association with Jews and his liberal sympathies. These are broadly acknowledged facts that in no way depend upon Mr. Swafford's particular propensities or qualifications.


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## 1996D (Dec 18, 2018)

Logos said:


> I don't know of any Brahms biographer who has failed to note his close association with Jews and his liberal sympathies. These are broadly acknowledged facts that in no way depend upon Mr. Swafford's particular propensities or qualifications.


Brahms was trying to _conserve_ the past traditions, Wagner was trying to break them, destroy them, and start something new. He wanted to _liberate_ music from tradition.

Swafford gets confused because he associates Jewishness with liberalism, and Brahms was liberal in some ways, but was musically very conservative.


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## Logos (Nov 3, 2012)

Brahms was antisemitic by modern standards, but that antisemitism was so mild by the standards of mid to late 19th century Germany that he was considered philosemitic in his own day. In the same way, Charles Sumner, the great senator dedicated to ending slavery, was probably a racist by modern standards, but in the context of his own day he was at the other end of the spectrum. Saying "Brahms hated Jews" without pointing out where he stood in reference to his contemporaries is grossly misleading.


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## Logos (Nov 3, 2012)

1996D said:


> Brahms was trying to _conserve_ the past traditions, Wagner was trying to break them, destroy them, and start something new. He wanted to _liberate_ music from tradition.


That's true, but there is a paradox involved since Wagner was trying to do away with Enlightenment traditions, which are liberal and newfangled in the grand scheme of history since they date from only the late 17th century. From this point of view, what Brahms was conserving was liberal.


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## 1996D (Dec 18, 2018)

Logos said:


> That's true, but there is a paradox involved since Wagner was trying to do away with Enlightenment traditions, which are liberal and newfangled in the grand scheme of history since they date from only the late 17th century. From this point of view, what Brahms was conserving was liberal.


Yet what Wagner was behind had as purpose to liberate from the past, not at all different from today's liberalism which is by no means enlightenment liberalism.

What is liberal is simply what shuns tradition and moves forward, what is conservative is simply what rejects this movement.


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## Logos (Nov 3, 2012)

1996D said:


> Yet what Wagner was behind had as purpose to liberate from the past, not at all different from today's liberalism which is by no means enlightenment liberalism.
> 
> What is liberal is simply what shuns tradition and moves forward, what is conservative is simply what rejects this movement.


Wagner liberated from one past (that of the 18th century with its Enlightenment ideals), and celebrated another pre-industrial, pre-enlightenment past (Classical Greece, the Middle Ages, Renaissance Nuremberg). Wagner is constantly looking into the distant past with eyes of longing--each of his operas is set centuries before his time in an idealized and glorified past.


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## mmsbls (Mar 6, 2011)

The thread is about composer biographies. Recent posts have included negative personal comments. Please refrain from discussing other members and focus back on composers and their biographies. Several posts that have violated the Terms of Service (or responded to ones that did) have been removed.


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## flamencosketches (Jan 4, 2019)

JAS said:


> Now you've gone and done it . . . you mentioned that W... guy
> 
> Is Brahms somehow controversial, in a way that I have not previously been aware?


It would seem Brahms is _very_ controversial, not too far behind he-who-must-not-be-named. Just about every time his name gets mentioned, it sparks some massive debate or another, usually somehow tying into politics or religion.


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## 1996D (Dec 18, 2018)

Logos said:


> Wagner liberated from one past (that of the 18th century with its Enlightenment ideals), and celebrated another pre-industrial, pre-enlightenment past (Classical Greece, the Middle Ages, Renaissance Nuremberg). Wagner is constantly looking into the distant past with eyes of longing--each of his operas is set centuries before his time in an idealized and glorified past.


It's his own world of idealized romanticism, it has nothing of Classical Greece or the religious Middle Ages. He simply wants nothing from the tradition that had a hold of Germany at the time, so did anything to break apart from it, and ultimately wanted his own fantasy of eternal lust to come to life. Brahms on the other hand relishes this tradition and doesn't want to let it go, at least not in the direction Wagner was taking it, hence why he's conservative.

Liberal is movement away from the status quo into something less restictive, that's all it is. You could say they were both liberals but one much, much more than the other.


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## JAS (Mar 6, 2013)

flamencosketches said:


> It would seem Brahms is _very_ controversial, not too far behind he-who-must-not-be-named. Just about every time his name gets mentioned, it sparks some massive debate or another, usually somehow tying into politics or religion.


It must be the ZZ Top beard. Who knows what might be hiding behind, or inside, that?


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## Logos (Nov 3, 2012)

1996D said:


> It's his own world of idealized romanticism, it has nothing of Classical Greece or the religious Middle Ages.


Certainly, Wagner's depictions of the middle ages or the renaissance in his operas are not historically accurate in detail, but this is not really germane to my point. We know from Wagner's own writings he felt that by means of these works he was resurrecting "the soul of the Middle Ages". Regardless of whether he succeeded in this aim, how can we call a man liberal who makes it his heartfelt task to celebrate, recreate, and glorify a state of civilization that crumbled centuries ago? This is an example of a conservative, backward-looking instinct in revolt against modernity.


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## 1996D (Dec 18, 2018)

Logos said:


> Certainly, Wagner's depictions of the middle ages or the renaissance in his operas are not historically accurate in detail, but this is not really germane to my point. We know from Wagner's own writings he felt that by means of these works he was resurrecting "the soul of the Middle Ages". Regardless of whether he succeeded in this aim, how can we call a man liberal who makes it his heartfelt task to celebrate, recreate, and glorify a state of civilization that crumbled centuries ago? This is an example of a conservative, backward-looking instinct in revolt against modernity.


True but he wanted sexual liberation, which goes in complete opposite direction to the Middle Ages. It was pure fantasy just as The Lord of Rings is fantasy; it's no coincidence that the books and movies draw from Wagner.

It was a reaction to industrialization so it had to look at something related to nature and a simpler past, but it's not at all conservatism. It's sexual liberalism disguised as conservatism because of the German nationalist element, but its essence is still one that wants liberation from all tradition and all morality. Wagner would've hated the Middle Ages and certainly the logos centered Classical Greece.


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## Logos (Nov 3, 2012)

1996D said:


> True but he wanted sexual liberation, which goes in complete opposite direction to the Middle Ages. It was pure fantasy just as The Lord of Rings is fantasy; it's no coincidence that the books and movies draw from Wagner.
> 
> It was a reaction to industrialization so it had to look at something related to nature and a simpler past, but it's not at all conservatism. It's sexual liberalism disguised as conservatism because of the German nationalist element, but its essence is still one that wants liberation from all tradition and all morality. Wagner would've hated the Middle Ages and certainly the logos centered Classical Greece.


After a google search on the phrase "Wagner wanted sexual liberation" the first book I find is one by E. Michael Jones, an author who is listed by the Anti-Defamation League as an antisemitic, far-right Catholic ideologue: https://www.adl.org/sites/default/files/documents/assets/pdf/combating-hate/E-Michael-Jones.pdf.

This reduction of Wagnerism to "sexual liberalism" or "sexual liberation" is rather absurd since his final work, Parsifal, has often been interpreted as profoundly negative in its portrayal of sexuality. Indeed that work is described in Julian Young's "The Philosophies of Wagner" as rejecting sexuality altogether. He goes so far as to describe Wagner as being "at war with sexuality". After all, Wagner's greatest philosophical influence, Schopenhauer, regarded sex with complete horror as a source of profound suffering.


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## 1996D (Dec 18, 2018)

Logos said:


> After a google search on the phrase "Wagner wanted sexual liberation" the first book I find is one by E. Michael Jones, an author who is listed by the Anti-Defamation League as an antisemitic, far-right Catholic ideologue: https://www.adl.org/sites/default/files/documents/assets/pdf/combating-hate/E-Michael-Jones.pdf.
> 
> This reduction of Wagnerism to "sexual liberalism" or "sexual liberation" is rather absurd since his final work, Parsifal, has often been interpreted as profoundly negative in its portrayal of sexuality. Indeed that work is described in Julian Young's "The Philosophies of Wagner" as rejecting sexuality altogether. He goes so far as to describe Wagner as being "at war with sexuality". After all, Wagner's greatest philosophical influence, Schopenhauer, regarded sex with complete horror as a source of profound suffering.


My sources are Adorno, Mann, and Derrida among others. Parsifal does oppose Tristan but that's after Wagner's break with Nietzsche, who would later be the main cause of the free love movement that would lead to the crazy 20s.


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## Logos (Nov 3, 2012)

1996D said:


> My sources are Adorno, Mann, and Derrida among others. Parsifal does oppose Tristan but that's after Wagner's break with Nietzsche, who would later be the main cause of the free love movement that would lead to the crazy 20s.


Had you heard of E. Michael Jones or the book Dionysos Rising? Do you ever go to a site called culture wars?


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## 1996D (Dec 18, 2018)

Logos said:


> Had you heard of E. Michael Jones or the book Dionysos Rising? Do you ever go to a site called culture wars?


No, but if you say he's an antisemite then I don't want to know. Derrida's book on Nietzsche and the connection between the latter and Wagner, as well as Nazism is undeniable. It was no coincidence why Wagner was the championed composer and Wagner fans here will go to great lengths to ignore the fact.


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## MarkW (Feb 16, 2015)

I don't know where this discussion got started. All Roger wanted was to read some biographies.

Brahms was really good at composing the kinds of music that were congenial to him. Wagner was really good at composing the kinds of music that were congenial to him. Debussy was really good at composing the kinds of music that were congenial to him. Bruckner was sort of good at composing the kinds of music that were congenial to him.

Swafford writes biographies that fit his concept of what a biography should do.

One is not obligated to like any of them.


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## Logos (Nov 3, 2012)

1996D said:


> No, but if you say he's an antisemite then I don't want to know. Derrida's book on Nietzsche and the connection between the latter and Wagner, as well as Nazism is undeniable. It was no coincidence why Wagner was the championed composer and Wagner fans here will go to great lengths to ignore the fact.


Do you ever go to a site called culture wars? In any case, Wagner's views on sexuality evolved over time till he came to hold quasi-ascetic opinions in his later years. Besides, "free love" (defining it broadly) is not necessarily liberal (in the sense anti-conservative) since it has precedents in exceedingly old religious and social traditions such as those of ancient Sparta, to name only one of the most memorable examples. And of course the vast majority of ancient societies condoned some form of concubinage, which gives free love (of a sort) a very substantial historical pedigree and precedent.


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## 1996D (Dec 18, 2018)

Logos said:


> Do you ever go to a site called culture wars? In any case, Wagner's views on sexuality evolved over time till he came to hold quasi-ascetic opinions in his later years. Besides, "free love" (defining it broadly) is not necessarily liberal (in the sense anti-conservative) since it has precedents in exceedingly old religious and social traditions such as those of ancient Sparta, to name only one of the most memorable examples. And of course the vast majority of ancient societies condoned some form of concubinage, which gives free love (of a sort) a very substantial historical pedigree and precedent.


