# Composers with the most different works: Read for Clarification



## clavichorder (May 2, 2011)

I didn't know how to refine the whole of the idea into this thread, but take that title "Composers with the most different works," add this to it: composer who from the most different works appears to be an entirely different composer. The "fingerprint" that we often readily hear in a given composer cannot not easily be said to be there. 

Can you think of any that are like this? Off hand, I'm not sure I can think of a significant enough composer that from one good work to another, has managed to be unrecognizable. They always hold onto something, or rather they can't help it? So early Scriabin and late Scriabin doesn't count for example, because to my ears there is still a common Scriabin fingerprint happening, though maybe he's getting close. Stravinsky is often praised for being so different from work to work, but he's usually doing something that gives him away or if not that, can be heard once you know. 

What's the best fitting example you can think of?


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## GreenMamba (Oct 14, 2012)

American composer Lukas Foss is known for his eclecticism. Not sure if you'd find a consistent personal style across his works. This probably doesn't help his legacy. 

I doubt you'd find a "top tier" composer who meets your criteria.


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## clavichorder (May 2, 2011)

Can you think of anyone who from one stylistic period to another, has completely reinvented their style to the point of being unrecognizable?(and not just good student works, to mature serious works, but both periods containing distinct voices).

For example, I looked at Domenico Scarlatti orchestral and dramatic works prior to the sonata writing spree of his older years. In my opinion there is some brilliant music he wrote before the sonatas, and they lack the oddities of his sonatas all the same, but maybe the wit is still there. Where the "sparkling wit" is missing, you just have a good baroque composer. 

I also think of Henry Purcell and his Viol Consort music as opposed to baroque chamber sonatas he later wrote. These SEEM distinct to me, and both contain brilliant elements. But you could probably find rhythm of motif tendencies that they share. I'm not sure on that, but it seems a composer would have to undergo a significant personality change or else be so exceptionally good at technical aspects of composition and have a motivation to change, money, changing times, request of a patron that spurred on something, etc.

As an aside, I respect Dvorak's eclecticism for a romantic era composer, but you can always tell it's him. The pentatonic melodies in his last great non program orchestral works(Cello Concerto in B minor, Symphony 9), and some chamber music did much to alter his style and he didn't lose anything by it.


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## isorhythm (Jan 2, 2015)

Maybe Ligeti?

Early: 



Later:


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## clavichorder (May 2, 2011)

It would be interesting if a composer had solid success for maybe some years early on, ages 17-26 for example, and then quit composing seriously for a long time and delved into another endeavor that changed and shaped their life. Then maybe in their 40s or 50s they were after something else, returned to composing and had no interest in revisiting any of their older techniques, maybe even preferred to write with a different creative process.


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## Guest (May 14, 2016)

Arvo Pärt? Neo-classicism, twelve tone, periods of silence, minimalism.


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## joen_cph (Jan 17, 2010)

Stravinsky, Noergaard, Ligeti come to mind in particular and by far, IMO.


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## Kjetil Heggelund (Jan 4, 2016)

Why not Frank Zappa? He's all over the place...60's r&b, psychedelic/progressive/experimental rock, pop, jazz, contemporary classical. True musical hero


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## arpeggio (Oct 4, 2012)

Three composers who radically changed in different directions.

George Rochberg: From twelve tone to romanticism.

Penderecki: From avant-garde to tonal.

Lutoslawski: From tonal to avant-garde.

We are discussing John Corigliano in another thread. He is a very eclectic composer who employs many techniques from tone rows to romanticism.

Film composers can be very eclectic.

Two of Jerry Goldsmiths concert works were based on tone rows: _Music for Orchestra_ and _Christo Appolo_. As well as some of his soundtracks: _Planet of the Apes_.

Leonard Rosenman studied with Schoenberg and would on occasion employ tone rows in is soundtracks.

