# "Impossibilities"



## Huilunsoittaja (Apr 6, 2010)

A thread to think and talk about the likelihood of certain fans existing in the music world.

Can a person be _equally _fanatic about Mahler and Brahms??? Of course it's possible to like both composers (myself included) but can you really be _obsessed _with both of them equally?

From my own experience, I do like Mahler _and _Brahms, but I would choose Brahms over Mahler almost _any _day. Also, I have 2 friends to bring to the case. One of them is a Mahler fanatic, and I asked him if he liked Brahms. He said yes, but not really that much. I also have a friend who is a Brahms fanatic, and we often talked about how much he (and me) _really _didn't like Mahler. 

And I think this is more than just an issue of taste. It's an issue of musical mentality. Do you prefer the smashing of your heart onto the manuscript, or the objective and collective approach to emotion (but not unemotional)?

This thread isn't just about Mahler and Brahms though. Do you know any other pairings of composers that have proved to be so "dichotomic" that they really split people one way or the other without much of a middle ground?


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## Art Rock (Nov 28, 2009)

For me they share second place in my ranking of composers (behind JS Bach). Doesn't that blow your premise out of the water?


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## Sonata (Aug 7, 2010)

They are both in my top 5


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## Carpenoctem (May 15, 2012)

It seems like Mozart vs. Beethoven is quite possibly the most popular debate in classical music.

And you can't win in that argument, because both were geniuses.


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## Manxfeeder (Oct 19, 2010)

Maybe this is picayunish, but wouldn't a better comparison be Mahler to Sibelius and Brahms to Bruckner? They did both meet and ended up on opposite sides. 

But either way, if the question really relates to the Apollo v. Dionysis dichotomy, viz, can you equally love things that are driven by form/content and those that are driven by emotion, personally, I think so. But I think that came with age; the older I get, personally, I find myself less threatened by other peoples' opinions/ideas and more interested in understanding them.


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## Ramako (Apr 28, 2012)

How many people are obsessed about both Mendelssohn and Wagner?


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## Carpenoctem (May 15, 2012)

Ramako said:


> How many people are obsessed about both Mendelssohn and Wagner?


I like them both, but I don't know anyone who is obsessed with both of them, quite an interesting pair of composers.


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## moody (Nov 5, 2011)

Carpenoctem said:


> I like them both, but I don't know anyone who is obsessed with both of them, quite an interesting pair of composers.


A person obsessed has no judgement and is certainly not a music lover.


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## Carpenoctem (May 15, 2012)

moody said:


> A person obsessed has no judgement and is certainly not a music lover.


Yeah, true.

One thing is having a favorite composer, and another is being obsessed by him.

I'd say it's more frequent in popular music though.


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## Couchie (Dec 9, 2010)

moody said:


> A person obsessed has no judgement and is certainly not a music lover.


What a load of stupid ****.


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## moody (Nov 5, 2011)

See what I mean...but for you we make an exception because it's too late.


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## Huilunsoittaja (Apr 6, 2010)

Ramako said:


> How many people are obsessed about both Mendelssohn and Wagner?


Speaking of that, Berlioz vs. Mendelssohn could be another example. They were quite different from each other, not only musically, but their mentality. I also like both, but not equally, I think Berlioz is more interesting. Although, both have qualities that I don't like, so that doesn't help either one either way. :lol:


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## Huilunsoittaja (Apr 6, 2010)

Art Rock said:


> For me they share second place in my ranking of composers (behind JS Bach). Doesn't that blow your premise out of the water?


But can't you be obsessed with a number of composers at the same time? And is ranking the same as personal interest?

In other words, your mind goes to pieces equally with Mahler and Brahms. That's what I mean by obsessed.

It could mean you have split personality too. 

The Brahms vs. Wagner dichotomy is usually brought up too. And also, I do love both of these composers, but not equally. It depends on my mood, but Brahms is still higher today.


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## powerbooks (Jun 30, 2012)

I think the question can be posed like this:

Can you think of any two composers who are totally antagonistic to each other? 

History always claims the rivalry of Brahms and Wagner in the later 19th century, but I like both of them, same as to Brahms and Mahler as the OP mentioned.

I have a hard time to think of any, but maybe later I may find someone......

Oh, maybe Mahler and Vaughan Williams can be the example for me. One is totally blandness, the other strikes you mind!