You should read Thomas Mann's books on Wagner - they will be illuminating. Mann was a Nobel Prize winner that opposed the Nazis and wrote extensively on Wagner.

But you keep mentioning antisemites, so I don't know what you're thinking. Wagner lovers always deeply perplex me.


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## Logos (Nov 3, 2012)

1996D said:


> You should read Thomas Mann's books on Wagner - they will be illuminating. Mann was a Nobel Prize winner that opposed the Nazis and wrote extensively on Wagner.
> 
> But you keep mentioning antisemites, so I don't know what you're thinking. Wagner lovers always deeply perplex me.


I simply asked whether you have ever visited a site called culture wars, and yet you don't answer. Why is that? Now that's perplexing, and quite interesting. In a discussion about Wagner, not mentioning antisemites is impossible since every mention of Wagner himself is a mention of an antisemite.


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## 1996D (Dec 18, 2018)

Logos said:


> I simply asked whether you have ever visited a site called culture wars, and yet you don't answer. Why is that? Now that's perplexing, and quite interesting. In a discussion about Wagner, not mentioning antisemites is impossible since every mention of Wagner himself is a mention of an antisemite.


I've just looked into it and it's a site owned by this antisemite man that has a profile from the ADL... Why is this man worth mentioning to you?


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## Logos (Nov 3, 2012)

1996D said:


> I've just looked into it and it's a site owned by this antisemite man that has a profile from the ADL... Why is this man worth mentioning to you?


I'd simply like to know if you've ever visited it before. Much of what you write bears a striking resemblance to things I found there.


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## 1996D (Dec 18, 2018)

Logos said:


> I'd simply like to know if you've ever visited it before. Much of what you write bears a striking resemblance to things I found there.


He's probably read Mann and turned it into an opportunity to promote antisemitism. If he critiques Wagner how I'm doing now then his source is probably Mann, who dissected the man, although why he would turn it into an attack on the Jews is perplexing. It's actually very ironic.


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## RogerWaters (Feb 13, 2017)

The autism in this thread is OFF THE SCALE. 

It also probably turns people off this site.


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## 1996D (Dec 18, 2018)

RogerWaters said:


> The autism in this thread is OFF THE SCALE.
> 
> It also probably turns people off this site.


What you can't understand = autism. He did make some weird connections though, and his name is _Logos_ which is hilarious.

Why did you name yourself Logos? I hate people misusing the term, interestingly the antisemitic site he mentions has a book named 'Logos rising'...

Typical Wagner fan.


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## Logos (Nov 3, 2012)

1996D said:


> What you can't understand = autism. He did make some weird connections though, and his name is _Logos_ which is hilarious.
> 
> Why did you name yourself Logos? I hate people misusing the term, interestingly the antisemitic site he mentions has a book named 'Logos rising'...
> 
> Typical Wagner fan.


The site does list such a book. Having noticed that, when you used the term logos just after making (I suppose coincidentally) an exact paraphrase from Dionysos Rising (another book from the same site) it seemed to me to be quite a series of coincidences. The term logos has so many indeterminate usages in philosophy, theology, and rhetoric that one would have to try very hard to misuse it. It simply happened to be the first word I thought of when making an account.


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## 1996D (Dec 18, 2018)

Logos said:


> The site does list such a book. Having noticed that, when you used the term logos just after making (I suppose coincidentally) an exact paraphrase from Dionysos Rising (another book from the same site) it seemed to me to be quite a series of coincidences. The term logos has so many indeterminate usages in philosophy, theology, and rhetoric that one would have to try very hard to misuse it. It simply happened to be the first word I thought of when making an account.


You're the one siding with Wagner the antisemite and curiously enough accusing me of such... Do you happen to be fan of Alinsky's _Rules for Radicals_? Dionysus is term Nietzsche used a lot, in which he discloses his will for debauchery. So this author has books named 'Dionysus Rising' and 'Logos rising'... Talk about confusion.

Tells me everything I need to know, and of you as well. How exactly did you come across this antisemitic site, your love of Wagner?

This is great, it really proves that Wagner still has suspect fans, and legitimizes everything I've been saying.


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## Logos (Nov 3, 2012)

1996D said:


> He's probably read Mann and turned it into an opportunity to promote antisemitism. If he critiques Wagner how I'm doing now then his source is probably Mann, who dissected the man, although why he would turn it into an attack on the Jews is perplexing. It's actually very ironic.


And here is Mann describing Wagner's transformation as regards his views on sexual ethics: _"What is to be said ... for the seriousness of that seeker after truth, that thinker and believer Richard Wagner? The ascetic and Christian ideals of his later period, the sacramental philosophy of salvation won by abstinence from fleshly lusts of every kind; the convictions and opinions of which Parsifal is the expression; even Parsifal itself - all these incontestably deny, revoke, cancel the sensualism and revolutionary spirit of Wagner's young days, which pervade the whole atmosphere and content of the Siegfried."_

This is precisely the same ideological change in Wagner that I described above as evinced in Parsifal. And again, neither of these perspectives on sexuality (the earlier anarchic and the later ascetic) is inherently "liberal". This passage by Mann is in no way a confirmation of Wagner simply "wanting sexual liberation". On the contrary, it shows that his views were much more complicated, and for the latter part of his life were diametrically opposed to anything liberation of that kind.

You seem to imply on the one hand that admiring Wagner is bad, and on the other that Thomas Mann had Wagner all figured out and is an ultimate authority on him. How can you believe these two things be true, since Mann, for all his objections to Wagner, nevertheless regarded him as one of the greatest artists who ever lived?


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## 1996D (Dec 18, 2018)

Logos said:


> And here is Mann describing Wagner's transformation as regards his views on sexual ethics: _"What is to be said ... for the seriousness of that seeker after truth, that thinker and believer Richard Wagner? The ascetic and Christian ideals of his later period, the sacramental philosophy of salvation won by abstinence from fleshly lusts of every kind; the convictions and opinions of which Parsifal is the expression; even Parsifal itself - all these incontestably deny, revoke, cancel the sensualism and revolutionary spirit of Wagner's young days, which pervade the whole atmosphere and content of the Siegfried."_
> 
> This is precisely the same ideological change in Wagner that I described above as evinced in Parsifal. And again, neither of these perspectives on sexuality (the earlier anarchic and the later ascetic) is inherently "liberal". This passage by Mann is in no way a confirmation of Wagner simply "wanting sexual liberation". On the contrary, it shows that his views were much more complicated, and for the latter part of his life were diametrically opposed to anything liberation of that kind.
> 
> You seem to imply on the one hand that admiring Wagner is bad, and on the other that Thomas Mann had Wagner all figured out and is an ultimate authority on him. How can you believe these two things be true, since Mann, for all his objections to Wagner, nevertheless regarded him as one of the greatest artists who ever lived?


I've already written how Wagner came to morality late in life, but that his journey had disastrous consequences, including heavily leading on Nietzsche into a vert dark path then turning his back on him. Both had disastrous consequences on the world, one forming the ideological construct for both Fascism and Communism.

Wagner was the composer who inspired Hitler to do what he did, was the poster boy of Nazism, and is rightfully banned today in Israel. Maybe you do have autism, so I'll forgive you, but my goodness you have to be able to introspect even a little.


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## Logos (Nov 3, 2012)

1996D said:


> You're the one siding with Wagner the antisemite and curiously enough accusing me of such... Do you happen to be fan of Alinsky's _Rules for Radicals_? Dionysus is term Nietzsche used a lot, in which he discloses his will for debauchery. So this author has books named 'Dionysus Rising' and 'Logos rising'... Talk about confusion.
> 
> Tells me everything I need to know, and of you as well. How exactly did you come across this antisemitic site, your love of Wagner?
> 
> This is great, it really proves that Wagner still has suspect fans, and legitimizes everything I've been saying.


Asking is not accusing. I'm not "siding" with any one. I've never read anything of Mr. Alinsky's. I came across that site an hour ago when I was researching the exact phraseology that you used. What "tells you everything you need to know"? Tells you everything about what, and how so?


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## 1996D (Dec 18, 2018)

Logos said:


> Asking is not accusing. I'm not "siding" with any one. I've never read anything of Mr. Alinsky's. I came across that site an hour ago when I was researching the exact phraseology that you used. What "tells you everything you need to know"? Tells you everything about what, and how so?


Are you a Wagner fanatic or not? And do you have autism?


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## Logos (Nov 3, 2012)

1996D said:


> I've already written how Wagner came to morality late in life, but that his journey had disastrous consequences, including heavily leading on Nietzsche into a vert dark path then turning his back on him. Both had disastrous consequences on the world, one forming the ideological construct for both Fascism and Communism.
> 
> Wagner was the composer who inspired Hitler to do what he did, was the poster boy of Nazism, and is rightfully banned today in Israel. Maybe you do have autism, so I'll forgive you, but my goodness you have to be able to introspect even a little.


You go too far in attributing so much to one person, but of course he (and a great many other German thinkers) partially inspired Nazism. Nazism, like Wagner's philosophy, is another manifestation of reactionary, anti-modern, anti-liberal sentiment. What exactly is your point?


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## Logos (Nov 3, 2012)

1996D said:


> Are you a Wagner fanatic or not? And do you have autism?


I'm not a fanatic in regard to Wagner or anything else. I've never been diagnosed with any medical condition of any kind.


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## 1996D (Dec 18, 2018)

Logos said:


> You go too far in attributing so much to one person, but of course he (and a great many other German thinkers) partially inspired Nazism. Nazism, like Wagner's philosophy, is another manifestation of reactionary, anti-modern, anti-liberal sentiment. What exactly is your point?


It was the German culture that Wagner and Nietzsche built that directly lead to Nazism. Their thought is so toxic that a whole deconstructionist movement was required to cleans intellectuals and society from this cancer. Derrida's book on Nietzsche is great, you should read it and so should all these ignorant Wagner fans.

They're two very disturbed people, and the famous 'separating the man from the music' or the 'artist from the art' simply does not apply here, it simply doesn't apply.


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## 1996D (Dec 18, 2018)

The fact that researching Wagner lead you to an antisemitic site says a lot.


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## Logos (Nov 3, 2012)

1996D said:


> It was the German culture that Wagner and Nietzsche built that directly lead to Nazism. Their thought is so toxic that a whole deconstructionist movement was required to cleans intellectuals from this cancer. Derrida's book on Nietzsche is great, you should read it and so should all these ignorant Wagner fans.
> 
> They're too very disturbed people, and the famous 'separating the man from the music' or the 'artist from the art' simply does not apply here, it simply doesn't not apply.


We were having a discussion about Brahms and Wagner and their respective political alignments (liberal/conservative) during their own lives. Yes, Wagner is one part of the ideological ancestry of Nazism, which (like Wagner's ideology) was a manifestation of anti-liberal, anti-modern reaction. Brahms by contrast had no such influence because he was a figure associated with political liberalism. That was my entire point.


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## Logos (Nov 3, 2012)

1996D said:


> The fact that researching Wagner lead you to an antisemitic site says a lot.


