Who is your favorite XX Century Composer?

[Xipe Totec]

Poll question: Who is your favorite XX Century Composer?

and why do you think so?

I don't have samples of all my favorites, so help me out and post some.

Here are some I found:

Star Wars - John Williams
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=izA5_kd72rc

Star Trek - Jerry Goldsmith
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EvRJcFczDh4

Batman - Danny Elfman
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=07s0smlPoCk

[Zomby Woof]

1. Frank Zappa

[Xipe Totec]

4. I Like Zappa too, but help me out here

post some samples, puhleeze?

:bounce:

[Initech]

42. Second!

Zappa was an unbelievable composer. Absolutely amazing.

[Xipe Totec]

44. Frank Zappa, The Early Years

Frank Zappa on the Steve Allen Show - Part One

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kGPPBwDBJDs


Frank Zappa on the Steve Allen Show - Part Two

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ufgn__85q9E


And something a little more recent...

Frank Zappa - Live - Montana

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iCG4Caw7IIc

[saltpoint]

2. Duke Ellington.

Ellington's Paris concerts proved to me what a genius he was as a composer and arranger.

The solo piano work alone is exquisite.

Gustav Holst is on your list -- thank you for that. His Folk Song Suites for Symphonic Wind Ensemble are terrific. He's more famous for The Planets, but give those Suites any day.

[Xipe Totec]

5. ...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SDDCzb3dv_Y

[CaliforniaPeggy]

3. My dear Xipe Totec...

I just love Aaron Copeland....

His dances from Rodeo, the soundtrack for The Tender Land, the music for Our Town, Fanfare for a Common Man...

The list just goes on and on......

His plain-spoken, yet vivid works, are wonderful and evocative...

They speak to me......:patriot:

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

6. Krzysztof Penderecki.

I also like Igor Stravinski, Dmitri Shostakovich, Aaron Copland, Karl Orff.

[saltpoint]

7. That's just a hell of a great list. Penderecki's THRENODY FOR THE

VICTIMS OF HIROSHIMA is one of the most powerful compositions ever.

[Xipe Totec]

8. Found a link to Threnody for the Victims of Hiroshima:

It is eerie. The style is reminiscent of Phillip Glass, but the emotions are more reminiscent of Mussorgsky.

http://www.somtow.com/audio/SOMTOW-Penderecki_for.m3u

[saltpoint]

11. Nicely put. You get some of the "throb" of Glass, but I agree with you --

there's the rush and bruise of the Russians, and the horror of the actual event that inspired it.

[riverdeep]

45. Love Penderecki

His Second Violin Concerto, with Anna Sophie-Mutter kickin it on violin, is one of the most beautiful and strange pieces of music I've heard. Quite accessible too, not like a Schoenberg twelve tone work or something.

[Flaxbee]

9. I voted for the Finn

...cuz I looove Finland.

Rachmaninoff is pretty good, too!

[Fenris]

10. Prokofiev

To me, that's the only answer to this question.:)

[Xipe Totec]

12. Good one!

I hate that the polls only allow so many choices...

Jascha Heifetz plays March by Prokofiev
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yNqP-PO66c8

[IntravenousDemilo]

49. Agreed! The 19th century boasted a great many musical geniuses...

Beethoven, Verdi, Wagner, Brahms, Tchaikowsky, Fauré -- the list goes on and on. For me, genius means producing a large body of consistently high-quality work, over and over and over, at least 80 per cent of the time.

The 20th produced only one who could be considered a genius on their level, and that was Prokofiev.

[GenDem]

13. I love all of the Gershwin brothers compositions

Imagine their body of work had they lived longer.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wx9zC31rtZc

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lHk6VGWmOpE

[Xipe Totec]

15. Monique Wilson just put me on a different mental plane

her voice is cristaline; I was mesmerized.

Thank you!

[GenDem]

19. It's a beautiful montage

I keep replaying it.

My cousin is a harpist at The Juilliard School. She played in the Juilliard orchestra under the direction of John Williams during the 50th anniversary extravaganza. We're very proud.

[WCGreen]

14. By far, George Gershwin...

The greatest American composer, a true polyglot who used vibrant folk rythms, ageless American melodies and blended them seemlessly within a classical structure...

[Xipe Totec]

16. I love Gershwin, but what about Copeland?

He too merits those accolades.

Grand Canyon Suite and Fanfare for the Common Man; surely these capture the American spirit?

[WCGreen]

22. The spirit....

But not the essence...

Copland captured the romantic side of America, the dream, the myth...

Gershwin took hold of the American pulse, the reality and infused his music with the American experience...

I love Copeland...

But I Adore Gershwin...

[Xipe Totec]

39. Copeland is Pastoral, while Gershwin is Urbane

Different views of America, but neither I think is more or less mythical than the other.

But I know what you mean.

[WCGreen]

41. Good point....

I did see a performance of Rodeo done by the Cleveland/San Jose ballet that I thoroughly enjoyed...

Maybe if we agreed that Copeland was reminding us of the past while grounded in the present and Gershwin was rooted in the present while looking optimistically toward the future...

In any event, I would say Copeland is my second favorite composer of the 20th century...

