# Composers with large oeuvre?



## DrKilroy (Sep 29, 2012)

I know that Telemann is probably the winner.  J. S. Bach's score is impressive, too. I'd like to know more composers who wrote a large number of works, especially over one thousand.

Also, this seems to be an old trend. Are there any post-baroque composers with really large oeuvre?

Thanks for interest and best regards, Dr


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## joen_cph (Jan 17, 2010)

Fartein Valen´s works amount to around 10 CDs 
- except from his 25.000 piano etudes (true! They seem to have been mainly technical exercises, though. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fartein_Valen).

Niels Viggo Bentzon, Alan Hovhaness and Darius Milhaud also belong to those who composed an enormous amount of works in different genres. Shostakovich, Holmboe and Villa-Lobos did well too, but Bentzon probably composed most. If one counts individual pieces in cycles, he got past 1000 works, such as the 13 works of each 24 Preludes & Fugues, over 600 opus numbers and at least two dozen symphonies.

I´ll leave the mentioning of a certain Finnish conductor-composer whose name I forgot to someone else ... ;-)


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## ahammel (Oct 10, 2012)

Schubert is probably doing pretty well in the "number of works per year of life" category.


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## Eschbeg (Jul 25, 2012)

Milhaud's oeuvre comprises almost 450 individual opus numbers. He was no Schubert, to be sure, but for a twentieth century composer he's definitely up there.


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## Eschbeg (Jul 25, 2012)

I just looked it up: Milhaud officially has 443 individual opus numbers.

Alan Hovhannes is right behind him with 434.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

joen_cph said:


> I´ll leave the mentioning of a certain Finnish conductor-composer whose name I forgot to someone else ... ;-)


The name you want is...is...heck, I forget too! But it sure as heck isn't that other Finnish guy, with such a paltry number of symphonies to his credit...


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## Vaneyes (May 11, 2010)

Probably more meaningful is what's in print, and for that you can get a rough idea at Arkiv Music.

http://www.arkivmusic.com/classical/main.jsp?gclid=CNLvnZrl9bUCFexaMgodc1QAmQ

THE BIG 3: Mozart - 7,751 recordings available; JS Bach - 7,520; LvB - 6,068.

Telemann has a puny 891.


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## peeyaj (Nov 17, 2010)

Schubert' Deutsche numbers (the classification on which his works are organized chronologically) were numbered up to D.998. On the other hand, D.795 (Die Schoene Mullerin) and D.911 ( Winterriese) contains 20 and 24 individual songs respectively. His two set of Impromptus (D.899 and D.935) contains 4 piano pieces each..etc So, Schubert wrote more than 1000 individual works. His composing lifetime is only 18 years though. (He started at 13 and died at 31).


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## ahammel (Oct 10, 2012)

Going in the other direction, how about composers with the _smallest_ output? I put Wagner at 19 completed works (15 operas, _Das Liebesmahl der Apostel_, the_ Siegfried Idyll_, the _Wesendock Leider_, and the symphony). Anybody have less than that?


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## Mahlerian (Nov 27, 2012)

ahammel said:


> Going in the other direction, how about composers with the _smallest_ output? I put Wagner at 19 completed works (15 operas, _Das Liebesmahl der Apostel_, the_ Siegfried Idyll_, the _Wesendock Leider_, and the symphony). Anybody have less than that?


He completed a good deal more than that:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_compositions_by_Richard_Wagner

A lot of the 113 items listed are incomplete, lost, arrangements of others' work, or not music to begin with, but still more than the 19 you mentioned.


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## Kieran (Aug 24, 2010)

Schubert's numbers are made up mainly of individual songs, are they? It's still an immense output, one that must have been largely compiled without breaks for tea.

Wolfie towers over them all (?) with about 170 cd's, even though he 'only' goes as far as K626, if we disregard the odd addition of a, b and c to some works. A lot of his catalogue is made of longer works, so forgive me if he never made 1000. I'll certainly have a word with him about it...


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## GGluek (Dec 11, 2011)

I'd say the "major" composer with the smallest number of works would probably have to be Mussorgsky -- two operas, "Pictures," Night on Bald Mountain, Songs and Dances of Death. Probably fewer than 10 hours of music.


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## Sonata (Aug 7, 2010)

Haydn had a pretty tremendously-sized output. over 100 symphonies alone. Not to mention the piano sonatas, masses, oratorios, string quartets, divertimenti and concerti


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## GGluek (Dec 11, 2011)

Although . . . I'd guess Webern has to have everyone beat in terms of total output time.


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## ahammel (Oct 10, 2012)

Mahlerian said:


> He completed a good deal more than that:
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_compositions_by_Richard_Wagner
> 
> A lot of the 113 items listed are incomplete, lost, arrangements of others' work, or not music to begin with, but still more than the 19 you mentioned.


That...is a good point.

Darn it, wrong on the internet again.


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## Mahlerian (Nov 27, 2012)

GGluek said:


> Although . . . I'd guess Webern has to have everyone beat in terms of total output time.


No, Ruggles has him beat. Webern's published output amounts to 3 hours or so (adding unpublished works doubles this), whereas Ruggles' is about 2.



ahammel said:


> That...is a good point.
> 
> Darn it, wrong on the internet again.


It happens to all of us.

And it could be worse: you could be wrong in print!


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## Taggart (Feb 14, 2013)

Anyone for Czerny - opus numbers up to 851 and probably several thousand pieces - not surprising when you get things like Op.139, 100 Progressive Studies without Octaves or Op.261, 125 Exercises for Passage Playing or Op.821, 160 8-Measure Exercises.


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## Guest (Mar 12, 2013)

Are we forgetting Vivaldi? I believe his opus number count is somewhere in the 800's. Handel numbers in the 600's. I believe that the English composer, William Byrd, was also quite prolific.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Bach has over a thousand BWV numbers, some short and some VERY long. It is estimated that a similar amount of music has been lost.


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## HarpsichordConcerto (Jan 1, 2010)

DrKilroy said:


> I know that Telemann is probably the winner.  J. S. Bach's score is impressive, too. I'd like to know more composers who wrote a large number of works, especially over one thousand.
> 
> Also, this seems to be an old trend. Are there any post-baroque composers with really large oeuvre?
> 
> Thanks for interest and best regards, Dr


*Christoph Graupner* (1683-1760), contemporary of Bach, Handel, Telemann.

More than 1,400 church cantatas (JS Bach probably wrote about 300 plus)

Over 70 surviving orchestral suites (JS Bach probably wrote a few more than 4)

Read more http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christoph_Graupner

I am waiting for some period instrument band(s) to record the complete oeuvre and release on CD, probably over 500 CDs?


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

ahammel said:


> Going in the other direction, how about composers with the _smallest_ output? I put Wagner at 19 completed works (15 operas, _Das Liebesmahl der Apostel_, the_ Siegfried Idyll_, the _Wesendock Leider_, and the symphony). Anybody have less than that?


Maurice Durufle - in the course of 50 years he released a grand total of about 15 original works, mostly choral or organ. Apart from that, a couple more remained unpublished and the remainder (about a dozen) are transcriptions of both his own works and by others. What I've heard of his ouput is of high quality - the seven available organ works follow in the great French tradition of Franck, Vierne etc and the four choral works (inc. 2 masses) are very gentle.

The French seem to have a gift for measly output - Varese, Dukas, Magnard, Duparc, Dutilleux etc.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

I'll add Arriaga -- though he cheated, dying at 19.


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