I wasn't researching Wagner. I was researching you by using your exact phrases, the goal being to find the source of your information.


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## 1996D (Dec 18, 2018)

Logos said:


> We were having a discussion about Brahms and Wagner and their respective political alignments (liberal/conservative) during their own lives. Yes, Wagner is one part of the ideological ancestry of Nazism, which (like Wagner's ideology) was a manifestation of anti-liberal, anti-modern reaction. Brahms by contrast had no such influence because he was a figure associated with political liberalism. That was my entire point.


Yes this is true. My argument was that Wagner was acting with the liberal spirit and Brahms with the conservative one, most certainly musically.

Wagner was the one moving things forward both culturally and musically, and Brahms was the one looking to the past of Bach, Mozart, and Beethoven.



Logos said:


> I wasn't researching Wagner. I was researching you by using your exact phrases.


Discussing Wagner quoting Mann, who is basically the authority on Wagner. And it lead you to an antisemitic site...


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## mmsbls (Mar 6, 2011)

The thread is temporarily closed due to rather problematic posts.


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## mmsbls (Mar 6, 2011)

The thread is now open.


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## pjang23 (Oct 8, 2009)

Ethereality said:


> No other composer outside of Bach, Beethoven and Mozart ranks so high as Debussy.
> 
> 1,647 voters gave their opinion from a much larger Classical community.
> 
> ...


The first poll only allows each voter to vote for a single composer, so it is basically useless statistical noise beyond the first few ranks.

Back to the OP: The Swafford bio of Brahms does embellish a little with the author's own interpretations (e.g. exaggerating the poverty of his childhood) but is pretty comprehensive in its coverage of Brahms's interactions with other major musical figures in his life, and gives the real-life context of many of his compositions. It's definitely an enjoyable read.


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## Ethereality (Apr 6, 2019)

Try not to post misinformation if you can.



pjang23 said:


> The first poll only allows each voter to vote for a single composer,


No.



> so it is basically useless statistical noise beyond the first few ranks.


Even if the first part is true about 1 composer per voter, the second part here is unsubstantiated speculation. If 581 people voted for Debussy as their_ favorite_, that's perfectly decent data to look at. But it seems it's more the famous _Classical composers_ who prefer Debussy more than Brahms. (New composers, and old great composers.)

Anyway, this whole thing was supposed to be a thread joke. So I'll let you get back to the OP


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## Botschaft (Aug 4, 2017)

And it wasn't even a decent joke. It's _prefer to_, not "prefer more than" by the way. Let's hope English isn't your native language, because it isn't mine. Not that you have any means of knowing whether the famous composers have preferred Debussy to Brahms or not.


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## Ethereality (Apr 6, 2019)

Again, please don't post any misinformation, on all the composer quotes we have, nor the English language. I don't know whether it's important or not that Debussy has a much higher preference to popularity ratio ie. serious listener/composer preference vs performance popularity, nor if most of the quotes we have, where the greatest composers after Debussy show preference for Debussy over Brahms when compared, but I posted that information anyway just to correct individuals as yourself. If you'd like a different tabulation, you must first reason why you're choosing your obscure sample. The sample chosen here is due to it being the biggest sample of the most common avid listeners and composers, where other major websites like RateYourMusic also show that Debussy is higher rated than Brahms, as well as YouTube. So it's not any stretch but your own imagination. Maybe you can find a different measurement that you like, and provide it. Of course I'm not claiming either composer is better, nor forcing you to choose your own preference. I am responding to a specific claim that was brought up.


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## SanAntone (May 10, 2020)

> Maybe you can find a different measurement ...


Sure. The only relevant measurement is *how much I like* a composer's music. I couldn't care less what you say "famous" composers" have thought about other composers. But I would never claim that my favorite composers are the "best" or "better" than someone else's.

And anyway, what does your list have to do with:



> Hello dear forum members. I am seeking your help with classic books on the following composers. Thank!
> 
> Bach
> Mozart
> ...


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## Guest (Aug 31, 2020)

Waldesnacht said:


> And it wasn't even a decent joke. It's _prefer to_, not "prefer more than" by the way. Let's hope English isn't your native language, because it isn't mine. Not that you have any means of knowing whether the famous composers have preferred Debussy to Brahms or not.


Or just 'prefer', as in "I prefer Debussy."


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## hammeredklavier (Feb 18, 2018)

Ethereality said:


> the greatest composers after Debussy show preference for Debussy over Brahms when compared, but I posted that information anyway just to correct individuals as yourself. If you'd like a different tabulation, you must first reason why you're choosing your obscure sample.


I don't know why you're so obsessed with that list. Many of the participants of the survey weren't even classical music composers. Un suk chin is a contemporary music composer. Contemporary music composers will be biased toward contemporary music. Hence the reason why Feldman, Cage, Glass are on the list, whereas Handel and Mendelssohn are not.


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## Botschaft (Aug 4, 2017)

Ethereality said:


> Again, please don't post any misinformation, on all the composer quotes we have, nor the English language. I don't know whether it's important or not that Debussy has a much higher preference to popularity ratio ie. serious listener/composer preference vs performance popularity, nor if most of the quotes we have, where the greatest composers after Debussy show preference for Debussy over Brahms when compared, but I posted that information anyway just to correct individuals as yourself. If you'd like a different tabulation, you must first reason why you're choosing your obscure sample. The sample chosen here is due to it being the biggest sample of the most common avid listeners and composers, where other major websites like RateYourMusic also show that Debussy is higher rated than Brahms, as well as YouTube. So it's not any stretch but your own imagination. Maybe you can find a different measurement that you like, and provide it. Of course I'm not claiming either composer is better, nor forcing you to choose your own preference. I am responding to a specific claim that was brought up.


Among famous composers, as opposed to obscure nonentities, you will hardly find a single one that has compared Debussy to Brahms. If contemporary composers do prefer Debussy _to_ Brahms (not "more than") it's probably because Debussy was more of a modern composer himself. If the wider public prefers Debussy to Brahms it's probably because Debussy is less challenging and more immediately and superficially pleasing than Brahms.


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## Ethereality (Apr 6, 2019)

hammeredklavier said:


> I don't know why you're so obsessed with that list. Many of the participants of the survey weren't even classical music composers. Un suk chin is a contemporary music composer. Contemporary music composers will be biased toward contemporary music. Hence the reason why Feldman, Cage, Glass are on the list, whereas Handel and Mendelssohn are not.


A list with all or mostly all Classical composers isn't biased. What is biased however is a forum that grew up not in the free digital age of widely choosing and exploring their own music from a young age. This age is the embodiment of an explosion of information. Hence when you take the very largest surveys (I posted) which directly equal the opinions of = the largest sample of invested Classical fans today _x_ the largest sample of greatest composers today, and then add a third list to it (the order of these numbers), you get exactly TalkClassical's list of top composers.

This forum is essentially, individuals with very developed tastes, but extremely biased towards the music that was available to them, from the selection of available recordings they formed their musical taste around. The evidence is so perfectly clear, even if I showed you the exact matching step by step, your closed minds would refuse to see the perfect 1:1 correlation.

For those who are interested in the reality of the Classical community, PM me and I can send you a powerpoint or charts showing how TalkClassical's taste in top composers is precisely 1:1 derived from album availabilities from local stores of past decades. Mostly TC is great and meaningful people, but who are out of the loop of 50 years of the latest trends in Classical appreciation.

Never have I said much at all whether I prefer Debussy to Brahms, but it is clear that nowadays Debussy is part of the Big 6. Some members have caught onto Mahler in this 6. Less have with the reality of Stravinsky.



Waldesnacht said:


> Among famous composers, as opposed to obscure nonentities, you will hardly find a single one that has compared Debussy to Brahms.


If you live in your own little world and aren't accustomed to factual realities



Waldesnacht said:


> If contemporary composers do prefer Debussy _to_ Brahms (not "more than") it's probably because Debussy was *more of a modern composer* himself.


I have no idea what that means. Ever heard of Bach? Beethoven? Wagner? Mahler? In fact, take a look at composers' lists nowadays. Not a predominance of modern composers here at all. Your logic is so backwards, it's been awful trying to see you form arguments, that I now can't tell if you're simply trolling and playing around.



Waldesnacht said:


> If the wider public prefers Debussy to Brahms it's probably because Debussy is less challenging and more immediately and superficially pleasing than Brahms.


That's clearly your own opinion and doesn't represent the majority of studious or creative Classical fans. Maybe it did when Brahms and The Big 3 was all they recorded back in this community's younger years, but for ~70 years Debussy has been trending exponentially more than most composers, and now in the digital age I'm afraid there's not much the traditionalist can do about his (or Stravinsky's) massive overtaking. But you seem to live in the dark about this. Either catch on by joining other communities and developing your ear, or wait for this reality to catch up to this community through new members.

Although it's likely not this forum that will be privy to the most advanced discussions in 10 years, when Debussy makes the solid Top 7 here in 10 years time and surpasses Brahms, remember Ethereality.

Remember me also when we do our next forum survey and Mahler and Mozart are tied for #3. Debussy will be about #7 then, Brahms #5 still.

I'll leave you with these to re-analyze


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## Lisztian (Oct 10, 2011)

hammeredklavier said:


> I don't know why you're so obsessed with that list. Many of the participants of the survey weren't even classical music composers. Un suk chin is a contemporary music composer. Contemporary music composers will be biased toward contemporary music. Hence the reason why Feldman, Cage, Glass are on the list, whereas Handel and Mendelssohn are not.


Of course, Unsuk Chin voted for Bach, Chopin, Mozart, Stravinsky and Webern


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## Botschaft (Aug 4, 2017)

Ethereality said:


> A list with all or mostly all Classical composers isn't biased. What is biased however is a forum that grew up not in the free digital age of widely choosing and exploring their own music from a young age. This age is the embodiment of an explosion of information. Hence when you take the very largest surveys (I posted) which directly equal the opinions of = the largest sample of invested Classical fans today _x_ the largest sample of greatest composers today, and then add a third list to it (the order of these numbers), you get exactly TalkClassical's list of top composers.
> 
> This forum is essentially, individuals with very developed tastes, but extremely biased towards the music that was available to them, from the selection of available recordings they formed their musical taste around. The evidence is so perfectly clear, even if I showed you the exact matching step by step, your closed minds would refuse to see the perfect 1:1 correlation.
> 
> ...


I, like many people on this forum, grew up in the digital age, and have freely explored music through the internet since my teenage years. Bach caught my interest first, and Brahms only much later. Once again you have no clue what you're talking about.



> If you live in your own little world and aren't accustomed to factual realities


That makes it sound like you're agreeing with me, but I'll let you name me a few widely famous composers, let's say a dozen, that have compared Debussy to Brahms. Not that you could.



> I have no idea what that means. Ever heard of Bach? Beethoven? Wagner? Mahler? In fact, take a look at composers' lists nowadays. Not a predominance of modern composers here at all. Your logic is so backwards, it's been awful trying to see you form arguments, that I now can't tell if you're simply trolling and playing around.


