# I am amazed by all the spiritual music written by atheist composers



## LarryW

I think of the Requiems by Brahms, Fauré, Verdi and more - composers who did not believe in a God and yet....
Ravel's deeply spiritual Kaddish - though he was an atheist.
Many, many examples....

Is there a definitive list of atheist composers?

I've started one & would appreciate knowing if there are others - Haydn called Beethoven an atheist - Beethoven called himself a pantheist (which was often code for atheist in his day, so I've included him):

Atheist composers

Bartok
Beethoven
Berlioz
Bizet
Brahms
Burgon, Geoffrey
Busoni
Debussy
Delius
Grainger
Harrison, Lou
Janacek
Kabalevsky
Khachaturian
Ligeti
Mahler
Marshall-Hill, George
Maxwell Davies
Mozart (almost certainly)
Orff
Paganini
Prokofiev
Ravel
Rimsky-Korsakov
Rorem
Rubinstein, Anton
Saint-Saens
Say, Fazil
Schubert
Schumann
Shostakovich
Sibelius
Smyth
Strauss, Richard
Tchaikovsky
Tippett
Varese
Vaughan Williams
Virgil Thomson
Verdi
Wagner
Xenakis


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## DavidA

You are wide of the mark with Mozart. He was a Freemason and one of the requirements of freemasonry is belief in a divinity. Or at least that is what a grandmaster of a lodge told me! Beethoven definitely believed in God (though not orthodox) and prayed regularly - see Swafford's biography.


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## Roger Knox

It is a long list, with several surprises.

According to Solomon Volkov _The Magical Chorus: A History of Russian Culture from Tolstoy to Solzhenitsyn_(2008), Prokofiev secretly became a Christian Scientist during his time in the USA.


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## JAS

Outside of a direct and extended statement about the topic from the person in question, I don't know how one can definitively assign a label to any historical figure. People are complicated, and it is not uncommon for people to drift in and out of various moods in regards to religion. (The general context and traditional importance of religion probably also makes it more complicated for historical figures, who may have felt it necessary to make a certain amount of pretense just to fit in.)


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## DavidA

I think when one uses the term 'atheist' today it is used of someone who definitely does not believe in God. In Beethoven's day, for example, it was used of someone who didn't accept the Catholic faith. For example a deist. Verdi has been described as an atheist but he was more anti-clerical than anti-religious.


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## TwoFlutesOneTrumpet

It's only amazing if you hold the mistaken belief that only religious people can be spiritual.


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## Manxfeeder

Was Tchaikovsky an atheist? I wasn't aware of that. And is Wagner officially labeled as an atheist?


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## annaw

Manxfeeder said:


> Was I wasn't aware of that. And is Wagner officially labeled as an atheist?


Not really. It's very difficult to say, to be honest.

Wagner had very unconventional views of religion which at least during some period combined both Buddhism and Christianity. He managed to believe in Christ but not in the Old Testament God. There was a thread about his religious views recently as well. There were some rather interesting points made .


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## Bulldog

I don't see anything unusual about atheist composers writing sacred choral music. I'm an atheist, love sacred choral music and would likely write some if I was a composer. It's music!!


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## tdc

That list is way off, most of the composers on that list weren't atheists. It seems like you've decided to group a bunch of famous composers names that weren't devoutly religious their entire lives and say they must have been atheists. There is a wider spectrum of beliefs than simply the black and white view that someone is a devout adherent to a specific organized religion or they must be an atheist. 

Further many of the composers you listed actually were religious in the traditional sense.


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## tdc

This wiki list is also dubious:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_atheists_in_music

There is no evidence of Ravel being an atheist, and as stated before Prokofiev is also highly questionable. However you will notice that even on the dubious wiki list there is no mention of Brahms, Bartok, Mahler, Debussy, Mozart, Beethoven etc.


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## Guest

LarryW said:


> I think of the Requiems by Brahms, Fauré, Verdi and more - composers who did not believe in a God and yet....
> Ravel's deeply spiritual Kaddish - though he was an atheist.
> Many, many examples....
> 
> Is there a definitive list of atheist composers?


Welcome to TC, LarryW - and to controversy with your first post!

To answer your question, there's this...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_atheists_in_music

Like others here, I doubt the truth of your list, and the idea that it's surprising that composers of no faith could nevertheless compose 'faith-based' music (for want of a better term).

(Sorry - just seen tdc's posting of the same list).


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## DavidA

MacLeod said:


> Welcome to TC, LarryW - and to controversy with your first post!
> 
> To answer your question, there's this...
> 
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_atheists_in_music
> 
> Like others here, I doubt the truth of your list, and the idea that it's surprising that composers of no faith could nevertheless compose 'faith-based' music (for want of a better term).
> 
> (Sorry - just seen tdc's posting of the same list).


You see even this is doubtful in some cases. Was Verdi an atheist? Verdi was never explicit about his religious beliefs. Anti-clerical by nature in his early years, he nonetheless built a chapel at Sant'Agata, but is rarely recorded as going to church. Strepponi wrote in 1871 "I won't say [Verdi] is an atheist, but he is not much of a believer."
For his funeral he specified, "Two priests, two candles, one cross, no flowers." Strange if he was an atheist.


