# Most perfectionist composer



## Felix Mendelssohn (Jan 18, 2019)

Which composers set sky-high standards for their output before publishing them?


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## Orfeo (Nov 14, 2013)

Others:


Bruckner
Wagner (very methodical)
Cesar Franck, perhaps
Goldmark
Dvorak
Tchaikovsky
Glazunov, to some extent
Sibelius
Bax, one can argue
Myaskovsky, with his unrelenting adherence to high standards in musical art against the backdrop of Socialist Realism doctrine
Stanford
Parry
Walton
Dukas, however regrettable in the final analysis


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## Tchaikov6 (Mar 30, 2016)

I voted Ravel, and his output reflects his perfectionism. Ravel wrote very few works, and very few of them are of low quality... so Ravel really wouldn’t except anything other than excellent.


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## Guest (Feb 16, 2019)

The classic description of Chopin's composing process:



> His creation was spontaneous, miraculous. He found it without searching for it, without foreseeing it. It came to his piano suddenly, complete, sublime, or it sang in his head during a walk, and he would hasten to hear it again by, tossing it off on his instrument. But then would begin the most heartbreaking labor I have ever witnessed. It was a series of efforts, indecision, and impatience to recapture certain details of the theme he had heard: what had come to him all of a piece, he now over-analyzed in his desire to write it down, and his regret at not finding it again "neat," as he said, would throw him into a kind of despair. *He would shut himself up in his room for days at a time, weeping, pacing, breaking his pens, repeating and changing a single measure a hundred times, writing it and effacing it with equal frequency, and beginning again the next day with a meticulous and desperate perseverance. He would spend six weeks on one page, only to end up writing it just as he had traced it in his first outpouring.*


If that's not perfectionism, I don't know what is. And here's a quote by the man himself



> Every difficulty slurred over will be a ghost to disturb your repose later on.


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## Guest (Feb 16, 2019)

Tchaikov6 said:


> I voted Ravel, and his output reflects his perfectionism. Ravel wrote very few works, and very few of them are of low quality... so Ravel really wouldn't except anything other than excellent.


Also applies to Chopin.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Somebody once asked Brahms what he had done that day. His answer (from memory, sorry): "I spent the morning inserting an eighth-note in my symphony. I spent the afternoon taking it back out."


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## hammeredklavier (Feb 18, 2018)

HSW said:


> Also applies to Chopin.


Not really. Someone will hate me for saying this, but he urged other people to destroy his unpublished pieces upon his death, many of which were composed in his late period.


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## wkasimer (Jun 5, 2017)

KenOC said:


> Somebody once asked Brahms what he had done that day. His answer (from memory, sorry): "I spent the morning inserting an eighth-note in my symphony. I spent the afternoon taking it back out."


And Brahms destroyed much, if not most of the music that he wrote.


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## Dimace (Oct 19, 2018)

I see no Beethoven, so I can not vote. Beethoven is with abysmal difference the most perfectionist composer in human history. The one and only where every single note in his music scores is inevitable.


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## EdwardBast (Nov 25, 2013)

Dimace said:


> I see no Beethoven, so I can not vote. Beethoven is with abysmal difference the most perfectionist composer in human history. The one and only where every single note in his music scores is inevitable.


I agree he should definitely be on the list. His sketch books prove this. Writing four sets of sketches before finalizing the opening theme of the Eroica is typical of his work.


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## Guest (Feb 16, 2019)

I'd probably say Boulez and Bruckner were overly perfectionist regarding the kinds of revisions they'd do their works.


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## Olias (Nov 18, 2010)

I have feeling the most perfectionist composer is someone we've never heard of because he/she never put anything out for public consumption.


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## mbhaub (Dec 2, 2016)

EdwardBast said:


> I agree he should definitely be on the list. His sketch books prove this. Writing four sets of sketches before finalizing the opening theme of the Eroica is typical of his work.


