Essential Richard Strauss

• Don Quixote
• Also Sprach Zarathustra ("Thus Spoke Zarathustra")
• Don Juan
• Ein Heldenleben ("A Hero's Life")
• Eine Alpensinfonie ("An Alpine Symphony")
• Till Eulenspiegels lustige Streiche ("Till Eulenspiegel's Merry Pranks")
• Four Last Songs for Soprano and Orchestra
• Der Rosenkavalier (opera)
• Elektra (opera)
• Salome (opera)

Essential Chopin

• Piano Concertos Nos. 1 and 2
• Piano Sonata No. 2 (includes "Funeral March")
• Ballades
• Etudes
• Mazurkas
• Nocturnes
• Polonaises
• Preludes
• Waltzes

Essential Vivaldi

• Flute Concertos in D, RV428, Op.10 No.3, ("Il Gardellino") and F, RV433, Op. 10, No. 1 ("La Tempesta di mare")
• L'estro armonico (twelve concertos)
• Mandolin Concerto in C, RV425
• The Four Seasons (Spring, Summer, Autumn, and Winter)
• Gloria in D

Essential Wagner

• Der Ring des Nibelungen (Das Rheingold, Die Walkure, Siegfried, and Gotterdammerung) (four-opera cycle)
• Die Meistersinger von Nurnberg (opera)
• Lohengrin (opera)
• Parsifal (opera)
• Tannhauser und der Sangerkrieg auf Wartburg (opera)
• The Flying Dutchman (opera)
  
• Tristan und Isolde (opera)
  

Essential Mendelssohn

• Symphonies Nos. 3 "Scottish" and 4 "Italian"
• Violin Concerto
• A Midsummer Night's Dream Overture and Incidental Music
  
• Hebrides Overture "Fingal's Cave"
• Piano Trio No. 1
• String Octet
• Songs without Words, Books 1 through 8 (for piano)
• Elijah

Essential Verdi

• Requiem Mass
• Aida (opera)
• Falstaff (opera)
• Il trovatore (opera)
• La traviata (opera)
• Otello (opera)
• Rigoletto (opera)
• Un ballo in maschera (opera)

Essential Schumann

• Symphonies Nos. 1 "Spring", 3 "Rhenish", and 4
• Piano Concerto in A Minor
• Piano Quintet in E-flat
• Carnaval (for piano)
• Fantasy in C, Op. 17 (for piano)
• Kinderszenen ("Scenes From Childhood") (for piano)
• Kreisleriana (for piano)
• Symphonic Etudes (for piano)
• Dichterliebe

Essential Dvorak

• Symphonies Nos. 7, 8, and 9 "From the New World"
• Cello Concerto in B Minor
• Slavonic Dances (for orchestra)
• Piano Trio No. 4 "Dumky"
• String Quartet No. 12 "American"

Essential Handel

• Music for the Royal Fireworks
• Water Music
• Messiah
• Julius Caesar in Egypt (opera)

Essential Tchaikovsky

• Symphonies Nos. 4, 5, and 6 "Pathetique"
• Piano Concerto No. 1
• Violin Concerto in D
• 1812 Overture
• Romeo and Juliet Fantasy Overture
• The Nutcracker
• The Sleeping Beauty
• Swan Lake
• Eugene Onegin (opera)

Essential Haydn

• Symphonies Nos. 93, 94 "Surprise", 95, 96 "Miracle", 97, 98, 99, 100 "Military", 101 "Clock", 102, 103 "Drumroll", and 104 "London" ("London Symphonies")
• Trumpet Concerto in E-flat
• String Quartets Nos. 60, 61 "Fifths", 62 "Emperor", 63 "Sunrise", 64, 65 ("Erdody Quartets")
• The Creation
• Mass No. 11 in D Minor "Nelson Mass"

Essential Schubert

• Symphonies Nos. 8 "Unfinished" and 9 "The Great"
• Piano Quintet in A, D. 667 ("The Trout Quintet")
• String Quartet No. 14 "Death and the Maiden"
• String Quintet in C, D. 956
• Piano Sonatas Nos. 20 in A, D. 959 and 21 in B-flat, D. 960
• Fantasia in C, D. 760 ("Wanderer Fantasy")
• Die Schone Mullerin
• Winterreise

Essential Brahms

• Symphonies Nos. 1, 2, 3, and 4
• Piano Concertos Nos. 1 and 2
• Violin Concerto
• Variations on a Theme by Haydn
• Clarinet Quintet
• A German Requiem

Essential Bach

• Brandenburg Concertos Nos. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6
• Orchestral Suites Nos. 1, 2, 3 (includes "Air"), and 4
• Double Violin Concerto
• Cello Suites Nos. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6
• Violin Partita No. 2
• Goldberg Variations
• The Well-Tempered Clavier
• Cantata No. 140, "Wachet auf, ruft uns die Stimme" (includes "Sleepers, Awake")
• Mass in B Minor
• St. Matthew Passion

Essential Beethoven

• Symphonies Nos. 3 "Eroica", 5, 6 "Pastoral", 7, and 9 "Choral"
• Piano Concertos Nos. 4 and 5 "Emperor"
• Violin Concerto in D Major
• String Quartets Nos. 7, 8, and 9 ("Razumovsky"), 13, 14, and 15
• Piano Trio No. 7 "Archduke"
• Violin Sonata No. 9 "Kreutzer"
• Piano Sonatas Nos. 8 "Pathetique", 14 "Moonlight", 21 "Waldstein", 23 "Appassionata", 29 "Hammerklavier", and 32
• Missa Solemnis
• Fidelio (opera)

Essential Mozart

• Symphonies Nos. 38 "Prague", 39, 40, and 41 "Jupiter"
• Piano Concertos Nos. 20, 21, 23, and 24
• Clarinet Concerto
• Sinfonia Concertante for Violin, Viola, and Orchestra
• Clarinet Quintet
• String Quartet No. 19 "Dissonance"
• String Quintet in G Minor, K. 516
• Serenades Nos. 10 "Gran Partita" and No. 13 "Eine kleine Nachtmusik"
• Requiem
• Don Giovanni (opera)
• The Magic Flute (opera)
• The Marriage of Figaro (opera)

Antonin Dvorak

According to a consensus I derived from data associated with the Penguin and Gramophone classical music recording guides, the Naxos and Deutsche Grammophon music catalogs, and the website Classical.Net, Antonin Dvorak's legacy currently ranks 9th among all classical music composers. This and the knowledge that his music is accessible lead me to the conclusion that the number of my friends and colleagues who have heard of him or are familiar with his music is disproportionately low. Perhaps this is because his name begins with the sequence of letters, D-V-. Well, here he is:


A concise introduction to Dvorak's unique musical style may be found in his Mazurek for Violin and Orchestra in E Minor, Op. 49. A more familiar tune may be found in his Slavonic Dance No. 2 in E Minor, Op. 72 (not to be confused with his Slavonic Dance No. 2 in E Minor, Op. 46).