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## JAS

I am not sure why we tend to focus so much on questions of this sort that depend on answers to questions that cannot really be answered. I suppose it is interesting to know such things about people who we admire, or who themselves are interesting to us, for a variety of reasons. Part of this issue seems to be the tendency of various groups that self-identify to align themselves with famous historical figures, particularly figures that are widely admired, personally or for some notable skill. Was Tchaikovsky homosexual, and did he commit suicide in part due to the complications with such a status? The case has been made for and against all of these claims. The case is far sketchier for someone like Leonardo Da Vinci, who has also sometimes been claimed by the LGBTQ community, but based on very scant evidence. If one is a religious person who admires Beethoven's music, I suspect that one will tend to see him as a religious person, and for the same for an atheist who will tend to see him as an atheist. Various discussions and arguments can be created and presented for various figures, but I don't see why we should not be willing to accept that for the most part we do not know, and probably never will.


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## Ariasexta

Not surprised: Code Hypocrisy.


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## LarryW

*atheistic controversy?*

I suspected that this post might ruffle some feathers but my intention was to see if others could contribute to my list which I am fairly sure is accurate... Sorry - I should have buffered the Mozart reference because I know that he himself assured his father that he was a believer (whether that is true or not).... Some of the contributors are making statements however based on their lack of knowledge. To say, for example, that Ravel was not an atheist is just incorrect. I met a woman some years ago whose mother tried to convert Ravel's mother to Catholicism (Ravel was indeed baptized in the little church in the Basque village of Ciboure) - Ravel's mother rejected the "offer" and said that she'd rather go to Hell with her atheist family than to heaven by herself! Ravel loved this story because it was so funny, showed how ballsy his mother could be, and through it got to proclaim his atheism. But to say that most of my list is wrong is simply.... well, wrong. Verdi/Brahms/Debussy/Fauré - of course they were..... It's not that labelling atheists is necessary, only it is fascinating to me that much of the most spiritual music has derived from those too many people feel cannot be truly spiritual. When I would posit that perhaps those who do not need a God are in fact the most "spiritual" of all! There is even controversy now about the religiosity of Bach and his propensity to write only secular music in his spare time, much to the horror of the church.... See Ted Goia's book: Music: A Subversive History.


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## SanAntone

Religious belief, or spirituality, is a very personal, and often private, thing. I think if a composer wrote a requiem or other sacred music we must assume there was some kind of spirituality at work within him. It need not have a name like Christianity.

Bottom-line for me is I simply don't care what their beliefs were; I listen to the music.


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## starthrower

Music is music. It can be dressed up with religious themes, sacred texts, prayers, etc. But in its pure state it remains abstract. That's the way I enjoy it. I never think about the composer's beliefs or inspiration for composing a particular piece. As SanAntone said, I just listen to the music.


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## Dimace

Beethoven maybe was remoted from religion, but personally I believe he wasn't atheist. He was looking for the divine (eastern religions) and when he was near to death he accepted a priest to comfort him to his last hours. The famous '' applaud, the comedy is over'' is referring (logically) to his difficult life and not to the priest, who the composer had accepted to be with him. Of course, religion and music are two different things, but some times are connected (see Bruckner) Not to be like Bach or Bruckner doesn't make you automatically an atheist.


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## Logos

In the past, any who diverged from orthodox church teaching might be labeled atheist, and the term was also used in a very loose sense to describe (quite regardless of beliefs) persons who led a supposedly dissolute or wicked life. The word was thrown about almost as a synonym of 'ruffian' or 'scoundrel', so that someone like Sir Walter Raleigh (or Marlowe, Spinoza, Jefferson, Hariot, etc.) was called an atheist, though calling him such in the modern sense would be absurd since his writings are filled with pious observation and theological speculation. We must be careful in examining supposed historical confirmations of 'atheism' and bear in mind the range of meaning that the term had.


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## EdwardBast

LarryW said:


> I suspected that this post might ruffle some feathers but my intention was to see if others could contribute to my list which I am fairly sure is accurate... Sorry - I should have buffered the Mozart reference because I know that he himself assured his father that he was a believer (whether that is true or not).... Some of the contributors are making statements however based on their lack of knowledge. To say, for example, that Ravel was not an atheist is just incorrect. I met a woman some years ago whose mother tried to convert Ravel's mother to Catholicism (Ravel was indeed baptized in the little church in the Basque village of Ciboure) - Ravel's mother rejected the "offer" and said that she'd rather go to Hell with her atheist family than to heaven by herself! Ravel loved this story because it was so funny, showed how ballsy his mother could be, and through it got to proclaim his atheism. But to say that most of my list is wrong is simply.... well, wrong. Verdi/Brahms/Debussy/Fauré - of course they were..... It's not that labelling atheists is necessary, only *it is fascinating to me that much of the most spiritual music has derived from those too many people feel cannot be truly spiritual.* When I would posit that perhaps those who do not need a God are in fact the most "spiritual" of all! There is even controversy now about the religiosity of Bach and his propensity to write only secular music in his spare time, much to the horror of the church.... See Ted Goia's book: Music: A Subversive History.


I'd say the best take away from this thread is that it belies the popular notion that to compose great and convincing music composers must personally identify with the emotions the music expresses or the ideas, religious or otherwise, behind its words and imagery. This is nonsense, of course. There is no reason to think an atheist is at any disadvantage in composing devout, inspiring, and spiritually moving religious music. As several others have said, it's just music. Skill and imagination, which is all it takes to write good religious music, have little if anything to do with belief and spirituality.


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## JAS

^^^ skill and imagination, and some idea of what religious music does and sounds like. (I think the composer must have some personal understanding of the feelings involved, but they need not originate from overtly religious ideas.)