Debussy is indeed a more modern composer than Brahms, and modern composers are clearly and vastly over-represented on that list compared to on other, less obviously biased ones. Are you blind, by any chance? This is of course not to say that modernness is the only factor at play.



> That's clearly your own opinion and doesn't represent the majority of studious or creative Classical fans. Maybe it did when Brahms and The Big 3 was all they recorded back in this community's younger years, but for ~70 years Debussy has been trending exponentially more than most composers, and now in the digital age I'm afraid there's not much the traditionalist can do about his (or Stravinsky's) massive overtaking. But you seem to live in the dark about this. Either catch on by joining other communities and developing your ear, or wait for this reality to catch up to this community through new members.


It's not just my opinion that Debussy is a less challenging and more immediately and superficially pleasing than Brahms but an easily recognizable fact. The same is true for Mozart, who is just as great as Brahms. I should add however that this doesn't mean that Debussy or Mozart lack depth and that their appeal is entirely or mainly superficial or that the people who prefer their music do so for superficial reasons, but simply that the surface of their music charms the ear more easily.


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## Ethereality (Apr 6, 2019)

Waldesnacht said:


> Many people on this forum grew up in the digital age.





Waldesnacht said:


> Among famous composers, as opposed to obscure nonentities, you will hardly find a single one that has compared Debussy to Brahms.





Waldesnacht said:


> The same is true for Mozart, who is just as great as Brahms.





Waldesnacht said:


> Modern composers are clearly and vastly over-represented on that list.





Waldesnacht said:


> This doesn't mean that Debussy or Mozart lack depth and that their appeal is entirely or mainly superficial or that the people who prefer their music do so for superficial reasons, but simply that the surface of their music charms the ear more easily.


Ouch! I'm almost offended by your inaccuracies. Not even one word could I understand.

If you'd like, I can defend Brahms for you next time, as you miss so many actual true points. For now we'll have to agree to disagree.

What is it you wanted? Quotes of famous composers who put Debussy at the same level as The Big 3? Not many composers praise or talk about Brahms I'm afraid... but you could become aware of that if you did some homework. Statements from famous composers putting Debussy in the Big 4 though, there happen to be loads of those  Statements that Wagner and Mahler are also "up there with Bach, Debussy, and Beethoven." Maybe we ought to make a new thread? I've said about 5 times now, we're off topic of the current thread and I don't want to keep disrupting it.


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## Josquin13 (Nov 7, 2017)

For W.A. Mozart, I'd most recommend a series of books by Mozart scholar H.C. Robbins Landon, & especially his two books on Mozart's last 10 years: 1781-1791 "The Golden Years" and "1791: Mozart's Last Year"(see links below), but also his book on Mozart's earlier years entitled, "Mozart and Vienna". Landon also created a Mozart 'compendium' with other scholars, however, I've not read it. From my experience, his books are consistently well researched (& btw, there's also an excellent Robbins Landon book on F.J. Haydn, entitled "Haydn: His Life and Music", which was published in 1988):

https://www.amazon.com/1791-H-C-Rob...s+landon+mozart&qid=1599020711&s=music&sr=1-1

https://www.amazon.com/Mozart-1781-...s+landon+mozart&qid=1599020711&s=music&sr=1-3

https://www.amazon.com/Mozart-Vienn...s+landon+mozart&qid=1599020711&s=music&sr=1-4

https://www.amazon.com/Mozart-Mason...s+landon+mozart&qid=1599020711&s=music&sr=1-6

For Beethoven, Maynard Solomon's book is enjoyable, but he gets the "immortal beloved" wrong, in my opinion. She wasn't Antonie Brentano. Rather, the evidence more strongly supports that she was Josephine Brunsvik. In fact, it's so obvious that I'm surprised the question of her identity has proven so elusive to scholars. I guess people love a mystery. (Btw, Solomon also wrote a well reviewed biography on Mozart, which I've not yet read: https://www.amazon.com/Mozart-Life-...4SZXVW693BN&psc=1&refRID=NJ3F3S0Z44SZXVW693BN).

https://www.amazon.com/Beethoven-Se...FMN5SWAFN50&psc=1&refRID=GXRVTMTPPFMN5SWAFN50

Therefore, I'd recommend reading a biography of Beethoven that argues the case for his "only love" Josephine, but I don't know which one that is?, or if such a book even exists... ? But it does seem to me that such a biographer would naturally, most likely have done their overall research more thoroughly & astutely than others.

In addition, there is of course Alexander Wheelock Thayer's authoritative and meticulously well researched "Life of Beethoven", which has already been mentioned.

One of my personal favorite biographical writings on Beethoven is a brief, but profound essay the conductor Eugen Jochum wrote on Beethoven the man, or "human being, which once appeared on the back of the old Philips LPs from Jochum's 1960s Beethoven symphony cycle with the Concertgebouw Orchestra of Amsterdam. In this short essay Jochum reveals a depth of understanding about Beethoven and his music that few biographers have approached in many more pages. Here it is:

"What the New Testament is for Christians, Beethoven could be--and even is to a larger extent--for those who strive after the humanitarian ethos. Is it perhaps that the human being is the subject of all he has to say?

The human being who in Bach lived, believed, suffered, and died sheltered but also confined within the strictly defined bounds of Protestant Christian existence, humble, bound to a God in an objective order. The human being who in Mozart already enjoyed full freedom in the seraphic beauty of a perfect harmony, almost innocent, in spite of every refinement touching only in 'Don Giovanni' the dark substratum of the world, hubris and destruction, but in the confrontation of forces returning to the law.

But what is the human being in Beethoven? He is the entity entirely filled with consciousness of himself, the hazards of his existence, his suffering, his nobility, and his greatness. This man Beethoven, who was he?

Certainly no hero in the sense of the martial victor, no Achilles, radiant even in downfall, but a man pursued by the demons of his inmost being, seaching for freedom, greatness, and above all love. And all wrung under the most adverse circumstances from humiliation and misery, and in the unimaginable lonliness to which deafness condemned him, without ever the sound of a loving voice to break this barrier.*

As 'God gave him the power to say what he suffered,' he could only put all that white hot emotion, mute suffering, humiliation, and intimations of an ineffable sublimity into musical form. And so he transmuted in the forge of his suffering the human means of expression into musical form, relentlessly wrought into the most exact design. And then the miracle happens, that in this most pure, virile music all that stirs the heart of a human being is turned to speech; suffering, grief, lonliness, but also, and above all, the indescribable sweetness of consolation, happiness, dance, ecstasy carried to the bounds of mystical transport; from the Virgilian secular piety of the 'Pastoral' symphony and the 'Concalescent's hymn of thanks to the Godhead,' of the String Quartet Op. 132, to the visionary perception of a Father beyond the stars and the devotion of the 'Missa Solemnis.' The entire span of the human heart and spirit is in that work, perceptible, communicable. There is appeal and reassurance, the courage to shoulder one's own destiny in the faith in the indestructible, invincible dignity which makes human beings what they are.

That is Beethoven for me.

[*That he enjoyed a social position among the Viennese nobility which was exceptional for a musician of the day alters nothing. To him this position was a mere veneer, more or less arrogated, and at the same time despised. Nor was there solace in his many erotic episodes, none of which led to the marriage he so earnestly desired. They only deepen the shadows in the picture of this Goyaesque life.]"

What an intelligent man Jochum was.

With that said, I've not read Jan Swafford's book on Beethoven. (Edit: Oh yes, I'd be remiss not to additionally mention J.W.N. Sullivan's 1960 book, "Beethoven: His Spiritual Development", which many people get enthusiastic about: https://www.amazon.com/Beethoven-Sp...hoven+spiritual&qid=1599154259&s=books&sr=1-1

As for books on other composers, I've particularly enjoyed the psychiatrist/musician Peter Ostwald's excellent biography on Robert Schumann, entitled "Schumann: The Inner Voices of a Musical Genius". It is very well researched (as was always the case with Ostwald's books--such as on Glenn Gould, who Ostwald knew personally, Nijinsky, and the "Marriage Diaries of Robert & Clara Schumann"). & of course, the young Brahms figures prominently in Schumann's later life story.

https://www.amazon.com/Schumann-Inner-Voices-Musical-Genius/dp/1555537243
https://www.thriftbooks.com/w/schum...-ostwald/540600/#isbn=1555530141&idiq=3999610
https://www.amazon.com/Schumann-Inn...s=peter+ostwald&qid=1599148974&s=books&sr=1-1

John Worthen's extensive biography of Schumann is also worth reading (no pun intended): it's entitled "Robert Schumann: Life and Death of a Musician" (at 496 pages!): https://www.amazon.com/Robert-Schum...orthen+schumann&qid=1599149350&s=books&sr=1-1.

I'd also recommend Robert & Clara's daughter, Eugene Schumann's "Memoirs", along with the published lifelong correspondence between Johannes Brahms and Clara Schumann (if you can track them down at a library, since they're OOP & quite expensive to buy nowadays). I mention the Schumanns because their life story intertwines with and makes a vivid entree into the life of Brahms. Brahms was after all a close family friend and godfather to their son, Felix, whose short, tragic life inspired Brahms' beautiful, sorrowful 1st Violin Sonata (which is a great favorite of mine).

https://www.amazon.com/Schumanns-Jo...ugenie+schumann&qid=1599150280&s=books&sr=1-1

Otherwise, I've enjoyed Christopher Hogwood's book on George Frideric Handel: https://www.amazon.com/Handel-Revis...=handel+hogwood&qid=1599150849&s=books&sr=1-1. Though, as with classical music recordings, I don't believe there's any such thing as a 'definitive' biography.

& especially when it comes to Claude Debussy, who I am fanatical about (along with Maurice Ravel & that whole Ballets Russes period in Paris at the turn of the last century).

IMO, essential Debussy reads would include his letters fo Désiré-Emile Inghelbrecht, who was one of the composer's close friends, "Debussy's Resonance" (edited by Steven Huebner and François de Médicis)--which is a collection of scholarly essays on Debussy, Debussy's "Selected Letters"--edited by Francois Lesure and Roger Nichols:https://www.amazon.com/Debussy-Lett...françois+lesure&qid=1599153352&s=books&sr=1-3, and Francois Lesure's exhaustive and highly detailed biography on the composer, "Claude Debussy: A Critical Biography", which was published in a French to English translation by the University of Rochester Press (at 544 pages!): https://www.amazon.com/Claude-Debus...françois+lesure&qid=1599153352&s=books&sr=1-1. In addition, Léon Vallas, Marcel Dietschy, and Edward Lockspeiser were once highly regarded biographers of Debussy, as well.