Communication (October 2009)

"If a composer could say what he had to say in words he would not bother trying to say it in music." --Gustav Mahler

"After playing Chopin, I feel as if I had been weeping over sins that I had never committed, and mourning over tragedies that were not my own." --Oscar Wilde

The Different Roles of Recordings

Sometime last week, I turned on the radio and caught the final one and a half movements of Rachmaninov's Piano Concerto No. 2, featuring soloist Krystian Zimerman and conductor Seiji Ozawa (Deutsche Grammophon 000185802). This recording is electric. Zimerman does things on the piano the likes of which I have not heard anywhere else, and both soloist and conductor display deep understanding and manage to teach even those who are already very familiar with it something new about the music. I actually own this recording on CD but hadn't heard it in years. While there are problems (such as a few places where the piano overpowers the orchestra) that keep it from being one of the definitive recordings of the work, this is a recording not to be missed by admirers.

***

Generally, it is best to listen first to one of the acknowledged "definitive recordings" of a work of classical music. This helps one grasp more quickly the music's basic meaning. Once one has reached a sufficient level of understanding, one then enjoys the luxury of being able to listen profitably to recordings that are not as consistently great from beginning to end. This is because, secure in our understanding, we may choose to overlook the parts that we feel are wrong and focus more on the parts that we feel are right, including parts that reveal something deep about the music that we hadn't noticed before.

We should not wonder, then, why artists continue to find the motivation to record classic works. There is always the opportunity to enrich listeners with some new insight.

Unpunished Rapture

I have lived long enough to notice that, generally, for every high I experience there is a low that follows. Human beings, if they are to be happy, are forced into lives of moderation. Music, however, might be a relative exception to the rule. For, the high brought on by music is a spiritual one and is perhaps most associated physically with a state of tension. Now, the opponent process for a state of physical tension is one of relaxation, which is normally what I experience following a thrilling music performance.

I now quote:

If I were to begin life again, I would devote it to music. It is the only cheap and unpunished rapture upon earth. --Sydney Smith

Classical Music (cont.)

I found a quote related to yesterday's post:

Musical compositions, it should be remembered, do not inhabit certain countries, certain museums, like paintings and statues. The Mozart Quintet is not shut up in Salzburg: I have it in my pocket. --Henri Rabaud

Classical Music

I stumbled across a clip from Henze's opera Pollicino yesterday. The scene I watched was the one where Hänsel (from Hänsel und Gretel) conceives of his plan to find a way out of the woods. (In case you're curious: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_AvaxvHU1Uo.)

Listening to the music, I thought again about how some composers (e.g. Henze) are accepted as part of the classical music tradition while others (e.g. John Williams) are not. It is a tricky thing, outlining rules for what should be considered classical music and what shouldn't be. Such a judgment is rightfully left to subjective analysis. I will say, however, that I think in most cases the community gets it right.

Some prefer the term "art music" to "classical music," but I think that the former term is broader and does not narrowly define what is commonly referred to as "classical music." For "classical music" is not just an elitist term; it represents a specific concept that many people value and would like to preserve. Classical music compositions are conceived of and are written down in Platonic form. They exist so that artists may take up the challenge time and time again of realizing the forms. It is not a particular performance and all of its details that are of primary interest to the classical music aficionado--it is the composition and the way in which that composition is enlightened by the performance.

My son, chosen and loved

We live in a world where meaning is becoming lost beneath piles of distractions. As our technologies expand, things like a mother's loving advice to her son during a nature walk, expressed in terms of timeless wisdom, are being replaced by physical and emotional distances and electronic diversions. But we are still human, and in our souls will forever be a yearning for nourishment that occasionally, at least, fights through all of the distractions and requests meaningful activity.

"My son, chosen and loved, Let your mother share your wounds"

Thus begins Henryk Gorecki's Symphony of Sorrowful Songs, a timely source of catharsis for today's person. The initial critical response to this symphony was negative, and it focused on Gorecki's break from his previous, avant-garde style. How ultimately fitting.

Naxos Catalogue No. 8.550822

Magnum Opus

The term "magnum opus" is reserved for an artist's greatest achievement. In some cases, the artist, the public, and critics all agree upon the work that is worthy of such distinction; in others, it takes over 200 years before a consensus begins to emerge, informed by the composer's place in the repertoire; and in yet other cases, there is no consensus, and there need not be one. If you, however, are looking for one great work to introduce you to a composer, then you couldn't do much better than to refer to this list, which I compiled based on scrupulous research.

I must give credit to the editors at http://digitaldreamdoor.nutsie.com/pages/best-classic-top10.html. Their classical music lists are well-informed, and I agreed with nearly all of their 39 choices for a composer's "top work."