Although he is famous for his more tonal score, John Williams would occasionally compose atonal works like his _Violin and Flute Concertos_.


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## majlis (Jul 24, 2005)

And Liszt? If you listen to his last piano works, you would never believe that it was same composer of the Hungary Rhapsodies.


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## clavichorder (May 2, 2011)

Yes, those late piano pieces are incredible.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

I have read the OP carefully and would like to nominate Vivaldi. To some this will seem strange. But in fact his works, from one to the next, may vary by five or more notes. What a magnificent variety his output had!


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## Weston (Jul 11, 2008)

A possible example might be Gustav Holst. We've all heard The Planets, but then on hearing another work, such as Beni Mora, can find few similarities. Some claim him to be a chameleon, but now after listening to as many of his works as I can I think I've finally caught on to some subtle musical gestures that are part of a signature sound. It takes a lot of listens though.

Then there is of course Schoenberg. To the layman listener Verklärte Nacht sounds very different from the Piano Concerto or Violin Concerto.


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## tdc (Jan 17, 2011)

There is quite a bit of variety in the oeuvre of Charles Ives. Listen to the early Symphonies then contrast with the fourth then listen to the micro tonal music or the unique enigma that is The Unanswered Question. Central Park in the Dark sounds very similar to the middle movement of Bartok's PC 2 (and was written earlier).


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## EdwardBast (Nov 25, 2013)

As others have mentioned: Stravinsky! The quintessential example I would say.


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## SeptimalTritone (Jul 7, 2014)

Cage had a lot of variety, although it wasn't a variety between different periods in his life, but a variety of musical platforms.

Electronic music in Cartridge Music
Webernian use of prepared piano and orchestra in Concert for Prepared Piano and Orchestra
Very minimalist aleatoric soundscapes in his numbered pieces, e.g. Fourteen
Diatonic direct expressiveness in Thirteen Harmonies

It's not obvious to the "blind" listener that these are all from the same composer.

On the other hand, compare Schoenberg here v.s. here. To me at least, it is clearly from the same composer.


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## Morimur (Jan 23, 2014)

Karlheinz Stockhausen


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## Pugg (Aug 8, 2014)

majlis said:


> And Liszt? If you listen to his last piano works, you would never believe that it was same composer of the Hungary Rhapsodies.


Amen to this :tiphat:


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## Chordalrock (Jan 21, 2014)

clavichorder said:


> Can you think of anyone who from one stylistic period to another, has completely reinvented their style to the point of being unrecognizable?(and not just good student works, to mature serious works, but both periods containing distinct voices).
> 
> For example, I looked at Domenico Scarlatti orchestral and dramatic works prior to the sonata writing spree of his older years. In my opinion there is some brilliant music he wrote before the sonatas, and they lack the oddities of his sonatas all the same, but maybe the wit is still there. Where the "sparkling wit" is missing, you just have a good baroque composer.


"Wit" can't be THE defining feature of a composer, since other composers have it too. After all, you won't say about Haydn "Oh, he's clearly composing pastiches of Scarlatti."

I think this obsession over stylistic finger-prints is rather silly, partly because I never study composers closely enough to know what those finger-prints are, and all that that results in is me feeling less biased when evaluating the worth of a piece of music: if it has great themes it's great, if it has solid material and great use of that material, it's pretty good, if it has great mood and produces a pleasing aesthetic impression it's excellent, and so on. Why would I care if I can solve the mystery of "Who dunnit?" It's music, not a crime novel.

I won't deprive you of a contribution to this thread though, so here's mine: compare the Lamentations by Ernst Krenek with his symphonies and string quartets, particularly the neo-Romantic ones. I'd be surprised if you found ANY connections. Let us know what you think (if you decide to pursue this avenue of investigation).


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## Xenakiboy (May 8, 2016)

Morimur said:


> Karlheinz Stockhausen


Preach it bruther!!!


