# The biggest overall change in style



## violadude (May 2, 2011)

Out of all the composers, who's music do you think changed the most from the first pieces they wrote to the last? Note that this is different from who's music went through the most style changes, if they went through a lot of style changes, and then switched back to their first style at the end they're overall style change wouldn't be much. That's how I am defining the term overall for the sake of this thread anyway. Any ideas?


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## Lisztian (Oct 10, 2011)

Liszt. From his ultra-virtuoso, sometimes empty opera-fantasies, to his late choral works/experimental piano works.


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## violadude (May 2, 2011)

Lisztian said:


> Liszt. From his ultra-virtuoso, sometimes empty opera-fantasies, to his late choral works/experimental piano works.


Are you sure your answer is unbiased? 

Just kidding lol Liszt is indeed a good example.

I might have to think about it for a while, but my vote might go to Schoenberg or Stravinsky.

Schoenberg's first pieces such as the Opus 2 Gesange sound incredibly like Brahms, then Veklarte Nacht and String Quartet No. 1 are in a very unique Schoenberg language, but still so lush and romantic. Contrast that with pieces like Ode to Nepolean, the String Trio and Survivor from Warsaw. It is quite a difference, although in a way, you can hear works like Veklarte Nacht "naturally evolve" into his later pieces.

With Stravinksy, just listen to Firebird, then listen to Agon. 'Nuff said haha.


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## Lisztian (Oct 10, 2011)

violadude said:


> Are you sure you're answer is unbiased?
> 
> Just kidding lol Liszt is indeed a good example.


Ahah no I admit to being biased, but still he is the best example I can think of.


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## violadude (May 2, 2011)

Lisztian said:


> Ahah no I admit to being biased, but still he is the best example I can think of.


Oh no! You quoted my ungodly usage of "you're" in the wrong context! I should have edited that sooner >.<


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## Lisztian (Oct 10, 2011)

violadude said:


> Oh no! You quoted my ungodly usage of "you're" in the wrong context! I should have edited that sooner >.<


Uh oh...Beware the grammar police


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## DavidMahler (Dec 28, 2009)

Great question. I'm thinking as I write this...

Liszt is actually definitely up there.

Debussy evolved quite a bit from his early days, but he didn't really continue to evolve all throughout.

Beethoven obviously evolved a bit

Mahler evolved tremendously, but the fact that he started up with titanic symphonic works keeps him from my top choice...

for me the answer is.....

*Brahms*

and I'll explain why

The guy started brilliantly with huge piano sonatas, a piano concerto which pretty much could be considered the most weighty ever written (even more than Busoni's much vaster work)

By the time we reach the end of his career he managed to brilliantly (and hopefully unconsciously) alter his direction without really changing his style. His final symphony, clarinet quintet, sonatas, trio, late piano works, final songs, and organ works are so autumnal and filled with resignation and harmonic revelations which I don't think the young Brahms would have ever dreamed of. If you compare the Op. 5 with the Op. 119...they sound like two entirely different (and equally brilliant) composers.

Because the quality of Brahms' work is consistently brilliant throughout his lifespan, it's very easy to observe that his outlook, his stance in life changed, because one needs not to judge the quality of the work, but simply the mood and sentiment of the work. I will say though that Brahms at age 60 was a finer musical thinker than Brahms at 25


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## regressivetransphobe (May 16, 2011)

Scriabin would be a pretty decent nomination. Pleasant Chopin worship to frequently atonal, almost psychedelic cosmic-mindedness and weighty themes like the spiritual ecstasy of creation.


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## violadude (May 2, 2011)

regressivetransphobe said:


> Scriabin would be a pretty decent nomination. Pleasant Chopin worship to frequently atonal, almost psychedelic cosmic-mindedness and weighty themes like the spiritual ecstasy of creation.


Oh ya! Jeeze I cant believe I didn't think of that.


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## Rasa (Apr 23, 2009)

It's Monteverdi. From pure renaissance to Baroque over the course of his Madrigal books. None of the above can match.

Renaissance and Baroque are two different styles, while any early 20th century modernism can always be seen as an extention of the late romanticism of those composers.


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## HarpsichordConcerto (Jan 1, 2010)

Cage? From anything that has sound in it to no sound.


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## violadude (May 2, 2011)

HarpsichordConcerto said:


> Cage? From anything that has sound in it to no sound.


Actually, I was asking about the change between a composer's first pieces and their last pieces. 4'33" was written in 1952, pretty close to the middle of Cage's musical career....nice try though.


