# Most Repetitive Composers



## neoshredder

Name the most repetitive composers. I know some of my favorites can be repetitive at times. It still sounds great though. Vivaldi, Albinoni, Mozart, Glass, and Minimalism in general comes to mind. At least the early Mozart symphonies seem similar.


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## LordBlackudder

vivaldi, bach, john cage.


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## Ukko

Satie. He had one musical 'trick', used it over and over and...


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## Chi_townPhilly

LordBlackudder said:


> john cage.




Didn't see that one coming.

I was thinking more Philip Glass.

However, *the* most repetitive composers are likely marginally known scribblers who have lapsed into understandable obscurity. If we limit the discussion to _famous_ composers perceived to be repetitive, then observations will veer in another direction.

Before long, someone will say Bruckner is repetitive. I'd reply that he's repetitive to those who fail to fully understand him. If I launched that brickbat at Vivaldi, a Baroque fan could make the same accusation of non-comprehension to *me.*

And he'd have a point.


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## Huilunsoittaja

A conductor once told me (impersonally, he was telling this to our whole Honors band), that the only composer who was able to master repetition beyond the regular "3 times is max" rule was _Bruckner_, although he didn't go into explaining why. Does anyone agree?


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## LordBlackudder

well i only listened to some john cage and it all sounds the same. it's repeatedly boring.

henry purcell, satie.


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## ComposerOfAvantGarde

Hilltroll72 said:


> Satie. He had one musical 'trick', used it over and over and...


So did Vivaldi.


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## waldvogel

Most repetitive composer?

Vivaldi, Vivaldi, Vivaldi, Vivaldi, Vivaldi, Vivaldi, Vivaldi, Vivaldi, Vivaldi, Vivaldi, Vivaldi, Vivaldi, Vivaldi, Vivaldi, Vivaldi, Vivaldi, Vivaldi, Vivaldi, Vivaldi, Vivaldi, Vivaldi, Vivaldi. 

In fact, if you say AVivaldi over and over again really quickly, it sounds like his standard formula.


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## ComposerOfAvantGarde

Most repetitive composer=composer who has written a lot of music that follows the same formula, similar instrumentation, form etc. right? Not necessarily most repetitive music then.


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## joen_cph

Donizetti, Verdi. Some of the most predictable composers ever, of course with variations now and then.

Satie´s oeuvre is way too manifold to be called repetitive, I think, the same applies to Purcell, of course. Think of Parade versus Musique d´Ameublement versus Sports et Divertissements versus Gymnopedies versus ... etc. He may be irritating at times, but he did make excursions into obvious seriousness too (Nocturnes, Socrate, Gnoisiennes).

Vivaldi´s work contains a lot of repetition, but also a lot of innovation, so he doesn´t qualify really either.


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## Turangalîla

SCHUBERT! Oh my goodness! Have you heard his piano sonatas?


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## neoshredder

If I knew this thread was going to be attacking Vivaldi so much, I would've thought twice before making it. I guess he has a reputation for being repetive even though he is also innovative as joen_cph said. Corelli is also in that category as I notice a lot of similar combination of sounds that he loves to use over and over. I think a slight repetition is necessary for a composer to make his mark. Now if the pieces get too similar, than it gets annoying. Glass is by far the worst I've heard for repetitiveness.


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## PianoMan

I've always found Schumann repetitive, mostly since he includes repeats at the end of almost every section of his piano stuff. However, his music is so well written that there's almost always something else to bring out the second time through, or some other way to color the music to keep it interesting.


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## ComposerOfAvantGarde

Rossini. His operas are great but overtures not so much. Once you know the formula you'd be able to whistle any of the overtures while only knowing three tunes used in it.


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## Turangalîla

neoshredder said:


> Glass is by far the worst I've heard for repetitiveness.


You can't say that Glass is "by far the worst", because repetition is the essence of his music. Other composers (such as Vivaldi, etc.) often used repetition because they had difficulty coming up with fresh material, but Glass, Reich, Adams, and the rest of the Minimalist lot used lots of repetition *on purpose* because it was part of their compositional technique. That's like criticizing Schönberg for writing music that was "too atonal".


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## ComposerOfAvantGarde

I think Glass repeats himself too much. I'm not saying his music is repetitive, because his music from the mid 80s onwards is a LOT less repetitive than in the 60s and 70s, but I'm saying that a lot of the motifs and rhythms that he uses _now_ he has usually used before. His new music seems to me just a rearrangement of motifs and chord progressions that he wrote in the 80s and 90s.

I like his recent stuff though.


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## Chrythes

CarterJohnsonPiano said:


> You can't say that Glass is "by far the worst", because repetition is the essence of his music. Other composers (such as Vivaldi, etc.) often used repetition because they had difficulty coming up with fresh material, but Glass, Reich, Adams, and the rest of the Minimalist lot used lots of repetition *on purpose* because it was part of their compositional technique. That's like criticizing Schönberg for writing music that was "too atonal".