I should also mention that any of the writings that you can find by pianist/scholar Roy Howat on Debussy and his works make for invaluable reading, such as Howat's "Debussy in Proportion: A Musical Analysis" (but also any Howat liner notes to CDs, etc.). I'd additionally recommend Paul Roberts's book on Debussy's piano music, as well: https://www.amazon.com/Images-Piano...sy+paul+roberts&qid=1599153011&s=books&sr=1-1. Edit: Oh yes, I'd also recommend "Debussy on Music": https://www.amazon.com/Debussy-musi...ebussy+on+Music&qid=1599154069&s=books&sr=1-3

As for Stephen Walsh's book, I've not read it. I've noticed that it has received some good reviews; however, I doubt that Debussy would have liked being called a "painter of sound" anymore than he liked being called an "impressionist", which was a label that he strongly disliked. So, I don't overly go for Walsh's title... but of course it may be an excellent book, and I shouldn't judge a book by its title.

Hope that helps.


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## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

I’m just ploughing through Swafford’s biography of Beethoven. Was a great composer who turned out some of the greatest works of history. Sadly what a very unsuccessful man he was though, unable to have proper relationships and living in squalor and misery. But what a legacy he left us!


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## Logos (Nov 3, 2012)

Waldesnacht said:


> Debussy is indeed a more modern composer than Brahms, and modern composers are clearly and vastly over-represented on that list compared to on other, less obviously biased ones. Are you blind, by any chance? This is of course not to say that modernness is the only factor at play.


This list would also have us believe that Benjamin Britten is a greater composer than Haydn, and Ligeti than Wagner. Not only is Debussy greater than Brahms but so is Saariaho, who is also greater than Chopin. It's a good thing we have contemporary composers to put true valuations on things. Otherwise my rankings might look somewhat different. I was particularly grateful to learn that Handel is far inferior to the great Sondheim.


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## EdwardBast (Nov 25, 2013)

_____________________________


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## EdwardBast (Nov 25, 2013)

DavidA said:


> I'm just ploughing through Swafford's biography of Beethoven. Was a great composer who turned out some of the greatest works of history. Sadly what a very unsuccessful man he was though, unable to have proper relationships and living in squalor and misery. But what a legacy he left us!


I too am plowing trough Swafford at the moment. The going has gotten especially difficult during Beethoven's disastrous "child rearing" days. What courage and fortitude in his struggles with life and art.


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## Barbebleu (May 17, 2015)

DavidA said:


> I'm just ploughing through Swafford's biography of Beethoven. Was a great composer who turned out some of the greatest works of history. Sadly what a very unsuccessful man he was though, unable to have proper relationships and living in squalor and misery. But what a legacy he left us!


I've got that on my current reading pile too. Very detailed!


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## Caroline (Oct 27, 2018)

So what do you think? Why did Beethoven focus so much time on Karl?

[this posted in the wrong place - was meant to be under Edward Bast & David A]


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## MarkW (Feb 16, 2015)

Caroline said:


> So what do you think? Why did Beethoven focus so much time on Karl?
> 
> [this posted in the wrong place - was meant to be under Edward Bast & David A]


There's a lot of Freudian speculation on this. But things you can probably take as reasonable:

A) He really disliked his late brother's wife, thought she was a woman of easy virtue, and extrapolated from that that she must be an unfit mother.

B) If the "Immortal beloved" letter is to be believed, he finally resigned himself (in 1812) to the likelihood that he would never be married, and the sudden "availability" of Karl represented perhaps his last chance to raise a child.


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## EdwardBast (Nov 25, 2013)

Caroline said:


> So what do you think? Why did Beethoven focus so much time on Karl?
> 
> [this posted in the wrong place - was meant to be under Edward Bast & David A]


I've nothing much to add to what Mark said, except (perhaps): a sense of duty to family as a normal part of his ethical thinking, maybe an unfulfilled desire for the warmth of human contact on a regular basis, and, alas, a bit of spite against the boy's mother Johanna and a wish not to see her prevail(?)


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## Ethereality (Apr 6, 2019)

Logos said:


> This list would also have us believe that Benjamin Britten is a greater composer than Haydn, and Ligeti than Wagner. Not only is Debussy greater than Brahms but so is Saariaho, who is also greater than Chopin. It's a good thing we have contemporary composers to put true valuations on things. Otherwise my rankings might look somewhat different. I was particularly grateful to learn that Handel is far inferior to the great Sondheim.


Just want to say, according to 174 very different professionals, the composers above are better overall. I don't really see the issue with different, developed opinions clashing with the mainstream but also very much agreeing with them: they have Bach, Beethoven, Mozart and Haydn there on the Top 50, so not too strange. If you survey 174 'average listeners' then the result will favor Haydn and Handel. There is no right or wrong choice, that is why I wanted to combine both giant surveys into a big list, to get the most balanced largescale list of all time. Haydn and Handel win overall, because some professionals indeed voted for them. But

are they really better or worse? It's always up to the individual. As an individual, I often side more with the professional composers, because they're much smarter than the mainstream. I learn to see that their opinions are often deeper and more sensible. But that is me. That doesn't mean Handel is bad, but he's definitely not a favorite.


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## Caroline (Oct 27, 2018)

MarkW said:


> There's a lot of Freudian speculation on this. But things you can probably take as reasonable:
> 
> A) He really disliked his late brother's wife, thought she was a woman of easy virtue, and extrapolated from that that she must be an unfit mother.
> 
> B) If the "Immortal beloved" letter is to be believed, he finally resigned himself (in 1812) to the likelihood that he would never be married, and the sudden "availability" of Karl represented perhaps his last chance to raise a child.


He wrote after 1812 that happiness would be a family of his own - wife and children . He continued to seek a wife after adopting Karl (1815 or 1816?) and at least one woman was interested in him (and he not in her apparently). Karl was that 'son'. He signs letters to Karl as 'your affectionate father,' etc. Seems reasonable.

Johanna did have a record and 'owing to low moral character' stated during the guardianship hearings - Beethoven, of relatively high moral fiber, did feel obligated to raise Karl. He also I think truly wanted a better life for Karl, better than he had. I came across a letter stating this recently and I hadn't considered how that was important to him.

The Sterbas published a book in the '50s - Beethoven and his Nephew - which may add to this. I am not familiar with the book.


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## Caroline (Oct 27, 2018)

EdwardBast said:


> I've nothing much to add to what Mark said, except (perhaps): a sense of duty to family as a normal part of his ethical thinking, maybe an unfulfilled desire for the warmth of human contact on a regular basis, and, alas, a bit of spite against the boy's mother Johanna and a wish not to see her prevail(?)


It may have been part of his ethical thinking and family responsibility - as he looked after his brothers. The relationship with Johanna was odd - he provided her with some financial support - and he went out of his way to prevent her from seeing Karl.


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## EdwardBast (Nov 25, 2013)

And Johanna ultimately lost Karl because of a pregnancy out of wedlock, confirming her "low character" at a critical juncture. No one seemed to mind Beethoven's prostitutes. Usual double standard.


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## Caroline (Oct 27, 2018)

EdwardBast said:


> And Johanna ultimately lost Karl because of a pregnancy out of wedlock, confirming her "low character" at a critical juncture. No one seemed to mind Beethoven's prostitutes. Usual double standard.


Definitely the double standard prevailed then as now. The words 'low character' were used during the guardianship hearings (as you may likely know). There were something like 200 prostitutes in Vienna during Beethoven's time - many of which had been included with Napoleon's army. Prostitutes were widely employed. Somewhere I read that after a man was married (at least in the Vienna of that time) it was considered usual for him to visit prostitutes - have you understood this?


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## Logos (Nov 3, 2012)

Ethereality said:


> As an individual, I often side more with the professional composers, because they're much smarter than the mainstream. I learn to see that their opinions are often deeper and more sensible. But that is me. That doesn't mean Handel is bad, but he's definitely not a favorite.


Contemporary composers are experts on the subject of contemporary music, but the task of comparing composers of the common practice period, however, is one best left to music historians. Simply being an artist does not make one an expert critic of historical art. Modern architects are not authorities on the subject of Gothic architecture. Few of today's painters are qualified to speak on the subject of the old masters. Most contemporary artists are far too deeply submerged in ephemeral trends of their own day to be good judges of work from vastly different periods. While I might agree that contemporary composers are probably more intelligent than the average listener, I submit that the same is true of music historians, who have the benefit of a more comprehensive knowledge of the subject, and whose judgments therefore benefit from a wider context, less subject to arbitrary changes in fashion.


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## Ethereality (Apr 6, 2019)

Logos said:


> This list would also have us believe that Benjamin Britten is a greater composer than Haydn, and Ligeti than Wagner. Not only is Debussy greater than Brahms but so is Saariaho, who is also greater than Chopin. It's a good thing we have contemporary composers to put true valuations on things. Otherwise my rankings might look somewhat different. I was particularly grateful to learn that Handel is far inferior to the great Sondheim.


Firstly need to iterate, the issue obviously isn't "the opinions of good composers today vs the opinions of bad sucessful composers today," what have you. Professional composers today are backed by the modern Classical community and that's where these composer lists come from, their success and popularity. That's the only legitimate reason they're chosen, is their high respect.

Knowing that, the question becomes, do we listen to individuals who are so innate and intelligent at musical discernment in constructing the most praised of works today, whose listening of music is so natural that most individuals fail to understand the quality of their ear? Or do we choose critics, who the reason they're successful, like the former, is because the mainstream listen to them too, thus both groups are arbitrarily chosen by what people think is right. The difference is, the former group has innate talent and precision in discerning music that takes a lifetime to attempt being good at oneself, and that can be attempted and measured. In other words, one group yields opinions that are much better understood by their ownselves--innate grasp. The other group reflects recycled analyses of what some people, ie. analytical individuals, think is correct, but analytical mind doesn't = musical understanding.

An even greater issue you bring up is that modern composers today don't easily discern past greats. However, the data says completely opposite to this, so I don't think you have a point there. In fact I can turn it around and say the same thing. Where are your critics praise of Monteverdi, Gesualdo and Hildegard > Handel? Where are your critics praise of a few of the new greats? It depends on the critics. The only question becomes: where is your critics' list, and will I be able to learn as much from looking into it as I have the opinions of the innately knowledgeable of music, the creative masterminds of today? For instance, I've already learned so much more from Beethoven or Debussy than I have Brahms, since their creative processes were much more advanced and contributions greater. Brahms only expounded on 'popular Beethoven' in style, otherwise they're very different composers in skill. This list is more of the intellect.


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## Logos (Nov 3, 2012)

Having a good ear in one genre of composition does not make one an expert on all forms and periods of music. Would you ask a jazz musician, however good his ear, for his opinion on the relative merits of baroque composers? Most contemporary composers have little or nothing to do with common practice period music, and few if any qualifications in music history. I don't know what you mean by "more intellectual". If the task be to evaluate and compare composers throughout history, the best-qualified persons to do this are music historians. That seems to me to be self-evident. You have stated that the contemporary composers were chosen based on the praise their works received, but few living composers are recognized by the mainstream at all, and contemporary classical music enjoys little success or praise of any kind beyond a very small circle of connoisseurs. Being a successful contemporary classical composer is a bit like being the tallest man among the pygmies. Even the most famous among them is hardly known to the generally educated public. In other words, there is no widely lauded body of living composers from which to draw in the first place.