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## Carpenoctem (May 15, 2012)

powerbooks said:


> History always claims the rivalry of Brahms and Wagner in the later 19th century


Later in his life, Brahms valued Wagner and said that those who did not like Wagner's music couldn't actually understand it.


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## powerbooks (Jun 30, 2012)

Carpenoctem said:


> Later in his life, Brahms valued Wagner and said that those who did not like Wagner's music couldn't actually understand it.


That was my point: I do not believe they disliked each other as history claimed. It is like today's media hype of michael phelps and ryan lochte rivalry.


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## brianwalker (Dec 9, 2011)

Ramako said:


> How many people are obsessed about both Mendelssohn and Wagner?


I like Mendelssohn.



Huilunsoittaja said:


> Can a person be _equally _fanatic about Mahler and Brahms??? Of course it's possible to like both composers (myself included) but can you really be _obsessed _with both of them equally?


Me.


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## Couchie (Dec 9, 2010)

moody said:


> See what I mean...but for you we make an exception because it's too late.


It's sad that you've never been so moved by a composer so as to cure obsession... like never falling in love.


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## moody (Nov 5, 2011)

Art Rock said:


> For me they share second place in my ranking of composers (behind JS Bach). Doesn't that blow your premise out of the water?


That has nothing to do with the question posed.


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## ComposerOfAvantGarde (Dec 2, 2011)

Ramako said:


> How many people are obsessed about both Mendelssohn and Wagner?


Hahaha, I like both and I think they are as good as each other but most days I would prefer to listen to Wagner.


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## ComposerOfAvantGarde (Dec 2, 2011)

powerbooks said:


> I think the question can be posed like this:
> 
> Can you think of any two composers who are totally antagonistic to each other?
> 
> ...


I'm not sure about this but maybe Schoenberg and Hindemith. Hindemith had a very strong view that all music should be tonal and Schoenberg was a pioneer of atonality. I don't think they were "rivals" as such but their ideas seem to disagree with each other.


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## Crudblud (Dec 29, 2011)

Boulez and Shostakovich. *snigger*


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## moody (Nov 5, 2011)

Couchie said:


> It's sad that you've never been so moved by a composer so as to cure obsession... like never falling in love.


Unfortunately this sentence makes no sense.
But in any case= Obsession---The domination of one's thoughts by a persistant idea,image, desire.
Obsess = To dominate or preoccupy the thoughts,feeligs or desires of a person.Beset,trouble or haunt 
persistently or abnormally.
If that is the situation of anyone here a) get a life b) get a psychiatrist


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## drpraetorus (Aug 9, 2012)

Can a person be _equally _fanatic about Mahler and Brahms???

In my case I fantically dislike them both.


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## Ramako (Apr 28, 2012)

moody said:


> Unfortunately this sentence makes no sense.
> But in any case= Obsession---The domination of one's thoughts by a persistant idea,image, desire.
> Obsess = To dominate or preoccupy the thoughts,feeligs or desires of a person.Beset,trouble or haunt
> persistently or abnormally.
> If that is the situation of anyone here a) get a life b) get a psychiatrist


I have neither a life nor a psychiatrist.


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## NightHawk (Nov 3, 2011)

I am obsessed with music, period. And, I have gone on Brahms binges and Mahler binges and Radiohead _et al_ binges on countless occasions. I think it's great to let a single work or the works of a single composer seep into your DNA 

note re OP: 'dichotomies'? I can go from Bach to Xenakis in a heartbeat. Maybe that's why I have benign arrhythmias! Nice thread.


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## StlukesguildOhio (Dec 25, 2006)

I can go from Bach to Xenakis in a heartbeat.

That would just be a nauseous experience for me.


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## moody (Nov 5, 2011)

Ramako said:


> I have neither a life nor a psychiatrist.


Don't tell me your troubles,got troubles of my own.


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## StlukesguildOhio (Dec 25, 2006)

Personally I greatly admire the music of both Brahms and Mahler. I don't think I like anything by Brahms as much as I love _Das Lied von der Erde_, but I find Brahms to have a far greater range than Mahler and I would place him higher up in my personal pantheon. I do suspect that there is some validity to the broader question as to whether there are certain pairings of composers in which you find yourself falling clearly on one side or the other of the spectrum. As the Mozart vs Ligeti/Xenakis/Zappa debacle seems to prove, all of us have certain preferences... even if we attempt to be open to everything. Placing one aspect of the German/Viennese school on one side (Mahler, Richard Strauss, Zemlinsky, Schreker, Korngold) and another on the other side (Schoenberg, Berg, Webern) I have no doubt upon which side my preference falls. I "appreciate" Schoenberg... even quite like some pieces, and I like Berg very much, and a good number of the works that I have heard by Webern... but I love Mahler and Strauss and the early operas of Korngold and like Schreker and Zemlinsky a great deal. I can think of similar dichotomies involving later 20th century composers. Or even older composers.