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## Xenakiboy (May 8, 2016)

Kjetil Heggelund said:


> Why not Frank Zappa? He's all over the place...60's r&b, psychedelic/progressive/experimental rock, pop, jazz, contemporary classical. True musical hero


I vouch for that, except the majority of his music is outside of clasical. Still, he's genius is the field of genre-less musicicians and composers!:tiphat:


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## DeepR (Apr 13, 2012)

clavichorder said:


> So early Scriabin and late Scriabin doesn't count for example, because to my ears there is still a common Scriabin fingerprint happening, though maybe he's getting close.


I think he does. I think few people if any would've recognized that Prometheus was composed by the same composer as the Piano Concerto, for example. Or the 2nd sonata and the 5th even.


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## Chordalrock (Jan 21, 2014)

DeepR said:


> I think he does. I think few people if any would've recognized that Prometheus was composed by the same composer as the Piano Concerto, for example. Or the 2nd sonata and the 5th even.


Not to mention you can find connections between different pieces by different composers, so finding some stylistic similarity between, say, a composer's early and late works doesn't necessarily amount to proof that they're by the same composer.

I think anyone would be hard-pressed to prove via stylistic analysis alone that Dufay's early isorhythmic motets, his lighter songs, and his late masses are by the same composer. The most that I've heard, having read a few papers on the composer, is that his works generally, or often, share "a brilliance of melodic ability unequalled by any of his contemporaries" (I'm paraphrasing). So you could say, "Oh, that's very good stuff, it must be Dufay". :lol:


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## Il_Penseroso (Nov 20, 2010)

majlis said:


> And Liszt? If you listen to his last piano works, you would never believe that it was same composer of the Hungary Rhapsodies.


As well as the Faust symphony or the oratorio Christus...


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## Delicious Manager (Jul 16, 2008)

I'd suggest John Foulds and Dmitri Shostakovich - from the sublime to the (intentionally) ridiculous in both cases.


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## EarthBoundRules (Sep 25, 2011)

How about Prokofiev's _Classical Symphony_? None of the occasional dissonance like _Peter and the Wolf_!


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## Czech composer (Feb 20, 2016)

I think Janacek is the case. Style of his later compositions is quite different from his early ones.


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## starthrower (Dec 11, 2010)

Kjetil Heggelund said:


> Why not Frank Zappa? He's all over the place...60's r&b, psychedelic/progressive/experimental rock, pop, jazz, contemporary classical. True musical hero


Stylistically diverse, yes! But the the stamp of the mother superior is on all of it.


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## Manxfeeder (Oct 19, 2010)

Erik Satie started out with static pieces with harmonies based on 4ths and 7ths, then he went into a phase of small satirical/ comedic pieces, he wrote dance-hall and even a ragtime piece, then wrote in a style where the music is made of repeated motifs that don't necessarily relate but sound pasted together. The most common factor is, they were mostly written for piano. But stylistically, he changes.


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## clavichorder (May 2, 2011)

Chordalrock said:


> "Wit" can't be THE defining feature of a composer, since other composers have it too. After all, you won't say about Haydn "Oh, he's clearly composing pastiches of Scarlatti."


I didn't mean "wit" in a general sense. I meant "the wit that is peculiar to Scarlatti." His own brand of it that appears in the sonatas, but not as obviously in other works.


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## Chordalrock (Jan 21, 2014)

Manxfeeder said:


> Erik Satie started out with static pieces with harmonies based on 4ths and 7ths, then he went into a phase of small satirical/ comedic pieces, he wrote dance-hall and even a ragtime piece, then wrote in a style where the music is made of repeated motifs that don't necessarily relate but sound pasted together. The most common factor is, they were mostly written for piano. But stylistically, he changes.


But Satie was an actual genius, not a talented conformist.


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## Stavrogin (Apr 20, 2014)

Without too much thinking I'd mention Liszt, Stravinskij, R.Strauss, Shnitke and Part


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