# Fecund symphonists



## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Just for fun -- which composers wrote more than 20 symphonies? Please include the numbers if you can!


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## Tristan (Jan 5, 2013)

For some reason I kept thinking "fecund" was a synonym for "gross", but I think I had the wrong root word in mind >.<

Fecund symphonists:

Haydn - 104 symphonies
Hovhaness - 67 symphonies
Mozart - 41 symphonies
Myaskovsky - 27(?) symphonies

That's just off the top of my head.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Just in passing, Haydn is pretty stable at 106, including the unnumbered "A" and "B". Four of Mozart's 41 numbered symphonies are spurious or doubtful, but there's a hatful of others that are unnumbered and attributed, so he's probably safely over 41 in total.

Bejart will be able to add some from Haydn's era, and of course there's the most prolific of all symphony composers, still cranking them out...and another who passed away in 2000...


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## Guest (Mar 8, 2014)

I'd better go pop some advil before someone mentions Segerstam.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Avoiding Segerstam for the moment, here are members of the 20+ club from the times of Mozart and Haydn, the ones I could easily find. There must have been quite an appetite for symphonies in those days! I think the total population in the areas these works reached was maybe one to two million people, a single medium-sized city today!

Luigi Boccherini - 28 symphonies
Christian Cannabich - 75 symphonies
François-Joseph Gossec - 34 symphonies
Adalbert Gyrowetz (Jírovec ) - 60+ symphonies
Michael Haydn - 43 symphonies
Sir William Herschel - 24 symphonies
John Marsh - 39 symphonies (at least)
Josef Mysliveček - 55 symphonies
Ignace Pleyel - 41 symphonies
Franz Xaver Richter - 80 symphonies extant
Antonio Rosetti - 51 symphonies
Carl Philipp Stamitz - 50 symphonies
Johann Baptist Wanhal (Vanhal) - 51 symphonies
Paul Wranitzky (Vranický) - 56 symphonies


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## HaydnBearstheClock (Jul 6, 2013)

Giovanni Battista Sammartini (67)


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Hah! Good one!.................


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## violadude (May 2, 2011)

KenOC said:


> Hah! Good one!.................


? ....................


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## Polyphemus (Nov 2, 2011)

Havergal Brian 32.


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## quack (Oct 13, 2011)

In the classical era they really composed at a fecund rate but they are sadly now regarded as second rate:

Václav Pichl (89)
Johann Christian Bach (48)
Carl Stamitz (50)
Franz Ignaz Beck (24)
Carl Friedrich Abel (~40) - mostly famous for a symphony of his being ascribed to young Mozart
František Adam Míča (27) - barely any of them recorded
Carl Ditters von Dittersdorf (~120) - The "Haydn Killer" and there may well be another 90 other symphonies of doubtful authorship that could be ascribed to mister Ditto. Although it might all just be an accidental duplication, like his name.


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## joen_cph (Jan 17, 2010)

All 20th-Century composers:

Leif Segerstam around ~270
Derek Bourgeois (1941- ) around ~85
Erik Fordell (+1981) 44
Sergei Slonimsky 35
Alemdar Karamanov 24
Niels Viggo Bentzon 23
Mieczyslaw Weinberg 26
Iannis Ivanovs 21
Henry Cowell 20


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Among the big-number composers, let's pause and remember Alan Hovhaness and his 67 symphonies. It's his birthday today. He passed away in Seattle in 2000.

Of all these worthies with the exception of Haydn and Mozart, he probably gets the most performances these days. Several of his symphonies are played with some frequency and even have nicknames, esp. "Mysterious Mountain" and "Mt. St. Helens."


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## Itullian (Aug 27, 2011)

KenOC said:


> Among the big-number composers, let's pause and remember Alan Hovhaness and his 67 symphonies. It's his birthday today. He passed away in Seattle in 2000.
> 
> Of all these worthies with the exception of Haydn and Mozart, he probably gets the most performances these days. Several of his symphonies are played with some frequency and even have nicknames, esp. "Mysterious Mountain" and "Mt. St. Helens."


I have enjoyed what I've heard from him.


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## Serge (Mar 25, 2010)

And I can only imagine how pleased they all are with themselves. Not Mozart, of course. He died kind of young...


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## GreenMamba (Oct 14, 2012)

KenOC said:


> Among the big-number composers, let's pause and remember Alan Hovhaness and his 67 symphonies. It's his birthday today. He passed away in Seattle in 2000.
> 
> Of all these worthies with the exception of Haydn and Mozart, he probably gets the most performances these days. Several of his symphonies are played with some frequency and even have nicknames, esp. "Mysterious Mountain" and "Mt. St. Helens."


Is he played often outside the US? How about Myaskovsky in Russia and perhaps elsewhere? I'm curious.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

GreenMamba said:


> Is he played often outside the US? How about Myaskovsky in Russia and perhaps elsewhere? I'm curious.


Good question. I was thinking only US (jingoist that I am...) Maybe Finland is awash in Segerstam performances.


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## joen_cph (Jan 17, 2010)

Hallvard Johnsen (Norway, 1916-2003): 24


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## joen_cph (Jan 17, 2010)

Oleg Eiges (1905-1992 Russia): 20

Lev Knipper (1898-1974 Russia): 21


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