Well at least he didn't hide his incompetence by coming up with a lazy post-modernist musical ideology!
:devil:
But seriously, I was into Glass a couple of years ago, but he became boring very fast, and I guess he's the only composer I'd dare to hold as repetitive.


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## Moira

I think any music in a particular genre probably sounds the same to an untutored ear, which probably accounts for the fact that I find all baroque music similarly bland in its own way. I know I should be able to easily distinguish between English, French, Italian and German baroque but for the most part I can't unless I really, really concentrate which is an odd thing for me to do to baroque because I think of baroque as pleasant background noise to cover the sounds of the loud rock band three blocks away and the neighbour's quaint folk music in an idiom which is beyond me. I point out that I don't dislike baroque in any way. It just doesn't interest me much and I find it all quite similar so when something particular, like one of the famous Four Seasons movements or Goldberg Variations or Brandenberg Concertos leap out and demand my attention I'm always taken by surprise.


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## carlmichaels

No contest. Its Scarlatti. I think he wrote the same sonata 555 times.


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## Quartetfore

Glass for shure, he puts me to sleep. BUT some of his operas are very interesting


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## joen_cph

Glass was even out of the "composer" scope to me  , but I am not being fair of course.


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## Zanralotta

I once had a desk neighbour who joked that Telemann "wrote" all his stuff by cutting his old scores into tiny pieces and putting them together again in a different order.


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## Taneyev

Vivaldi. He wrote only one concerto. But repeated a hundred times.


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## PetrB

Tchaikovsky ~ endless repetition, wholesale, of the theme or melody, often a whole or half-step up - another aspect of his music which turns me off / away from most music which does that - tons of sequencing - I just lose interest.

Bach ~ not repetitive, but gets one idea, and just does not let go of it.

Bruckner ~ if you want that theme or motif to appear in about every key over the course of one movement, he's your guy, but not mine.


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## GoneBaroque

It has been said that Vivaldi wrote the same concerto 2,000 times. The same goes for Philip Glass and John Williams.


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## neoshredder

Odnoposoff said:


> Vivaldi. He wrote only one concerto. But repeated a hundred times.


That one concerto sure has great variations to it. Four Seasons being the proof.


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## Jeremy Marchant

Huilunsoittaja said:


> A conductor once told me (impersonally, he was telling this to our whole Honors band), that the only composer who was able to master repetition beyond the regular "3 times is max" rule was _Bruckner_, although he didn't go into explaining why. Does anyone agree?


Yes!

And I don't know how he did it, either.
Whereas, with Tchaikovsky (say) the endless repetition drives me mad (so I simply don't listen), with Bruckner it just comes across as sublime.


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## ComposerOfAvantGarde

But how many times does Beethoven repeat the motif in the development section of the first movement of his sixth symphony?


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## Huilunsoittaja

Jeremy Marchant said:


> Yes!
> 
> And I don't know how he did it, either.
> Whereas, with Tchaikovsky (say) the endless repetition drives me mad (so I simply don't listen), with Bruckner it just comes across as sublime.


Can you give me an example of a Bruckner work that is like that? I want to hear it for myself.


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## Jaws

Sibelius, Sibelius, Sibelius. It is very boring music to start with but then it gets repeated and repeated and repeated. Thinking of one movement of the 5th Symphony here that would be half the length if he only used one theme once. 

I can't stand anything that Sibelius wrote, will leave a concert halfway through to avoid it. I don't suppose though that, that is very obvious???


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## neoshredder

Haha I just happened to be listening to Sibelius right now. Very pleasing to the ears imo. Similar to Respighi or one of the closest 20th century music gets to Baroque. But I guess I haven't listened to Sibelius long enough for the repeating patterns.


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## tdc

carlmichaels said:


> No contest. Its Scarlatti. I think he wrote the same sonata 555 times.


Hmmm.... I have about a dozen or so of the sonatas on recording and all of them seem very diverse to me...and very impressive. Further I have explored many others on youtube and found similar diversity.

Do these really seem identical to you?


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## joen_cph

The Sibelius claim is way out as regards most of his music and his musical transformation ideas, it must be related to only some of the works (symphonies 1-3 ???). He is famous for his ideas on "organic development":
http://www.antonin-serviere.com/site/Texts_files/Amsterdam.pdf (interesting!)


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## peeyaj

CarterJohnsonPiano said:


> SCHUBERT! Oh my goodness! Have you heard his piano sonatas?


Speaking of someone who didn't know his piano sonatas well.. Oh my.


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## Roberto

neoshredder said:


> Glass is by far the worst I've heard for repetitiveness.


Yes, he and some other minimalists drive me crazy.