Beethoven was certainly a great composer, but no perfectionist. He was notoriously untidy in his scores. Missing accidentals, incoherent phrasing, inconsistent dynamics, and some notes that are clearly wrong. It took a lot of editors a lot of time and hard work to get his music in to playable shape. I suppose we have a misunderstanding of "perfectionist". Even Sibelius fails on that count. His scores are notorious for their problems. Later, sure, he polished and took his time, especially with the symphonies. Nor is Tchaikovksy so much a perfectionist - the many different performing editions of his music published during his lifetime testifies to that. No perfectionist would have tolerated it.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Edvard Grieg composed his Piano Concerto in A minor in 1868, when he was 24. One of his few large-scale works, it was a big success. He tinkered with it for the rest of his life, including at least seven wholesale revisions. The last revision was completed just before his death, 39 years after the work’s composition.


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## Josquin13 (Nov 7, 2017)

Actually, Olivier Knussen comes to mind. He wasn't prolific, it took him forever to finish a piece. He had standards, and wouldn't be finished until he met those standards, I gather. By various accounts, he had an incredible ear, too.

But I voted for Ravel...


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

mbhaub said:


> Beethoven was certainly a great composer, but no perfectionist. He was notoriously untidy in his scores. Missing accidentals, incoherent phrasing, inconsistent dynamics, and some notes that are clearly wrong. It took a lot of editors a lot of time and hard work to get his music in to playable shape. I suppose we have a misunderstanding of "perfectionist". Even Sibelius fails on that count. His scores are notorious for their problems. Later, sure, he polished and took his time, especially with the symphonies. Nor is Tchaikovksy so much a perfectionist - the many different performing editions of his music published during his lifetime testifies to that. No perfectionist would have tolerated it.


Sir George Grove's 1896 book _Beethoven and His Nine Symphonies_ has, among numerous other musical illustrations, several examples of how the most basic and effective ideas in the symphonies were developed over time from pedestrian and inferior initial thoughts. You get a sense of these motives and themes being beaten into shape through great effort, an effort not abandoned until the ideas arrived at their best form for use.

That, to me, is an indicator of "perfectionism" that goes beyond the details of publication on paper. In any event, many of the errors in score were the fault of publishers and, particularly, copyists who had to contend with Beethoven's scrawls. He often had the opportunity to proof the publisher's versions before printing, but even so, many errors escaped his efforts and sometimes his corrections were ignored. Not surprisingly, it was common at the time for printed notices of new music in the journals to include lists of errata…


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## Guest (Feb 17, 2019)

hammeredklavier said:


> but he urged other people to destroy his unpublished pieces upon his death


Confirms my point.


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## David Phillips (Jun 26, 2017)

Maybe we should have a poll to decide who was the most slapdash composer.


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## eugeneonagain (May 14, 2017)

As with the initial reply I would have put Bruckner and Walton before any of those others. Walton in particular was known for being slow and constantly revising as he went.


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## EdwardBast (Nov 25, 2013)

mbhaub said:


> Beethoven was certainly a great composer, but no perfectionist. He was notoriously untidy in his scores. Missing accidentals, incoherent phrasing, inconsistent dynamics, and some notes that are clearly wrong. It took a lot of editors a lot of time and hard work to get his music in to playable shape. I suppose we have a misunderstanding of "perfectionist". Even Sibelius fails on that count. His scores are notorious for their problems. Later, sure, he polished and took his time, especially with the symphonies. Nor is Tchaikovksy so much a perfectionist - the many different performing editions of his music published during his lifetime testifies to that. No perfectionist would have tolerated it.


Ken pretty much answered this above as I would have. Just to be clear: It never occurred to me the OP question meant perfectionist in proofreading and penmanship. I assumed it was referring to aesthetic decisions.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

Perfectionism is a personality trait, and it tends to be counterproductive. At its extreme it keeps people from getting anything done at all, because they're afraid to begin lest their results fail to meet their standards. Most artists want their work to be "right" and will work at it until it is. That isn't perfectionism, it's just being conscientious in doing one's job.


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## amfortas (Jun 15, 2011)

Woodduck said:


> Perfectionism is a personality trait, and it tends to be counterproductive. At its extreme it keeps people from getting anything done at all, because they're afraid to begin lest their results fail to meet their standards.


Thank you. I've been trying to post the same idea for days now, but just couldn't get right.


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## eugeneonagain (May 14, 2017)

Woodduck said:


> Perfectionism is a personality trait, and it tends to be counterproductive. At its extreme it keeps people from getting anything done at all, because they're afraid to begin lest their results fail to meet their standards. Most artists want their work to be "right" and will work at it until it is. That isn't perfectionism, it's just being conscientious in doing one's job.