Adams, John - Nixon in China
Albeniz, Isaac - Iberia
Albinoni, Tomaso Giovanni - Oboe Concerto in D Minor, Op. 9, No. 2
Bach, Carl Philippe Emanuel - 6 Hamburg Symphonies, Wq. 182
Bach, Johann Sebastian - Mass in B Minor
Balakirev, Mily Alexeyevich - Tamara
Barber, Samuel - Adagio for Strings
Bartok, Bela - Concerto for Orchestra
Bax, Arnold - Tintagel
Beach, Amy Marcy Cheney - Symphony in E Minor "Gaelic"
Beethoven, Ludwig von - Symphony No. 9 "Choral"
Bellini, Vincenzo - Norma
Berg, Alban - Violin Concerto "To the Memory of an Angel"
Berio, Luciano - Sequenza I for Flute solo
Berlioz, Hector - Symphonie Fantastique
Bernstein, Leonard - Symphonic Dances from "West Side Story"
Berwald, Franz Adolf - Symphony No. 3 "Singuliere"
Bizet, Georges - Carmen
Boccherini, Luigi - String Quintet in E Major, Op. 11, No. 5
Borodin, Alexander - Symphony No. 2
Boulez, Pierre - Le marteau sans maitre
Brahms, Johannes - Symphony No. 4
Britten, Benjamin - War Requiem
Bruch, Max - Violin Concerto No. 1
Bruckner, Anton - Symphony No. 7
Buxtehude, Dietrich - Prelude, Fugue and Chaconne for Organ in C Major, BuxWV137
Byrd, William - My Ladye Nevells Booke
Cage, John - Sonatas and Interludes for Prepared Piano
Carter, Elliott - String Quartet No. 2
Chabrier, Emmanuel - Espana
Chausson, Ernest - Poeme for Violin and Orchestra
Chopin, Frederic - Preludes, Op. 28
Copland, Aaron - Appalachian Spring
Corelli, Arcangelo - Concerti grossi, Op. 6
Couperin, Francois - Pieces de clavicin, Book 3, Ordre 13 in B Minor
Debussy, Claude - La Mer
Delibes, Leo - Lakme
Delius, Frederick - On Hearing the First Cuckoo in Spring
Donizetti, Gaetano - Lucia di Lammermoor
Dowland, John - Lachrimae
Dufay, Guillaume - Mass "Se La Face ay pale"
Dukas, Paul - The Sorcerer's Apprentice
Dvorak, Antonin - Symphony No. 9 "From the New World"
Elgar, Edward - Cello Concerto in E Minor
Enescu, George - Romanian Rhapsodies
Falla, Manuel de - El amor brujo
Faure, Gabriel - Requiem
Franck, Cesar Auguste - Violin Sonata in A Major
Gabrieli, Giovanni - In Ecclesiis
Gershwin, George - Rhapsody in Blue
Gesualdo, Carlo - Madrigals, Book VI
Gibbons, Orlando - First Set of Madrigals and Mottets
Glass, Philip - Einstein on the Beach
Glazunov, Alexander - Violin Concerto in A Minor
Glinka, Mikhail - Russlin and Ludmilla
Gluck, Christoph von - Orpheus and Eurydice
Gorecki, Henryk - Symphony No. 3 "Symphony of Sorrowful Songs"
Gounod, Charles Francois - Faust
Grainger, Percy - Lincolnshire Posy
Granados, Enrique - Goyescas
Grieg, Edvard - Piano Concerto in A Minor
Handel, George Frideric - Messiah
Haydn, Franz Joseph - The Creation
Hildegard of Bingen - Symphonia armonie celestium revelationum
Hindemith, Paul - Mathis der Maler (Symphony)
Holst, Gustav - The Planets
Hummel, Johann Nepomuk - Piano Concerto No. 2
Ives, Charles - Three Places in New England
Janacek, Leos - Glagolitic Mass
Josquin Desprez - Missa Pange Lingua
Kabalevsky, Dmitri - The Comedians, for small orchestra (suite)
Khachaturian, Aram - Gayane
Kodaly, Zoltan - Hary Janos Suite
Korngold, Erich - Violin Concerto in D Major
Kreisler, Fritz - Liebesleid
Lalo, Edouardo - Symphonie espagnole
Lassus, Orlande de - Penitential Psalms of David
Lehar, Franz - Die lustige Witwe
Leoncavallo, Ruggiero - I Pagliacci
Leonin - Viderunt Omnes
Ligeti, Gyorgy - Atmospheres
Liszt, Franz - Piano Sonata in B Minor
Lully, Jean-Baptiste - Atys
Machaut, Guillaume de - Messe de Nostre Dame
Mahler, Gustav - Symphony No. 5
Martinu, Bohuslav - Double Concerto for 2 String Orchestras, Piano & Timpani
Mascagni, Pietro - Cavalleria Rusticana
Massenet, Jules - Werther
Mendelssohn, Felix - Midsummer Night's Dream Incidental Music
Messiaen, Olivier - Quartet for the End of Time
Meyerbeer, Giacomo - Les Huguenots
Milhaud, Darius - La Creation du Monde
Monteverdi, Claudio - Vespro della Beata Vergine
Mozart, Wolfgang Amadeus - Don Giovanni
Mussorgsky, Modest - Pictures at an Exhibition
Nielsen, Carl - Symphony No. 5
Offenbach, Jacques - The Tales of Hoffman
Pachelbel, Johann - Canon and Gigue in D Major
Paganini, Nicolo - Caprices for Solo Violin
Palestrina, Giovanni Pierluigi da - Missa Papae Marcelli
Part, Arvo - Tabula Rasa
Pergolesi, Giovanni Battista - Stabat Mater
Perotin - Beata Viscera
Piazzolla, Astor - Tango Suite for Two Guitars
Poulenc, Francis - Flute Sonata
Prokofiev, Sergei - Symphony No. 5
Puccini, Giacomo - La Boheme
Purcell, Henry - Dido and Aeneas
Rachmaninov, Sergei - Piano Concerto No. 2
Rameau, Jean-Philippe - Castor et Pollux
Rautavaara, Einojuhani - Cantus Arcticus "Concerto for Birds and Orchestra"
Ravel, Maurice - Daphnis et Chloe
Reger, Max - Introduction and Passacaglia in D Minor
Respighi, Ottorino - Pines of Rome
Rimsky-Korsakov, Nikolai - Scheherazade
Rodrigo, Joaquin - Concierto de Aranjuez
Rossini, Gioachino - The Barber of Seville
Saint-Saens, Camille - Symphony No. 3 "Organ"
Sarasate, Pablo Martin de - Zigeunerweisen
Satie, Erik - 3 Gymnopedies
Scarlatti, Domenico - Sonata in E, K.380, L.23 "Cortege"
Schnittke, Alfred - Concerto Grosso No. 1
Schoenberg, Arnold - Verklarte Nacht
Schubert, Franz - Winterreise
Schumann, Clara Josephine - Trio for Piano and Strings in G Minor
Schumann, Robert - Piano Concerto in A Minor
Schutz, Heinrich - Symphoniae Sacrae III, Op. 12
Scriabin, Alexander - Piano Sonata No. 5
Shostakovich, Dmitri - Symphony No. 10
Sibelius, Jean - Symphony No. 2
Smetana, Bedrich - Ma Vlast
Stockhausen, Karlheinz - Kontakte
Strauss, Johann, Jr. - The Blue Danube Waltz
Strauss, Richard - Till Eulenspiegel's Merry Pranks
Stravinsky, Igor - The Rite of Spring
Tallis, Thomas - Spem in alium
Tchaikovsky, Pyotr Ilyich - Symphony No. 6 "Pathetique"
Telemann, Georg Philipp - Overture-Suite for Recorder, Strings and Basso Continuo in A Minor, TV 55 no a 2
Tippett, Michael - A Child of Our Time
Vaughan Williams, Ralph - Fantasia on a Theme of Thomas Tallis
Verdi, Giuseppe - Otello
Victoria, Tomas Luis de - O Magnum Mysterium
Villa-Lobos, Heitor - Bachianas Brasileiras No. 5
Vivaldi, Antonio - Four Seasons
Wagner, Richard - Tristan und Isolde
Walton, William - Symphony No. 1
Weber, Carl Maria von - Der Freischutz
Webern, Anton - Five Movements for String Quartet
Wieniawski, Henryk - Violin Concerto No. 2
Wolf, Hugo - Morike Lieder

I welcome comments challenging the works I've decided to include here.

Johann Pachelbel

When Johann Pachelbel was 25 years old (in the year 1678), he began working as an organist at a Protestant church in Erfurt, Germany, called Predigerkirche ("Preacher's Church"). He remained there for 12 years. During this time, he composed his now-famous Canon in D.

Predigerkirche's official website has many photos ("Bilder") of the church that you can view here. Seeing the beauty of the architecture and of the organ, it is not hard to imagine how Pachelbel was inspired to compose music of such elegance and optimism. I like to think of the Canon in D as a timeless artifact containing something of the essence of the church and of Pachelbel's experiences working there.

Vivaldi's Tour

The Baroque era is the earliest period of classical music from which music is still widely listened to and performed today (although there definitely remains interest in Renaissance as well as earlier music). Most of the famous Baroque composers all lived around the same time. Below is a time line showing when they lived.


All of these composers passed away before the United States of America was born. And during their lives, people still got around either on foot or on horses or by small boat. I wonder which Vivaldi would be more surprised to discover were he to tour the world of the 21st century: (1) the modern system of ground transportation, or (2) his music being rated and discussed on youtube. I imagine the latter would be the more amazing discovery.

Here is one of my favorite works by Vivaldi. I particularly like the third movement (2:45 - 4:35). (I might not have discovered this and many other works without the Internet.)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f9ZqcpMRLis

Zipf's Law

In response to a comment I received for the post "What's on the Radio?, Part 2," yes, the data is largely Zipfian.