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## Sid James (Feb 7, 2009)

I made THIS thread on composers who were chameleons a while back. Similar things discussed on that, where I said this, which I think is relevant here -

*Richard Strauss *- He also went from one style to another, from being one of the movers and shakers of late Romanticism to ruffling a few feathers with the dissonances of _Salome_ &_ Elektra_, to Neo-Classicism in things like _Der Rosenkavalier _to aspects of atonality in_ Metamorphosen for 23 solo strings_ & many things in between (but he didn't fully flesh out some of his directions as thoroughly as Stravinsky, I think)...


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## Ravellian (Aug 17, 2009)

In terms of complete stylistic changes throughout a career, I think Stravinsky wins it all:

Early period (Rite of Spring): an innovative "modular" approach to composing with stratified layers of sound and atonal harmonic stasis.
Middle period (Pulcinella): shift to neoclassicism and simplicity of texture
Late period (Agon): shift to serialism 

Scriabin is another good example. After listening to the 2nd piano sonata, and then listening to the 9th, I feel most people would be saying "what the hell happened?"


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## Aramis (Mar 1, 2009)

Wagner anyone? Try his early piano sonatas and other stuff inspired by von Weber and the Italians. If compared with groundbreaking harmonies and forms of his late operas like Parsifal the change is gigantic.


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## clavichorder (May 2, 2011)

A second nomination for Scriabin, though an argument can be made for Scriabin's consistency as well. And though the resemblance to Chopin was there in his early works, he was far from derivative, his famous early etude from 14 years old has originality to it already, and his op. 3 Mazurkas are sometimes really jazzy.

Is Ludwig van not worthy of mention? Also, I think Haydn can be mentioned as well, from his early little symphonies to his late Choral works, in one facet, from his early sonatas to his late sonatas in another, and to a lesser extent, the evolution of his string quartet. It was like he was juggling three different pioneering musical innovations at once.


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## clavichorder (May 2, 2011)

And actually, though I'm not a huge fan of his whole output, perhaps the most radically transforming composer of them all has not been mentioned. Charles Ives! His early romantic american symphonies somehow evolved into the concord sonata in a span of just a little over 20 years.


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

Charles Ives, perhaps a predictable choice. His early stuff was often quite lush in a typical late Romantic way but the real fun started with works like his 2nd symphony. Such a pity that he produced so little after c. 1920.

Janacek is another who started off composing within traditional parameters but then had that fantastic period of the last 20+ years where he stamped his works with a very distinctive style.

Apologies, Clavichorder - I was compiling my post as you were sending yours.


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## clavichorder (May 2, 2011)

The inverse of this topic is also interesting as well. Who were the least changed composers? Some composers seemed to come "pre made" and only got more refined with time, sometimes to the point where they get almost boring. Mendelssohn is one. Medtner is a composer who remained highly consistent and in his later years, got a little too staid for even my tastes. Brahms had a very similar path to Medtner, which is why we can draw that parallel. So here we have almost the reverse phenomena, a composer that starts off a little bit radical, and by the time they are older, are so conservative its not even funny, not only because times changed, but because they themselves seem to have travelled back in time.


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## Chris (Jun 1, 2010)

*Frank Bridge* moved from a tuneful style to something not far from atonality.


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## Weston (Jul 11, 2008)

clavichorder said:


> Is Ludwig van not worthy of mention? Also, I think Haydn can be mentioned as well, from his early little symphonies to his late Choral works, in one facet, from his early sonatas to his late sonatas in another, and to a lesser extent, the evolution of his string quartet. It was like he was juggling three different pioneering musical innovations at once.


I was planning to mention all the big composers of the classic period. Though one of the shortest periods of music history (in fact I'm not even sure why we call our favorite music "classical") this period was a transition more than even modernism. Music from the early classical, with all the surface decor of the baroque and little of its polyphonic depth, sounds radically different to my ears than the late classical as the musical world became poised to all but abandon formal restraints and move into romanticism. Even the instruments of choice changed more than in any other period with the increase in popularity of the piano, and with larger and louder forces assembled for the orchestra, and the setting aside of the continuo.

So for me both Haydn and Beethoven changed quite a bit, but the biggest change was in Mozart. Early Mozart is nearly intolerable to me, while late Mozart (yes, I can't believe this is me saying this) rivals Beethoven and Schubert in depth and innovation.


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

Least changed? Hmm...Elgar and Rachmaninov spring to mind.


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## Air (Jul 19, 2008)

Among 20th century composers, Anton Webern stands out as one of the most dramatic examples of a composer who had a dramatic shift in style from the beginning to the end of his career.