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## Ethereality (Apr 6, 2019)

That's frankly one of the most ludicrous, inaccurate things I have ever read. None of these composers would compare themselves with Bach or Beethoven, no you're right about that. I was hoping you could respond to my points. If there were pygmies, I'd only naturally assume it would be the arbitrary selection of talentless analysts you read from.

One thing I do agree with is, if one is actually interested in others' opinions, which is no requirement for anybody, then we need to look at the opinions of today, not yesteryear. Not for their social relevance, but because today is the spot we can pool all history and knowledge equally. We could pool composers from 100 years ago (which we have) but we'd be ignoring the past 100 years. So the trick seems to be finding the sweet spot. Since most modern composers love the Big 3 and Wagner and Mahler, it's uncertain whether we need to do this or not. Might be best just to learn more from their collective understanding at this time, from Gesualdo to Glass, which is all it's about.

If the Classical music industry ever becomes as bad as the film industry, I'll be sure to pull out of regarding any professional opinions. But the claim that the Classical industry is failing now artistically, is indeed ludicrous. Doesn't mean you need to go out and buy their music.


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## Logos (Nov 3, 2012)

I never made any statement as to whether contemporary classical music was succeeding artistically. I wrote that it receives little recognition at all, and that contemporary composers are largely unknown to the wider public. This means that claiming that there are 174 renowned contemporary composers is rather ridiculous. Renowned among whom? Each other? The general public has little idea that contemporary classical music exists at all. But that is a separate matter from its artistic success. You find things to agree with that I never wrote, and you find ludicrous certain points that I likewise never expressed. Contemporary composers are not professionals when it comes to evaluating and comparing common practice period music. "Classical music" (1650-1900) and contemporary classical music really have nothing to do with each other at this late date in history. Music of past centuries is not the area of their expertise, but that of music historians.


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## Ethereality (Apr 6, 2019)

Define the years of the common practice period so that we all know where to draw the line on great composers, according to your brilliant view. Since all your historians disagree, you'll have to provide me the very best expert on the subject so that we deter any artistic blasphemy among us. It would be great if professional composers studied Classical music, no? Almost so they know where to break new ground? Then we'd have talented people listening to and rating music.


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## Logos (Nov 3, 2012)

Ethereality said:


> Define the years of the common practice period so that we all know where to draw the line on great composers, according to your brilliant view. Also, since all your historians disagree, you're going to have to provide me the very best expert on the subject so that we deter any artistic blasphemy among us. Lol.


Common practice period: roughly 1650-1900. I certainly wouldn't rely on any one historian or musicologist. Donald Tovey, Ernest Newman, Charles Rosen, Alan Walker, Joseph Kerman, Alfred Einstein, Hugo Riemann--these are a few that immediately come to mind.


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## Logos (Nov 3, 2012)

Ethereality said:


> It would be great if professional composers studied Classical music, you think?


It would be, but contemporary composers do not study common practice period music to the extent that you seem to imagine, any more than contemporary painters spend their time studying Titian or Tintoretto. Instead they are largely concerned with composers of the more immediate past and today's trends.


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## Ethereality (Apr 6, 2019)

I hope you realized those questions were mostly rhetorical. There's only so much critiquing of music you can do before you realize it's more rewarding on the brain to write music. The most ingenious and invested critics realize this, that's why they became composers. It doesn't mean they're fancy pens of literature like the reaffirming dumplestilskins people buy into.

Now some points these musicologists make are interesting and informative, but I've learned more overall from composers.


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## consuono (Mar 27, 2020)

Logos said:


> It would be, but contemporary composers do not study common practice period music to the extent that you seem to imagine, any more than contemporary painters spend their time studying Titian or Tintoretto. Instead they are largely concerned with composers of the more immediate past and today's trends.


I'd say most of them do, and come to realize that common practice reached such a plateau that the only choices available now are riffing on the old masters or being "original" and "daring" by being as unlike them as possible.


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## Logos (Nov 3, 2012)

Ethereality said:


> I hope you realized those questions were mostly rhetorical.


I did realize that, but because those questions (or rather, sarcastic statements disguised as questions) evinced premises that I believed to be inaccurate, I chose to address them in the manner that I did. I've learned more about the common practice period from composers (of that period) than I have from historians, but not from today's composers. If I want to learn about 18th century music, then I consult historians and musicologists who have studied that era, or the composers that lived through that century. Today's composers, however, have nothing to do with the matter.


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## Logos (Nov 3, 2012)

> I'd say most of them do, and come to realize that common practice reached such a plateau that the only choices available now are riffing on the old masters or being "original" and "daring" by being as unlike them as possible.


They do study it, but does the typical contemporary composer study to the point that they have attained to a comprehensive understanding of 18th and 19th century musical forms that would enable them to make authoritative and historically contextualized evaluations in distinguishing between the relative merits of music from eras widely distant from each other? I should say that that is a rare achievement, and one that will be more commonly reached among musicologists and historians than composers themselves (not that there isn't a certain degree of overlap in these fields).


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## consuono (Mar 27, 2020)

> They do study it, but does the typical contemporary composer study to the point that they have attained to a comprehensive understanding of 18th and 19th century musical forms that would enable them to make authoritative and historically contextualized evaluations in distinguishing between the relative merits of music from eras widely distant from each other?


I think they absolutely do, the overwhelming majority of them anyway. But what are they going to do, write Brahmsian or Mahlerian symphonies when Brahms and Mahler have already done so?


> any more than contemporary painters spend their time studying Titian or Tintoretto.


By the way, a lot of graphic artists are probably well acquainted with the old masters in their medium as well, but photography (including cinema) made Titians and Tintorettos obsolete. Therefore painting had to become something other than a stylized presentation of recognizable reality, and so here comes Expressionism etc etc etc. I think in music the dynamic is similar. The 17th-19th century musical craftsman is obsolete, although the desire is still there to go through the motions and cling to the old pattern, in the same way that pop stars and their handlers in *their* tired medium are always in some way trying to recreate Elvis or Motown or the Beatles...while at the same time trying to be the anti-ElvisWhatevers.


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## Logos (Nov 3, 2012)

consuono said:


> I think they absolutely do, the overwhelming majority of them anyway. But what are they going to do, write Brahmsian or Mahlerian symphonies when Brahms and Mahler have already done so? By the way, a lot of graphic artists are probably well acquainted with the old masters in their medium as well, but photography (including cinema) made Titians and Tintorettos obsolete. Therefore painting had to become something other than a stylized presentation of recognizable reality, and so here comes Expressionism etc etc etc. I think in music the dynamic is similar. The 17th-19th century musical craftsman is obsolete, although the desire is still there to go through the motions and cling to the old pattern, in the same way that pop stars and their handlers in *their* tired medium are always in some way trying to recreate Elvis or Motown or the Beatles...while at the same time trying to be the anti-ElvisWhatevers.


Yes, all these media are tired. For all the reasons you mention, I would never attempt, or endorse an attempt to create new fine art in the first place, so that places me in opposition to contemporary artists in principle. I don't say paint like Titian. I say don't paint at all--save our eyes. I don't say compose like Brahms. I say don't compose at all--spare our ears.


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## flamencosketches (Jan 4, 2019)

Logos said:


> Yes, all these media are tired. For all the reasons you mention, I would never attempt, or endorse an attempt to create new fine art in the first place, so that places me in opposition to contemporary artists in principle. I don't say paint like Titian. I say don't paint at all--save our eyes. I don't say compose like Brahms. I say don't compose at all--spare our ears.


So you want to keep art and music strictly a thing of the past...?


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## Ethereality (Apr 6, 2019)

@Logos, You're not really in opposition though. None of those composers would say they're better than Brahms. Composition and advanced structural thinking is just who they _are_, it's their artistic passion and intuitive nature as it was for Brahms, and there's nothing we need to be spared from in what they create through this talent. To imply the music they write is bad, is completely ridiculous, and it's not the best music nor would they say it is. It's just 'advanced music today.' I don't believe you're so vehemently opposed to them as you're saying really.

It's not our first or natural choice in _music_, but it should be our first choice in _thought process_: some people here might listen to pop rather than contemporary Classical and that only shows some people are dead-brained sometimes. But not producing 'go-to music' doesn't disqualify these composers as innately talented critics who understand music better than most who might apply for the job. Instead of putting them down, simply just imagine trying to do what they do.

What is their mental process, their psychology and level of creative understanding? We can ask Bach or Beethoven, the best composers, who the best composers are, but the resulting list wouldn't end up too informative. We need a mix of the great talent and the fair knowledge of all history. *If they made this survey in 1900,* people would be laughing at it too. Because it would have all these 'Romantic' dudes on the top. Now we have a list with _2_ living composers in the Top 20, and the whole forum blows up. Hilarious!

I personally think that list which the 174 came up with is a work of art in of itself (including all their individual comments they wrote in the article, I'll post it again.) This list isn't really meant to be *agreed with,* it's meant to be intensely studied and wondered upon for years, as it represents an understanding mostly beyond our talents and experience. We shall see more of these names rise higher in the next 50 years of the mainstream Classical community, like Ligeti and Messiaen, as they've been uptrending on this very forum for its whole life! What's to stop them from making the Top 20 on *our* forum in 30 years? The list is legit. That doesn't mean the best composers won't continue to dominate, but that we will have expanded in our understanding and acceptance of lesser composers.

It's difficult arguing the truth of trends... because before they come true, no one cares. After they come true and you show everyone, no one cares either. History shows that we like music from Classical and Romanticism, and then some contemporary composers. In 100 years, this community will: like music from Classical and Romanticism mostly, and then a bit more contemporary composers than before, and then a few 1950+ composers. That's the way the trend's been going the whole time!


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## consuono (Mar 27, 2020)

flamencosketches said:


> So you want to keep art and music strictly a thing of the past...?


It's already a thing of the past, and it's modern art and artists that made it so, along with technological changes. Also there's the possibility that the well has run dry. I can't think of any area of music in the "western world" that is vibrant and engaging at this moment, whether pop or "serious", and I can't picture much that's being produced right now that will be celebrated and remembered even a decade from now.


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## Logos (Nov 3, 2012)

I'm leaning towards the dry well hypothesis. We may have reached sediment.


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## SanAntone (May 10, 2020)

The thread "Definitive music biographies" has been overtaken by an off-topic discussion about a list of professional composers ranking past composers.

It would seem that creating a thread with that as the topic would be preferable than hi-jacking a thread that might have been interesting to those us who enjoy reading music biographies. Reading recommendations from others about music biographies is vastly more interesting to me than the current discussion about a list of which later/living composers rank past composers.

*Moderators: Would it be possible to peel off the off-topic discussion into a separate thread, so that this thread may return to its original topic?*


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## Logos (Nov 3, 2012)

_Bach_ - Philipp Spitta (3 vols.)

_Haydn_ - Landon (_Haydn: A Documentary Study_ and _Chronicle and Works_ in 5 vols.), Rosemary Hughes

_Mozart _ - Eric Blom, Alfred Einstein

_Beethoven_ - Maynard Solomon, Tyson and Kerman, Thayer (Forbes rev.)