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## BurningDesire (Jul 15, 2012)

I don't think its that outlandish for somebody to love both of them equally, or even obsess over both of them. They're both very Romantic and _very_ German. XD


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## BurningDesire (Jul 15, 2012)

ComposerOfAvantGarde said:


> Hindemith had a very strong view that all music should be tonal


I find that pretty funny, because alot of people I know have mistaken his music as atonal when we've played it XD


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## Couchie (Dec 9, 2010)

moody said:


> Unfortunately this sentence makes no sense.
> But in any case= Obsession---The domination of one's thoughts by a persistant idea,image, desire.
> Obsess = To dominate or preoccupy the thoughts,feeligs or desires of a person.Beset,trouble or haunt
> persistently or abnormally.
> If that is the situation of anyone here a) get a life b) get a psychiatrist


c) And not a single **** was given that day.


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## bigshot (Nov 22, 2011)

Ramako said:


> How many people are obsessed about both Mendelssohn and Wagner?


Raises hand.


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## Cnote11 (Jul 17, 2010)

Crudblud said:


> Boulez and Shostakovich. *snigger*


Two of my favorites! Boulez can keep his opinions.


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## BurningDesire (Jul 15, 2012)

Cnote11 said:


> Two of my favorites! Boulez can keep his opinions.


Boulez was wrong!


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## moody (Nov 5, 2011)

Couchie said:


> c) And not a single **** was given that day.


I always say that I'm amazed by the standard of musical opinion emanating from you.


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## mmsbls (Mar 6, 2011)

I don't think I've ever been obsessed with any composer, but I don't see why someone couldn't really love exploring two dissimilar composers. I think most of us (OK maybe not Couchie ) love composers who are modestly to distinctly different. We could simply want to explore both at the same time. Recently I've spent a lot of time listening to modern composers as well as Renaissance music. 

I wouldn't call it "impossible", but I have been more surprised with those who really like one composer but do not like another composer who most consider quite similar. For example people who like Haydn but not Mozart or the other way around (although I'm not sure I've ever seen anyone state the latter preference) surprise me. I know many (including myself and those with significantly more expertise) who have trouble telling some of their music apart. I've never understood how someone manages to really like Haydn but not Mozart.


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## NightHawk (Nov 3, 2011)

I actually started the morning with Schumann S-5tet and then shifted straight into _Pithoprakta_ and my breakfast stayed down just fine 



StlukesguildOhio said:


> I can go from Bach to Xenakis in a heartbeat.
> 
> That would just be a nauseous experience for me.


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## Vesteralen (Jul 14, 2011)

Personally, I equate "obsession" with an inability to see anything but good in something or someone. I haven't done that for a long, long time. (I had a Brahms obsession _and_ a Schumann obsession in my younger days.)

I still get caught up in intense interest in a composer (I've gone through both Nielsen and Elgar phases more recently), but I no longer look at _anyone_ through rose-colored glasses.

As to the OP, I can't say. Never had a really intense interest in Mahler - just one of many composers I enjoy now and then.

My suggestion for two composers with whom it might be impossible to have a simultaneous obsession - Schumann and Liszt.


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## Lisztian (Oct 10, 2011)

Vesteralen said:


> My suggestion for two composers with whom it might be impossible to have a simultaneous obsession - Schumann and Liszt.


I *almost* disprove this. Schumann is one of my favourite compsers. I wouldn't say i'm obsessed with him though. A suggestion of mine would be Liszt and Brahms.


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## Huilunsoittaja (Apr 6, 2010)

Thanks for all the posts. 

Perhaps I could have explained what I meant by obsessed. I was more general than particular. You simply love a composer _and everything they ever wrote_, with only a few exceptions. Haven't you ever known a composer you loved maybe 90-95% of whatever works you've heard? If not, you haven't discovered what it is to obsess over a composer yet. 

