# Lone Wolves?



## Strange Magic (Sep 14, 2015)

As we think about a composer, we often think also of another one, or two, or maybe three others whom we associate in our minds with the first. It can be mentor/disciple, or maybe friendly(?) enemies--I'm thinking Debussy/Ravel, each working similar seams but in different but neighboring mines. The list is long: Liszt/Wagner, or maybe Liszt/Chopin; Mendelssohn/Schumann; Tchaikovsky/Rachmaninoff; Mozart/Haydn; Brahms/Dvorak, etc. But what about composers who maybe "didn't make friends easily", or who forged their own unique, idiosyncratic paths? I'm thinking Stravinsky, Scriabin, Sibelius, Bartok? I'd be interested in what composers other people think of as totally _sui generis_, working a musical seam alone in the mine, with nobody else springing to mind as friend, disciple, fellow traveler.


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## Dedalus (Jun 27, 2014)

Just reacting to the composers you labeled as _sui generis_... At least two of them. Specifically I've seen Sibelius vs Mahler and Stravinsky vs Schoenberg (for some reason?) before and more than once. I tend to think that the way the human mind works makes us always want to compare something unfamiliar with something familiar so we always end up having these comparisons in our mind. I'm sure somebody could come up with a composer to compare Scriabin and Bartok with too.


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## Heck148 (Oct 27, 2016)

Carl Ruggles
Charles Ives
Harry Partch


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## sloth (Jul 12, 2013)

giacinto scelsi


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## Strange Magic (Sep 14, 2015)

Max Bruch comes to mind as something of a lone wolf, though he appears to have been sociable enough. Ditto Saint-Saens, except he became more and more irascible as he aged and as fate treated him rather cruelly with the deaths of his children; he evidently became an atheist as a result. Prokofiev?


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## jailhouse (Sep 2, 2016)

Messiaen developed 2 things by himself.

his unique modes of limited transposition and im prettu sure he was the first to incorporate hindu rhythms and non-retrogradeable rhythms.

He also invented serialization of every aspect of a piece beyond the notes (dynamic, rhythmic, etc) in his 2nd rhythm etude. Stockhausen and boulez music would simply not exist without the genius of messiaen.

One of the true originals of the 20th century


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## Becca (Feb 5, 2015)

I would add Havergal Brian to the list.
In the 19th century, probably Hector Berlioz.
Re Sibelius, he & Nielsen have about the same relationship as Ravel & Debussy.


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## JAS (Mar 6, 2013)

How about Delius? (In regard to Berlioz, who would have been my other suggestion, I recall a former co-worker who had been professionally trained as a musician, but had to change careers. He used to say that his composition teacher often said that Berlioz seemed to have been beamed down from another planet, not in any derogatory sense.) 

Also, some of the actual connections may be more complicated than we imagine. Tchaikovsky was influenced by Rubenstein and Raff, but he was also working in a context of the mighty Russian handful, who were somewhat opposed to his less obvious, to them, innate Russianness (if that is a term). Even a lone wolf is going to be shaped by his or her circumstances. No one is born into a vacuum, and few really create something wholly new, with no influences or predecessors . . . and even more rare is that something that is created that way worth much.


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## Manxfeeder (Oct 19, 2010)

Moondog probably fits here.


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## starthrower (Dec 11, 2010)

Becca said:


> In the 19th century, probably Hector Berlioz.
> Re Sibelius, he & Nielsen have about the same relationship as Ravel & Debussy.


Berlioz was definitely an oddball. But I don't see hear much in common betweem Sibelius and Nielsen.

Varese was a maverick composer.

And how about Steve Reich?

And Dutilleux


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## starthrower (Dec 11, 2010)

Dedalus said:


> I'm sure somebody could come up with a composer to compare Scriabin and Bartok with too.


Some of Ligeti's work can be compared to Bartok for obvious reasons.


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## JAS (Mar 6, 2013)

Manxfeeder said:


> Moondog probably fits here.


It is rather strange to think of the idea of Moondog fitting in anywhere, but this would seem apt. (That observation, of course, does not necessarily convey a personal endorsement of his, I think, mostly rather crazy ideas. Indeed, it may be the fact that he really does seem so crazy that he could be characterized as a lone wolf, or the fact that he was a lone wolf that makes him seem so crazy.)


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## Rhinotop (Jul 8, 2016)

Maybe Allan Pettersson


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## Strange Magic (Sep 14, 2015)

We may assign more recent composers to lone wolf status because of the growing diversity of classical music itself,. plus the rapidly increasing number of composers plying their trade. Hence more opportunities to be the individualist among individualists. Then there is always Grieg, something of a loner. But for years people would associate him with Schumann because record companies were fond of putting their piano concertos together on a single disk.


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

Satie?mmmmmmmmmm


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## Manxfeeder (Oct 19, 2010)

elgars ghost said:


> Satie?mmmmmmmmmm


I was thinking that myself. Though he was surrounded by the greats - Debussy, Ravel, Les Six - he always spoke his own language. He was more of an influencer than the one influenced.


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## Strange Magic (Sep 14, 2015)

Prokofiev comes to mind as a loner. He corresponded frequently with his old friend Miaskovsky, liked Ravel's music, played bridge with Poulenc, got into a fight with Rachmaninoff over Scriabin's music and how R played it, early-on had an envy/secret-admirer relationship with Stravinsky, and Shostakovich didn't much like him. But I don't see much influence anyone had over his mature musical evolution. We read that William Walton paid attention to what Proko was doing, and I should have thought that Proko and Bartok would have had something to say to one another, but there is no record of any contact between them. Big ego and too busy composing, maybe, to form a bond, musical or otherwise, with another composer.


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## Totenfeier (Mar 11, 2016)

Carl Orff?

Ottorino Respighi?


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## Daniel Atkinson (Dec 31, 2016)

jailhouse said:


> Messiaen


Messiaen? are you kidding?

He was a teacher, he knew *a lot* of people and was almost central to the innovations of the 50s, if anything he's the opposite of a lone wolf :lol:


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## starthrower (Dec 11, 2010)

Totenfeier said:


> Carl Orff?


Heavily influenced by Stravinsky.


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## Strange Magic (Sep 14, 2015)

Totenfeier said:


> Carl Orff?
> 
> Ottorino Respighi?


Respighi. I hear certain similarities in the music of Respighi and Villa-Lobos, and there is Respighi's _Brazilian Impressions_. I wonder whether or to what extent the two composers were in contact or served as mutual influences.


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## jailhouse (Sep 2, 2016)

Daniel Atkinson said:


> Messiaen? are you kidding?
> 
> He was a teacher, he knew *a lot* of people and was almost central to the innovations of the 50s, if anything he's the opposite of a lone wolf :lol:


Uhh op states "or who forged their own unique, idosyncratic path" which is the fefinition of what messiaen did.


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## Bettina (Sep 29, 2016)

Fauré. As far as I know, he wasn't associated with any particular school or movement. I can't think of any other composers whose music is similar to his.


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