# The most complex piece of music



## Phil loves classical (Feb 8, 2017)

Not necessarily good, but complex. Here is my vote:


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## Kjetil Heggelund (Jan 4, 2016)

Was going to mention Kurtze Schatten II for guitar solo by the same man. I think he's the ultimate new complexity composer. I like his music more now than when I first heard it.


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## Phil loves classical (Feb 8, 2017)

Prokofiev said, there are more possibilities with tonal music, music which develops on themes, harmonies, although I've heard some atonal works which also build on themes. What are some of the most complex of those?

Ferneyhough's complexity may be seen also as only on the surface. Is there anything that gets carried over past a few bars?


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## Sina (Aug 3, 2012)

Yup, I was going to name him too. The Kairos CD is great: https://www.kairos-music.com/cds/0013072kai
Also this work for full orchestra:





Let also not forget another "new complexity" veteran, James Dillon, and his mighty Nine Rivers Cycle




Or this orchestral work which is my favorite


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## Sina (Aug 3, 2012)

Phil loves classical said:


> Ferneyhough's complexity may be seen also as only on the surface. Is there anything that gets carried over past a few bars?


All we're talking is on the surface. What happens in depth is unspeakable and has nothing to do with how the music is written. It's all upon the listener, and no logic can explain it, IMO.


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## Phil loves classical (Feb 8, 2017)

Sina said:


> All we're talking is on the surface. What happens in depth is unspeakable and has nothing to do with how the music is written. It's all upon the listener, and no logic can explain it, IMO.


I do think there is logic that can explain some harmonically complex works like Tristan and Isolde and Rite of Spring. I'm trying to think of more.

A case can be made for Beethoven's late quartets, but I feel it is more subjective in this case.


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## Tallisman (May 7, 2017)

The Well-Tempered Clavier. Not immediately obvious, but it really is.


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## Tallisman (May 7, 2017)

Phil loves classical said:


> Not necessarily good, but complex. Here is my vote:


''Not necessarily good'' - I second that. Isn't it interesting that music can be amazingly complex musically and simultaneously intellectually blank.


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## Phil loves classical (Feb 8, 2017)

Tallisman said:


> The Well-Tempered Clavier. Not immediately obvious, but it really is.


Agree here. Doesn't need to be technically difficult to be complex, while with the Ferneyhough, there is no implied harmony. One for a harmonically (chromatically) atonal complex work is Bartok's Music for Percussion, Celesta and Strings.

Recently bought a Ligeti 4CD set for a good bargain. Ligeti wrote some brilliant and complex works, and good too. His String Quartet no. 2 stands out to me.


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## bigboy (May 26, 2017)

Did you have a particular definition of "complexity" in mind? I have felt that there are many pieces out there which at first listen or play seem complex, but really are, for lack of a better word, just confusing. I don't mean "confusing" in a disparaging sense, I think it is a legitimate (and engaging) artistic goal to try and confound the listener. The example that springs to my mind immediately is Satie's Vexations. 

I feel this way about some of Ligeti's stuff for piano- some of it isn't super complex, but he does such a good job of subverting my expectations that it certainly seems very intricate and complex.

On the other hand, as Tallisman mentioned, the WTC isn't really confusing, but it is certainly complex.


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## Phil loves classical (Feb 8, 2017)

bigboy said:


> Did you have a particular definition of "complexity" in mind? I have felt that there are many pieces out there which at first listen or play seem complex, but really are, for lack of a better word, just confusing. I don't mean "confusing" in a disparaging sense, I think it is a legitimate (and engaging) artistic goal to try and confound the listener. The example that springs to my mind immediately is Satie's Vexations.
> 
> I feel this way about some of Ligeti's stuff for piano- some of it isn't super complex, but he does such a good job of subverting my expectations that it certainly seems very intricate and complex.
> 
> On the other hand, as Tallisman mentioned, the WTC isn't really confusing, but it is certainly complex.