Can someone love 90% of one composer's works and then 90% of an antithetical composer, one of completely different aesthetic values. That's what I meant.

If you were to ask me who I'm more "obsessed" with, Glazunov or Prokofiev, I can to this day say they are _equal_ although different. Of course, I'm over the "craze" and now both of them are just like good old friends, as I use to say. We'll never stop being friends. Current fads and all will come and go but they won't.


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## Sonata (Aug 7, 2010)

Personally I crave musical variety. I LOVE exploring new genres. When I started listening to classical seriously a year ago, I had no idea the variety of music to be discovered. It was a wonderful revelation. I like the fact that there are composers that come from such different places. I may be in a blues mood one day, symphonic metal the next, Brahms today and Ravel tomorrow. So for me, listeing to and loving two composers with different ideologies and styles is in no way a deterrent to me loving them both,


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## TrazomGangflow (Sep 9, 2011)

moody said:


> Unfortunately this sentence makes no sense.
> But in any case= Obsession---The domination of one's thoughts by a persistant idea,image, desire.
> Obsess = To dominate or preoccupy the thoughts,feeligs or desires of a person.Beset,trouble or haunt
> persistently or abnormally.
> If that is the situation of anyone here a) get a life b) get a psychiatrist


Just because you have never been so moved by a composer that you have become obsessed with him or her doesn't mean you need to ruin it for those of us who have. Jealous, perhaps?


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## violadude (May 2, 2011)

Life is too short to be obsessed with any composers, for me at least.


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## ComposerOfAvantGarde (Dec 2, 2011)

violadude said:


> Life is too short to be obsessed with any composers, for me at least.


I agree with you, violadude.


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## Ramako (Apr 28, 2012)

ComposerOfAvantGarde said:


> I agree with you, violadude.


I take it that means in principle, rather than practice 

*cough* *Ligeti* *cough cough*


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## ComposerOfAvantGarde (Dec 2, 2011)

Ramako said:


> I take it that means in principle, rather than practice
> 
> *cough* *Ligeti* *cough cough*


Most things are better in principle than practise. My political ideology for example.










:tiphat:


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## violadude (May 2, 2011)

ComposerOfAvantGarde said:


> Most things are better in principle than practise. My political ideology for example.
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Hey, it could work if society completely turns over a new leaf and functions entirely differently from how it usually does.


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## Huilunsoittaja (Apr 6, 2010)

violadude said:


> Hey, it could work if society completely turns over a new leaf and functions entirely differently from how it usually does.


Yeah, and maybe if Man was perfect too.


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## ComposerOfAvantGarde (Dec 2, 2011)

violadude said:


> Hey, it could work if society completely turns over a new leaf and functions entirely differently from how it usually does.


In _this_ country it won't. If anything like that happens here most of the population would flee to someplace else


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## violadude (May 2, 2011)

Huilunsoittaja said:


> Yeah, and maybe if Man was perfect too.


Man needn't be perfect. They would just have to change the way they thought about how things usually work is all.

Anyway, this isn't a political forum. Dammit COAG! :scold:


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## Huilunsoittaja (Apr 6, 2010)

violadude said:


> Anyway, this isn't a political forum. Dammit COAG! :scold:


Right! This was my thread, and I don't want it to get closed down because of other people. :lol:


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## Sid James (Feb 7, 2009)

Huilunsoittaja said:


> ...
> Can a person be _equally _fanatic about Mahler and Brahms??? Of course it's possible to like both composers (myself included) but can you really be _obsessed _with both of them equally?...


I've never come across a 'fanatic' of both of those online. I have come across 'fanatics' of both Bach and Wagner online though, plenty of times (a dime a dozen territory?). I'm fine with that, but not when these people stick things in my face like I'm a moron for not liking or doing what they do. But anyway I'll stop there.



> ...
> From my own experience, I do like Mahler _and _Brahms, but I would choose Brahms over Mahler almost _any _day.
> ...


I would too, but I'm a chamber music fan, so my choice is obvious in that way.



> ...
> And I think this is more than just an issue of taste. It's an issue of musical mentality. Do you prefer the smashing of your heart onto the manuscript, or the objective and collective approach to emotion (but not unemotional)?...