Handel in his operas. Wagner


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## Roberto

tdc said:


> Hmmm.... I have about a dozen or so of the sonatas on recording and all of them seem very diverse to me...and very impressive. Further I have explored many others on youtube and found similar diversity.
> 
> Do these really seem identical to you?


True - Scarlatti is tirelessly inventive and brilliant


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## carlmichaels

I think I may have a few more of Scarlatti's sonatas than you but I don't want to turn this into a pissing contest, nor do I dislike his work. Clearly you can pick two sonatas and find a difference, just as you could with any other composer's works mentioned so far. I'm sorry you took my statement literally. The point is, it's rather ridiculous to collect a whole lot of these 555 works as they tend to sound the same after a while.


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## Jeremy Marchant

Huilunsoittaja said:


> Can you give me an example of a Bruckner work that is like that? I want to hear it for myself.


The effect is only really happens when Bruckner uses repetition to drive home a conclusion and, taken out of context it doesn't often work. The whole point is that it is the culmination of a process. However, you could try this, the scherzo of the eighth symphony. (Apologies - couldn't find a YT clip that is complete.)


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## Jaws

joen_cph said:


> The Sibelius claim is way out as regards most of his music and his musical transformation ideas, it must be related to only some of the works (symphonies 1-3 ???). He is famous for his ideas on "organic development":
> http://www.antonin-serviere.com/site/Texts_files/Amsterdam.pdf (interesting!)


Symphonies 1-5! Violin concerto, Finlandia, Karelia Suite, just for a start. One of the symphonies I can't remember which one (I avoid Sibelius as much as possible) has a large part of a last movement that consists of D major scales. Someone on here will know which one. The 5th symphony has a horn theme in one movement that goes on, and on, and on. On old records it would sound as if the needle had got stuck, got stuck, got stuck........


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## joen_cph

I can´t agree on that one. There are tons of 19th century symphonies more repetitive than the later Sibelius. You even seem to include the 4th as repetitive.


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## MusikCritique

CarterJohnsonPiano said:


> You can't say that Glass is "by far the worst", because repetition is the essence of his music. Other composers (such as Vivaldi, etc.) often used repetition because they had difficulty coming up with fresh material, but Glass, Reich, Adams, and the rest of the Minimalist lot used lots of repetition *on purpose* because it was part of their compositional technique. That's like criticizing Schönberg for writing music that was "too atonal".


Glass sits on the same progressions for quite a few of his works as well...I believe it's more than just technique.

Repetitiveness within one work--if that's what you are referring too, then sure, I'll agree there. What bothers me is his re-use from one piece to another.


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## Jaws

joen_cph said:


> I can´t agree on that one. There are tons of 19th century symphonies more repetitive than the later Sibelius. You even seem to include the 4th as repetitive.


I can't stand Sibelius, but I don't think that this is very obvious?


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## TrazomGangflow

Listen to Mendelssohn's War March of the Priests overture. That is a spot on example of repetitive.


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## Sid James

ComposerOfAvantGarde said:


> But how many times does Beethoven repeat the motif in the development section of the first movement of his sixth symphony?


I think I talked about that in an old thread I did, in my opening post actually:
http://www.talkclassical.com/14409-origins-minimalism.html#post189303
Seems Ludwig van was doing similar things to some organic type minimalists - eg. our own Ross Edwards, imitating the patterns of nature in his music.


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## Sid James

I don't mind Philip Glass' repetition, more the earworm factor. He's a good tunesmith, and listen to his stuff too many times in a row and they'll burrow into your head. Can't get his tunes out. Not exactly a weakness, but I try to avoid listening to him too much for this reason. But I like him generally speaking.

I don't think repetition is necessarily bad. It gives structure. Eg. minuets had the 'trio' in between and Bruckner for example continued this with his scherzos.

I think someone above who said that composers who repeat themselves, we don't know most of them, they have gone into obscurity or almost that. It is said Carl Czerny had a studio with several desks, on each desk he worked on a separate piece. It was like a factory assembly line arrangement. His work Variations on a theme by Haydn is actually quite good, but it may well be a needle in the haystack amongst all the other stuff he trundled out from his production line.


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## Roberto

ComposerOfAvantGarde said:


> I think Glass repeats himself too much. I'm not saying his music is repetitive.


Is that because you don't want to repeat yourself?

Go on just say it: HIS MUSIC IS REPETITIVE ...HIS MUSIC IS REPETITIVE..... his music is repetitive....hismusicisrepetitive


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## Roberto

Jaws said:


> I can't stand anything that Sibelius wrote, will leave a concert halfway through to avoid it. I don't suppose though that, that is very obvious???


D'you mind me asking who you like, in that period?