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## EdwardBast

JAS said:


> ^^^ skill and imagination, and some idea of what religious music does and sounds like. (I think the composer must have some personal understanding of the feelings involved, but they need not originate from overtly religious ideas.)


Knowing the tradition of the forms in which one is composing is just part of the requisite skill set. Of course a skilled composer setting out to compose a motet will have listened to other motets. Personal understanding of feelings is irrelevant. One only needs to understand the conventions by which feelings of various kinds are expressed. That's stylistic competence.


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## DavidA

LarryW said:


> I suspected that this post might ruffle some feathers but my intention was to see if others could contribute to my list which I am fairly sure is accurate... Sorry - I should have buffered the Mozart reference because I know that he himself assured his father that he was a believer (whether that is true or not).... Some of the contributors are making statements however based on their lack of knowledge. To say, for example, that Ravel was not an atheist is just incorrect. I met a woman some years ago whose mother tried to convert Ravel's mother to Catholicism (Ravel was indeed baptized in the little church in the Basque village of Ciboure) - Ravel's mother rejected the "offer" and said that she'd rather go to Hell with her atheist family than to heaven by herself! Ravel loved this story because it was so funny, showed how ballsy his mother could be, and through it got to proclaim his atheism. But to say that most of my list is wrong is simply.... well, wrong. Verdi/Brahms/Debussy/Fauré - of course they were..... It's not that labelling atheists is necessary, only it is fascinating to me that much of the most spiritual music has derived from those too many people feel cannot be truly spiritual. When I would posit that perhaps those who do not need a God are in fact the most "spiritual" of all! There is even controversy now about the religiosity of Bach and his propensity to write only secular music in his spare time, much to the horror of the church.... See Ted Goia's book: Music: A Subversive History.


I think you are putting too much emphasis on one book with an obvious axe to grind. The ridiculous nonsense about the religiosity of Bach is one example of our speculations to justify our own secularism. The fact that Verdi himself specified religious trappings for his funeral does not give much credence to the fact that he was an avowed atheist as does the fact he built a chapel. That is not to say he was a believer - he wasn't. But agnostic fits the bill better. And I haven't ever heard the tale about the church being horrified at Bach writing secular music.


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## JAS

EdwardBast said:


> Knowing the tradition of the forms in which one is composing is just part of the requisite skill set. Of course a skilled composer setting out to compose a motet will have listened to other motets. Personal understanding of feelings is irrelevant. One only needs to understand the conventions by which feelings of various kinds are expressed. That's stylistic competence.


If you are merely copying form, then there is no need for understanding feelings, since feelings are not involved. But it is true in acting that to really play a part, you have to find the part of your own experience that can be summoned up for the role, even if the precise circumstances are different. This is also true in writing, and I find it hard to imagine that that it is also true in composing, if one is composing something to generate a feeling.


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## tdc

LarryW said:


> I suspected that this post might ruffle some feathers but my intention was to see if others could contribute to my list which I am fairly sure is accurate... Sorry - I should have buffered the Mozart reference because I know that he himself assured his father that he was a believer (whether that is true or not).... Some of the contributors are making statements however based on their lack of knowledge. To say, for example, that Ravel was not an atheist is just incorrect. I met a woman some years ago whose mother tried to convert Ravel's mother to Catholicism (Ravel was indeed baptized in the little church in the Basque village of Ciboure) - Ravel's mother rejected the "offer" and said that she'd rather go to Hell with her atheist family than to heaven by herself! Ravel loved this story because it was so funny, showed how ballsy his mother could be, and through it got to proclaim his atheism. But to say that most of my list is wrong is simply.... well, wrong. Verdi/Brahms/Debussy/Fauré - of course they were..... It's not that labelling atheists is necessary, only it is fascinating to me that much of the most spiritual music has derived from those too many people feel cannot be truly spiritual. When I would posit that perhaps those who do not need a God are in fact the most "spiritual" of all! There is even controversy now about the religiosity of Bach and his propensity to write only secular music in his spare time, much to the horror of the church.... See Ted Goia's book: Music: A Subversive History.


Re: Ravel, you have one anecdote, not even attributed to the composer directly, it is just not enough to know. A number of different spiritual texts were in Ravel's book collection, what exactly his personal beliefs were is speculation.


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## Guest

@EdwardBast and JAS

Anyone who has the skill set, and the understanding of the theology can compose in the style of. The question is not so much about what the composers composed, but whether what they composed can be taken as real evidence of their personal commitment to a religious faith. Since personal beliefs (as opposed to a commitment to social conventions such as going to church) are not necessarily publicly shared, I'd say that any list of either atheists or theists would need much more scrutiny than is possible here. I also take the point that the word itself has not always been used as an accurate description, but as a general label for the socially 'irreligious'.

I'm with those who note with interest, the various ideas, some spiritual, some faith-based, some church-based, that inform a composition, but then just get on with the business of listening to it. Beethoven's 9th neither gains nor loses in my estimation because of its spiritual content, and I wouldn't like to draw any conclusions about his personal faith commitment from it.