No, it's open. I know Tristan and Isolde is way more complex than Ferneyhough harmonically, even with my limited grasp of musical theory. Music is complex in more ways than one.


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## ArtMusic (Jan 5, 2013)

Phil loves classical said:


> Not necessarily good, but complex. Here is my vote:


Yeah I agree, it's not a good piece but I do also think it is overly complex. String Quartets tend to suffer from this a lot, unfortunately.


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## beetzart (Dec 30, 2009)

Beethoven's Hammerclaiver Sonata is a tough and complex piece of music. And maybe the Diabelli variations, too.


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## isorhythm (Jan 2, 2015)

I can't find the article I'm thinking of now, but it's been argued that _complicated_ and _complex_ are different things in music, and I agree.

Ferneyhough's music seems to me only complicated, not complex.


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## JAS (Mar 6, 2013)

This vaguely reminds me of a comment that is often made at work, that too many people mistake mere activity for purposeful progress.


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

Any of the Bach organ fugues, Well-Tempered Clavier fugues and fuga movements from the Second and Third Unaccompanied Violin Sonatas would surely qualify.

Complexity simply for the sake of pure difficulty means nothing to me. Complex music must also be magnificent music and the above Bach examples qualify.


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## silentio (Nov 10, 2014)

hpowders said:


> Any of the Bach organ fugues, Well-Tempered Clavier fugues and fuga movements from the second and third unaccompanied violin sonatas would surely qualify.
> 
> Complexity simply for the sake of pure difficulty means nothing to me. Complex music must also be magnificent music and the above Bach examples qualify.


I'm with hpowders on this. For complexity for the sake of ... complexity itself, I don't really care. But the most complex musics that "work" for me are Musical Offering and The Art of the Fugue.

Honorable mentions for me are

Brahms' Piano Quartet no.3
Wagner's Gotterdammerung (or even the entire cycle if one try to grasp the overarching structure of the work)
Berg's Violin Concerto
Nielsen's Symphony 5
Bartok's Symphony for Orchestra


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## Klassik (Mar 14, 2017)

Tallisman said:


> The Well-Tempered Clavier. Not immediately obvious, but it really is.


4'33" is clearly the obvious choice. I think that goes without saying! I think the WTC works for a more obscure, less obvious choice though!


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## Dan Ante (May 4, 2016)

Phil loves classical said:


> Not necessarily good, but complex. Here is my vote:


*I hate to be negative but this is exactly the kind of composition that I file in the waste bin. If this is the way forward count me out.*


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## arpeggio (Oct 4, 2012)

*I hate to be positive but when I follow it with the score it actually makes sense.

FYI I normally do not care for Ferneyhough. It does not bother me if people like him and there are threads about him.*


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## Tchaikov6 (Mar 30, 2016)

No mentions of Mahler? That was the first composer that came to my head. Especially Symphonies 9 and 10.


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## Dan Ante (May 4, 2016)

arpeggio said:


> *I hate to be positive but when I follow it with the score it actually makes sense.
> 
> FYI I normally do not care for Ferneyhough. It does not bother me if people like him and there are threads about him.*


*FYI I don't give a banana who likes it ... I don't*


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## Chronochromie (May 17, 2014)

silentio said:


> I'm with hpowders on this. For complexity for the sake of ... complexity itself, I don't really care. But the most complex musics that "work" for me are Musical Offering and The Art of the Fugue.
> 
> Honorable mentions for me are
> 
> ...


OP: "Not necessarily good, but complex."


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## Jacob Brooks (Feb 21, 2017)

Interpreting complexity as how "entangled the musical content is" instead of how difficult it is to play makes this a much more interesting question to me. In this case it is very difficult to weigh the different layers of content, because while a Bach fugue is very complex on the surface a piece like one by Bruckner or Mahler inhabits a structural space that contains a lot of a different sort of content. I wish I could put this more precisely into words but this is the best I've yet put it.