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## ComposerOfAvantGarde

Roberto said:


> Is that because you don't want to repeat yourself?
> 
> Go on just say it: HIS MUSIC IS REPETITIVE ...HIS MUSIC IS REPETITIVE..... his music is repetitive....hismusicisrepetitive


His earlier music is repetitive. It may come across as either wonderfully hypnotic or boring compared to how long your attention span is. I think his works after the violin concerto no. 1 are excellent, but in each new piece he wrote since then, you feel like that you've heard it before. And you probably have. Glass' more recent works are really not that repetitive, but the chord progression and the rhythms he uses he has probably already composed either in the first violin concerto or some orchestral work he might have written in the late 80s early 90s.


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## DaDirkNL

Listen to every one of the 104 symphonies Haydn composed. Then you know repetitism.


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## csacks

Schumann, who had a maniac disorder, had some compulsory thinking, not only about music. Listen his 4º symphony, it is spectacular, but, Oh God, please give him some medication.
It has been mentioned, but Vexations, from Satie, is intended to be repeated 180 times. IMO nothing else could be said after that


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## shangoyal

DaDirkNL said:


> Listen to every one of the 104 symphonies Haydn composed. Then you know repetitism.


Yes, exactly like everybody keeps repeating the use of the middle C in their compositions. Now that is some repetition.


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## Winterreisender

Johann Strauss II comes to mind.


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## Cosmos

Steve Reich, Philip Glass, Schubert (piano sonata wise), Mozart kinda, and Vivaldi


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## HaydnBearstheClock

DaDirkNL said:


> Listen to every one of the 104 symphonies Haydn composed. Then you know repetitism.


I have to disagree - maybe in terms of compositional methods, but you can't be serious and say symphonies 6-8 sound like symphonies 103 & 104.


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## Blake

I'd have to say Bruckner. But this type of repetition isn't a negative, as he's one of my favorite composers of all time. Such monumental vision couldn't be accomplished without his use of repetition... glorious repetition.


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## PetrB

Bruckner... standard complaint is the theme of one movement wholesale repeated in twelve keys (this was 'corrected' by a colleague who said, _"Wrong, make that all twenty-four keys"_ 

I cannot help but think of the old film theater sing-alongs, the "Follow the bouncing ball" variety, whenever I hear that in Bruckner, which is about all the time in at least one movement or more of each of his symphonies.


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## Novelette

csacks said:


> Schumann, who had a maniac disorder, had some compulsory thinking, not only about music. Listen his 4º symphony, it is spectacular, but, Oh God, please give him some medication.


Ouch!!!!!!!!!!!!!


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## Blake

PetrB said:


> Bruckner... standard complaint is the theme of one movement wholesale repeated in twelve keys (this was 'corrected' by a colleague who said, _"Wrong, make that all twenty-four keys"_
> 
> I cannot help but think of the old film theater sing-alongs, the "Follow the bouncing ball" variety, whenever I hear that in Bruckner, which is about all the time in at least one movement or more of each of his symphonies.


It's an unrelenting rapture.


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## bigshot

This thread is ridiculous.


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## Blake

Why, yes... yes it is. Ridiculous is still in my frequent range of experiences on this planet.


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## samurai

csacks said:


> Schumann, who had a maniac disorder, had some compulsory thinking, not only about music. Listen his 4º symphony, it is spectacular, but, Oh God, please give him some medication.
> It has been mentioned, but Vexations, from Satie, is intended to be repeated 180 times. IMO nothing else could be said after that


Hopefully, you meant to write "manic disorder", rather than what you actually wrote. Whatever else he might have been, I don't think Schumann was a maniac.


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## PetrB

bigshot said:


> This thread is ridiculous.


Mirroring quite a lot of everyday life, it seems


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## HaydnBearstheClock

PetrB said:


> Mirroring quite a lot of everyday life, it seems


We seem to have a lot of sceptics on this board, hehe.


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## DaDirkNL

HaydnBearstheClock said:


> I have to disagree - maybe in terms of compositional methods, but you can't be serious and say symphonies 6-8 sound like symphonies 103 & 104.


I agree, there's a lot of difference between the very early and the London symphonies. The last ones are much more formal while the early ones are more playful and comic. But still, within every period of Haydn's symphonic writing, I can't really say that every one of them isn't a tiny bit of the same. Not to degrade Haydn's symphonies, because there's plenty of first class writing and some of them belong to my favourite symphonies.


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## agglerithm

I haven't read the entire thread, but has "repetitious" been defined? Does it refer to repetition within individual pieces, or repetition between pieces? 

Someone mentioned Bach earlier. I don't see Bach being repetitious under either definition. 

Vivaldi? Wrote the same concerto 500 times, according to Stravinsky. I personally haven't felt the need to listen to all 500.