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## LarryW

*I love these responses*

That basically Music itself is something transcendent, uplifting and, yes, spiritual no matter what is the source (or commission) that sparks its existence is undeniable. Ravel once said that Music is his only god. But Lou Reed basically said the same thing as well. Doesn't matter who you are I suppose. And I've always felt that music was the most "divine" of the arts because of the way in which it transports you. These ideas are so painfully obvious - I think anyone on this site would agree. Living in Canada, next to our too often fundamentalist neighbours who speak of the amorality of those who do not believe... well, I was struck reading about Haydn who designated his peer Beethoven an atheist, just as Toscanini spoke of his friend Verdi's atheism... And on top of that having made a couple of films on Ravel, as well as those on Shostakovich, Eisler, I learned of their almost devout atheism "in spite of" the resplendent and transcendent art that they created. I am conflating ideas perhaps. But I am struck by the wisdom and moderation of the posters here. That is something very British and I am thankful.


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## TwoFlutesOneTrumpet

LarryW said:


> That basically Music itself is something transcendent, uplifting and, yes, spiritual no matter what is the source (or commission) that sparks its existence is undeniable. Ravel once said that Music is his only god. But Lou Reed basically said the same thing as well. Doesn't matter who you are I suppose. And I've always felt that music was the most "divine" of the arts because of the way in which it transports you. These ideas are so painfully obvious - I think anyone on this site would agree. Living in Canada, next to our too often fundamentalist neighbours who speak of the amorality of those who do not believe... well, I was struck reading about Haydn who designated his peer Beethoven an atheist, just as Toscanini spoke of his friend Verdi's atheism... And on top of that having made a couple of films on Ravel, as well as those on Shostakovich, Eisler, I learned of their almost devout atheism "in spite of" the resplendent and transcendent art that they created. I am conflating ideas perhaps. But I am struck by the wisdom and moderation of the posters here. That is something very British and I am thankful.


I don't know if this is a British thing or not. I would think it's more of a rational thought thing, liberated from the dogmas of religion. Many religious people hold the belief that you'd have to be religious to be spiritual or to have morals. They are of course deceiving themselves just like they are deceiving themselves in beliefs of an omnipotent friend in the sky loving them. It's a myth many take for reality. If a composer does not believe this myth, it does not remove the composer's ability to create highly spiritual music.


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## DavidA

TwoFlutesOneTrumpet said:


> I don't know if this is a British thing or not. I would think it's more of a rational thought thing, liberated from the dogmas of religion. Many religious people hold the belief that you'd have to be religious to be spiritual or to have morals. They are of course deceiving themselves just like they are deceiving themselves in beliefs of an omnipotent friend in the sky loving them. It's a myth many take for reality. If a composer does not believe this myth, it does not remove the composer's ability to create highly spiritual music.


I think you have to be highly irrational to believe there is an 'omnipotent friend in the sky'. I don't either! Neither does anyone I know. Reminds me of Yuri Gargarin telling everyone he didn't find 'God up there'. Thanks! We did know that! :lol:

For goodness sake, a gifted composer is able to make music and give a veneer of spirituality whether he believes it or not - just like a gifted actor is able to play a part.


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## hammeredklavier

LarryW said:


> Mozart (almost certainly)


On 25 October 1777, Mozart wrote to his father:
"Papa must not worry, for God is ever before my eyes. I realize His omnipotence and I fear His anger; but I also recognize His love, His compassion, and His tenderness towards His creatures. He will never forsake His own. If it is according to His will, so let it be according to mine. Thus all will be well and I must needs be happy and contented."

On January 4, 1783, he wrote to his father about his Mass K.427:
"About my moral commitment, yes, that's absolutely right; - it flowed out of my pen not unintentionally - I truly made that promise in my heart and really hope to keep it. - When I made it, my wife was still single - but the promise was easy to make because I was determined to marry her as soon as she recovered her health. - Time and circumstances have delayed our trip, as you yourself know; - but as proof that I really made that promise I have the score of half a mass lying here in hopes of getting finished."

On 4 April 1787, he wrote to his father:
"This very moment I have received a piece of news which greatly distresses me, the more so as I gathered from your last letter that, thank God, you were very well indeed. But now I hear that you are really ill. I need hardly tell you how greatly I am longing to receive some reassuring news from yourself. And I still expect it, although I have now made a habit of being prepared in all affairs of life for the worst. As death, when we come to consider it closely, is the true goal of our existence, I have formed during the last few years, such close relations with this best and truest friend of mankind, that his image is not only no longer terrifying to me, but is indeed very soothing and consoling! And I thank my God for graciously granting me the opportunity of learning that death is the key which unlocks the door to our true happiness."

"Ruth Halliwell, a contrbutor to The Cambridge Mozart Encyclopedia, writes, "An educated guess at the totality of Mozart's beliefs based on reconciling the motley evidence would probably posit a broad belief in Christianity, but impatience with many of the requirements of the Catholic church." Another contributor, Bruce MacIntyre suggests that Mozart seems to have been a freethinking Catholic with a private relationship to God."

"According to his first biographer, Franz Xaver Niemetschek, who is generally an accurate witness:
Church music . . . was Mozart's favourite form of composition. But he was able to dedicate himself least of all to it." (The Cambridge Companion to Mozart , edited by Simon P. Keefe , Page 127)

'C-D-F-E', an expressive device dating back to the credo of Josquin des Prez's Missa pange lingua. Some believe it symbolizes the word "credo", which means "I believe".