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## Mandryka (Feb 22, 2013)

Phil loves classical said:


> Ferneyhough's complexity may be seen also as only on the surface. Is there anything that gets carried over past a few bars?


Is your idea that deep complexity (as opposed to the superficial complexity you hear in the quartet) is structural? "Local" may be a less evaluative word for this idea, as opposed to "long range"

Has anyone got a view of the structure of the Ferneyhough quartet?

I think it's absolutely true that, in the Ferneyhough, you get the impression that new ideas come in before the old ideas have been exhausted. So nothing much gets carried over a few bars _locally_. I am sure this is what he wanted to explore in the piece. Nevertheless the piece sounds coherent and integrated to me.

One piece which seems to me to have no long range complexity, just a sequence of randomly juxtaposed and thematically disconnected bits of music, is Beethoven op 130/133


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## arpeggio (Oct 4, 2012)

deleted by author


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## Nereffid (Feb 6, 2013)

Dan Ante said:


> I hate to be negative but this is exactly the kind of composition that I file in the waste bin. If this is the way forward count me out.


I don't think anyone said this was the way forward. Certainly not *the* way forward. There are lots of ways forward. Some of them aren't even forward!


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## Razumovskymas (Sep 20, 2016)

Phil loves classical said:


> Not necessarily good, but complex. Here is my vote:


Maybe you are mistaking "complex piece of music" with "a piece of music that looks very complex and exotic on the score"?

apart from that I'm in minute 3:08 and I'm still enjoying it (in some way ;-)

Sounds less complex then other modern music I heard.


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## Razumovskymas (Sep 20, 2016)

Maybe I should say "less random" instead of "less complex".

I'm at 11:21 and really getting into it. Will this be the piece that finally gets me into modern music????


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## Razumovskymas (Sep 20, 2016)

A bit disappointed by that final cadence though!


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## mtmailey (Oct 21, 2011)

There are many complexed pieces of music like in ROMANTIC ERA, & in classical era music.Beethoven symphony 9 MOLTO VIVACE is complexed one will see what i mean when you hear it.


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## mathisdermaler (Mar 29, 2017)

Tallisman said:


> ''Not necessarily good'' - I second that. Isn't it interesting that music can be amazingly complex musically and simultaneously intellectually blank.


 Very true. Luckily Ferneyhough's music is both.


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## BabyGiraffe (Feb 24, 2017)

Xenakis used advanced math to generate some complex (and alien sounding) music.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

I'm reminded of people who claim some of Bartok's music is based on the Fibonacci series and is somehow good as a result. Good it may be, but certainly not for that reason!


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## Mandryka (Feb 22, 2013)

KenOC said:


> certainly not for that reason!


If it is good, there has to be a reason why. I don't know why you're so anti-maths.


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## BabyGiraffe (Feb 24, 2017)

KenOC said:


> I'm reminded of people who claim some of Bartok's music is based on the Fibonacci series and is somehow good as a result. Good it may be, but certainly not for that reason!


Well, some of the most consonant chord ratios are Fibonacci numbers (1/1 -unison, 1/2 - octave , 2/3 - fifth, 3/5 - major sixth, 5/8 - minor sixth, 8/13 - thirteen harmonic - used in African and Oriental music; the rest of the series continues to generate the golden ratio) , diatonic scale is also based on the the Fibonacci sequence. We can say that big part of the Western music is based on Fibonacci, but in the end it's all what you do with the notes and rhythms, not how you derived them.


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## DeepR (Apr 13, 2012)

I'm no expert but the music of Roslavets seems to be among the most complex music that I still enjoy. At least complex in the harmonic sense.


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## Weston (Jul 11, 2008)

Phil loves classical said:


> Not necessarily good, but complex. Here is my vote:


I love, LOVE, *LOVE* me some complex music. But, come on! 3/16 || 11/32 || 5/8 ? Queen Victoria has more of a pulse than that. Pick a time signature and stick with it long enough to sink in.