_Weber_ - Warrack

_Schubert_ - Otto Deutsch (_The Schubert Reader_ and _Memoirs by His Friends_)

_Brahms_ - Hans Gal

_Wagner _- Ernest Newman (4 vols.)


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## consuono (Mar 27, 2020)

SanAntone said:


> The thread "Definitive music biographies" has been overtaken by an off-topic discussion about a list of professional composers ranking past composers.
> 
> It would seem that creating a thread with that as the topic would be preferable than hi-jacking a thread that might have been interesting to those us who enjoy reading music biographies. Reading recommendations from others about music biographies is vastly more interesting to me than the current discussion about a list of which later/living composers rank past composers.
> 
> *Moderators: Would it be possible to peel off the off-topic discussion into a separate thread, so that this thread may return to its original topic?*


:lol: Can anybody show me a thread in this subforum that hasn't been hijacked? I'm thinking maybe the Early Music Listeners one.


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## Caroline (Oct 27, 2018)

Landon documentary of Beethoven
Beethoven - Forbes' Life;
Beethoven: Solomon (note Solomon also wrote Beethoven Essays, a different book) 

Mozart: Solomon, 
'1791 - Mozart's Last Year (don't recall the author's name), 
Mozart - Suchet book 

Letters:
Both Mozart's and Beethoven's were translated by Emily Anderson and you can find Beethoven's online I believe - I bought the 3 v series from a 3rd party. Collections of Mozart's letters are on Amazon and presto (and other places). They are very interesting and an excellent supplement to biographies.

There is also a 3v translation of letters written to Beethoven (T. Albrecht), which are extremely interesting.


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## SanAntone (May 10, 2020)

*Robbins-Landon *was always my go-to author of the Classical period; but I haven't read the *Solomon* book on Beethoven, and now Mozart, that many of you recommend.

Have any of you read the three volumes by *Daniel Heartz*, covering Haydn-Mozart-Beethoven. Not biographies, _per se_, but they are a very good discussion of the period, style, and societal mores that produced these men, and presumably their music.

*Haydn, Mozart and the Viennese School: 1740-1780 *

View attachment 142665


*Mozart, Haydn and Early Beethoven: 1781-1802*

View attachment 142664


*Music in European Capitals: The Galant Style, 1720-1780 *

View attachment 142666


The modern world shares little with the time of Haydn, Mozart and Beethoven (we take for granted ideas and ways of life which did not exist during this time) that I found these books very informative.


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## Caroline (Oct 27, 2018)

SanAntone said:


> *Robbins-Landon *was always my go-to author of the Classical period; but I haven't read the *Solomon* book on Beethoven, and now Mozart, that many of you recommend.
> 
> Have any of you read the three volumes by *Daniel Heartz*, covering Haydn-Mozart-Beethoven. Not biographies, _per se_, but they are a very good discussion of the period, style, and societal mores that produced these men, and presumably their music.
> 
> ...


Solomon is a very important contribution to scholarly work on Beethoven. He adds a bit of a psycholoanalytical perspective - all biographers try to add soemthing new to the literature. Another Beethoven book, which is all biography and puts his life in perspective of the times (politics, techology, art. etc.), is by Marek (Beethoven: Biography of a Genius). It's an excellent book even though it has a few factual errors. It was published in 1974 if I recall - so more research findings came to the fore since then.

Thank you for the referral to the Heartz titles.

One book on Beethoven is specific to myth-making (by Alessandra Comini): The Changing Face of Beethoven. I have looked through it but not sat down in a serious way with it. It is a tome. It is not a biography per se. It is an important reference to scholars - I found it through the bibliographies of books I have read by Solomon, Lockwood, and others.


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## Caroline (Oct 27, 2018)

Josquin13 said:


> One of my personal favorite biographical writings on Beethoven is a brief, but profound essay the conductor Eugen Jochum wrote on Beethoven the man, or "human being, which once appeared on the back of the old Philips LPs from Jochum's 1960s Beethoven symphony cycle with the Concertgebouw Orchestra of Amsterdam. In this short essay Jochum reveals a depth of understanding about Beethoven and his music that few biographers have approached in many more pages. Here it is:
> 
> "What the New Testament is for Christians, Beethoven could be--and even is to a larger extent--for those who strive after the humanitarian ethos. Is it perhaps that the human being is the subject of all he has to say?
> 
> ...


Thank you for posting Jochum's eloquent description of Beethoven, who did not hide his emotions from people - in his music or otherwise.

I am also not convinced Antonie is the IB - at least by American scholars. There is a lot of evidence for Josephine.

What is interesting is that there is no compelling information - to my knowledge - in the writings of any of his friends of the period.


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## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

Caroline said:


> Thank you for posting Jochum's eloquent description of Beethoven, who did not hide his emotions from people - in his music or otherwise.
> 
> I am also not convinced Antonie is the IB - at least by American scholars. There is a lot of evidence for Josephine.
> 
> What is interesting is that there is no compelling information - to my knowledge - in the writings of any of his friends of the period.


Sorry but I really think these romantic descriptions of Beethoven are so far from what the man was actually like. You have only to read Swafford's biography (or for a lighter read, John Suchet's) to find out Beethoven was absolutely impossible with everyone - his friends, his patrons, his publishers, his servants, his musicians and even himself. When we listen to his music we have to come to terms with the fact that the man who created these incredible works of art - probably unsurpassed in the history of music - was a sad, tragic figure who couldn't 'do' life at all. It appears all the facilities had gone into his genius. He was totally unsuccessful at being a human being. The reason people put up with him (some didn't) was for the sake of his colossal genius. One story says it all. When staying with brother Johann, he was taken to see one of Johann's clients. The lady of the house offered drinks and thinking the miserable, shabby figure sitting hunched in the corner was some kind of lackey said, "This poor man shall have one too," and gave Beethoven one. Afterwards her husband told her, "Don't you realise that was Beethoven, the greatest living composer?"


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## Caroline (Oct 27, 2018)

DavidA said:


> Sorry but I really think these romantic descriptions of Beethoven are so far from what the man was actually like. You have only to read Swafford's biography (or for a lighter read, John Suchet's) to find out Beethoven was absolutely impossible with everyone - his friends, his patrons, his publishers, his servants, his musicians and even himself. When we listen to his music we have to come to terms with the fact that the man who created these incredible works of art - probably unsurpassed in the history of music - was a sad, tragic figure who couldn't 'do' life at all. It appears all the facilities had gone into his genius. He was totally unsuccessful at being a human being. The reason people put up with him (some didn't) was for the sake of his colossal genius. One story says it all. When staying with brother Johann, he was taken to see one of Johann's clients. The lady of the house offered drinks and thinking the miserable, shabby figure sitting hunched in the corner was some kind of lackey said, "This poor man shall have one too," and gave Beethoven one. Afterwards her husband told her, "Don't you realise that was Beethoven, the greatest living composer?"


Your comments are also true. Beethoven, was, if history is accurate and complete (dubious at best), he was a complicated man and was a sensitive character as well as a very difficult one. He, as well said by Barry Cooper, 'bungled' life in general. Even Beethoven said "...everything I do except music is badley done and stupid." This was said to a publisher via a (good) friend by the name of Streicher, whom you will know of. Beethoven was aware of his limitations but also of his goodness as a human being. All authors have biases - one has to read many biographies to appreciate the subject. He was difficult with publishers and copyiests (and to be fair continuously made errors with his works). He was demanding of performers (as are today's maestros - Gardiner as a fellow TC member pointed out). The list goes on. Swafford did not cite references for many of his comments (I wish he had) and I hoenstly couldn't find them in other books I have.

There are many stories like the one you cited - a great many anecdotal - and many of his contemporaries who initiated these were later in the 19th century shownn to be unreliable sources (Thayer spent much time trying to debunk them as well as what Schindler created in 1840). Many myths about Beethoven were born during his lifetime - and perpetuated throughout the 19th century. Many of the anecdotes (whether the one you mention is one) - of which there are plenty - originated or were repeated by people with biased opinions, didn't really know Beethoven, and were based on old memories and then taken as gospel. As you say, he was respected as a genius so many people tolerated a lot of antisocial behavior. In addition - that friends from his youth, and friends he made during his years in Beethoven, stayed true to him to his end speak to his better qualities.

This is awfully long, I just realized...I didn't mean to get carried away.


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## Roger Knox (Jul 19, 2017)

Logos said:


> Yes, all these media are tired. For all the reasons you mention, I would never attempt, or endorse an attempt to create new fine art in the first place, so that places me in opposition to contemporary artists in principle. I don't say paint like Titian. I say don't paint at all--save our eyes. I don't say compose like Brahms. I say don't compose at all--spare our ears.


How do you qualify to say people shouldn't paint or shouldn't (as I do) compose? No one said you have to view or listen and it's up to you -- not the creators -- to "spare" your ears and eyes.


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## SanAntone (May 10, 2020)

Logos said:


> Yes, all these media are tired. For all the reasons you mention, I would never attempt, or endorse an attempt to create new fine art in the first place, so that places me in opposition to contemporary artists in principle. I don't say paint like Titian. I say don't paint at all--save our eyes. I don't say compose like Brahms. I say don't compose at all--spare our ears.


LOL :lol:

Thanks for the chuckle.


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## consuono (Mar 27, 2020)

Roger Knox said:


> How do you qualify to say people shouldn't paint or shouldn't (as I do) compose? No one said you have to view or listen and it's up to you -- not the creators -- to "spare" your ears and eyes.


But then there shouldn't be such befuddlement and consternation when next to nobody's listening. It's not that 99.99% of humanity consists of closed-minded philistines who just don't understand; they're just exercising their right not to listen to sonic gobbledygook.


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## Logos (Nov 3, 2012)

Roger Knox said:


> How do you qualify to say people shouldn't paint or shouldn't (as I do) compose? No one said you have to view or listen and it's up to you -- not the creators -- to "spare" your ears and eyes.


This is like planting a field with mines and saying it's up to me to avoid them. Bad art is constantly springing up in unavoidable contexts and unless one stay in monkish isolation one is bound to be unexpectedly hoist with a petard or two. Virtually every major city being brimful with artistic monstrosities, both aural and visual, one can't be spared their presence.


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## Caroline (Oct 27, 2018)

Logos said:


> This is like planting a field with mines and saying it's up to me to avoid them. Bad art is constantly springing up in unavoidable contexts and unless one stay in monkish isolation one is bound to be unexpectedly hoist with a petard or two. Virtually every major city being brimful with artistic monstrosities, both aural and visual, one can't be spared their presence.


Brilliantly said.


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## SanAntone (May 10, 2020)

Logos said:


> This is like planting a field with mines and saying it's up to me to avoid them. Bad art is constantly springing up in unavoidable contexts and unless one stay in monkish isolation one is bound to be unexpectedly hoist with a petard or two. Virtually every major city being brimful with artistic monstrosities, both aural and visual, one can't be spared their presence.


