# Which composer would you like to meet?



## TudorMihai (Feb 20, 2013)

If you are able to travel back in time and meet a particular composer, which one would you like to meet and what do you want to ask him? Myself, I would like to meet Mahler and ask him how his surroundings and emotions are transposed in his music. Another composer I would like to meet is Bach and ask him how he's able to compose a new cantata every week.


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## Wicked_one (Aug 18, 2010)

I'd go back to Beethoven's times and buy a ticket for that huge concert where he premiered the 5th and the 6th symphony among other works. 

Afterwards, I'd like to see Paganini, especially the concert where Liszt was present. I want to see on Liszt that 1st impression that Paganini left on him. 

After Paganini, surely, a Liszt recital. "The concert is me" , ok, bring it on, full force!  And I would like to get to know Liszt because he was a really smart chap, he was. 

And of course, Mahler. I would like to know the "secrets" behind composing such massive and lovely symphonies and what they mean and how he came up with all the melodies and such. And before coming back to present times, I'd take a picture of him and photograph his manuscripts


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## ComposerOfAvantGarde (Dec 2, 2011)

I'd like to go to the future and meet a new composer that no one today could possibly imagine and I'd like to share with them some musical ideas and get inspired by that conversation, exchange and use different ideas from each other in our own works. It would be amazing to find out what the music int he future will be like. I'd have to bring back a score too.......


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## TudorMihai (Feb 20, 2013)

Wicked_one said:


> I'd go back to Beethoven's times and buy a ticket for that huge concert where he premiered the 5th and the 6th symphony among other works.


Yes, I would like to go to that period and attend the premiere of his 9th symphony and witness the moment when he came on the stage after the performance and see that unforgettable moment when he was turned around the see the ovations and applause. Another concert I would like to attend is the premiere of Mahler's 8th symphony, conducted by the maestro himself.


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## ComposerOfAvantGarde (Dec 2, 2011)

If I were to go to the past, I would go there to discover any forgotten composer or discouraged composer and either give them a composition lesson if they need one or somehow get their works performed more often in the time they lived. Then I'd go back to the present day and give performances of their work. Bring a new composer to light, remember a forgotten composer! I already want to go back and convince Max Planck to leave quantum physics for another day and focus on being a composer! :lol:


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## JCarmel (Feb 3, 2013)

I think above all...I'd like to give some threads of comfort to Tchaikovsky. I'd like to tell him that although there is still ignorance & prejudice, things are much better today. I'd like to tell him also about the very odd coincidental things about him that I learnt-of in Christopher Nupen's 2 part film-biography, that mirrored things in my life. The one that struck home in particular was how as a child he would adore to hear a particular aria from Don Giovanni...& he found listening to it, was thrilling. That was exactly the same for me...& there were other things pertaining to his emotional nature.
And above all, I felt so _very_ sorry to read about his devastation, when his patroness & once-so close-confidante, Madame Von Meck, ceased to write to him. I do believe that that tremendous sense of loss contributed to his possible suicide.


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## Guest (Sep 21, 2013)

OK, we've mentioned past and future, both equally inaccessible.

So how's about present? It we've got. Let's use it.

Of the ones I haven't met yet (because I do a lot of that meeting composers thing already--oh, it's fun!), I think I'd most like to meet Lachenmann because I love his music so much. Mark Andre, too. And Christina Kubisch and Berangere Maximin.


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## brianvds (May 1, 2013)

TudorMihai said:


> Another composer I would like to meet is Bach and ask him how he's able to compose a new cantata every week.


"I have many children, and I trained them in composition myself."


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## Ingélou (Feb 10, 2013)

I'd like to meet Turlough O'Carolan, at the great house of one of his Anglo-Irish patrons, and get him to write a jig in my honour.


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## Manxfeeder (Oct 19, 2010)

some guy said:


> OK, we've mentioned past and future, both equally inaccessible.
> 
> So how's about present? It we've got. Let's use it.


