# Smarter than the average composer



## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Some composers had lives aside from music where they made a mark. In fact there are quite a few. I'll mention Borodin to kick things off.

Borodin was a chemist by profession. Per Wiki, "In his profession Borodin gained great respect, being particularly noted for his work on aldehydes... One experiment published in 1862 described the first nucleophilic displacement of chlorine by fluorine in benzoyl chloride... Borodin is co-credited with the discovery of the Aldol reaction, with Charles-Adolphe Wurtz. In 1872 he announced to the Russian Chemical Society the discovery of a new by-product in aldehyde reactions with alcohol-like properties, and he noted similarities with compounds already discussed in publications by Wurtz from the same year. He published his last full article in 1875 on reactions of amides and his last publication concerned a method for the identification of urea in animal urine."

Not sure what all this means, but he sounds smart to me! Your candidates?


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## PetrB (Feb 28, 2012)

Why on earth would a second skill-set also at a professional level qualify anyone as 'smarter?' 
Of course I am lampooning / questioning the OP as taken literally. 
But, _smarter?_ Really?


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Good enough for Yogi Bear, good enough for me. :lol:


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## joen_cph (Jan 17, 2010)

_Philidor_ could be among the candidates, though the world-transforming aspects of chess seem limited.

_Ciurlionis_ is more widely known for his paintings, but they seem technically rather awkward, it´s his formal inventions that are remarkable, and he didn´t produce a school.

Whereas _Rousseau_ must be said to have been highly influential, as well as a secondary opera composer.

_William Herschel_ was a pioneer in astronomy, but later forgotten as a composer.


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## PetrB (Feb 28, 2012)

Arnold Schoenberg's paintings are both in private collections and museums, and not because he became world-renown as a composer.

Ditto for singer-songwriter Joni Mitchell.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

joen_cph said:


> _William Herschel_ was a pioneer in astronomy, but later forgotten as a composer.


Not forgotten by me. I have six of his symphonies! He's a very good call, IMO.


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## PetrB (Feb 28, 2012)

Would it stretch credibility if Yogi said, ".... who had an additional and noted talent in another discipline?" 

I think not, but I'm peculiar that way


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## TwoFourPianist (Mar 28, 2013)

Here's a fun little face about Borodin.

Because he was so busy with his professsion, the only time he could really compose was when he was ill. He said to his friends, "I can only compose when I am too unwell to give my lectures. So my friends, reversing the usual custom, never say to me 'I hope you are well', but 'I do hope you are ill'".


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## Manxfeeder (Oct 19, 2010)

Charles Ives sold insurance full-time and, to my understand, invented double indemnity insurance policies.

John Alden Carpenter was vice-president of his father's shipping supply business but managed to study music at Harvard, take lessons from Elgar, write music, and receive an honorary MA from Harvard, an honorary doctorate, and become a Knight of the French Legion of Honor.

I should mention also, Benjamin Franklin wrote some nice music in addition to all the other stuff he did, even inventing the glass armonica, which Mozart and Beethoven composed music for.


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## Weston (Jul 11, 2008)

I'd love to hear some Herschel music. I didn't know of it.

There is Paderewski who was a Prime Minister of Poland I think.


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## Tapkaara (Apr 18, 2006)

Oh yes, my man Ifukube...

He graduated from Hokkaido Imperial University's Agricultural Department. His graduation paper was a thesis on the vibrations and acoustics of wood. He worked as a forestry officer for several years in northern Japan. During this time, due to a background in botany, discovered a new type of cherry tree. During WWII, because of his expertise in the properties of wood, he was engaged by the Japanese government to study an all-wood British war plane that the Japanese had captured, the DeHavilland Mosquito.


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## arpeggio (Oct 4, 2012)

Frederick the Great was a virtuoso piccolo player and composed some piccolo concertos.


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## vertigo (Jan 9, 2013)

Not a composer, but Dimitris Sgouros did postgraduate studies in mathematics at Oxford.