Zipf's Law is an empirical law that states that given some collection of natural language utterances, the frequency of any word is inversely proportional to its frequency rank. This means that in a body of text such as all the words contained in this blog, the most frequent word ("the") should appear about twice as often as the second most frequent word; the second most frequent word should appear about twice as often as the fourth most frequent word; and so on.

Something that has intrigued statisticians for decades is the fact that many types of data besides natural language data also can be well approximated by Zipfian distributions. The test to see if some data is Zipfian is to plot the logarithm of the frequency by the logarithm of the rank. If the resulting data points tend to fall along a straight line, then the data is Zipfian.

In this case, which is only analogous to the natural language domain, frequency of words is replaced by airtime of composers. We see in the scatter plot above that the data is in fact Zipfian for a large range of values.

Perahia's Schubert

One of my favorite works for solo piano is Schubert's Impromptu in G flat major, Op. 90, No. 3. I listened to several different versions on youtube before I discovered this one:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_qDzTcVpYB0

The performer is Murray Perahia, and his interpretation is dynamic but disciplined. When I listen I hear the music and not the performance. This work, performed in such a lovely way, is a good example of the beauty of early Romanticism in music. The strength and diversity of emotions it evokes surpasses that of most of the music that came before it.

What's on the Radio?, Part 2

The above chart shows the percentage of total airtime on Classical WETA dedicated to composers 1 through N (for N = 1..50), for the year 2009 (ending on June 10th), where each composer is ranked according to the airtime dedicated to his or her music as per the previous post.

This chart shows that the top 4 composers (Mozart, Beethoven, Haydn, and Bach) account for over 25% of all airtime. Furthermore, the top 11 composers account for 50% of all airtime, and the top 50 composers account for 80% of all airtime.

The chart below is the same as the one above, but with N ranging fully from 1 to 368.

What's on the Radio?

I wanted to know what kind of music is played on Washington D.C.'s classical music radio station, Classical WETA 90.9 FM. And now, 600 lines of Java (computer) code and two days later, I have the answer.

Classical WETA began publishing online its daily playlists during November of 2008. Using this web resource, I wrote some code that creates a database of sorts filled with information about all the music aired from January 1, 2009, to today, June 10, 2009 (this range spans 161 days). Once I had the database, I wrote some more code that computes some basic statistics. I also did some data management so that the results are pretty accurate.

Below are the results. The first number after a composer's name is the total airtime for that composer, rounded to the nearest hour. The number in parentheses is the number of times that composer came on the radio. From this, we can see that Classical WETA favors older composers and airs very little music by some famous modern composers (see Prokofiev, Bartók, Shostakovich, and Stravinsky, for examples). Also, it always seemed like Telemann came on quite often, and these results confirm my suspicion.

Edit: After seeing the list below, a friend pointed out to me that if you tune in at a random time, there is about a 50% chance you will hear music by someone in the top 10 of the list (Mozart, Beethoven, Haydn, Bach, Dvorák, Mendelssohn, Brahms, Tchaikovsky, Schubert, and Handel).

Composer Total Airtimes on Classical WETA 90.9 FM for the Year 2009:

1. Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, 313 hours (890 selections)
2. Ludwig van Beethoven, 254 hours (625 selections)
3. Joseph Haydn, 236 hours (683 selections)
4. Johann Sebastian Bach, 213 hours (810 selections)
5. Antonin Dvorák, 158 hours (409 selections)
6. Felix Mendelssohn, 151 hours (481 selections)
7. Johannes Brahms, 140 hours (316 selections)
8. Piotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky, 137 hours (329 selections)
9. Franz Schubert, 108 hours (275 selections)
10. George Frideric Handel, 101 hours (407 selections)
11. Georg Philipp Telemann, 99 hours (407 selections)
12. Antonio Vivaldi, 98 hours (487 selections)
13. Frédéric Chopin, 89 hours (351 selections)
14. Robert Schumann, 81 hours (204 selections)
15. Sergei Rachmaninoff, 70 hours (155 selections)
16. Camille Saint-Saëns, 57 hours (181 selections)
17. Richard Wagner, 48 hours (126 selections)
18. Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov, 45 hours (136 selections)
19. Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach, 40 hours (159 selections)
20. Louis Spohr, 33 hours (96 selections)
21. Johann Strauss, Jr., 33 hours (172 selections)
22. Carl Maria von Weber, 31 hours (139 selections)
23. Gioacchino Rossini, 29 hours (158 selections)
24. Johann Nepomuk Hummel, 28 hours (95 selections)
25. Edvard Grieg, 27 hours (96 selections)
26. Georges Bizet, 26 hours (89 selections)
27. Johann Christian Bach, 26 hours (120 selections)
28. Gabriel Fauré, 25 hours (86 selections)
29. Max Bruch, 25 hours (58 selections)
30. Alexander Glazunov, 24 hours (82 selections)
31. Hector Berlioz, 21 hours (58 selections)
32. Ottorino Respighi, 21 hours (45 selections)
33. Claude Debussy, 19 hours (84 selections)
34. Michael Haydn, 19 hours (63 selections)
35. Maurice Ravel, 19 hours (74 selections)
36. Giuseppe Verdi, 18 hours (35 selections)
37. Luigi Boccherini, 17 hours (69 selections)
38. Domenico Scarlatti, 17 hours (100 selections)
39. Giacomo Puccini, 16 hours (28 selections)
40. Carl Stamitz, 16 hours (58 selections)
41. John Field, 15 hours (33 selections)
42. Franz Liszt, 15 hours (54 selections)
43. Johann David Heinichen, 14 hours (66 selections)
44. Franz Danzi, 14 hours (43 selections)
45. Bedrich Smetana, 14 hours (61 selections)
46. Jean Sibelius, 13 hours (51 selections)
47. Nicolò Paganini, 13 hours (39 selections)
48. Léo Delibes, 13 hours (38 selections)
49. Aram Khachaturian, 12 hours (44 selections)
50. Jacques Offenbach, 12 hours (56 selections)
51. Vasily Sergeyevich Kalinnikov, 12 hours (19 selections)
52. Johan Halvorsen, 11 hours (51 selections)
53. Henryk Wieniawski, 11 hours (51 selections)
54. Jean-Philippe Rameau, 11 hours (36 selections)
55. Giuseppe Torelli, 11 hours (77 selections)
56. Modest Mussorgsky, 10 hours (25 selections)
57. Johan Helmich Roman, 10 hours (42 selections)
58. Edouard Lalo, 10 hours (21 selections)
59. Antonio Bazzini, 10 hours (52 selections)
60. Richard Strauss, 10 hours (31 selections)
61. Johann Baptist Georg Neruda, 10 hours (44 selections)
62. Ralph Vaughan Williams, 10 hours (41 selections)
63. William Boyce, 9 hours (51 selections)
64. Franz von Suppé, 9 hours (56 selections)
65. Gaetano Donizetti, 9 hours (4 selections)
66. Alexander Borodin, 8 hours (38 selections)
67. Mauro Giuliani, 8 hours (23 selections)
68. Bernhard Henrik Crusell, 8 hours (22 selections)
69. Tomaso Albinoni, 8 hours (32 selections)
70. Mikhail Glinka, 8 hours (43 selections)
71. Silvius Leopold Weiss, 8 hours (35 selections)
72. Ignaz Joseph Pleyel, 8 hours (31 selections)
73. Johann Christoph Friedrich Bach, 8 hours (35 selections)
74. Frederick the Great of Prussia, 8 hours (33 selections)
75. Fritz Kreisler, 8 hours (49 selections)
76. Arthur Foote, 8 hours (15 selections)
77. Carl Friedrich Abel, 7 hours (35 selections)
78. Giovanni Gabrieli, 7 hours (43 selections)
79. Leos Janácek, 7 hours (23 selections)
80. Giuseppe Antonio Brescianello, 7 hours (39 selections)
81. Chevalier de Saint-Georges, 7 hours (23 selections)
82. Francois-Adrien Boieldieu, 7 hours (23 selections)
83. Sir Arthur Sullivan, 7 hours (36 selections)
84. Johann Wilhelm Wilms, 7 hours (14 selections)
85. Jean-Féry Rebel, 7 hours (31 selections)
86. Pablo de Sarasate, 7 hours (34 selections)
87. Francesco Maria Veracini, 6 hours (24 selections)
88. Charles Avison, 6 hours (30 selections)
89. Giuseppe Tartini, 6 hours (26 selections)
90. Percy Aldridge Grainger, 6 hours (35 selections)
91. John Marsh, 6 hours (28 selections)
92. Daniel-François-Esprit Auber, 6 hours (31 selections)
93. Pierre Rode, 6 hours (22 selections)
94. Sergei Prokofiev, 6 hours (22 selections)
95. Sir Charles Hubert Hastings Parry, 6 hours (18 selections)
96. Henry Purcell, 6 hours (28 selections)
97. Emmanuel Chabrier, 6 hours (33 selections)
98. Etienne-Nicolas Mehul, 6 hours (19 selections)
99. Alexander Nikolayevitch Scriabin, 6 hours (16 selections)
100. Ferdinando Carulli, 6 hours (20 selections)
101. Sir Edward Elgar, 5 hours (19 selections)
102. Charles Gounod, 5 hours (22 selections)
103. Antonio Salieri, 5 hours (25 selections)
104. Franz Clement, 5 hours (10 selections)
105. John Knowles Paine, 5 hours (17 selections)
106. Peter von Winter, 5 hours (15 selections)
107. Gustav Mahler, 5 hours (8 selections)
108. Christian Cannabich, 5 hours (23 selections)
109. Louis Moreau Gottschalk, 5 hours (19 selections)
110. Leonardo Leo, 5 hours (20 selections)
111. Dmitri Kabalevsky, 5 hours (22 selections)
112. Leopold Mozart, 5 hours (25 selections)
113. Thomas Augustine Arne, 5 hours (24 selections)
114. Benjamin Godard, 5 hours (14 selections)
115. Johann Christoph Bach, 5 hours (21 selections)
116. Domenico Cimarosa, 5 hours (17 selections)
117. Francois Couperin, 4 hours (25 selections)
118. Emil Waldteufel, 4 hours (25 selections)
119. Jean-Joseph Cassanéa de Mondonville, 4 hours (28 selections)
120. Charles-Auguste de Bériot, 4 hours (11 selections)
121. Ernö von Dohnányi, 4 hours (11 selections)
122. Edward MacDowell, 4 hours (11 selections)
123. Franz Anton Hoffmeister, 4 hours (14 selections)
124. Christoph Willibald Gluck, 4 hours (13 selections)
125. Francois Devienne, 4 hours (14 selections)
126. Franz Krommer, 4 hours (13 selections)
127. Johann Pachelbel, 4 hours (18 selections)
128. Vincenzo Bellini, 4 hours (6 selections)
129. William Grant Still, 4 hours (14 selections)
130. Muzio Clementi, 4 hours (12 selections)
131. Francesco Ciléa, 3 hours (1 selections)
132. George Gershwin, 3 hours (14 selections)
133. John Adams, 3 hours (1 selections)
134. Josef Myslivecek, 3 hours (17 selections)
135. John Playford, 3 hours (21 selections)
136. Juan Crisóstomo de Arriaga, 3 hours (8 selections)
137. Nicholas Maw, 3 hours (1 selections)
138. Graf Unico Wilhelm van Wassenaer, 3 hours (15 selections)
139. Dmitri Shostakovich, 3 hours (20 selections)
140. Mikhail Ippolitov-Ivanov, 3 hours (18 selections)
141. Traditional, 3 hours (15 selections)
142. Benjamin Britten, 3 hours (13 selections)
143. Luys de Narvaez, 3 hours (13 selections)
144. Samuel Wesley, 3 hours (14 selections)
145. Johann Friedrich Fasch, 3 hours (11 selections)
146. César Franck, 3 hours (7 selections)
147. Georges Enescu, 3 hours (12 selections)
148. James Hook, 3 hours (10 selections)
149. Sir Edward German, 3 hours (11 selections)
150. Carl Nielsen, 3 hours (12 selections)
151. Antonio Rosetti, 3 hours (9 selections)
152. Anton Bruckner, 3 hours (4 selections)
153. Karl Goldmark, 2 hours (12 selections)
154. Gabriel Pierne, 2 hours (12 selections)
155. Elias Parish Alvars, 2 hours (5 selections)
156. Joseph Fiala, 2 hours (8 selections)
157. Marc-Antoine Charpentier, 2 hours (15 selections)
158. Domenico Caudioso, 2 hours (9 selections)
159. Georg Caspar Schurmann, 2 hours (6 selections)
160. Archduke Rudolf of Austria, 2 hours (8 selections)
161. Jan Zach, 2 hours (8 selections)
162. Carl Michael Ziehrer, 2 hours (8 selections)
163. Mily Balakirev, 2 hours (12 selections)
164. Robert Ballard, 2 hours (7 selections)
165. Franz Lehar, 2 hours (10 selections)
166. Renaissance Music, 2 hours (10 selections)
167. Adriano Banchieri, 2 hours (7 selections)
168. Ludwig August Lebrun, 2 hours (8 selections)
169. Victor Herbert, 2 hours (8 selections)
170. Adolphe Adam, 2 hours (14 selections)
171. Giovanni Bottesini, 2 hours (10 selections)
172. Thomas Linley, 2 hours (7 selections)
173. Leonard Bernstein, 2 hours (14 selections)
174. George Chadwick, 2 hours (7 selections)
175. Josef Strauss, 2 hours (12 selections)
176. Friedrich von Flotow, 2 hours (6 selections)
177. Nicola Fiorenza, 2 hours (9 selections)
178. Gasparo Spontini, 2 hours (12 selections)
