# Composers in your collection ranked by playing time



## AndorFoldes (Aug 25, 2012)

One thing is to make lists of favorites based on current preferences, another is to look at your collection and make a ranking based on playing time.

Unlike a list of favorites, playing time is something that can be measured and will likely be a reflection of your preferences over a longer period of time.

That is, unless you have completely ditched any physical collection and rely solely on streaming. Then perhaps it would be possible to make a ranking based on how much you have listened to each composer.

My collection is fairly conventional, as the three most represented composers by playing time are Mozart, Beethoven and Haydn, in that order.

What about you?


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## brotagonist (Jul 11, 2013)

"Playing time"? I am confused: you mean playing frequency, don't you, or do you really mean playing time (the length of a piece)?

Well, as for playing frequency, I am not non-physical (use CDs about 65% of the time; You Tube, Naxos and others about 35% of the time), but I only keep track of my physical (CD) listening. Since I play my collection through again and again, this won't really tell you (me) anything, since they all get played equally often


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## Bulldog (Nov 21, 2013)

JS Bach gets about half of my playing time. The remainder, at least over the past year, is equally distributed among:

Scheidemann
Froberger
Handel
Mozart
Haydn
Schumann
Scriabin
Shostakovich
Weinberg
Myaskovsky
Taneyev


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## D Smith (Sep 13, 2014)

I listen to my CD's and off iTunes mostly, but am now starting to stream when I don't have a disc mentioned here. So I don't really have any way of measuring listening time.


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## AndorFoldes (Aug 25, 2012)

No, I meant the total playing time of the music in your collection, not listening time.


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## joen_cph (Jan 17, 2010)

Beethoven, Mozart, Bach, Schubert, Stravinsky, Liszt, Händel, Vivaldi & Wagner are probably-probably those I own most recordings of. 
Partly explained by their productivity - as for Haydn for example, there are also less multiple versions of works.


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## Bulldog (Nov 21, 2013)

AndorFoldes said:


> No, I meant the total playing time of the music in your collection, not listening time.


It would take me days to come up with that measurement, and the result wouldn't be worth the time.


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## Iean (Nov 17, 2015)

lately, it has been Bach, Tartini, Wagner, Beethoven, Bruckner, Chopin, :angel:


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## Guest (Nov 30, 2015)

A year or two back, when we were discussing the merits of a weighted ranking system in a list of ranked composers, I took it upon myself to do a fun little spreadsheet. 

I took last.fm data for "number of plays" and made a few calculations between these numbers and my own calculations of "average track length" for each composer on my iPod. I ultimately produced a scaled factor for my time spent with each composer, and I graphed all of these factors together to see the difference between my #1 and #2, my #9 and #10, and so on. 

The reason for the graphing was that posters had questioned whether or not the difference between one's favorite and second favorite composer should really be treated as the same difference between one's 17th favorite and 18th favorite composer. As expected, the graph took on an exponential form, getting steeper with absolute favorites. 

That's neither here nor there. Anyway, the main relevance here is that I'm not sure even those factors were accurate; I would really need to take data for individual tracks, given the preference for one composer's short works or another's long works.

TL;DR: I'd be interested in making another fun little spreadsheet for ya, but it'd take some time


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## Art Rock (Nov 28, 2009)

At about 200 CD's, Bach would be number one. Mahler second.


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## Headphone Hermit (Jan 8, 2014)

Bulldog said:


> It would take me days to come up with that measurement


Same here. I have over 100 CDs of each of the following: Bach, Beethoven, Mozart, Liszt, Schubert and over 50 of each of Haydn, Berlioz, Shostakovich, Wagner - more precision than that would take me days to calculate


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

If ignoring factors such as multiple recordings, transcriptions etc. then Mozart comes out on top (with c. 80 discs), followed by Beethoven (c. 50), J.S. Bach, Shostakovich and Britten (c. 40-45 each).

EDIT: Forgot to mention Hindemith - I have about 40 discs of his stuff, too.


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## Guest (Nov 30, 2015)

AndorFoldes said:


> No, I meant the total playing time of the music in your collection, not listening time.