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## HaydnBearstheClock

DaDirkNL said:


> I agree, there's a lot of difference between the very early and the London symphonies. The last ones are much more formal while the early ones are more playful and comic. But still, within every period of Haydn's symphonic writing, I can't really say that every one of them isn't a tiny bit of the same. Not to degrade Haydn's symphonies, because there's plenty of first class writing and some of them belong to my favourite symphonies.


The thing is, Haydn was often constrained by deadlines and couldn't invest a huge amount of time on each symphony - nonetheless, the ideas scattered throughout them are excellent. Symphonies like 44, 46 and 48 are I think a good culmination of his earlier efforts and the London symphonies are the final flowering of his style. But any symphony I hear by him, I like.


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## badRomance

The premise of this thread is total garbage; at least compost can make the ground more fertile. This is just pure junk.


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## Blake

Hahaha, such angelic communication.


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## jim prideaux

Jaws said:


> Sibelius, Sibelius, Sibelius. It is very boring music to start with but then it gets repeated and repeated and repeated. Thinking of one movement of the 5th Symphony here that would be half the length if he only used one theme once.
> 
> I can't stand anything that Sibelius wrote, will leave a concert halfway through to avoid it. I don't suppose though that, that is very obvious???


ooh!......how emphatic!


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## csacks

samurai said:


> Hopefully, you meant to write "manic disorder", rather than what you actually wrote. Whatever else he might have been, I don't think Schumann was a maniac.


Hi Samurai, there are many psychiatric opinions saying that Robert Schumann had a bipolar depression, also called maniac-depressive disorder. It explains both his so many suicidal attempts and also his sad cognitive impairment in his late life. OCD is quite common in between them. I still cannot understand which is your point about the post. Probably my English is tricking
me


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## GreenMamba

Csacks

It is "manic" depressive, not "maniac." Slight difference.


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## samurai

csacks said:


> Hi Samurai, there are many psychiatric opinions saying that Robert Schumann had a bipolar depression, also called maniac-depressive disorder. It explains both his so many suicidal attempts and also his sad cognitive impairment in his late life. OCD is quite common in between them. I still cannot understand which is your point about the post. Probably my English is tricking
> me


@ csacks, No problem; language--especially when on this medium--can often be very tricky and/or confusing. I get the gist of your point.


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## csacks

Thanks, in Spanish is "Mania", and those who have it are called "maniacos". Sorry about that.


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## Alydon

waldvogel said:


> Most repetitive composer?
> 
> Vivaldi, Vivaldi, Vivaldi, Vivaldi, Vivaldi, Vivaldi, Vivaldi, Vivaldi, Vivaldi, Vivaldi, Vivaldi, Vivaldi, Vivaldi, Vivaldi, Vivaldi, Vivaldi, Vivaldi, Vivaldi, Vivaldi, Vivaldi, Vivaldi, Vivaldi.
> 
> In fact, if you say AVivaldi over and over again really quickly, it sounds like his standard formula.


Well, as the famous quotation says: "Vivaldi wrote one concerto 600 times."


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## Dom

Vivaldi's concerti are awful, although I don't mind his sacred music.


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## neoshredder

Dom said:


> Vivaldi's concerti are awful, although I don't mind his sacred music.


Awfully good you mean.


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## violadude

I heard once that Scriabin was pretty repetitive...wouldn't stop yammering on about the secret magic contained in his music and how it would bring about the apocalypse. The fates must have not liked him challenging their power over the world seeing as he did of a humble lip sore.


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## starthrower

Milton Babbitt 




...just kidding!

BTW, there's a great documentary about Babbitt on YouTube. You don't even have like his music to enjoy it.


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## hpowders

Vivaldi and Bruckner.


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## Vaneyes

Bach, Schubert, and the rest of the minimalists.


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## hpowders

Schubert as in his 9th symphony played in a slow, stately fashion with all repeats taken!!


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## arpeggio

Knock! Knock! Who's there? Knock! Knock! Who's there? Knock! Knock! Who's there? Knock! Knock! Who's there? Knock! Knock! Who's there? Knock! Knock! Who's there? Knock! Knock! Who's there? Knock! Knock! Who's there? Knock! Knock! Who's there? Knock! Knock! Who's there? Knock! Knock! Who's there? Knock! Knock! Who's there? Knock! Knock! Who's there? Knock! Knock! Who's there? Knock! Knock! Who's there? Knock! Knock! Who's there? Phillip Glass


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## hpowders

Narrowing it down to one, I have to go with Vivaldi. Seems like he wrote the same concerto with minor changes some 400 times.


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## neoshredder

hpowders said:


> Narrowing it down to one, I have to go with Vivaldi. Seems like he wrote the same concerto with minor changes some 400 times.


It seems you're WRONG!


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## KenOC

Yes, most certainly wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong (repeat 400 times)


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## Gilberto

I don't mind anything that is said well being repeated. Every once in a while.