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## starry (Jun 2, 2009)

Berwald

"Berwald started an orthopedic and physiotherapy clinic in Berlin in 1835, which turned out to be profitable. Some of the orthopedic devices he invented were still in use decades after his death."

"Saw-mill and glass-works manager, orthopaedic pioneer, polemicist [on social issues] and publisher - Franz Berwald was all these, so it's astonishing that he ever found the time to compose."


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## Novelette (Dec 12, 2012)

From Wikipedia:

"Saint-Saëns was a multi-faceted intellectual. From an early age, he studied geology, archaeology, botany, and lepidoptery. He was an expert at mathematics. Later, in addition to composing, performing, and writing musical criticism, he held discussions with Europe's finest scientists and wrote scholarly articles on acoustics, occult sciences, Roman theatre decoration, and ancient instruments. He wrote a philosophical work, Problèmes et mystères, which spoke of science and art replacing religion; Saint-Saëns's pessimistic and atheistic ideas foreshadowed Existentialism. Other literary achievements included Rimes familières, a volume of poetry, and La crampe des écrivains, a successful farcical play. He was also a member of the Astronomical Society of France; he gave lectures on mirages, had a telescope made to his own specifications, and even planned concerts to correspond to astronomical events such as solar eclipses"


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## deggial (Jan 20, 2013)

Xenakis, firstly an architect/civil engineer, worked with Le Corbusier for 12 years.


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## Guest (Mar 31, 2013)

Manxfeeder said:


> I should mention also, Benjamin Franklin wrote some nice music in addition to all the other stuff he did, even inventing the glass armonica, which Mozart and Beethoven composed music for.


I listened to B. Franklin's string quartet a few months ago and found it horrid. But I'm no expert.

I'll plug my favorite obscure composer Jean Cras, who was a career officer in the French navy:

With the outbreak of war in 1914 Cras was appointed as adjutant to Admiral Augustin Boué de Lapeyrère. He later worked in the Submarine Defense Service. In 1916 he was appointed commander of the torpedo boat Commandant Bory. During the Adriatic campaign he sank a submarine and was commended for his bravery in rescuing a sailor who had fallen overboard.[2]
After the war Cras became Chief Secretary to the Chief of General Staff, and was promoted to Commander. He served on several other vessels before being appointed Service Chief on the General Staff for Scientific Research. In 1931 he was appointed Major General of the Port of Brest and promoted to rear admiral. He occupied this position when he died after a short illness.[2]


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## SottoVoce (Jul 29, 2011)

BPS said:


> I listened to B. Franklin's string quartet a few months ago and found it horrid. But I'm no expert.


It is indeed terrible. He wasn't very keen on high art and liked the folk music and the jingles of his day, so one should take it as it is.


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## joen_cph (Jan 17, 2010)

_Dane Rudhyar_ was apparently an unusual talent in the rather hopeless science of astrology,

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dane_Rudhyar

and a painter too.


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## Weston (Jul 11, 2008)

If we're going with obscure composers, there is Emil František Burian, who along with writing music. according to Wikipedia, was a poet, journalist, singer, actor, musician, dramatic adviser, playwright and director. He was also active in the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia.

Maybe the guy couldn't hold down a position. I rather like the one string quartet I have in my collection.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

SottoVoce said:


> It is indeed terrible. He wasn't very keen on high art and liked the folk music and the jingles of his day, so one should take it as it is.


A quote from an online source: "Franklin must have written this quartet as a way of entertaining himself and his amateur music-loving friends, who couldn't play the string instruments, but would certainly be able to produce sound and rhythms with a bow on open strings."


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## Op.123 (Mar 25, 2013)

Mendelssohn was fantastic at not only music but art, sport and languages


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## TwoFourPianist (Mar 28, 2013)

He was certainly a child prodigy.


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## Manxfeeder (Oct 19, 2010)

Based on the previous comments, I'm revising my statement to "I should mention also, Benjamin Franklin wrote some [horrid, terrible] music in addition to all the other stuff he did, even inventing the glass armonica, which Mozart and Beethoven composed music for."

There. All fixed. :tiphat:


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