I think that Brahms is less obviously autobiographical compared to Mahler, but he still puts himself into his music, many times. I mean the _Piano Quartet #3_, a very dark work, is more or less a memorial to Robert Schumann. Brahms was also reading 'The Sorrows of the Young Werther' at the time, and he compared himself to that character, but thankfully didn't blow his brains out just cos he couldn't get the girl (Clara). Other works by Brahms with this type of autobiographical or directly emotional element are _String Sextet #2_ (which has in musical code the name a woman he was courting at the time, Agathe von Siebold) and in some respects his fascination with the music of Hungary, and incorporating it into his music. Brahms' lifelong friend and colleague, violinist Joseph Joachim (who was from Hungary) was of pivotal importance here.



> ...
> This thread isn't just about Mahler and Brahms though. Do you know any other pairings of composers that have proved to be so "dichotomic" that they really split people one way or the other without much of a middle ground?


I don't know about that. I mean I've got a good deal of light classical in my collection, stuff that many would consider total kitschy schmaltz or lowbrow rubbish (eg. Broadway musicals and operettas, gypsy musics, etc) and at the same time I've got a lot of things like 'atonal' and post-1945 stuff. Quite 'highbrow' stuff of the sort. So is that a dichotomy that's seemingly impossible? I mean I don't think its the usual thing but nothing is impossible with people's different musical tastes.


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## Sid James (Feb 7, 2009)

ComposerOfAvantGarde said:


> I'm not sure about this but maybe Schoenberg and Hindemith. Hindemith had a very strong view that all music should be tonal and Schoenberg was a pioneer of atonality. I don't think they were "rivals" as such but their ideas seem to disagree with each other.


I think (from my understanding/reading/listening, etc.), Hindemith was less ideologically against 'atonality' and Schoenberg before the war than he became after. This may be because after 1945, composers like Hindemith and K.A. Hartmann where left out in the cold and seen as 'dinosaurs' by some with the trend towards 'total serialism' and all that. So my guess is that Hindemith just reacted against this and kind of poo-pooed atonality (& maybe serialism), whereas before the war he was kind of neutral on it from what I can gather.

But that ideological split was ended by Stravinsky when he went over to serialism in the early 1950's. So 'modern tonal' and atonal/serial approaches where kind of 'married' by a composer who was still a big kid on the block, even though Igor was by that time not young, of course. & once minimalisms of various kinds happened in the 1960's and '70's, all that palaver generated by Boulez and Adorno kind of bit the dust. They became the new 'dinosaurs' it seems (well, their dogmas did).

But back to the main topic of this thread. . .


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## Xaltotun (Sep 3, 2010)

One can do a lot of things with art; one can observe, compare, analyze, or just relax and go along with it. But if I would have to resort to these methods and leave _obsessing_ out of it, I don't think I'd want to spend my time with art any more. Perhaps I'd start doing sports instead! To me, the greatest thing about art - music included - is that I can _totally obsess_ myself with it. Mind you, that doesn't mean that I can't rationally discuss it. The obsessing part just happens inside my head, and for the most part, it's a private experience.

On the other hand, if "obsession" means that one is frantically typing BACHBACHBACH or WAGNERWAGNERWAGNER on internet fora, as opposed to in an inner monologue, then leave me out of it.

When it comes to Brahms and Mahler, well, they're both in my top 6 composers. As discussed, Brahms is anything but a cold and calculating composer... but Mahler is even further away in the irrational side, much less restrained, and thus somewhat more prone to my obsessions. I'm always more drawn towards extremists in art.


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## brianwalker (Dec 9, 2011)

violadude said:


> Life is too short to be obsessed with any composers, for me at least.


Life is too short not to be obsessed with at least a few composers.


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## Huilunsoittaja (Apr 6, 2010)

brianwalker said:


> Life is too short not to be obsessed with at least a few composers.


Depends where the obsession leads you. If you're left in ashes of disappointment, then it's bad, but if an obsession helped you to know yourself better, I think that would be a good thing.


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## Ondine (Aug 24, 2012)

I have my favourite which is Mozart. But music is beyond having a favourite one. The message of music goes further than a couple of composers. This is why, even having a favourite one, I can't get obsessed with -lets say- Mozart.

Music is a mean for discovering in ourselves things that -maybe- through pure reason can't be grasped. 

Each musician offers something of his own, of his historical moment, of his main concerns about existence, of his understandings about things. 

The main thing here is the language that is used, and this language is music. The most touching, universal and precise language mankind has at hand.

Ups... I got too philosophical... sorry.


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