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## neoshredder

KenOC said:


> Yes, most certainly wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong (repeat 400 times)


Speaking of being repetitive, how about that good, old, reliable Haydn.


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## KenOC

Perhaps oddly, I've never found Haydn repetitive. For instance, his recapitulations are typically quite (or even drastically) different from his expositions -- to a greater extent than Beethoven or certainly Mozart. He marks repeats within sections, of course -- one common repeat is for the entire development and recap. This was because audiences seldom got the chance to hear the music, so repeats helped make it more intelligible. Today we might occasionally grow a bit impatient, since we can hum the whole work in our heads already...


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## hpowders

neoshredder said:


> It seems you're WRONG!


Okay, maybe it was 500. 

Driving me nuts: the same 4 notes over and over: dah dah deh dah, dah dah dee dah, dah dah dee dah, etc;


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## Fortinbras Armstrong

Well, you could say that there are exactly two themes in the first movement of Beethoven's Fifth Symphony, each of which (especially the first, four note theme) gets repeated over and over.

Peter Schickele did a nice bit on this,






Personally, I do not believe that Vivaldi wrote the same concerto over and over. Oh, there are some which simply seem to be the same concerto arranged for different instruments, but he often was quite original.


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## hpowders

It's a tie between Bruckner and Schubert.


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## Tero

Both of my big favorites do a lot of repeats of minimal themes. Vivaldi and Sibelius. Sibelius apparently wrote so called cells so they are purposely repeated. However, even if a short piece is repeated on an instrument, there is always something else going on too. The 5th symphony repeats the swan theme FOREVER!


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## Captainnumber36

edited and deleted.


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## flamencosketches

Repetition is one of a composer's greatest tools I think. It's one of the keys into the listener's brain. 

I would say Schubert is guilty of a liberal use of repetition. He always makes good use of it though.


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## Captainnumber36

edited and deleted.


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## Guest

Repetition is baked into classical music. Sonata form, rondo form, theme and variations, minuet or scherzo and trio, are all based on presenting the same theme or motif in different contexts, different voicings, different harmonies, different embellishments. Even free forms like Ballades contain much repetition and thematic development. I don't see a dramatic difference between how "repetitive" one composer is compared to another. It is a matter of how much imagination the composer displays in coming up with new embodiments of the basic material.


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## chu42

PianoMan said:


> I've always found Schumann repetitive, mostly since he includes repeats at the end of almost every section of his piano stuff. However, his music is so well written that there's almost always something else to bring out the second time through, or some other way to color the music to keep it interesting.


Huh? Wouldn't that make any music with repeats in it repetitive? 
Schumann is one of the most original composers out there, his piano works are so varied and they don't often use sonata form because Schumann simply had too many ideas to be cramped in a box. His early piano works are the best Romantic examples of a collection of ideas (more like a suite) rather than a single idea developed and repeated (sonata form). Waldszenen, Carnaval, Kinderszenen, Kriesleriana, Davidsbündlertänze, Fantasiestucke, etc.

That isn't to say that Schumann was never repetitive. His Violin Concerto is very much so, albeit beautiful nonetheless.

And even in his piano music, if he found a rhythm that he liked he would not let go of it for a while. But that's not really being repetitive with thematic material like Glass, Vivaldi, etc.


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## zelenka

you can recognize most Mozart works without even knowing them thanks to his repetitive style


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## larold

One of the greatest, Mozart, is also one of the most repetitive. I looked at the score for his Gran Partita once after reading it had 32 repeats. It does. I once had a recording of Stokowski playing his Symphony 35; it was over in 14 minutes because Stoki took none of the repeats.

Just about anyone that wrote/writes in sonata form is going to be repetitive. About the only piece of classical music I know without a repeat is Schubert's song Ganymed. It lasts about 5 minutes.


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## Guest

All music of the period had the same conventional arrangement of repeats. This is not a specific characteristic of Mozart.


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## Larkenfield

Here's repetitive...






I would describe Mozart's Grand Partita as_ sublime_ rather than repetitive. He gives the audience of his day a full opportunity to hear it. I have never considered Mozart repetitive, ever, if one notices that genius that fills his scores. He was more criticized for his content being too intense, too full of one great idea after another, almost impossible to keep up with, than repetitive. People expected new music in his era and they didn't have a download to play over and over. Miss the genius and it's the usual tiresome complaints.


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## hammeredklavier

Some people don't seem to be able to tell the difference between "being repetitive just to fill bars" and "building form through repeititions".

2:29 _"Repetition is what gives form to music"_.






David C F Wright might be an idiot as everyone says, but at least he understands the difference properly.

https://www.wrightmusic.net/pdfs/schubert.pdf
_"As a composer, Schubert was very inadequate. He had little or no sense of form or structure and his music is so repetitive as to be often downright boring and tedious. He could not develop his material as could great composers such as Haydn, Mozart and particularly Beethoven...