What's great about our time is, we are able to contact composers through social media. I'm Facebook friends with a few of them. And our local university has composers who are in residence or who hang out there. I've had a couple chance encounters, and the ones out here have been nice and accessible.

However, as far as the past, I'd like to visit Erik Satie in the last week of his life to let him know how his music has come to be appreciated and what his innovations have contributed to 20th Century music. He would be surprised and delighted.


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## ptr (Jan 22, 2013)

I would love to resurrect CoAG a hundred years after him leaving this earthly delight behind as the most celebrated composer in history just for the fun of it! And waiting for this to happen, I'd like to do the same with Gustav Mahler tomorrow just as a practice run... 

/ptr


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## PetrB (Feb 28, 2012)

Another:

I'd like to hang out with Rameau, as a couple of guys attending one of the Zimmermannsche Kaffeehaus (Cafe Zimmerman) concerts, but with neither Rameau or Bach recognizing who the other was. I'd like to see Rameau's reaction to the music, hear what he had to say about it.

I'm thinking the whole scenario slightly perverse, and it could be "fun _and_ informative." :lol:


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## Nereffid (Feb 6, 2013)

I'd go back to just before Wagner published "that" article, tell him about the neverending debate on the subject, quietly show him a few photos from Auschwitz, and let him think things through a bit.

Or maybe I'd just call round to Berlioz with a big bag of weed.


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## mstar (Aug 14, 2013)

JCarmel said:


> I think above all...I'd like to give some threads of comfort to Tchaikovsky. I'd like to tell him that although there is still ignorance & prejudice, things are much better today. I'd like to tell him also about the very odd coincidental things about him that I learnt-of in Christopher Nupen's 2 part film-biography, that mirrored things in my life. The one that struck home in particular was how as a child he would adore to hear a particular aria from Don Giovanni...& he found listening to it, was thrilling. That was exactly the same for me...& there were other things pertaining to his emotional nature.
> And above all, I felt so _very_ sorry to read about his devastation, when his patroness & once-so close-confidante, Madame Von Meck, ceased to write to him. I do believe that that tremendous sense of loss contributed to his possible suicide.


Nice, very nice. Tchaikovsky, though, did not kill himself. I once made a thread on that subject.... It's hidden somewhere in the forum.  It has been proven. Also, Nadezha von Meck did fund him for some time, and after about thirteen years, broke both the financial support as well as the correspondence. Though she had said that it was due to her lack of money at the time, it has been verified that that was not the case. Instead, I propose that she had to concentrate on sending her 11? children to school, help them to find a job, etc.. At that time, Tchaikovsky had already written his fifth symphony. The fifth was related to his sixth. Actually, they were very much related and connected. After over a year of Tchaikovsky research and close examination of most of his works as well as events and some letters, I conclude that there are certain connections between several of his works, and many references between thgm - one being between the Sixth and the Nutcracker. It sounds absurd, but it is fairly complicated. He was not unintelligent, to day the least. Anyway, his death was not suicide, or connected with Nadezha's lack of correspondence. 
If you really are interested ine event and reason of the composer's death, you can always direct message, but I say! Most people are not. :lol:


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## aleazk (Sep 30, 2011)

I would like to attend to those Cafe Zimmerman concerts too, and to see Bach playing the violin. The organ too, of course, but not in the Cafe!.
I would like to attend to some lecture by Ligeti.


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## SiegendesLicht (Mar 4, 2012)

Well, I would definitely love to meeet Wagner, and I am sure we would not be talking only about music. I would probably ask him lots of questions about his view of German history, religion and mythology, what he thinks about life in the _Kaiserreich_ and many many more. Except that... he would probably want to know about everything that happened in German history after his own time, and it would be extremely hard to bring myself to tell him about some things.