179. Samuel Barber, 2 hours (9 selections)
180. Salomon Jadassohn, 2 hours (6 selections)
181. Franz Lachner, 2 hours (6 selections)
182. Vincent d' Indy, 2 hours (4 selections)
183. Schubert/Liszt, 2 hours (12 selections)
184. Bach/Busoni, 2 hours (5 selections)
185. Agustin Barrios Mangore, 2 hours (4 selections)
186. Ignaz Paderewski, 2 hours (5 selections)
187. Johann Martini, 2 hours (5 selections)
188. Wilhelm Friedemann Bach, 2 hours (9 selections)
189. Gottfried Finger, 2 hours (4 selections)
190. John Stanley, 2 hours (6 selections)
191. Nicola Porpora, 2 hours (5 selections)
192. Clara Wieck Schumann, 2 hours (4 selections)
193. Marin Marais, 2 hours (11 selections)
194. Traditional Irish, 2 hours (4 selections)
195. Giovanni Paisiello, 2 hours (3 selections)
196. Cecile Chaminade, 2 hours (9 selections)
197. Hugo Alfvén, 2 hours (9 selections)
198. Philipp Heinrich Erlebach, 2 hours (5 selections)
199. Louis Ganne, 1 hours (10 selections)
200. Anton Stamitz, 1 hours (5 selections)
201. Baldassare Galuppi, 1 hours (7 selections)
202. Claudio Monteverdi, 1 hours (9 selections)
203. Sir Charles Villiers Stanford, 1 hours (4 selections)
204. Franz Benda, 1 hours (5 selections)
205. Johann Christian Schieferdecker, 1 hours (7 selections)
206. Kalervo Tuukkanen, 1 hours (11 selections)
207. Jean-Joseph Mouret, 1 hours (3 selections)
208. Johann Strauss, Sr., 1 hours (8 selections)
209. Franz Berwald, 1 hours (8 selections)
210. Franz Xaver Wolfgang Mozart, 1 hours (3 selections)
211. James Brooks, 1 hours (5 selections)
212. Joseph Lanner, 1 hours (7 selections)
213. Rudolf Friml, 1 hours (7 selections)
214. Zoltan Kodaly, 1 hours (4 selections)
215. Albert Franz Doppler, 1 hours (6 selections)
216. Ferdinand David, 1 hours (6 selections)
217. Max Reger, 1 hours (6 selections)
218. Anton Rubinstein, 1 hours (7 selections)
219. William Byrd, 1 hours (6 selections)
220. Alessandro Marcello, 1 hours (5 selections)
221. François Rebel and François Francoeur, 1 hours (1 selections)
222. Jacques de Saint-Luc, 1 hours (5 selections)
223. Manuel de Falla, 1 hours (9 selections)
224. Padre Antonio Soler, 1 hours (8 selections)
225. Richard Addinsell, 1 hours (6 selections)
226. David Diamond, 1 hours (5 selections)
227. Engelbert Humperdinck, 1 hours (6 selections)
228. Felix Draeseke, 1 hours (4 selections)
229. Samuel Coleridge-Taylor, 1 hours (5 selections)
230. Jean-Baptiste Arban, 1 hours (7 selections)
231. Johann Joachim Quantz, 1 hours (4 selections)
232. Enrique Granados, 1 hours (7 selections)
233. Franz Ignaz Beck, 1 hours (6 selections)
234. Tylman Susato, 1 hours (7 selections)
235. Heinrich Marschner, 1 hours (6 selections)
236. Ernest Bloch, 1 hours (5 selections)
237. Iosif Ivanovici, 1 hours (7 selections)
238. John Dowland, 1 hours (5 selections)
239. John Mahon, 1 hours (4 selections)
240. Jules Massenet, 1 hours (6 selections)
241. Otto Nicolai, 1 hours (6 selections)
242. Thomas Morley, 1 hours (8 selections)
243. Johan Wagenaar, 1 hours (5 selections)
244. Michele Mascitti, 1 hours (7 selections)
245. Nikolai Medtner, 1 hours (3 selections)
246. Joseph Joachim, 1 hours (1 selections)
247. Albert Roussel, 1 hours (3 selections)
248. Eric Satie, 1 hours (6 selections)
249. Strauss Family, 1 hours (4 selections)
250. Daniel Bacheler, 1 hours (5 selections)
251. Francesco Xaverio Geminiani, 1 hours (5 selections)
252. Filippo Gragnani, 1 hours (3 selections)
253. Gabriel Diaz, 1 hours (5 selections)
254. John Alden Carpenter, 1 hours (4 selections)
255. Georg Matthias Monn, 1 hours (2 selections)
256. John Harbison, 1 hours (2 selections)
257. Hermann Bellstedt, 1 hours (4 selections)
258. Arcangelo Corelli, 1 hours (4 selections)
259. Igor Stravinsky, 1 hours (6 selections)
260. Joseph Rheinberger, 1 hours (1 selections)
261. Emil Nikolaus von Reznicek, 1 hours (6 selections)
262. Francois Borne, 1 hours (3 selections)
263. Scott Joplin, 1 hours (4 selections)
264. Francis Poulenc, 1 hours (3 selections)
265. Josef Rheinberger, 1 hours (3 selections)
266. Joseph Canteloube, 1 hours (4 selections)
267. Anton Arensky, 1 hours (1 selections)
268. Eduard Strauss, 1 hours (4 selections)
269. Hans Sitt, 1 hours (4 selections)
270. Georg Christoph Wagenseil, 1 hours (3 selections)
271. Wilhelm Stenhammar, 1 hours (4 selections)
272. Alban Berg, 1 hours (1 selections)
273. André Previn, 1 hours (1 selections)
274. Charles Tomlinson Griffes, 1 hours (2 selections)
275. Thomas Shaw, 1 hours (2 selections)
276. Ambroise Thomas, 1 hours (3 selections)
277. Henry Charles Litolff, 1 hours (3 selections)
278. Jeno Hubay, 1 hours (4 selections)
279. Arnold Schoenberg, 0 hours (1 selections)
280. Bach/Rachmaninoff, 0 hours (3 selections)
281. Libby Larsen, 0 hours (1 selections)
282. Reinhold Glière, 0 hours (4 selections)
283. Aaron Copland, 0 hours (3 selections)
284. Claude Gervaise, 0 hours (3 selections)
285. Frederick Delius, 0 hours (1 selections)
286. Gerald Finzi, 0 hours (1 selections)
287. Kosaku Yamada, 0 hours (1 selections)
288. Malcolm Arnold, 0 hours (3 selections)
289. Eugène Ysaÿe, 0 hours (2 selections)
290. John Ireland, 0 hours (1 selections)
291. Anonymous, 0 hours (3 selections)
292. Kevin Puts, 0 hours (1 selections)
293. Thomas Tallis, 0 hours (1 selections)
294. Albert Zabel, 0 hours (2 selections)
295. Horatio Parker, 0 hours (2 selections)
296. Miklos Rozsa, 0 hours (2 selections)
297. Pietro Locatelli, 0 hours (1 selections)
298. Astor Piazzolla, 0 hours (1 selections)
299. Johann Peter Salomon, 0 hours (2 selections)
300. Toru Takemitsu, 0 hours (1 selections)
301. Cesar Cui, 0 hours (3 selections)
302. Hans Neusidler, 0 hours (2 selections)
303. Roy Harris, 0 hours (1 selections)
304. Arno Babadjanian, 0 hours (1 selections)
305. Béla Bartók, 0 hours (2 selections)
306. Ernest Chausson, 0 hours (1 selections)
307. Gustav Holst, 0 hours (2 selections)
308. Niels Wilhelm Gade, 0 hours (2 selections)
309. Frank Martin, 0 hours (1 selections)
310. Ferde Grofé, 0 hours (2 selections)
311. Johann Gottlieb Janitsch, 0 hours (1 selections)
312. Virgil Thomson, 0 hours (2 selections)
313. William Bolcom, 0 hours (1 selections)
314. Ellen Taaffe Zwilich, 0 hours (1 selections)
315. Johann III Strauss, 0 hours (2 selections)
316. Jean-Baptiste Lully, 0 hours (2 selections)
317. Moritz Moszkowski, 0 hours (2 selections)
318. Somei Satoh, 0 hours (1 selections)
319. Gordon Jacob, 0 hours (1 selections)
320. György Sándor Ligeti, 0 hours (1 selections)
321. Rossini/Britten, 0 hours (1 selections)
322. Benedetto Marcello, 0 hours (1 selections)
323. Bright Sheng, 0 hours (1 selections)
324. Fanny Mendelssohn-Hensel, 0 hours (1 selections)
325. Howard Hanson, 0 hours (1 selections)
326. Lars-Erik Larsson, 0 hours (1 selections)
327. Paul Dukas, 0 hours (1 selections)
328. Saro/Bruell, 0 hours (2 selections)
329. Stanley Myers, 0 hours (1 selections)
330. Alonso Mudarra, 0 hours (1 selections)
331. Alphonse Hasselmans, 0 hours (1 selections)
332. Amy Beach, 0 hours (1 selections)
333. Graeme Koehne, 0 hours (1 selections)
334. Harold Shapero, 0 hours (1 selections)
335. Irving Fine, 0 hours (1 selections)
336. Johannes Ockeghem, 0 hours (1 selections)
337. Maria-Theresia von Paradis, 0 hours (1 selections)
338. Amilcare Ponchielli, 0 hours (1 selections)
339. Giles Franaby, 0 hours (1 selections)
340. Hamilton Harty, 0 hours (1 selections)
341. Henri Herz, 0 hours (1 selections)
342. Jan Dismas Zelenka, 0 hours (2 selections)
343. Pietro Mascagni, 0 hours (1 selections)
344. Schubert/Prokofiev, 0 hours (1 selections)
345. Strauss/Schulz-Evler, 0 hours (1 selections)
346. Adolph Martin Foerster, 0 hours (1 selections)
347. Andrea Gabrieli, 0 hours (1 selections)
348. Arthur Frackenpohl, 0 hours (1 selections)
349. Louis Joseph Herold, 0 hours (1 selections)
350. Michigo Miyagi, 0 hours (1 selections)
351. Erich Wolfgang Korngold, 0 hours (1 selections)
352. Henry Kimball Hadley, 0 hours (1 selections)
353. Hugo Wolf, 0 hours (1 selections)
354. Josef Fiala, 0 hours (1 selections)
355. Juventino Rosas, 0 hours (1 selections)
356. Karol Kurpinski, 0 hours (1 selections)
357. Emil von Reznicek, 0 hours (1 selections)
358. John Philip Sousa, 0 hours (1 selections)
359. Pietro Lappi, 0 hours (1 selections)
360. Ron Nelson, 0 hours (1 selections)
361. Samuel Scheidt, 0 hours (1 selections)
362. Schubert/Rachmaninoff, 0 hours (1 selections)
363. Alessandro Stradella, 0 hours (1 selections)
364. Johann Jr & Josef Strauss, 0 hours (1 selections)
365. Marcel Tournier, 0 hours (1 selections)
366. Rachmaninoff (arr. Kreisler), 0 hours (1 selections)
367. Vivian Fung, 0 hours (1 selections)
368. Francis Lopez, 0 hours (1 selections)