Well, having said that, I do sort of enjoy the conversational ambient quality of the piece, but I doubt I'll make the effort to decipher it. I don't seem to mind Boulez who apparently uses no time indications at all. What is the difference, I wonder.


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## Guest (Jun 20, 2017)

I cannot think of any case in which a Bach fugue could be considered more complex than a Ferneyhough quartet...


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## Guest (Jun 20, 2017)

KenOC said:


> I'm reminded of people who claim some of Bartok's music is based on the Fibonacci series and is somehow good as a result. Good it may be, but certainly not for that reason!


Key:
Opinion
Fact


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## Casebearer (Jan 19, 2016)

Some of Berio's Sequenza's strike me as complex.


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## Retyc (May 10, 2016)

the score of Ferneyhough's la terre est un homme is gigantic...


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## Dan Ante (May 4, 2016)

I once saw a score allegedly transposed from a tape recording of a Chimp or Orangatang it was a piano being thumped and believe me it was so complicated that no time sig or key could be distinguished or any sort of pattern I don’t know how it would rate againsed Ferneyhough.


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## mmsbls (Mar 6, 2011)

Could people give a sense of what they mean by complex? I view complexity as something related to information theory. Maybe the number of bits necessary to specify the average measure of a single "voice" of a work. Obviously a symphony has many more "voices" so it would be more complex than a string quartet, but comparing a single voice puts them on a more equal playing field.

Anyway, I assume people are using varying definitions that look at higher levels of complexity. I'm not sure how easy it is to compare works based on those definitions.


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## Phil loves classical (Feb 8, 2017)

mmsbls said:


> Could people give a sense of what they mean by complex? I view complexity as something related to information theory. Maybe the number of bits necessary to specify the average measure of a single "voice" of a work. Obviously a symphony has many more "voices" so it would be more complex than a string quartet, but comparing a single voice puts them on a more equal playing field.
> 
> Anyway, I assume people are using varying definitions that look at higher levels of complexity. I'm not sure how easy it is to compare works based on those definitions.


Touched on a couple of different definitions so far:
1. How convoluted are the rhythms and tone arrangments like in that Ferneyhough quartet.
2. How far reaching are the harmonic layers, progressions and themes like Tristan.
3. A combination of both like Rite of Spring.


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## mathisdermaler (Mar 29, 2017)

Weston said:


> I love, LOVE, *LOVE* me some complex music. But, come on! 3/16 || 11/32 || 5/8 ? Queen Victoria has more of a pulse than that. Pick a time signature and stick with it long enough to sink in.
> 
> Well, having said that, I do sort of enjoy the conversational ambient quality of the piece, but I doubt I'll make the effort to decipher it. I don't seem to mind Boulez who apparently uses no time indications at all. What is the difference, I wonder.


I love Ferneyhough but even that piece is hard for me. Try this one, its my favorite:


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## Phil loves classical (Feb 8, 2017)

mathisdermaler said:


> I love Ferneyhough but even that piece is hard for me. Try this one, its my favorite:


Definitely more interesting to me. Thanks.


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## Dan Ante (May 4, 2016)

Phil loves classical said:


> Definitely more interesting to me. Thanks.


Sorry I can't say the same.


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## NothungWorld (Feb 27, 2017)

Complex as a pure engineer's art or as a great art. Great art, complex in mind = Bach
(There are, unfortunately, clean engineers in the art)


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## Heck148 (Oct 27, 2016)

Some of the most complex music - in very basic terms, came from Charles Ives - he writes in bi-tonality, or poly-tonality; very tricky or complex rhythmic figures - 7 against 8, 14 against 16, 5 against 7, etc....I think his intent was deliberate chaos, or disruption of the basic rhythmic pulse. Also - with Ives we may have two or more separate tempi going on simultaneously, in the same piece.
this is his "stereophonic" concept, or hearing two different parade bands playing different works at the same time, with the listener positioned between them....rather simple concept, but quite complex when executed properly and effectively.


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