Oh ok. Then the answer is Stockhausen.


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## Nereffid (Feb 6, 2013)

Mahler; Bach; Mozart; Beethoven; Schubert; Handel; Haydn.
This is a reflection of several years of diligently collecting repertoire pieces and a ridiculous number of Mahler recordings. My actual listening is much more varied than that list implies.


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## musicrom (Dec 29, 2013)

I've never had any sort of classical CD collection - if we go by that, Chopin would probably be #1 because I have one CD that's all Chopin. I have like 2 or 3 other CDs, but they're mostly a bunch of random famous pieces by different composers.

On the other hand, I've been counting my likes on Pandora (slightly different from listening time), and my current top 10 are:

1. Ludwig van Beethoven (51)
2. Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov (47)
3. Jean Sibelius (43)
4. Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky (39.1)
5. Antonín Dvořák (39)
6. Frederic Chopin (35)
7. Felix Mendelssohn (34)
8. Sergei Prokofiev (32)
9. Dmitri Shostakovich (23.1)
10. Johann Sebastian Bach (22)


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## Morimur (Jan 23, 2014)

It changes all the time. Overall I'd say Bach but that could be wrong.


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## Jos (Oct 14, 2013)

^^
Same here, currently lots of Mozart and Haydn pianosonatas, overall probably Bach.
I don't keep track tbh.


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## jtbell (Oct 4, 2012)

Here are my current top 40 composers according to total length of recordings, according to my database:

+--------------+------------------+---------+------------+
| lastname | firstname | seconds | hr:min:sec |
+--------------+------------------+---------+------------+
| Haydn | Joseph | 1433883 | 398:18:03 |
| Beethoven | Ludwig van | 1295013 | 359:43:33 |
| Sibelius | Jean | 1277863 | 354:57:43 |
| Bach | Johann Sebastian | 717755 | 199:22:35 |
| Mozart | Wolfgang Amadeus | 713638 | 198:13:58 |
| Nielsen | Carl | 620314 | 172:18:34 |
| Brahms | Johannes | 362891 | 100:48:11 |
| Grieg | Edvard | 330244 | 91:44:04 |
| Dvorák | Antonín | 310147 | 86:09:07 |
| Mahler | Gustav | 297776 | 82:42:56 |
| Wagner | Richard | 297514 | 82:38:34 |
| Tchaikovsky | Peter | 284794 | 79:06:34 |
| Prokofiev | Sergei | 258599 | 71:49:59 |
| Shostakovich | Dmitri | 253277 | 70:21:17 |
| Rautavaara | Einojuhani | 216416 | 60:06:56 |
| Schubert | Franz | 213019 | 59:10:19 |
| Strauss | Richard | 212349 | 58:59:09 |
| Villa-Lobos | Heitor | 206802 | 57:26:42 |
| Copland | Aaron | 188613 | 52:23:33 |
| Stravinsky | Igor | 179253 | 49:47:33 |
| Rachmaninoff | Sergei |  176073 | 48:54:33 |
| Messiaen | Olivier | 174107 | 48:21:47 |
| Holmboe | Vagn | 167311 | 46:28:31 |
| Bruckner | Anton | 165812 | 46:03:32 |
| Langgaard | Rued | 164187 | 45:36:27 |
| Bartók | Béla | 151942 | 42:12:22 |
| Sallinen | Aulis | 145267 | 40:21:07 |
| Ravel | Maurice | 134639 | 37:23:59 |
| Gade | Niels | 132530 | 36:48:50 |
| Nørgård | Per | 131759 | 36:35:59 |
| Berlioz | Hector | 131335 | 36:28:55 |
| Ives | Charles | 118997 | 33:03:17 |
| Hindemith | Paul | 115728 | 32:08:48 |
| Stenhammar | Wilhelm | 115381 | 32:03:01 |
| Pettersson | Allan | 114313 | 31:45:13 |
| Buxtehude | Dietrich | 111031 | 30:50:31 |
| Pärt | Arvo | 110953 | 30:49:13 |
| Berwald | Franz | 110478 | 30:41:18 |
| Sæverud | Harald | 109664 | 30:27:44 |
| Glass | Philip | 108363 | 30:06:03 |
+--------------+------------------+---------+------------+

Ugh, I can't get this table to format properly. Apparently the forum software insists on collapsing multiple blank spaces into a single blank space, so I can't even use spaces for formatting.