A New Mythology

To me, the closest thing we have to the ancient Greeks' mythological heroes in our current culture is the classical music composers. More than great scientists, more than great painters or writers, the lives and works of the great composers is the stuff of legend. We often hear of the "trinity" of Bach, Mozart, and Beethoven. We see images of Debussy riding the waves of the sea. We hear accounts of Rachmaninov's towering height and large hands, of Liszt's virtuosity at the keyboard, of Elgar's mustache.

There simply is not the same degree of general interest in someone like Howard Florey, who played a key part in the discovery of penicillin, as there is in Ludwig van Beethoven. Granted, some writers such as Shakespeare and Austen are quite revered, but how can they compete with Beethoven for mythological status when the very concept represented by Beethoven's name is grounded partly in his musical setting of Ode To Joy?

While the lives and personalities of the great composers of classical music might become increasingly mythicized in the future, we can rest easy knowing that their works will be left intact.

Rejoice, O Virgin

I would like to share this performance of Rachmaninov's Bogoroditse Devo (Rejoice, O Virgin), from Vespers. I sang this song with a large choir over 10 years ago, and I can still remember the goosebumps... If you have sung it, you probably know what I mean. It has a unique power for performers.

The Melbourne University Choral Society (MUCS):

The Triple Concerto

Beethoven's Concerto for Violin, Cello, and Piano in C Major (the "Triple Concerto") does not, to my mind, evoke images of Spring, of celebrations, or of anything else, for that matter. Rather, it is a witty, inventive musical world that does not seem to strive at any connection with the actual world. Its purpose is to surprise, delight, and entertain. Some would think that this type of music is the province of pop artists, but I would say it depends on what you're looking for. It is true that pop music offers different types of interesting "sounds" that are achieved using various instruments (including the human voice) and methods of audio processing, but when it comes to the delights we experience purely from the internal logic of a piece of music, classical music excels--the Triple Concerto being a fine example.

Jute Weaving

Here is just one of many possible jute weaving patterns, the "plain weave." The question I'd like to ask is: How much of this image would you have to see before you "understood" that the strands of jute formed a plain weave pattern?

First, suppose you were given the following images that were cut out from the larger, original image (and magnified):

Based on these, you would be unable to understand much about the original image as a whole. In fact, even if you were given hundreds of images like these, you would face the same difficulty.

Now, suppose you were given the following images:

Seeking a parsimonious explanation, you might indeed be inclined to suspect a plain weave pattern based on this pair of images. Furthermore, the more images like these you saw, your confidence in your plain weave guess would increase.

Now, suppose you were given the following image:

At this point, it is undeniable that at least part of the image exhibits a plain weave pattern. You might even say it is likely that the plain weave pattern continues for some distance beyond the borders of this image.

Finally, if you were able to see the entire image (the image located at the top of this post), then of course there would be no question that the image contains a plain weave pattern (assuming you trust your senses).

Listening to classical music can be like trying to surmise a jute weaving pattern given sets of increasingly informative images representing but pieces of the entire pattern. The first time you listen to a work, even if you pay close attention, your brain might only reward you with a bunch of small images like the ones included in the first pair above. Upon subsequent listens, your brain might start giving you a few images like the ones in the second pair. Eventually, you arrive finally at an understanding of the work as a whole. This can require great effort, particularly if your brain is not as yet trained to start feeding you broader images of the work during the first one or two listens. However, having put in the effort, the reward at the end is a deep understanding of the work's form. Having gained this understanding, you also will have experienced the work's meaning and the emotions that come along with that meaning, just as you can look on at the plain weave pattern and marvel at its more subjective qualities, which include its beautiful simplicity and its technological practicality.