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## Cheyenne (Aug 6, 2012)

Bruckner would be my man. I think a nice talk with a gentle spirit like him would be delightfully tranquil and informative.


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## Ondine (Aug 24, 2012)

MOZART. I think we will have a great time together laughing at society with a good glass of beer


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## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

SiegendesLicht said:


> Well, I would definitely love to meeet Wagner, and I am sure we would not be talking only about music. I would probably ask him lots of questions about his view of German history, religion and mythology, what he thinks about life in the _Kaiserreich_ and many many more. Except that... he would probably want to know about everything that happened in German history after his own time, and it would be extremely hard to bring myself to tell him about some things.


If I met Wagner I would be sure not to have my credit card on me!


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## trazom (Apr 13, 2009)

TudorMihai said:


> Another composer I would like to meet is Bach and ask him how he's able to compose a new cantata every week.


I can guess it would probably be along the lines "First I start by writing down one note, then another one, and repeat this process until it's finished."


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## Vesteralen (Jul 14, 2011)

Francesca Caccini .


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## ArtMusic (Jan 5, 2013)

TudorMihai said:


> If you are able to travel back in time and meet a particular composer, which one would you like to meet and what do you want to ask him? Myself, I would like to meet Mahler and ask him how his surroundings and emotions are transposed in his music. Another composer I would like to meet is Bach and ask him how he's able to compose a new cantata every week.


The ones in the past - the greatest ones. Bach, Mozart, Beethoven, Haydn, Handel, Schubert, Schumann, Mendelssohn, Monteverdi, Vivaldi, ............ and on it goes!


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## Blancrocher (Jul 6, 2013)

Ned Rorem--unless he already put all his good gossip in his books.


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## aleazk (Sep 30, 2011)

ComposerOfAvantGarde said:


> I already want to go back and convince Max Planck to leave quantum physics for another day and focus on being a composer! :lol:


I don't think so .


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## ComposerOfAvantGarde (Dec 2, 2011)

aleazk said:


> I don't think so .


I just _knew_ you were going to come along to disagree with that.


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## brianvds (May 1, 2013)

Cheyenne said:


> Bruckner would be my man. I think a nice talk with a gentle spirit like him would be delightfully tranquil and informative.


But please, whatever you do, don't suggest any revisions to any of his symphonies.


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## PetrB (Feb 28, 2012)

aleazk said:


> I would like to attend to those Cafe Zimmerman concerts too, and to see Bach playing the violin. The organ too, of course, but not in the Cafe!.
> I would like to attend to some lecture by Ligeti.


Maybe we could meet later and swing by to hear Bartok in recital playing both his own works and those of Beethoven, of which he was a brilliant executant and interpreter (and did he know Beethoven or did he know Beethoven -- just look at those string quartets)!


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## Guest (Sep 22, 2013)

From the past, not a one. I like the music, but would be somewhat fearful of meeting the person.
From the present, I might muster up enough enthusiasm for the idea of meeting Brian Eno, but for the same reason, I think I wouldn't really want to.


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## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

If I ever met Beethoven I would want to do so outside of his flat. He live apparently in absolute squalor. One visitor even noticed an unemptied chamberpot lying under the piano, the stench of which filled the room!


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## Nereffid (Feb 6, 2013)

Oh, also I'd go back to 14th century France and track down the mysterious Ars subtilior composer Solage just so we could have some sort of biographical information about him.

Come to think of it, a time traveller could make quite a career tracking down the composers of famous anonymous works. Hmmm... plot idea for Doctor Who episode? "The Greensleeves Code"... aliens bring the tune to Earth because it contains an activation code for... something....


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## GiulioCesare (Apr 9, 2013)

Wagner and Mendelssohn. Together, in a tavern. Drinks are on me.


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## ComposerOfAvantGarde (Dec 2, 2011)

GiulioCesare said:


> Wagner and Mendelssohn. Together, in a tavern. Drinks are on me.


Poor Mendelssohn.