...Let me quote one example. Take the A flat Impromptu, the second of the set known as D935. He writes a tune of about eight bars then repeats it an octave higher. Then he repeats the theme and the octave higher version and so we have the tune four times in succession all in the same key. Then he has about 13 bars of chords which go nowhere and what does he then do? Repeat the tune and then again the same tune an octave higher. He repeats the bars of chords and the tune another twice. So the main tune comes eight times in three minutes. It is all the same and tedious and the tune is not varied rhythmically nor is there a change of key or any development.

There follows a trio section of 12 bars of nothing but broken chords. What does he do next? Repeat the 12 bars of broken chords. Another 34 bars of boring broken chords continues the piece. What follows that? Those 34 bars of broken chords again followed by eight bars of....broken chords. The tune in A flat returns and is immediately repeated an octave higher. There follows those bars of purposeless chords and the tune again and yet again that slight tune an octave higher. The tune is still in the same key and rhythmically the same. The music is so tame; it shows no invention, skill or development. There are no interesting harmonies or development. It is all so bland as well as being painfully boring and monotonous, and it is so juvenile and undeniably amateur! And do you really want to hear 90 odd bars of broken chords?

There are so many other examples which will prove the point! Schubert may have written some pretty tunes but nothing else, said Hans Keller.

Study his songs and notice that most of the time the piano part is merely vamping, merely common chords repeated. Vamp, vamp, vamp. In one extended passage in the Piano Trio in E flat the left hand of the piano part has only three notes which appear and appear and appear. Some of his songs are really dreadful. Look at the piano part of Death and the Maiden for example. It is so sterile, unimaginative and, frankly, very poor."
_


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## flamencosketches

^You are clearly infatuated with this man's ideas. The next time one of these threads comes around, I would like to see you present your argument against Schubert/Chopin without resorting to quotes from David CF Wright. Surely you have just as much authority as him on these matters in any case, I don't know if quoting him so frequently is adding anything to your argument or if it's just giving your opponents fodder to argue against (as you said, we all say he is an "idiot").


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## hammeredklavier

flamencosketches said:


> ^You are clearly infatuated with this man's ideas. The next time one of these threads comes around, I would like to see you present your argument against Schubert/Chopin without resorting to quotes from David CF Wright. Surely you have just as much authority as him on these matters in any case, I don't know if quoting him so frequently is adding anything to your argument or if it's just giving your opponents fodder to argue against (as you said, we all say he is an "idiot").


With all due respect, I quote Wright only because he describes really well what I think are Schubert's weaknesses. 
I find his courage to speak against the Schubert cult admirable. I don't think of him as an authority or anything, I consider him to be just like one of us. And when it comes to Schubert's inability to develop his material, there are actually some people on TC who agree that Schubert does have those weaknesses: that Schubert's D960 is only good as an "extended song", not as a "sonata structure".

I'm also baffled why some people would accuse Mozart (out of all composers) for "repeat signs", which was customary for a lot of common practice music in instrumental genres. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Repeat_sign The repeat sign gives freedom for the performers to decide whether to repeat or not. 
(I'm also baffled why some people pretend Mozart only wrote secular instrumental works that involve repeat signs, when he's just as much a composer of concertos or liturgical works that don't involve any repeat signs at all, 



 but this is topic for another day. )

Schubert's D960, with the repeat signs, the first movement goes over 20 minutes in length. With the exposition section going over 5 minutes in length. Are his material and ability to develop good enough to make up for the "heavenly length"?






Let's compare with the first movement of Mozart K310:






0:00 ~ 1:43 exposition section
1:43 ~ 3:17 exposition section repeated by repeat sign
3:17 ~ 5:56 development + recapitulation
5:56 ~ 8:39 development + recapitulation repeated by repeat sign

The section at 3:17 is the development of the section at 0:00
upon entering recapitulation at 4:12, Mozart develops on the main theme further at 4:28, 
the section at 4:58 is the "classical contrast" of the section at 0:52
It's the concept "the same face, albeit with a different expression". Notice how the earlier one sounds innocent in character, the later one tragic. It's not just undergone a change of key (major/minor). Notice the melodic variation that enhances the change of character.
The 'final resolution' at 5:34 is derived from exposition material at 1:28. 
In this way, the classical essayists had extroardinary sense to keep proportion while fully expressing themselves within the frames. http://fibonaccifacts.blogspot.com/2014/11/mozart-and-golden-ratio_2.html

Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven truly understood how to go about motivic development. Schubert did not.

In Schubert, there's no intricate skills of rhythmic, harmonic variation, or modulation, - a clear "lack of variety in technique". Is there any section in Schubert where he displays skills of imitation and stretto, for example? He's analogous to an amateur who pretends to be good at classical music composition of extended forms by changing the bass figurations accompanying the same melody he uses again and again.