Yes. I'd say, however, that this personality trait exists in a lot of people and is made even more evident when one is engaged in creative work upon which one's reputation rests. 
When I first starting professional tailoring I was severely slowed down by wanting garments to be as 'perfect' as I could get them before they could leave my table. It's a matter of competence and confidence, which comes with practice, work and the ability to believe in your work without paying more attention to critique than is necessary.

Someone like Bruckner suffered from the latter issue more than anything. Listening to third-party advice that undermined his own belief in his work.


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## SixFootScowl (Oct 17, 2011)

My first thought was Beethoven but he is not on the list, probably so there will be some chance of others being voted for.


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## hammeredklavier (Feb 18, 2018)

Tchaikov6 said:


> I voted Ravel, and his output reflects his perfectionism. Ravel wrote very few works, and very few of them are of low quality... so Ravel really wouldn't except anything other than excellent.
> 
> 
> HSW said:
> ...





HSW said:


> Confirms my point.


No. Chopin isn't that much more a perfectionist than Schubert is, even if you look at the published output. Have you seen how how much cliche there is in his bread-and-butter, salon miniatures? How devoid of motivic build or development and how full of New-Age-like candy that's passed for profundity among many Romanticism enthusiasts? 
Great melodists? 




Op.53: 



Op.44: 



Op.48 No.1: 



There is a good reason why Wagner called him "a composer for one right hand", and as I'm posting this, someone is probably after me to discuss again how Chopin follows aesthetic values different from previous eras, has a unique voice, created a whole new musical language (unlike the classical masters "who were too old-fashionably narrow-minded that they could never think outside the box or voice their own inner thought" as he claims)- when the fact is, even Chopin's highly acclaimed Ballade No.4 in F minor is heavily influenced by Hummel Fantasy in E flat Op.18 



 and nothing changes the fact about his limitations of proper skills in various aspects.


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## Bwv 1080 (Dec 31, 2018)

Dutilleux was a notorious perfectionist, producing relatively few works as a result


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## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

hammeredklavier said:


> No. Chopin isn't that much more a perfectionist than Schubert is, even if you look at the published output. Have you seen how how much cliche there is in *his* bread-and-butter, salon miniatures? How devoid of motivic build or development and how full of New-Age-like candy that's passed for profundity among many Romanticism enthusiasts?
> Great melodists?
> 
> 
> ...


I'm confused as to who you are talking about, Chopin or Schubert. Do you like Chopin? Who is cliched in his salon miniatures? Too many "him" and "his" references to be clear.


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## Littlephrase (Nov 28, 2018)

millionrainbows said:


> I'm confused as to who you are talking about, Chopin or Schubert. Do you like Chopin? Who is cliched in his salon miniatures? Too many "him" and "his" references to be clear.


He's referring to Chopin, but it is implied the same thing applies for Schubert. In his mind, both are untalented amateurs who deserve no more recognition than a Hummel or a Spohr.


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## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

Mozart wasn't a perfectionist - he just wrote nearly perfect music without trying.


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## Captainnumber36 (Jan 19, 2017)

DavidA said:


> Mozart wasn't a perfectionist - he just wrote nearly perfect music without trying.


As was noted in a previous thread, he worked very hard from the day he was born and had genetic disposition and a father that fostered his talent.


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## hammeredklavier (Feb 18, 2018)

Littlephrase1913 said:


> He's referring to Chopin, but it is implied the same thing applies for Schubert. In his mind, both are untalented amateurs who deserve no more recognition than a Hummel or a Spohr.


Yes, I'm referring to Chopin. Both Schubert and Chopin are indeed geniuses, but I find the titles attributed to Chopin "greatest for the piano", "greatest harmonist since Bach" Great melodists? often extreme. Chopin could be called the greatest piano _methodist_. However, there's no way he wrote the greatest keyboard music, let alone piano music, his Etudes don't even come close to Bach WTC. Even the Waltzes, Except the few (Op.18, Op.34 No.1, Op.42 that are written with as much musical content as Johann Strauss II Waltzes, the rest are 'A' - 'B' - 'A' s, quite literally. This is the case with most of his 60+ Mazurkas, along with dozens of songs that written in the similar format, they combine to make up half his output. How can we consider him a perfectionist like Ravel. That's what I meant, Chopin isn't that much more a perfectionist than Schubert. Chopin still deserves his place in music history as a musical genius - but again, there's idolatry about him other people find disturbing.