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## Nereffid (Feb 6, 2013)

GiulioCesare said:


> Wagner and Mendelssohn. Together, in a tavern. Drinks are on me.


Cage fight or mud wrestling? :cheers:


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## Vesteralen (Jul 14, 2011)

Nereffid said:


> Cage fight or mud wrestling? :cheers:


Mud wrestling. Cage was not invited.


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## BartokBela (Mar 12, 2013)

Bartok. Just the two of us, walking from village to village in the Hungarian countryside. Talking about composers, his musical ideas and a lot of other things to pass the time... I'll carry the huge grammophone


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## ComposerOfAvantGarde (Dec 2, 2011)

I wanna bake some bread with Cazazza Dan.


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## brianvds (May 1, 2013)

GiulioCesare said:


> Wagner and Mendelssohn. Together, in a tavern. Drinks are on me.


And who is going to pay for the damage to the premises?


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## SiegendesLicht (Mar 4, 2012)

ComposerOfAvantGarde said:


> Poor Mendelssohn.


I put a "like" under that post because you assume Wagner would win


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## ComposerOfAvantGarde (Dec 2, 2011)

SiegendesLicht said:


> I put a "like" under that post because you assume Wagner would win


Hell yeah he'd win! but musically, not in terms of religion


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## SimonNZ (Jul 12, 2012)

I want to stand near Debussy listening to the Javanese gamelan at the 1889 Exposition Universelle, hearing the music as he heard it, not interrupting him or breaking his concentration (it was an important moment), but maybe peeking over his shoulder at his notebook.


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## mstar (Aug 14, 2013)

If I met Tchaikovsky, I would valse. With him. Regardless of any controversial topic....

Yes, valse.... Then TWO concerts, not one! Then out to a spacious, non-genetically-modified garden for us, and then what? Out to dinner, but of course, we wouldn't really _care_ for anything, so we would spend the rest of the evening together, along with the stars, but no extremely vibrant colors, or that may indicate the city's strong output of pollution, potentially blocking the effective amounts of photons from reaching the botanical life in the garden.... And then, reluctantly, what! We would part, assuming that he would not walk me home first if the distance is considerable by walking, and if it not raining, in which case I would............. have to take a vehicle back to my residence. (Phew! Close one. )

Assuming that Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky is the gentleman that he is, I would have spent little to no money that day, nor have tired myself out, I would perhaps be able to obtain a good night's rest. And if I could have another day with him, who knows what might befall us? Perhaps an event worthy of Rachmaninov's music? 

HOW ROMANTIC I'VE GOTTEN! (Hey, where's that Carmen smiley that was posted in another thread? :lol


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## brianvds (May 1, 2013)

SimonNZ said:


> I want to stand near Debussy listening to the Javanese gamelan at the 1889 Exposition Universelle, hearing the music as he heard it, not interrupting him or breaking his concentration (it was an important moment), but maybe peeking over his shoulder at his notebook.


Yes! Or perhaps just looking at his rapt expression. Or, in similar vein, keeping Bartok company while he discovers the world of Hungarian and Romanian folk music.


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## PetrB (Feb 28, 2012)

The time traveler successfully arrived in Paris to visit Guillaume de Machaut. That century was and would be assaulted with the black death, in waves, until nearly 1400. The visit was successful, and informative, and the traveler more than reluctantly took his leave, the notes and video and audio he had made during the visit with him.

He had left behind a simple pathogen, one which all people from the 21st century harbored, but for whom none were affected in any way. This is why it went unknown during the 21st century, and why the traveler had no idea that he was carrying something highly contagious to the already death assaulted and beleaguered 14th century.

The black death would lay claim to near half the population of Europe. The traveler was oblivious that he harbored and imported that pathogen which would lay claim to the souls of the other fifty percent.