Debussy, although half in, half out of the 20th century, is my all time favorite "contemporary" composer...

[IntravenousDemilo]

51. On the other hand, Leonard Bernstein...

captured both. He was a neat fusion of Gershwin, whom he probably never met, and Copland, who mentored Lenny and was a major influence.

[misanthrope]

47. Grand Canyon Suite is by Ferdi Grofe´ and...

...it's spelled "Copland" but pronounced the same as the version with the "e."

[trackfan]

17. I like Hindemith,

Bartok, many others

[AwakeAtLast]

48. Oooh! Another good one!

I've sung some of Hindemith, back in my college days. Tough stuff!

[GoddessOfGuinness]

18. I couldn't possibly pick only one; but here's a fun Barber composition..

http://youtube.com/watch?v=DYQ84RlUN0w

[Xipe Totec]

20. Beautiful composition

reminiscent of Gershwin, yet different; more modern.

I loved the xylophone.

[GoddessOfGuinness]

23. It reminds me a little of Debussy, too...

One of my teachers knew Barber; and told me that he was a deeply spiritual man. I feel like that spirituality is present in even the "lightest" of his compositions.

Glad you enjoyed! :toast:

[IntravenousDemilo]

50. You're probably familiar with his "Adagio" as well, but...

...have you heard his Overture to "The School for Scandal"? It's yummy...

[MilesColtrane]

21. My favorite XX composer?

Whoever the genius was that was the first guy to use the wah-wah guitar.

Bow-chika-wow-chika-chika-wow!!

[GalleryGod]

24. Bernstein & Sondheim

For Lite Listening

[IntravenousDemilo]

52. Bernstein was fantastic; Sondheim is even more so.

But then, I guess I would say that since he's been my mentor/instructor as a composer for the last 30 or so years. He's also the greatest-ever lyricist of the American Musical Theatre -- maybe even the greatest-ever English-language lyricist, period. Sondheim is a complete musical dramatist, and I think he deserves the Nobel Prize for Literature, for his innovations to, and stretching the boundaries of, the art of musical theatre. Unfortunately, there's no Nobel Prize for Music, and I've always wondered why, since unlike literature, music doesn't need to be translated into another language to be appreciated by people of other cultures. Music speaks directly to the listener without needing to filter it through a translator for foreign consumption (though one could argue that the performer is also a translator, and sometimes a bad performer has the same effect as a bad literary translation).

[pokerfan]

25. Igor Fyodorovich Stravinsky

[ironflange]

53. Seconded

I can't think of any composer who could take every new technique to come along (neo-classicism, serialism, etc) and use each one of them with such complete mastery. Second place belongs to Shostakovich. Third is a tie between at least a dozen more.

[Zookeeper]

26. I like John Adams...

especially "Nixon in China."

Also, Thelonius Monk.

[grasswire]

27. I voted for Gershwin because you didn't offer Ellington

They are the two top, IMO.

[SecularMotion]

28. Erich Wolfgang Korngold

Bela Bartok, John Adams, Harry Partch

[fortyfeetunder]

30. Korngold - one of the movie soundtrack pioneers

and he also wrote wonderful works for cello, violin, etc.

[sarge43]

29. My faves

Classical: Ralph Vaughan Williams, honorable mention Samuel Barber

Film: Bernard Hermann, honorable mention Carl Stalling

Popular: Duke Ellington, honorable mention Cole Porter

And Robb is still a dingbat.

[terrya]

31. Copland, no question.

"Appalachian Spring" is just one example of his greatness.

Although Sondheim does come in a very, very close second.

[MilesColtrane]

37. Where "Hoe-Down" from "Rodeo" came from....

Copland obviously listened to Alan Lomax's recordings...

http://www.loc.gov/folklife/lomax/americansouth/americansouth.html

Click on "Bonaparte's Retreat"...1937.

[Rabrrrrrr]

32. Varese, Zappa, Penderecki, Glass, Reich, Stockhausen, Stravinsky, Gorecki, Tan Dun

and a few others, like Riley, Monk, Laurie Anderson, Hovhannes, Harry Partch.

[wildhorses]

33. guess i am old fashioned ---

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z8ytY57u8_4

[Lydia Leftcoast]

34. I like Sergei Prokofiev, Samuel Barber, Ralph Vaughn Williams,

and the wonderful group of English composers who wrote sublime choral music (Gerald Finzi, C.W. Standford, Edward Bairstow, William Walton, Herbert Howells).

[Deep13]

35. Mahler? Nah, he's too dark.

[JitterbugPerfume]

36. Bob Dylan

[Poiuyt]

38. I've heard a lot of critics claim that Cole Porter was one of the greatest American composers

But I voted for Rachmaninoff. I love Russian music.

[Left Is Write]

40. Gene Simmons.

Just kidding.

[Xipe Totec]

43. A belated Sample of Copeland

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ScuPJOg2Igs

And Gershwin

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5O7qZnqflxM

[Richard Steele]

46. The Elfman. No one else has done so much, in so many varied genres. nm

[NNadir]

54. Frank Zappa.

Terje Rypdal and John Coltrane are way up there.