*[ 8:03 ]*





Shostakovich: "I remember quite a few musical opinions that Glazunov gave on a variety of subjects, such as: "The finale of Mozart's Jupiter Symphony is like the cathedral of Cologne." Honestly, to this day I can't think of a better description of that amazing music." (Testimony: The Memoirs of Dmitri Shostakovich, Page 62)

"Mozart wrote the Vesperae de Dominica in Salzburg in 1779, the same year as the Coronation Mass - a work, which the composer himself held in high esteem. It was no doubt this work that Mozart presented to Baron van Swieten when he later sought to introduce himself to the Viennese musical world as a composer of church music in the serious _stile antico_."

*[ 14:18 ]*





"In April 1791, Mozart applied to become the Kapellmeister at St. Stephen's Cathedral, and was designated by the City Council to take over this job following the death of the then-ailing incumbent, Leopold Hofmann. This never took place, since Mozart died (December 1791) before Hofmann did (1793)".

"Otta Biba has made a strong case that Mozart never lost interest in sacred music and the church style. ... The motet 'Ave verum corpus', K. 618 was written in June 1791 for the feast of Corpus Christi and can be seen as a test for his pending appointment at St Stephen's."






"When exactly it (K.341) was completed is uncertain, but the eminent scholar H. C. Robbins Landon reasons that it was not as late as suggested by those who have called it an "audition" piece for the post of Kapellmeister at Vienna's St. Stephen's Church, which would have been around 1788."


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## EmperorOfIceCream

I think many of the composers were not true atheist composers, but agnostic individuals who were unsure. But with some of the major composers I think LarryW is completely wrong, especially about Bartok:

*Bartok:* The inclusion of Bartok is one of the worst, becuase his atheism was only temporary and preceded great religious devotion. "Raised as a Catholic, by his early adulthood Bartók had become an atheist. He later became attracted to Unitarianism and publicly converted to the Unitarian faith in 1916. Although Bartók was not conventionally religious, according to his son Béla Bartók III, "he was a nature lover: he always mentioned the miraculous order of nature with great reverence." As an adult, Béla III later became lay president of the Hungarian Unitarian Church." He also wrote an adagio religioso in his PC3. Bartok was literally the president of a Church. Not an atheist.

*Brahms:* This is a controversy in biographies. Swafford says he was agnostic, but Musgrave and later Knox say that "Brahms's religion fits within the largerchannel of intellectual mainstream nineteenth-century Lutheranism." He also deeply read the Bible.

*Beethoven:* "In a letter to Rudolf of July 1821, Beethoven shows his belief in a personal God: "God ... sees into my innermost heart and knows that as a man I perform most conscientiously and on all occasions the duties which Humanity, God, and Nature enjoin upon me." On one of the sketches for the Missa Solemnis he wrote "Plea for inner and outer peace."

*Debussy:* Debussy was not religious, but he did make pantheistic statements in letters.

*Mozart:* Obviously not atheist, as the post above shows.


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## DavidA

Vaughan Williams was a convinced atheist in his younger days hobnobbing with the likes of Russell, but he obviously had doubts about his atheism as he progressed through life although never traditionally religious. He certainly believed in a transcendent. Music was the way for Vaughan Williams seemed to grapple with the meaning of spirituality, and music became the way for him to express a faith that he seems to have held though never articulated.


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## tdc

Some great posts here, thanks to the contributors and I would like to thank God, for all this inspired music. Thank you lord, in your name this was possible.

I don't believe atheist composers could have created so rich a tradition. No, in fact I believe the rise of atheism is connected to a decline of the classical tradition in the post modern era.


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## Chilham

DavidA said:


> Vaughan Williams was a convinced atheist in his younger days hobnobbing with the likes of Russell, but he obviously had doubts about his atheism as he progressed through life although never traditionally religious. He certainly believed in a transcendent. Music was the way for Vaughan Williams seemed to grapple with the meaning of spirituality, and music became the way for him to express *a faith that he seems to have held *though never articulated.


Your evidence for Vaughan Williams' "faith"?


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## starthrower

tdc said:


> Some great posts here, thanks to the contributors and I would like to thank God, for all this inspired music. Thank you lord, in your name this was possible.
> 
> I don't believe atheist composers could have created so rich a tradition. No, in fact I believe the rise of atheism is connected to a decline of the classical tradition in the post modern era.


You view it as a decline and others see it as a musical evolution. Are composers in modern times expected to continue creating works in the classical tradition of the 18th and 19th centuries regardless of their beliefs? The tradition is preserved in musical scores and recordings for posterity.


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## TwoFlutesOneTrumpet

tdc said:


> Some great posts here, thanks to the contributors and I would like to thank God, for all this inspired music. Thank you lord, in your name this was possible.
> 
> I don't believe atheist composers could have created so rich a tradition. No, in fact I believe the rise of atheism is connected to a decline of the classical tradition in the post modern era.


Yes, thank you Lord for making me an atheist. The rise of atheism is an inevitable consequence of the rise in knowledge, specifically scientific knowledge. That most people are not atheists these days simply reflects on people's general lack of understanding of science and ignorance of the history of homo sapiens and religion.


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## DavidA

TwoFlutesOneTrumpet said:


> Yes, thank you Lord for making me an atheist. The rise of atheism is simply an inevitable consequence of the rise in knowledge, specifically scientific knowledge. That most people are not atheists these days simply reflects on people's general lack of understanding of science and ignorance of the history of homo sapiens and religion.


Pull the other leg, mate! :lol:


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## JAS

I think that this thread, to some extent, shows how personally we are attached to the music we appreciate, and how much we see it as a reflection of our own thoughts. What is most interesting is how at odds such thoughts may be, and yet the principle still applies. (I have little doubt that this phenomenon is why debates here so often get so intense, with lots of heat and little light.)