I often see more attempts to attribute "creator of a whole new language" to Chopin (and maybe Debussy) than most other famous composers. _Usually_ by people who say things like 'classical era masters lacked ingenuity and creative thinking skills'. 
Field Romance in E flat: 



Chopin Nocturne in E flat: 



Hummel piano concerto A minor: 






Larkenfield said:


> The chance of mistaking Brahms for Tchaikovsky, or Liszt or Schumann for Chopin, was far less likely to happen because these composers were more interested in _conforming to their own ideals _than the Classicists were in _conforming to the ideals of Greece and Rome_, which had inspired Classicism in the first place, despite the great contributions of Haydn and Mozart. Unless this can be fully appreciated and understood, the dyed-in-the-wool Classicists have about as much insight into the Romantics as fingernails on a chalkboard. The Romantics represented the expanded imagination that was freed after the Classicism of Haydn and Mozart had run its course and the world had dramatically changed... They no longer had to genuflect before royalty and the aristocracy in order to survive, and inspiration could far more dictate form. That was necessary for the overall emotional expression and freedom in music. That expanded freedom overall was considered a contribution to composition, _a plus_, not a debility.






_"" this is the unmistakable sound of Frederic Chopin ""_


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## Alonso (Feb 1, 2019)

Perfectionist in the sense of fastidious: Debussy, Ravel. Dutilleux was said to be so perfectionist that he would only publish of handful of works, all of them masterful. Boulez was the epitome of this school: he was a perfectionist to the point of continuously revisiting and reformulating works. This french, impressionist kind of perfection is that of the seasoned artisan. It is a perfection of tasteful decoration, of exquisite perfumes, of hazy natural landscapes. This is different from the austrian geometrical perfection of the likes of Schoenberg, and especially Webern. This second perfection is that of compressed lyrical beauty, economy of means, mathematical astuteness, density. It means investing each note with a sense of absolute necessity. A fullness of relations.


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## GraemeG (Jun 30, 2009)

Brahms. If it wasn't up to scratch, it was destroyed.
Beethoven wrote tub-thumping rubbish and had it published; what perfectionist would have written Wellington?
Most composers have written all kinds of second rate stuff.
Brahms may have had a (very) few 'immature' works, but there's nothing second-rate about anything he wrote.
And he still got to Op 120+.
Graeme


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## BrahmsWasAGreatMelodist (Jan 13, 2019)

No one's mentioned Durufle yet. Quite the perfectionist... my vote still goes to Brahms though. Ravel would be my second choice.


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## amfortas (Jun 15, 2011)

Littlephrase1913 said:


> He's referring to Chopin, but it is implied the same thing applies for Schubert. In his mind, both are untalented amateurs who deserve no more recognition than a Hummel or a Spohr.


I kind of like Hummel and Spohr.


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## Ethereality (Apr 6, 2019)

Brahms by 90 light-years. You can just hear it in his decisions. Weary, can't say greatest.


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## ArtMusic (Jan 5, 2013)

Brahms was the most perfectionist, although I do think it is not always best for his music especially when it came to the large scale works.


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## Ethereality (Apr 6, 2019)

ArtMusic said:


> Brahms was the most perfectionist, although I do think it is not always best for his music especially when it came to the large scale works.


Then again, you can argue he made an ultimatum.


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## elgar's ghost (Aug 8, 2010)

I'd second whoever it was who suggested Boulez as he thought his compositions are never absolutely finished - Boulez didn't so much revise some of his works as keep them in a perpetually evolving state. 

I do think Webern should be included - listening to his music gives the impression that he had to really wrench it out of himself. I like the Brahms story and there was a similar one about Webern - allegedly during the course of a day the only progress he made on one of his scores was to put down a rest sign. 

Varèse might be another candidate - instigating a kind of 'year zero' policy after all of his output apart from one song was lost and then providing less than three hours of new music during the last 47 years of his life. He never seemed to work on more than one piece at a time, either.


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## Phil loves classical (Feb 8, 2017)

I feel Brahms to be kind of rough, chunky or grinding at times, but can hear much as meticulously crafted. I feel Britten to be silky smooth, even though it's not always interesting to me.