Meanwhile, even in the moment it took for him to return to his own time, he began to feel oddly insubstantial. He arrived in his home laboratory, and looked out of the window to the busy street at the front of the house he lived in. He saw that people were, for one moment, flickering into half transparency like a gutting candle, their image wavering, and it took no time to realize they were dissipating -- in seconds -- into nothingness, just gone.

He had another split second to think that perhaps by going back, something had happened to the ancestors of those now disappearing, breaking the lineage which was responsible for their presence, and effectively wiping the slate of European history clean starting not long after the time of his visit, and likely that slate a tabula rasa by about 1400, until he realized he had less than one second of consciousness left until he, too, would be gone.

It is not nice to mess with Mother Nature,








and it is not at all a good idea to mess with Father Time, either


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## ArtMusic (Jan 5, 2013)

GiulioCesare said:


> Wagner and Mendelssohn. Together, in a tavern. Drinks are on me.


Cool....can I join in?


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## brianvds (May 1, 2013)

PetrB said:


> He had another split second to think that perhaps by going back, something had happened to the ancestors of those now disappearing, breaking the lineage which was responsible for their presence, and effectively wiping the slate of European history clean starting not long after the time of his visit, and likely that slate a tabula rasa by about 1400, until he realized he had less than one second of consciousness left until he, too, would be gone.


Hehe, very good point. In scifi time travel movies, you often see people arrive in some distant past where, weirdly, everyone speaks modern English or French. But a modern visitor to medieval England would not understand a word they are saying.

And your point about pathogens is very valid. If we time traveled to the time of the dinosaurs it might be even worse: our bugs would wipe them out, even as their wipe us out.


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## HaydnBearstheClock (Jul 6, 2013)

Nereffid said:


> Cage fight or mud wrestling? :cheers:


more like UFC.

(20 chars)


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## HaydnBearstheClock (Jul 6, 2013)

I think meeting Grieg would have been nice, he seems to have a been a very morally upright person.


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## SiegendesLicht (Mar 4, 2012)

ComposerOfAvantGarde said:


> Hell yeah he'd win! but musically, not in terms of religion


So it would be a musical duel, like in _Tannhäuser_ or _Die Meistersinger_, not a physical one? We would have to rent the Wartburg Castle for it then.


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## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

GiulioCesare said:


> Wagner and Mendelssohn. Together, in a tavern. Drinks are on me.


Wagner would make sure you bought the drinks! He'd probably get the rest of your money off you too!


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## Wicked_one (Aug 18, 2010)

DavidA said:


> Wagner would make sure you bought the drinks! He'd probably get the rest of your money off you too!


In this case, Liszt will make a concert to raise money for you to drink? )


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## Celloman (Sep 30, 2006)

I would like to meet Bach on a dimly-lit street in the heart of Leipzig, on what would undoubtably be a dark and stormy night. I would ask him the question that has been tormenting musicologists for over two hundred and fifty years...

How do you drink your coffee? Light or dark?


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## mstar (Aug 14, 2013)

Celloman said:


> I would like to meet Bach on a dimly-lit street in the heart of Leipzig, on what would undoubtably be a dark and stormy night. I would ask him the question that has been tormenting musicologists for over two hundred and fifty years...
> 
> How do you drink your coffee? Light or dark?


Wonderful! And then, of course, you would have to give me the answer....


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## hreichgott (Dec 31, 2012)

I'd like to befriend Haydn. I have always felt close to him. I would like to find out if he was as joyful and tender-hearted as his music.


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## Guest (Oct 1, 2013)

I'd like to meet Aristotle and hear some of his music.


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## dgee (Sep 26, 2013)

I'd have nothing to say to most of them but I think I could have some fun at a Schubertiad or a Liszt concert. I would like to have met Bacharach too and am still holding out hope to meet Stevie Wonder


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## Andrei (Sep 11, 2013)

Surely *Haydn*! If ever there was a good natured bloke it would have to be him. Also *William Walton*, I feel an affinity and fancy we could have some really good discussions. Incidentally it is one of those odd things - and I am sure I am in a minority (hopefully not a minority of one) - but to me he is England's greatest composer. Finally *Arvo Pärt*, partly because I simultaneously love and do not understand his music, partly because it is theoretically possible to meet him.