I suspect that a similar principle is at work in the What is so Great about 20th Century thread.


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## DavidA

Chilham said:


> Your evidence for Vaughan Williams' "faith"?


Try this

https://www.societyarts.org/ralph-vaughan-williams-spiritual-vagabond.html

Reminds me of Ian Hislop who said, "I had to give up being an atheist. I kept having too many doubts!"


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## Chilham

DavidA said:


> Try this
> 
> https://www.societyarts.org/ralph-vaughan-williams-spiritual-vagabond.html
> 
> Reminds me of Ian Hislop who said, "I had to give up being an atheist. I kept having too many doubts!"


Thought so.

When faith seeks validation, faith will alway find it.

Christians redrafting history to suit their narrative.

It makes no difference to the beauty and splendour of Vaughan Williams' music, but if it makes you feel better, carry on.

ps. If you're going to quote others so closely, as you did with this article, I suggest you make it clear in your post that's what you're doing, rather than using other's words without attribution. Reminds me that the Bible is mostly copied or borrowed from myths and other religions. "God loves the plagiarist." He even created humankind in His image.


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## DavidA

Chilham said:


> Thought so.
> 
> When faith seeks validation, faith will alway find it.
> 
> Christians redrafting history to suit their narrative.
> 
> It makes no difference to the beauty and splendour of Vaughan Williams' music, but if it makes you feel better, carry on.
> 
> ps. If you're going to quote others so closely, as you did with this article, I suggest you make it clear in your post that's what you're doing, rather than using other's words without attribution. Reminds me that the Bible is mostly copied or borrowed from myths and other religions. "God loves the plagiarist." He even created humankind in His image.


No more than an atheist re-drafting history to suit his own image. It doesn't make me feel any better because I know Vaughan Williams was an agnostic at best but just answering the question with a little research. I wish you would not use other peoples words like 'myths' which you have obviously just plagiarised from somebody else in regard to the Bible. This is ironic when you have just condemned it in somebody else. Don't get insecure about spirituality. The fact is there was a spiritual side to Vaughan Williams's music even though he remained a 'cheerful agnostic'

https://rvwsociety.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/rvw_journal_33.pdf


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## TwoFlutesOneTrumpet

DavidA said:


> No more than an atheist re-drafting history to suit his own image. It doesn't make me feel any better because I know Vaughan Williams was an agnostic at best but just answering the question with a little research. I wish you would not use other peoples words like 'myths' which you have obviously just plagiarised from somebody else in regard to the Bible. This is ironic when you have just condemned it in somebody else. Don't get insecure about spirituality. The fact is there was a spiritual side to Vaughan Williams's music even though he remained a 'cheerful agnostic'
> 
> https://rvwsociety.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/rvw_journal_33.pdf


All religions are myths, created by humans for humans. This is so obvious to anyone who approaches religion with an open mind and tries to understand it, instead of already having reached a conclusion and trying to validate it at all costs by dismissing evidence that repudiates their belief.


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## Chilham

DavidA said:


> No more than an atheist re-drafting history to suit his own image. It doesn't make me feel any better because I know Vaughan Williams was an agnostic at best but just answering the question with a little research. I wish you would not use other peoples words like 'myths' which you have obviously just plagiarised from somebody else in regard to the Bible. This is ironic when you have just condemned it in somebody else. Don't get insecure about spirituality. The fact is there was a spiritual side to Vaughan Williams's music even though he remained a 'cheerful agnostic'
> 
> https://rvwsociety.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/rvw_journal_33.pdf


I plagiarised the word, "Myth"? :lol:


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## DavidA

Chilham said:


> I plagiarised the word, "Myth"? :lol:


Don't worry. You're not the only one under that misconception.


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## mmsbls

This thread is specifically about which composers were atheists/agnostics/believers of some kind and to some extent about the ability of non-believers to write spiritual music. It is not about belief in general or religion in general. Please refrain from general comments about belief or religion and focus on the thread topic.


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## science

To me, the question of whether a composer came down on one side or another of a question is less significant than the question of whether he or she was a searcher, a questioner. To make really great art, perhaps especially music, it might not actually be necessary to be the kind of person who doubts the authorities and the crowds, but it probably really helps.


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## ORigel

tdc said:


> This wiki list is also dubious:
> 
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_atheists_in_music
> 
> There is no evidence of Ravel being an atheist, and as stated before Prokofiev is also highly questionable. However you will notice that even on the dubious wiki list there is no mention of Brahms, Bartok, Mahler, Debussy, Mozart, Beethoven etc.


Bartok was an atheist for a time. Works during that period included the first two string quartets, his opera, and The Wooden Prince.


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## Astrosmash

Agree 100%. And you put it more delicately than I would have. Religious belief may inform text content, If text is part of a composition, but skill and ingenuity are really the only points of interest worth talking about. Messiaen immediately comes to mind in this regard. Being a non believer myself, his ‘programmatic impetus’ doesn’t really interest me in any meaningful ‘compositional’ way, but his unique methodology fascinates me


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## Astrosmash

I imagine Beethoven was a pre-Nietzschesque ‘believer’...


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## Ariasexta

OP has an considerate idea about this whole matter, even though there might be some inaccuracies in the list. Thanks for this thread.