In general, the forms and associated meanings to be discovered in works of classical music are relatively intricate and complex and therefore can be difficult to uncover. However, because complex forms are often useful in communicating important, sophisticated, and sometimes subtle ideas, classical music occupies an important place in the music world. Fortunately, the journey toward uncovering a work's form and meaning can be a rewarding one, similar to how some of the smaller images extracted from the larger image of the plain weave pattern can themselves be interesting to observe.

The Best-Kept Secret of the IRS

When you phone the IRS, they first put you on hold for about 10-15 minutes. Then, you talk to someone who transfers you to the appropriate office, and you go back on hold for another 5-10 minutes (this might happen more than once). So, what do you get to listen to while waiting? Well, I made two phone calls during April, and both times the playlist was as follows:

1) Waltz of the Flowers from Tchaikovsky's Nutcracker Suite
2) The first movement (Allegro) from Mozart's Eine Kleine Nachtmusik
Repeat.

I have to give the IRS credit, as I can't think of any other tunes I'd rather listen to while on hold for so long. (Also, I should mention that both times they answered my questions fully and professionally.)

Sophistication

I am currently reading The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoevsky, translated from the Russian by Pevear & Volokhonsky. It is my third attempt, and this time I suspect I will finish it. I can say only now with certainty that I did not fully appreciate the novel the first two times around. It took faith in critics and in friends, multiple friends, to keep me interested enough to return to it a third time. For whatever reason, I am now prepared to notice the genius of the text. I wonder which of my life experiences in the last couple of years prepared me for this novel?

I write this here because the same thing happens in classical music and, I believe, in any art. As we gain life experience, we tend to understand and appreciate more works of art. And we tend to understand works we enjoyed before in more profound ways. (The great artist is always waiting for everyone else to catch up.)

I imagine there are people who have experienced the essences of much of what is commonly available to all humans possessing the requisite amount of intellect. This is what is meant by the term "sophisticated." Life for these people must be extraordinary, for they get to enjoy the works of geniuses from far away in time and in space. Goethe was probably one such person, and he wrote about the idea:

"And I want to savor in my inner self whatever's the lot of all mankind, to grasp the highest and deepest with my mind, to heap man's wells and woes on my bosom..." --Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (from Faust)

The Written Word

Another way of measuring composers' legacies is to see how much has been written about them. You could imagine taking every book ever written and then tallying up for each composer how many pages discuss that composer in some way. I did a study based on this idea, only I used just four books, each of which contains many sections where each section is devoted to a particular composer. The books I used all rank highly on amazon.com in terms of relevancy for the query, "classical music." They are:

1. The Rough Guide to Classical Music, by Staines et al.
2. The Essential Canon of Classical Music, by David Dubal
3. Classical Music: Third Ear: The Essential Listening Companion, by Alexander Morin
4. The NPR Guide to Building a Classical CD Collection: The 350 Essential Works, by Ted Libbey

These books cover 534 different composers. It turns out that Beethoven has the highest page count total with 133 pages between the four books. Here are the results, where the numbers following the names are page totals, summed up over all four books (in the case of a tie, I somewhat arbitrarily favored less recent composers):

Classical Music Composers

1. Beethoven 133
2. Mozart 125
3. Bach 104
4. Tchaikovsky 77
5. Handel 69
6. Brahms 65
7. Schubert 63
8. Strauss 60
9. Mahler 59
10. Schumann 52
11. Haydn 51
12. Stravinsky 45
13. Prokofiev 43
14. Wagner 41
15. Debussy 41
16. Chopin 39
17. Dvorak 38
18. Liszt 37
19. Verdi 37
20. Ravel 36
21. Mendelssohn 34
22. Shostakovich 34
23. Rachmaninov 33
24. Sibelius 33
25. Bartok 32
26. Britten 31
27. Elgar 30
28. Monteverdi 28
29. Schoenberg 25
30. Vivaldi 24
31. Berlioz 24
32. Janacek 24
33. Berg 24
34. Copland 24
35. Bruckner 23
36. Vaughan Williams 23
37. Puccini 22
38. Gershwin 22
39. Hindemith 22
40. Mussorgsky 21
41. Grieg 21
42. Donizetti 20
43. Nielsen 20
44. Franck 19
45. Rimsky-Korsakov 19
46. Saint-Saens 19
47. Faure 19
48. Weber 18
49. Rossini 18
50. Poulenc 17
51. Paganini 16
52. Bizet 16
53. Smetana 16
54. Scriabin 16
55. Schutz 15
56. Bellini 15
57. Borodin 15
58. Purcell 14
59. Offenbach 14
60. Falla 14
61. Barber 14
62. Gounod 13
63. Strauss II 13
64. Ives 13
65. Scarlatti 12
66. Wolf 12
67. Martinu 12
68. Villa-Lobos 12
69. Gluck 11
70. Bruch 11
71. Delius 11
72. Korngold 11
73. Respighi 10
74. Webern 10
75. Walton 10
76. Bernstein 10
77. Messiaen 10
78. Schnittke 10
79. Stockhausen 10
80. Gesualdo 9
81. Massenet 9
82. Leoncavallo 9
83. Holst 9
84. Bax 9
85. Grainger 9
86. Kodaly 9
87. Cage 9
88. Tippett 9
89. Carter 9
90. Boulez 9
91. Tallis 8
92. Rameau 8
93. Boccherini 8
94. Glazunov 8
95. Szymanowski 8
96. Zemlinsky 8
97. Mascagni 8
98. Honegger 8
99. Milhaud 8
100. Rodrigo 8
101. Ligeti 8
102. Glass 8
103. Palestrina 7
104. Byrd 7
105. Tartini 7
106. Hummel 7
107. Chabrier 7
108. Granados 7
109. Reger 7
110. Busoni 7
111. Lehar 7
112. Weill 7
113. Martin 7
114. Khachaturian 7
115. Orff 7
116. Lutoslawski 7
117. Takemitsu 7
118. Henze 7
119. Penderecki 7
120. Adams 7
121. Josquin Deprez 6
122. Lassus 6
123. Dowland 6
124. Lully 6
125. Charpentier 6
126. Buxtehude 6
127. Couperin 6
128. Pergolesi 6
129. Telemann 6
130. Bach, C.P.E. 6
131. Clementi 6
132. Cherubini 6
133. Glinka 6
134. Delibes 6
135. Sullivan 6
136. Satie 6
137. Dukas 6
138. Enescu 6
139. Bloch 6
140. Berio 6
141. Arnold 6
142. Davies 6
143. Part 6
144. Reich 6
145. Hildegard of Bingen 5
146. Machaut 5
147. Dufay 5
148. Ockeghem 5
149. Victoria 5
150. Gabrieli 5
151. Corelli 5
152. Scarlatti, A. 5
153. Albinoni 5
154. Strauss I 5
155. Meyerbeer 5
156. Berwald 5
157. Albeniz 5
158. Humperdinck 5
159. Duparc 5
160. Suk 5
161. Hartmann, K.A. 5
162. Varese 5
163. Gerhard 5
164. Durufle 5
165. Nono 5
166. Harrison 5
167. Kurtag 5
168. Rautavaara 5
169. Gubaidulina 5
170. Gorecki 5
171. Rihm 5

172 – 534. Others (1 – 4 pages each)

535+. Those who did not appear in any of the books