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## Lerouse (Sep 10, 2013)

TudorMihai said:


> Yes, I would like to go to that period and attend the premiere of his 9th symphony and witness the moment when he came on the stage after the performance and see that unforgettable moment when he was turned around the see the ovations and applause. Another concert I would like to attend is the premiere of Mahler's 8th symphony, conducted by the maestro himself.


I think this would have to be the concert I would attend also.

Not sure if anyone has seen the movie "Copying Beethoven", but if anything it made me love Beethoven even more and I almost had a tear in my eye when he turns and realised that everyone loved it!

If you have not seen "Copying Beethoven", its worth a watch if your a Beethoven fan!


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## Crudblud (Dec 29, 2011)

From the past: Morton Feldman. He seems like he was a down to earth regular guy who, as much as it is possible, thought for himself.

From the present: Probably Robert Ashley, and for much the same reasons as I gave for Feldman.

It's not exactly that I am dying to meet these people, but they are two that spring to mind who I wouldn't say "no" to meeting.


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## Schumann (Aug 12, 2013)

I would love to meet up with Mozart to understand and to feel his character as a person, I do think he's a jolly and spontaneous person with a great imaginative view and soul for music! 

But I would die to see Bach playing the harpsichord and to witness his lifestyle as a composer!


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## aleazk (Sep 30, 2011)

SimonNZ said:


> I want to stand near Debussy listening to the Javanese gamelan at the 1889 Exposition Universelle, hearing the music as he heard it, not interrupting him or breaking his concentration (it was an important moment), but maybe peeking over his shoulder at his notebook.


"...note to myself: use more pentatonic scales..."


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## Ingélou (Feb 10, 2013)

When I've visited Monsieur *Lully* & heard Turlough *O'Carolan* harping in the halls of the Anglo-Irish gentry, I'd like to meet *Heinrich Ignaz Franz Biber*. This is because I've developed *a massive crush* on _Andrew Manze & his magic baroque violin_, and the latest of AM's cds that we've bought is the *Rosary Sonatas*.

But if I met Mr Manze by chance, I'd be too overcome to speak - . It would be easier all round to travel back into the past & meet Herr Biber. We'd talk about faith, religious culture, and which of his three forenames he likes best.

Luckily, I'll have borrowed the _Universal Translator_ from the *Starship Enterprise*. I'd ask Biber about his artistic intentions when composing the Rosary Sonatas; about his personal faith & his favourite saint, and what he thinks about the relationship of church and state; also about marriage and children, and whether he was pleased that his daughter took the veil.

Then, just as he starts to ask me about the Church in the 21st century, I'll look at my watch, apologise profusely for taking up his time, and climb back into my time machine.


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## HaydnBearstheClock (Jul 6, 2013)

hreichgott said:


> I'd like to befriend Haydn. I have always felt close to him. I would like to find out if he was as joyful and tender-hearted as his music.


I don't think he could've faked the humour in his compositions .


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## Reichstag aus LICHT (Oct 25, 2010)

Lou Harrison. He had such a sunny personality.


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## BurningDesire (Jul 15, 2012)

I'd love to have the chance to meet and talk with Leonard Bernstein, and talk music with him :3


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## mstar (Aug 14, 2013)

Pyotr Ilyich Twenty-Five Characters.


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## Reichstag aus LICHT (Oct 25, 2010)

BurningDesire said:


> I'd love to have the chance to meet and talk with Leonard Bernstein


Seconded. The man was a phenomenon.


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## FLighT (Mar 7, 2013)

Gustav (and Alma) Mahler.