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## hammeredklavier

hammeredklavier said:


> *[ 5:50 ]*
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> "Gregorian melodies, of course, continued to be used in the Mass throughout the eighteenth century; but by Beethoven's time they were relatively rare, especially in orchestral Masses. The one composer who still used them extensively is Michael Haydn, in his a cappella Masses for Advent and Lent. It is significant that in some of these he limits the borrowed melody to the Incarnatus and expressly labels it "Corale." In the Missa dolorum B. M. V. (1762) it is set in the style of a harmonized chorale, in the Missa tempore Qudragesima of 1794 note against note, with the Gregorian melody (Credo IV of the Liber Usualis) appearing in the soprano. I have little doubt that Beethoven knew such works of Michael Haydn, at that time the most popular composer of sacred music in Austria."
> < Beethoven , By Michael Spitzer , Pg. 123 ~ 124 >


"In sketches from the beginning and end of his career we find harmonizations of Gregorian melodies: the Lamentations of Jeremiah and the Pange lingua. When he began work on the Missa Solemnis, he noted his intention: "In order to write true church music - look for all the plainchants of the monks." From such studies, not to mention his exercises in modal counterpoint for Haydn and Albrechtsberger, he learned to write the Dorian melody for "Et incarnatus est." From his notes and sketches it is evident that he regarded the "Gregorian" modes primarily as a means of religious expression. In 1809 he wrote: "*In the old church modes the devotion is divine, I exclaimed, and God let me express it someday.*" And in 1818, when he first thought of writing a choral symphony: "*A pious song in a symphony, in the old modes, Lord God we praise Thee-alleluja.*""


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## adeboram

Personally, I wouldn't say that they (the composers that mentioned above) are atheist. Maybe it's true that they are not believing in God, but, atheist sometimes referred to not having a religion or something, and, not having a religion doesn't mean you are an atheist in the first place. So, basically, maybe they don't have religion, but, they prefer to be spiritual, that's why they were able to compose such a spiritual pieces.


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## EmperorOfIceCream

The list might really be a good-faith attempt to talk about the relationship between music and religious beliefs, but I doubt that. When people make statments like this that are rabidly hostile to religion and espouse scientism: "The rise of atheism is an inevitable consequence of the rise in knowledge, specifically scientific knowledge. That most people are not atheists these days simply reflects on people's general lack of understanding of science and ignorance of the history of homo sapiens and religion" (I'll ignore that scientific observation has nothing to say about the existence of a transcendent God) it makes me think that a post like this is a revisionary attempt to try to redeem past composers for atheist materialists that think religious belief is tantamount to stupidity. The stuff about a "sky friend" is again hostile and shows complete ignorance of what religious people actually believe. There are many people here that really think that if you are religious you are stupid. The past thread about Bach being an atheist is another instantiation of that. I think we should have loving dialogue across ideological boundaries in relation to both music and religion. Statements like the one above are just rude and ignorant and are a non-starter for a discussion. And when we investigate topics like this, we ought to actually cite some biographies and be at least a little accurate. Anybody could do a quick Wikipedia search to learn that Bartok, Beethoven, and Mozart were clearly-definied theists. But the bigger problem is that lumping 20 composers under the "atheist" label makes us think they are atheists in they way contemporary people use the term. We could say that Wagner and Mahler were atheists in a sense, but they had complex, non-naturalistic spiritual beliefs that means that if we met them today they probably wouldn't self-identify as atheists. I think that people can make great music with any religious or irreligious beliefs. I do think music is kind of a fundamentally spiritual or transcendent thing, but we could debate that. A more interesting topic then I think would be what sort of beliefs inform music for the potentially non-theistic composers like Wagner and Mahler. Maybe music is just a matter of craft and talent, but I tend to think it's more. My thought is that non-believers could write spiritual music because they actually were spiritual, even if they didn't believe in God. Many of the Romantic poets were atheists, but they were also extremely spiritual and mystical.


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## JAS

EmperorOfIceCream said:


> The list might really be a _good-faith_ attempt to talk about the relationship between music and religious beliefs . . .


Pun intended, or not?


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## EmperorOfIceCream

Fides et ratio and all that :lol:


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## RICK RIEKERT

EmperorOfIceCream said:


> I think that people can make great music with any religious or irreligious beliefs. I do think music is kind of a fundamentally spiritual or transcendent thing, but we could debate that. A more interesting topic then I think would be what sort of beliefs inform music for the potentially non-theistic composers like Wagner and Mahler. Maybe music is just a matter of craft and talent, but I tend to think it's more. My thought is that non-believers could write spiritual music because they actually were spiritual, even if they didn't believe in God. Many of the Romantic poets were atheists, but they were also extremely spiritual and mystical.


When Mahler was asked why he never composed a Mass, he answered bluntly that he could never, with any degree of artistic or spiritual integrity, voice the Credo. From this it seems clear that Mahler was a confirmed agnostic.

However, Otto Klemperer's description of Mahler in his memoirs captures the composer's essential ambivalence towards religious belief: 'Mahler was a thorough-going child of the nineteenth century, an adherent of Nietzsche and typically irreligious. For all that, he was - as all his compositions testify - devout in the highest sense,' though his piety was 'not to be found in any church prayer-book'

Ferdinand Pfohl, a composer and music critic and Mahler's friend, who was fascinated by the enigmatic contradictions of Mahler's personality, says this about his friend in a memoir: 'Mahler was a mystic, a God-seeker. His imagination circled incessantly around these matters, around God and the world, around life and death, around spiritual matters and nature. Eternity and immortality were at the center of his thoughts. Death and eternity are the great theme in his art. He wanted to believe, belief at any price.'