However, art that appears to be bad to you is not "bad art." You don't appreciate it, that's all. Appreciating art is subjective and it is arrogant to claim that because you don't find a work of art interesting, it is bad. For every piece of music or art that you consider bad there will be others who think it is good. And you don't really suffer any actual hurt by being exposed, I presume unintentionally, to what you consider bad art or music, is is vastly different from stepping on a land mine.


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## Logos (Nov 3, 2012)

SanAntone said:


> However, art that appears to be bad to you is not "bad art." You don't appreciate it, that's all. Appreciating art is subjective and it is arrogant to claim that because you don't find a work of art interesting, it is bad. For every piece of music or art that you consider bad there will be others who think it is good. And you don't really suffer any actual hurt by being exposed, I presume unintentionally, to what you consider bad art or music, is is vastly different from stepping on a land mine.


There is no immediate physical harm, but all intellectual intake has some effect, insofar as it registers in the mind at all, and if it be incapable of making any impression on the mind it might as well not exist. To be around stupidity is to begin the process of becoming stupid. To be around meaningless ugliness is to dull the sense of order and beauty. It's a form of mental pollution to encounter bad art, for we know that persons who live out their days in ugly housing developments are mentally (and eventually, bodily) affected by the drabness and disorderliness of the appearances, and the chaos of the sounds that enter their minds every day. Orderly, beautiful, or grand surroundings lift the spirits; the converse debases them, and these negatively affect physical health over time. What bears bad fruit, in my estimation, is bad. In time, the outside (our environment) and the inside (the self) grow to resemblance.


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## SanAntone (May 10, 2020)

Logos said:


> There is no immediate physical harm, but all intellectual intake has some effect, insofar as it registers in the mind at all, and if it be incapable of make any impression on the mind it might as well not exist. To be around stupidity is to begin the process of becoming stupid. To be around meaningless ugliness is to dull the sense of order and beauty. It's a form of mental pollution to encounter bad art, for we know that persons who live out their days in ugly housing developments are mentally (and eventually, bodily) affected by the drabness and disorderliness of the appearances, and the chaos of the sounds that enter their minds every day. Orderly, beautiful, or grand surroundings lift the spirits; the converse debases them, and these negatively affect physical health over time. What bears bad fruit, in my estimation, is bad. In time, the outside (our environment) and the inside (the self) grow to resemblance.


I don't understand. Who is forcing you to "intake" bad art? Or are you trying to save humanity from what you have identified as bad art? Is it bad architecture that pollutes your soul? Billboards? Do you feel you are powerless to avoid this "meaningless ugliness?"

I find it very easy to avoid works of art I don't find interesting or ugly.


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## Logos (Nov 3, 2012)

SanAntone said:


> I don't understand. Who is forcing you to "intake" bad art? Or are you trying to save humanity from what you have identified as bad art? Is it bad architecture that pollutes your soul? Billboards? Do you feel you are powerless to avoid this "meaningless ugliness?"
> 
> I find it very easy to avoid works of art I don't find interesting or ugly.


I'm forced in the same way that a resident of the equator is forced to endure heat if he should step out of doors. I see the problem as a nearly all-pervasive characteristic of the time (yes, billboards and buildings, clothes, music, furniture, music, the landscape itself, etc.) and that makes us powerless to avoid it. And we must remember that these deleterious forms of art need not be encountered first hand in order to exert a noxious influence. If one interact with a man whose mind is filled with nothing but bad books and bad impressions, his society will be mentally unhealthful to one though the bad books and bad impressions were never directly encountered. In short, circumstances create the encounter and none can touch pitch without being defiled. Being a mere individual I have little hope of saving humanity from anything.


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## Logos (Nov 3, 2012)

Handel - Newman Flower, Paul Henry Lang


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## SanAntone (May 10, 2020)

Logos said:


> I'm forced in the same way that a resident of the equator is forced to endure heat if he should step out of doors. I see the problem as a nearly all-pervasive characteristic of the time (yes, billboards and buildings, clothes, music, furniture, music, the landscape itself, etc.) and that makes us powerless to avoid it. Circumstances create the encounter. Being a mere individual I have little hope of saving humanity from anything.


Have you considered joining a monastery? The same one Thomas Merton was a member of, just outside Louisville, KY, is still active. Conversely, you could simply live as a hermit.


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## Logos (Nov 3, 2012)

SanAntone said:


> Have you considered joining a monastery? The same one Thomas Merton was a member of, just outside Louisville, KY, is still active. Conversely, you could simply live as a hermit.


Even monasteries are not entirely insulated from today's tendencies. A contemporary monastery bears little more resemblance to one of the middle ages or the counter reformation than a modern university resembles its 18th century Prussian counterpart. The habits and buildings might appear the same but the persons within nevertheless partake, in a large degree, of the character of our time. In any case, I'm not a Roman Catholic. I suppose I do live rather hermetically (compared to the average person) as it is. "He is a happy man who can once for all avoid having to do with a great many of his fellow creatures."--Schopenhauer


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## consuono (Mar 27, 2020)

SanAntone said:


> Have you considered joining a monastery? The same one Thomas Merton was a member of, just outside Louisville, KY, is still active. Conversely, you could simply live as a hermit.


The ones in the "monastery" would appear to be devotees of "modern art".


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## Logos (Nov 3, 2012)

_Chopin: His Life_ - William Murdoch
_Schumann: Herald of a New Poetic Age_ - John Daverio
_Robert Schumann_ - Frederick Niecks


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## flamencosketches (Jan 4, 2019)

consuono said:


> The ones in the "monastery" would appear to be devotees of "modern art".


I don't follow that-in what sense? In any case, San Antone's advice was literal, and seemed sincere.


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## SanAntone (May 10, 2020)

<<<<<<< deleted >>>>>>>


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## lucrescu (Nov 22, 2016)

Hi there! I need help!
I want to listen all the compositions of Stravinsky and I need a book to accompany my project.
I want this book to discuss as many works as possible.
I want this book for biography facts and insides, also.
Can someone recommend me something? Stephen Walsh, Eric Walter White, something else? I'm lost.
Thank you!

PS: When I did a similar project about Shostakovich, I found a great book: 
Elizabeth Wilson - Shostakovich, a life remembered
I highly recommend this book to any fan of Shostakovich.


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## Amadea (Apr 15, 2021)

RICK RIEKERT said:


> For Mozart it's Hermann Abert's _W.A. Mozart_, translated from the German by Stewart Spencer and edited by Cliff Eisen. Abert's monumental work is "the fullest account of the composer's life and a detailed analysis of his operas, symphonies, concerti and chamber music. But what makes it stand above all others is its forensic examination of Mozart's personality and its relation to his music."


Do you know similar books on Beethoven or romantic composers or even Handel and Bach? I am interested in detailed analysis of compositions, which I don't find in regular books about them.


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## MarkW (Feb 16, 2015)

Thomas Scherman and Louis Biancolli's "The Beethoven Companion" is a large (1000+ pages) and relatively cheap compilation of excepts from other essays and books covering the composer's life, year by year, and each of the works. As an encyclopedic reference it's pretty good. Thayer's biography is the definitive old school "just the facts, ma'm" biography. Lockwood's, Soloman's, and Swafford's each have moments, but probably less about the actual music than you want.


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## Amadea (Apr 15, 2021)

MarkW said:


> Thomas Scherman and Louis Biancolli's "The Beethoven Companion" is a large (1000+ pages) and relatively cheap compilation of excepts from other essays and books covering the composer's life, year by year, and each of the works. As an encyclopedic reference it's pretty good. Thayer's biography is the definitive old school "just the facts, ma'm" biography. Lockwood's, Soloman's, and Swafford's each have moments, but probably less about the actual music than you want.


Yeah I know Solomon, I've read his Mozart and I have Beethoven too but didn't start it yet. He does a lot of psychoanalysis and goes very deep (maybe a bit too much sometimes). Thanks for the recommendations. I've found this too, what do you think? https://www.amazon.com/Cambridge-Companion-Beethoven-Companions-Music-ebook/dp/B00FF76UPM


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## MarkW (Feb 16, 2015)

Amadea said:


> Yeah I know Solomon, I've read his Mozart and I have Beethoven too but didn't start it yet. He does a lot of psychoanalysis and goes very deep (maybe a bit too much sometimes). Thanks for the recommendations. I've found this too, what do you think? https://www.amazon.com/Cambridge-Companion-Beethoven-Companions-Music-ebook/dp/B00FF76UPM


I haven't looked at it, but wouldn't doubt it's pretty good.


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## Bartolomeo (Jun 2, 2021)

I'm a big fan of Swafford's bios of Brahms and Beethoven. He's written one on Ives, but I haven't read it. I'm not as excited by his bio of Mozart, but it's OK. However, Gutman's Mozart: A cultural biography is first rate. He does an excellent job of setting Mozart in the cultural milieu of the late 18th c.


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## progmatist (Apr 3, 2021)

For whomever is interested: TCM (Turner Classic Movies) will air biopics about Mahler, and Liszt/Wagner tonight.


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## Esterhazy (Oct 4, 2014)

Although a little outdated and now improved by modern research the massive five volumes on Franz Joseph Haydn by H C Robbins Landon is masterly scholarship.


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## Caroline (Oct 27, 2018)

Bartolomeo said:


> I'm a big fan of Swafford's bios of Brahms and Beethoven. He's written one on Ives, but I haven't read it. I'm not as excited by his bio of Mozart, but it's OK. However, Gutman's Mozart: A cultural biography is first rate. He does an excellent job of setting Mozart in the cultural milieu of the late 18th c.


A more recent book, which was authorized by the Beethoven-Haus for the 250th Jubilee, is the biography by Jan Caeyers. Beethoven, A Life: Caeyers, Jan, Annable, Brent, Hope, Daniel: 9780520343542: Amazon.com: Books
Swafford’s biography of Beethoven is well done, but the Europeans have a bit of a different flavor I think.


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## Caroline (Oct 27, 2018)

While this is an old thread per se, for anyone still following, there is an interesting book translated from the German. It is about the subject of the ‘immortal beloved.’ While this subject is not much discussed in general biographies - it enriches one’s ‘understanding’ (or possibility) of Beethoven’s life in general and thus how it may have impacted his music - particularly when considering the 2nd and final maturity. I had no idea of the significance of the Immortal Beloved until reading the book by Marie Tellenbach and translated by John Klapproth. I am not yet finished with the book and there are primary sources (such as the many letters, diary entries of others, and historical records). 









Beethoven and His "Immortal Beloved" Josephine Brunsvik: Her Fate and the Influence on Beethoven's Œuvre: Tellenbach, Marie Elisabeth, Klapproth, John E: 9781499344417: Amazon.com: Books


Beethoven and His Immortal Beloved Josephine Brunsvik: Her Fate and the Influence on Beethoven's Œuvre [Tellenbach, Marie Elisabeth, Klapproth, John E] on Amazon.com. *FREE* shipping on qualifying offers. Beethoven and His Immortal Beloved Josephine Brunsvik: Her Fate and the Influence on...



www.amazon.com


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