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## isorhythm

Do you think maybe Schubert's artistic aims were different from Mozart's?


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## Woodduck

flamencosketches said:


> ^You are clearly infatuated with this man's ideas. The next time one of these threads comes around, *I would like to see you present your argument against Schubert/Chopin* without resorting to quotes from David CF Wright. Surely you have just as much authority as him on these matters in any case, I don't know if quoting him so frequently is adding anything to your argument or if it's just giving your opponents fodder to argue against (as you said, we all say he is an "idiot").


I trust you are not really asking for any more reruns of hammeredklavier's anti-Schubert and anti-Chopin rants. I'm beginning to wonder if he's being paid by David C. F. Wright to spread the gospel. Surely no one on this forum has ever spent so much time, and filled so many threads, with an obsessive disdain for a composer (or, in this case, two composers).


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## mark6144

Whenever I read criticism of Schubert's repetition, I wonder if it would have been perceived quite so negatively in his day, prior to the availibility of recordings. I think if I only had the chance to hear his works at the occasional salon, I might quite appreciate the repeats.


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## Machiavel

All composers do it. Beethoven 5 symphony last movement goes on and on and on , is it finish , no lets restart it.

The hammerklavier slow movment could be cut in half . Boredom beyond measure but everyone has an opinions right.

Wagner does not repeat or stretch for no reasons his operas, for sure lol.


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## KenOC

Machiavel said:


> ...Wagner does not repeat or stretch for no reasons his operas, for sure lol.


"Parsifal is the kind of opera that starts at six o'clock and after it has been going on for three hours, you look at your watch and it says 6:20." -- David Randolph


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## Dimace

The first thread in this great community which drives me to insanity. Bruckner, Tschaikowsky, Schumann, etc. repetitive? Please, my friends... With the same procedure Tolstoy is repetitive, Shalamov must commit suicide, Flober must throw die Madam in the waste garbage etc. I don't want to write what must do some of the greatest poets.


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## janxharris

I do find that an awful lot of classical music is spoilt by overly long works with too much repetition. I don't think sonata form with its recapitulation always works unless the composer has taken care to put enough variety in the development section.

I think there are some splendid moments in the Eroica first movement - but I do think it needs editing down. Heresy, I know, but I feel the same every time I hear it.


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## Larkenfield

hammeredklavier said:


> David C F Wright might be an idiot as everyone says, but at least he understands the difference properly.


It's not enough only to be critical of certain composers. I've read some of David Wright's scurrilous essays and consider him unqualified to offer an opinion. What he never understood about Schubert, in an essay that he wrote when he was in his early 20s and never reconsidered, is that it's possible to make something of the repeated figures in Schubert's music _and it's done all the time_. If it weren't true the world's greatest musicians and vocalists would never perform him, but they obviously do and have done so for more than 200 years. Nor is _all_ of his music full of repeated figures. Wright apparently understands nothing about the inspiration and soul of this sublime composer, who at his best is considered a treasure. Then compounding Wright's distortions and mischaracterizations are those who quote him with the same short-sightedness. It's not that Wright is incorrect in pointing out the certain shortcomings of someone like Schubert (or Chopin and Debussy)-all composers have them!- but that his tin ear isn't capable of perceiving the individuality and strength of their genius. I find him too negative and disappointing to read, not only because he can't hear their strengths but because he subjects them to his self-righteous moral judgments and condemnation that disapproves of the way they lived that they felt compelled to engage in. Put his ultra-conservatism in music together with his moral condemnation of composers' lives that he hasn't begun to understand, and it's a disagreeable and repugnant combination. It's important to read critics or historians who have a more constructive and balanced viewpoint and can maturely understand the strengths and weaknesses of any composer, including the ones who are historically important and still actively performed today, even if they happen not to be a personal favorite of the musicologist. Some critics seem to understand nothing that does not fit into their tiny box of ultra-conservatism and I highly question their repeated condemnation of certain composers as too heavily biased, distorted and inaccurate.


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## Azol

Simeon Ten Holt. Beautiful repetitititiveness 






P.S. People posting here composers like Rossini, Donizetti etc can't be serious, right? ut:


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## Phil loves classical

Philip Glass for sure. I found this article a while back. I found it hilarious.

http://nymag.com/arts/classicaldance/classical/reviews/philip-glass-2012-2/

"But Glass never had a good idea he didn't flog to death: He repeats the haunting scale 30 mind-numbing times, until it's long past time to go home.

To criticize Glass for excessive reiteration is a little like complaining that the rain is too damp. He repeats therefore he is. But even as he abandoned the rigors of early Minimalism, he continued to wear out the products of his own invention."


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