Mahler's wife Alma was to write later of her husband that: 'He had a strong leaning toward Catholic mysticism whereas the Jewish ritual had never meant anything to him. He could never pass a church without going in; he loved the smell of incense and Gregorian chants.'

The late great Mahler scholar Edward Reilly has suggested that Mahler's vision was a combination of the merging of the Judeo-Christian belief in an all-loving and powerful God with whom we seek a mystical union, and the humanist conviction of the power of the human spirit to overcome the difficult struggles of the material world. According to Reilly, 'what Mahler is essentially addressing are the very basic human fears of death and judgment (not just damnation, but the judgment of the worth of one's life), and the need to feel that life has meaning. His answers are affirmations that we in our striving and in our love give meaning to our lives, and that we can transcend both death and judgment.'


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## Handelian

I think the modern tendency to label people 'atheist' because they are not conventionally religious is as misguided as the old tendency to label everyone 'church of England' if they didn't practice a particular faith. Even someone like Verdi who had no time for organised religion, was more of an agnostic than an atheist. Interesting his wife labelled him, "not a strong believer". 
The fact that non-believers as artists can create religious music is no more surprising than composers like Schubert can create great love songs even though it appears he had never experienced much of it himself.


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## PDoniger

*Verdi and religion*

A revealing quotation from a letter by Strepponi is found in several Verdi biographies: "I exhaust myself in speaking to him about the marvels of the heavens, the earth, the sea, etc. It's a waste of breath! He laughs in my face and freezes me in the midst of my oratorical periods and my divine enthusiasm by saying 'you're all crazy,' and unfortunately he says it with good faith." The suggestion here seems far stronger than agnosticism and perhaps a bit less than full out atheism. I'm not sure where Verdi actually lands on this spectrum and have been thinking much about this of late. He did instruct that there be no religious services at his own funeral. His relationship with the clergy was very contentious, and the church often angered him. I'd love to find more evidence if anyone has any suggestions. I have read most of the biographies, including the massive tome by Mary Jane Phillips-Matz (wonderful book!).


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## Handelian

PDoniger said:


> A revealing quotation from a letter by Strepponi is found in several Verdi biographies: "I exhaust myself in speaking to him about the marvels of the heavens, the earth, the sea, etc. It's a waste of breath! He laughs in my face and freezes me in the midst of my oratorical periods and my divine enthusiasm by saying 'you're all crazy,' and unfortunately he says it with good faith." The suggestion here seems far stronger than agnosticism and perhaps a bit less than full out atheism. I'm not sure where Verdi actually lands on this spectrum and have been thinking much about this of late. He did instruct that there be no religious services at his own funeral. His relationship with the clergy was very contentious, and the church often angered him. I'd love to find more evidence if anyone has any suggestions. I have read most of the biographies, including the massive tome by Mary Jane Phillips-Matz (wonderful book!).


His instructions were, I believe, "One priest, one candle, one cross"


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## Coach G

RICK RIEKERT said:


> When Mahler was asked why he never composed a Mass, he answered bluntly that he could never, with any degree of artistic or spiritual integrity, voice the Credo. From this it seems clear that Mahler was a confirmed agnostic.
> 
> However, Otto Klemperer's description of Mahler in his memoirs captures the composer's essential ambivalence towards religious belief: 'Mahler was a thorough-going child of the nineteenth century, an adherent of Nietzsche and typically irreligious. For all that, he was - as all his compositions testify - devout in the highest sense,' though his piety was 'not to be found in any church prayer-book'
> 
> Ferdinand Pfohl, a composer and music critic and Mahler's friend, who was fascinated by the enigmatic contradictions of Mahler's personality, says this about his friend in a memoir: 'Mahler was a mystic, a God-seeker. His imagination circled incessantly around these matters, around God and the world, around life and death, around spiritual matters and nature. Eternity and immortality were at the center of his thoughts. Death and eternity are the great theme in his art. He wanted to believe, belief at any price.'
> 
> Mahler's wife Alma was to write later of her husband that: 'He had a strong leaning toward Catholic mysticism whereas the Jewish ritual had never meant anything to him. He could never pass a church without going in; he loved the smell of incense and Gregorian chants.'
> 
> The late great Mahler scholar Edward Reilly has suggested that Mahler's vision was a combination of the merging of the Judeo-Christian belief in an all-loving and powerful God with whom we seek a mystical union, and the humanist conviction of the power of the human spirit to overcome the difficult struggles of the material world. According to Reilly, 'what Mahler is essentially addressing are the very basic human fears of death and judgment (not just damnation, but the judgment of the worth of one's life), and the need to feel that life has meaning. His answers are affirmations that we in our striving and in our love give meaning to our lives, and that we can transcend both death and judgment.'


Leonard Bernstein indicated in his Mahler thesis (expounded in the documentary, _Mahler: The Drummer Boy_), that Mahler was VERY Jewish. Bernstein seems to assert that Mahler converted to Catholicism due to social pressure and because, in a church, "the music is better." Even so, Bernstein demonstrates that even Mahler's music is ostensibly Wagnerian, and loaded with German "milk-maid" music, underneath there is a strong undercurrent of Jewishness.


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## Coach G

I'm a big believer in Individual Psychology. I don't think people fit very neatly into three boxes: theist, atheist, and agnostic. There may be as many categories as their are people in the world and those categories change during different periods in people's lives.


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