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## brianvds (May 1, 2013)

BurningDesire said:


> I'd love to have the chance to meet and talk with Leonard Bernstein, and talk music with him :3


His "Young People's Concerts" are on YouTube, so we can at least listen to him talking about music. He was indeed wonderful at explaining it.


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## Richannes Wrahms (Jan 6, 2014)

I tend to forget that Bernstein is dead, he always looked so alive!


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## Stargazer (Nov 9, 2011)

I would both love and hate to meet Beethoven. 

If I could travel back in time to meet someone, I'd want to meet Schubert. Mostly just to tell him how famous he becomes later, and how much of an impact his music eventually has on the world. Oh, and to get a finish to the unfinished symphony, and ask him why on earth he kept it hidden all those years!!


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Stargazer said:


> I would both love and hate to meet Beethoven.
> 
> If I could travel back in time to meet someone, I'd want to meet Schubert. Mostly just to tell him how famous he becomes later, and how much of an impact his music eventually has on the world. Oh, and to get a finish to the unfinished symphony, and ask him why on earth he kept it hidden all those years!!


You might want to deliver some penicillin as well, that would be of more use.


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## Stargazer (Nov 9, 2011)

KenOC said:


> You might want to deliver some penicillin as well, that would be of more use.


...and might create an alternate reality paradox. I was never good at all of this science fiction stuff!


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Stargazer said:


> ...and might create an alternate reality paradox. I was never good at all of this science fiction stuff!


So give it a try. The worst that can happen is that you destroy the universe, right?


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## Frei aber froh (Feb 22, 2013)

*Paradox*



KenOC said:


> So give it a try. The worst that can happen is that you destroy the universe, right?











Hide in the church!


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## Frei aber froh (Feb 22, 2013)

Bernstein is high on my list too. Most of all, I think I would love to see/hear/listen to Bach improvise fugues on organ... that would be mind-blowing.


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## Mister Man (Feb 3, 2014)

I'd like to go back and play pranks on Wanger.


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## Svelte Silhouette (Nov 7, 2013)

None as the ones I like best are all dead and being haunted by anything more tangible than a melody might see me joining them in decomposing :lol:


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

I would like to meet Leonard Bernstein and ask him if he had a "thing" for Aaron Copland. If he was still there, I would ask him about conducting Mahler and Haydn.


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## Svelte Silhouette (Nov 7, 2013)

Mozart in my youth as we'd have had fun but Bach later or maybe Brahms or Beethoven as the Bs'd've been good drinking buddies.


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

I'd like to meet Mozart and have him watch the "Amadeus" flick and ask him does any of it have an iota of truth to it.


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## Polyphemus (Nov 2, 2011)

hpowders said:


> I'd like to meet Mozart and have him watch the "Amadeus" flick and ask him does any of it have an iota of truth to it.


To which his reply would undoubtedly be 'I wish'. (except for the end bit)


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## Frei aber froh (Feb 22, 2013)

I second Wagner for all of the reasons previously listed. Additionally, I would love to talk about religion with Beethoven and feminism with Clara Schumann (she and all female composers and the time desperately needed some). I think it would be fascinating to know what Shostakovich thought about the purpose and significance of art, but considering the circumstances he lived in, I wouldn't get an honest or straightforward answer.


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

William Schuman. He grew up without classical music to become one of America's greatest classical composers. I would love to ask him about that over a brew or two.


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## tomhh (May 28, 2014)

Maybe Lizst.He was definitely a very smart person.


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## Igneous01 (Jan 27, 2011)

1) I'd like to ask Scriabin where I can find the mystic mountain of unicorns - maybe take some mushrooms with him or peyote

2) Have a normal conversation with Alkan

3) Ask Schnittke if he ever had thoughts/feelings of killing people - some of his music seems to reflect the inner workings of a serial killer (but I still love him for it)

4) Ask Shostakovich how he was able to pull himself together through life


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## OldFashionedGirl (Jul 21, 2013)

Bártok, I would love to pass time with him with some of his strings quartets. 
Tchaikovsky, I would to drink some vodka and eating beef Stroganoff with him.
Bernstein, he looked a funny fella.