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## Lukecash12 (Sep 21, 2009)

1. JS Bach
2. JS Bach
3. JS Bach
4. Joseph Fux
5. Perotin
6. Scriabin


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## jtbell (Oct 4, 2012)

Aha! If you "go advanced" in the reply box, the code tags (# button in the palette) preserve blank spaces. Unfortunately I can't edit my earlier post now.


```
+--------------+------------------+---------+------------+
| lastname     | firstname        | seconds | hr:min:sec |
+--------------+------------------+---------+------------+
| Haydn        | Joseph           | 1433883 | 398:18:03  |
| Beethoven    | Ludwig van       | 1295013 | 359:43:33  |
| Sibelius     | Jean             | 1277863 | 354:57:43  |
| Bach         | Johann Sebastian |  717755 | 199:22:35  |
| Mozart       | Wolfgang Amadeus |  713638 | 198:13:58  |
| Nielsen      | Carl             |  620314 | 172:18:34  |
| Brahms       | Johannes         |  362891 | 100:48:11  |
| Grieg        | Edvard           |  330244 | 91:44:04   |
| Dvorák       | Antonín          |  310147 | 86:09:07   |
| Mahler       | Gustav           |  297776 | 82:42:56   |
| Wagner       | Richard          |  297514 | 82:38:34   |
| Tchaikovsky  | Peter            |  284794 | 79:06:34   |
| Prokofiev    | Sergei           |  258599 | 71:49:59   |
| Shostakovich | Dmitri           |  253277 | 70:21:17   |
| Rautavaara   | Einojuhani       |  216416 | 60:06:56   |
| Schubert     | Franz            |  213019 | 59:10:19   |
| Strauss      | Richard          |  212349 | 58:59:09   |
| Villa-Lobos  | Heitor           |  206802 | 57:26:42   |
| Copland      | Aaron            |  188613 | 52:23:33   |
| Stravinsky   | Igor             |  179253 | 49:47:33   |
| Rachmaninoff | Sergei           |  176073 | 48:54:33   |
| Messiaen     | Olivier          |  174107 | 48:21:47   |
| Holmboe      | Vagn             |  167311 | 46:28:31   |
| Bruckner     | Anton            |  165812 | 46:03:32   |
| Langgaard    | Rued             |  164187 | 45:36:27   |
| Bartók       | Béla             |  151942 | 42:12:22   |
| Sallinen     | Aulis            |  145267 | 40:21:07   |
| Ravel        | Maurice          |  134639 | 37:23:59   |
| Gade         | Niels            |  132530 | 36:48:50   |
| Nørgård      | Per              |  131759 | 36:35:59   |
| Berlioz      | Hector           |  131335 | 36:28:55   |
| Ives         | Charles          |  118997 | 33:03:17   |
| Hindemith    | Paul             |  115728 | 32:08:48   |
| Stenhammar   | Wilhelm          |  115381 | 32:03:01   |
| Pettersson   | Allan            |  114313 | 31:45:13   |
| Buxtehude    | Dietrich         |  111031 | 30:50:31   |
| Pärt         | Arvo             |  110953 | 30:49:13   |
| Berwald      | Franz            |  110478 | 30:41:18   |
| Sæverud      | Harald           |  109664 | 30:27:44   |
| Glass        | Philip           |  108363 | 30:06:03   |
+--------------+------------------+---------+------------+
```


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## AndorFoldes (Aug 25, 2012)

That is an interesting list, jtbell. As expected when you look at your collection as a whole, the top names are quite conservative although there is a clear Nordic flavor to the list.

As for this thread, I suppose it misfired, partly because I did not make clear what I was after and partly because most people don't keep track of their physical collections or have switched to streaming.


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