Not as many people are familiar with his early works (without opus numbers), but if you familiarize yourself with them, you can get a good idea of the sense of uncertainty Webern had when he first began to compose. He tried everything, from early Romantic intimate music to Straussian-like Romanticism to the rolling hills of English 20th century composers to Mahler's progressive tonality, to his ultimate dodecaphonic style, first highly influenced by Schoenberg and then taking a completely different path from Schoenberg altogether.

If that doesn't convince you, here are some examples of Webern's early works:






His earliest-known work, the _Two Pieces for Cello and Piano_, which was written in 1899. It could've very well been written by Brahms, Schumann, Chopin, or even Schubert. It's admittedly charming but really breaks no new ground.






_Im Sommerwind_ is quite a masterpiece in my opinion. There are many who reject it simply because they prefer Webern's later work, but if it was written by Delius, Vaughan Williams, or even Richard Strauss, would these people still say the same? I don't think so. It is a prime example of the lustrous, overly-extravagant, pastoral tone poem. Webern would later turn his back on all these things, but earlier in his career, we must remember that he wrote in this style pretty darn well.






Webern's _Passacaglia_, one of the greatest op. 1's ever written. Probably highly influenced by Mahler, it is a large sprawling work that explores progressive tonality but does not rid itself of extravaganza or the excesses of late Romanticism. What I love most about this work is its sense of pushing boundaries, and the urgency to get away from any known idioms.

Compare this to a few of Webern's later works, the _String Quartet_, op. 28 and the _Variations for Orchestra_, op. 30. This is the brilliant and unique style that we've come to expect from Webern, and which he fully developed in his mature years. It speaks far past his death into the mid-late 20th century and continues to influence contemporary music today.


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## Sofronitsky (Jun 12, 2011)

I'm confused how can anyone argue any composer other than Aaron Copland? I mean... from Billy the Kid to Serial-ism

From this




To this


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## clavichorder (May 2, 2011)

Sofronitsky said:


> I'm confused how can anyone argue any composer other than Aaron Copland? I mean... from Billy the Kid to Serial-ism


I thought of Copland, but I don't think it was a very linear progression, I think he just dove into serialism at one point. A little bit of this here, a little bit of that there. Eclectic composer, same for Barber. I may be wrong though.


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## Couchie (Dec 9, 2010)

Probably Vivaldi.


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## Nix (Feb 20, 2010)

Are people not saying Beethoven, just cause they're tired of answering every question 'Beethoven'? Take his Op. 1 Piano Trio's and compare it with the late String Quartets.. started writing like Haydn, ended up writing something not all that different from early Schoenberg. 

What I find even more interesting though are composers who come full circle. Like Schoenberg, Bartok, and Penderecki... started romantic, went elsewhere, took what they learned and came full swing back into romanticism.


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## Sofronitsky (Jun 12, 2011)

Couchie said:


> Probably Vivaldi.


Couchie I have not seen you in a long time! You are looking great, as usual. The style change is working quite well I must say!


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## hespdelk (Mar 19, 2011)

This is debateable, but I'd say it might be more useful to gauge a shift from early _maturity_ to late style? This came to mind with mention of Wagner's early piano pieces - I don't know that one should really count any composer's earliest dabblings, as these are always part of the process of learning. Of course, where to draw that line is a can of worms of, to stay on theme, Wagnerian proportions. 

I second Scriabin as a contender - though his style remains more of an evolution than a whole hearted change I'd say... what's interesting is how far a path he travelled.

Monteverdi represents a collosal shift not only for himself but for the history of music..

But ultimately I think I would go with Schonberg - from the early chamber pieces, Verklarte nacht and Gurrelieder to his serial works is a downright break in style.

Yes, I do agree that his serial work carries on and evolves a great deal of what was already present in his late romantic style, but there is nonetheless a full break in style. The very priorities of what is to be considered important amongst the components of music, the way it is put together changes.


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## Couchie (Dec 9, 2010)

Sofronitsky said:


> Couchie I have not seen you in a long time! You are looking great, as usual. The style change is working quite well I must say!


Haben Sie vielen Dank!


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## maxshrek (Sep 14, 2011)

Well, I must vote for Bach. In addiction to be my favourite artisti, his contrapunctus contained in the Art of Fugue are conceived in a very different style respect those written in his youth experiments and the fugues of the Well Tempered Klavier.


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## HarpsichordConcerto (Jan 1, 2010)

*Egon Wellesz* (1885-1974), his nine symphonies written between 1945 - 1971, which I recently finished listening. The first two symphonies can be described as unmistakably tonal in idiom, while #5 and beyond were unmistakably 12-tone. It's fascinating for me to see composers switch from one to the other. All symphonies are approachable works though not necessarily the more remarkable 20th century symphonies. Rest assured, nothing bizzare coming from me.


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