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## scratchgolf (Nov 15, 2013)

KenOC said:


> You might want to deliver some penicillin as well, that would be of more use.


Perhaps some Prozac for Schumann and some marijuana for Mendelssohn as well.

Beethoven, and especially Bach seem to have a distance to them which makes them seem as if they may never have existed. I've always felt this way about George Washington as well. A picture on a wall that I've been staring at my entire life. I have a very difficult time issuing them personality, even if I've read extensively on them. Schubert and Mendelssohn, on the other hand, seem much easier for me to relate to and imagine. If either of them appeared in my living room I'd accept them as they appeared. Bach or Beethoven would feel like someone in a costume.


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

Polyphemus said:


> To which his reply would undoubtedly be 'I wish'. (except for the end bit)


Yeah. From the only portrait done from life, he does look like kind of a dull fellow.


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## science (Oct 14, 2010)

My choice might be Delius. Not that he's my favorite composer or anything, just that he seems like he might've been a cool guy to hang out with. 

Some of my other top choices would be Nono and Henze.


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## Oliver (Feb 14, 2012)

Alma Mahler.


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## Morimur (Jan 23, 2014)

György Ligeti. He wasn't pretentious.


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## RCWP (May 20, 2014)

I'd like to meet Henry Purcell down the Pub'. There he was bound to be surrounded by friends singing his bawdy songs - joining in -
what a joy!


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## aleazk (Sep 30, 2011)

Lope de Aguirre said:


> György Ligeti. He wasn't pretentious.


Yeah, but was quite temperamental. Check this book.


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## Ingélou (Feb 10, 2013)

RCWP said:


> I'd like to meet Henry Purcell down the Pub'. There he was bound to be surrounded by friends singing his bawdy songs - joining in -
> what a joy!


Good idea - because, as Purcell's mates would be natural having-a-good-time seventeenth century blokes who used the words that they sang in everyday settings, they wouldn't have that horrible arch self-consciously posh voice used by today's singers.

(Still scarred by the experience of buying a cd of Purcell's drinking songs & being so put off by the chortling style that we immediately donated it to a charity shop.  )


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## shangoyal (Sep 22, 2013)

After watching Amadeus, I really felt like meeting Mozart and hear that laugh in person (or any laugh).


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

This portrait was done from life. Does this look like a dude who would have that kind of laugh, or any laugh, for that matter?


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## shangoyal (Sep 22, 2013)

hpowders said:


> View attachment 43271
> 
> 
> This portrait was done from life. Does this look like a dude who would have that kind of laugh, or any laugh, for that matter?


:lol:

Well, you can't say, maybe he was very _changeable_.


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

Maybe he was just arguing with his sister about who gets to wear the big wig. Looks like she won!


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## Ingélou (Feb 10, 2013)

shangoyal said:


> :lol:
> 
> Well, you can't say, maybe he was very _changeable_.


hpowders - touché?


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## Cantabile (May 24, 2014)

I'd go a little further back in time and go down to the pub with Thomas Morley to sing some saucy Renaissance canzonets! Whoo hoo! That would be a lot of fun!


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## shangoyal (Sep 22, 2013)

Ingélou said:


> hpowders - touché?


:lol: hpowders shames even Mozart on that! (as far as we can see anyway)


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

Ingélou said:


> hpowders - touché?


Yes. It takes one to know one. Sticking with a decision requires the kind of self-discipline I can only dream of.


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

shangoyal said:


> :lol: hpowders shames even Mozart on that! (as far as we can see anyway)


Maybe, but at least I wear my own hair. I was about to criticize his position at the clavier, but stopped when I realized it was after all, Mozart.


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## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

Anthony Newman.


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