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## hammeredklavier (Feb 18, 2018)

Versions and editions of Bruckner's symphonies
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Versions_and_editions_of_Bruckner's_symphonies

Symphony No. 1
1865-66: Grandjean [1995]
1866: Carragan [1998],
1868: Thomas Röder [2014]
1877/1884: Haas [1935], Nowak [1953]
1891: Doblinger [1893], Brosche [1980]

Symphony No. 2	
1872: Carragan [2005]
1873: Carragan
1876: Carragan
1877: Haas [1938]3, Nowak [1965], Carragan [2007]
1892: Doblinger [1892]

Symphony No. 3
1873: Nowak [1977]
1874: Carragan
1876: Nowak [1980], Carragan
1877-1878: Oeser [1950], Nowak [1981]6
1889: Rättig [1890], Nowak [1959]

Symphony No. 4
1874: Nowak [1975]
1878: Haas [1936], Nowak [1981], Carragan
1881 (aka 1878/1880): Haas [1936], Korstvedt [2019]
1886 (aka 1878/1880): Nowak [1953]
1888: Gutmann [1889], Korstvedt [2004]

Symphony No. 5
Doblinger [1896]10, Haas [1935], Nowak [1951]

Symphony No. 6
Doblinger [1899]11, Haas [1935], Nowak [1952]

Symphony No. 7
Gutmann [1885], Haas [1944], Nowak [1954]

Symphony No. 8
1887: Nowak [1972], Hawkshaw (2017)
1890: Haas [1939]14, Nowak [1955]
1892: Haslinger-Schlesinger-Lienau

Symphony No. 9
Doblinger [1903]15, Orel [1932], Nowak [1951], Cohrs [2000]
Finale sketches: Orel [1934], Phillips [1994-2002]


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## mikeh375 (Sep 7, 2017)

Britten had that rare combination of extraordinary technical facility allied to a distinctive musicality and invention. Add to that his fabulous orchestration, flawless inner ear, clear and crisp conducting and him being one of the finest pianists of his generation then you have something pretty perfect imv. The Concerto posted by Phil above is a fine example of the technical facility and emotional power of his voice.


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## SanAntone (May 10, 2020)

A composer not listed in the poll is *Maurice Duruflé*, but who was a perfectionist. He only published 14 works - only those he felt were up to his standards. I voted for Brahms, however.


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## Botschaft (Aug 4, 2017)

Brahms is the gold standard of music.


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## Richannes Wrahms (Jan 6, 2014)

Webern is obviously the answer, other candidates are Boulez and Kurtag.


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## Allegro Con Brio (Jan 3, 2020)

I voted Webern. The amazingly precise arrangement of the pitches, timbres, and textures that he chooses is something to behold.


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## Ned Low (Jul 29, 2020)

hammeredklavier said:


> Versions and editions of Bruckner's symphonies
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Versions_and_editions_of_Bruckner's_symphonies
> 
> Symphony No. 1
> ...


Well i don't understand why you mentonied Nowak and Hass editions as they were published after composer's lifetime. Clearly, things would have been different had the editions been published in Bruckner's time.With regards to Carragan, do you still hold Bruckner responsible for the editions William Carragan has published probably out of Bruckner's discarded sketches? I haven't even heard of the other editions you mentioned.

Regarding the versions, we know that Bruckner didn't revise symphonies 5,6,7 and 9. His revisions of symphonies 2,3,4 and 8 are considerable. We don't know whether he willingly revised them or not. We will never know which version is the right one, i.e the one Bruckner himslef considered as the best version. And I'm personally tired of discussing versions. Go for the one you like. That's it.

But i think Bruckner revised them not because he was a perfectionist like Brahms but because he was inscure and valued the suggestions of those close to him like Hermann Levi. Had he been a perfectionist, he would have burnt the earlier versions of symphonies 2,3,4 and 8, something which Brahms would have done. Then we wouldn't be discussing whether the 1873 is the best version of the 3rd symphony or the 1877 or even the last revision 1889/90.


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## Agamenon (Apr 22, 2019)

Orfeo said:


> Others:
> 
> 
> Bruckner
> ...


Yes, Wagner was very methodical. And if you take a look at the scores, you´ll find perfect writing.


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