Who is, in your opinion, the world's worst reputable composer?

Yes, I'm sure you could teach Beethoven what music's really about....

I'm sure you could do an equally good job teaching Beethoven about music.

Justin! I disagree about Brahms. Some of his music is a little meandering, but then again some of his other stuff grabs you by the balls! I'm tempted to post a youtube video to back me up!

I recognise Williams' obvious sources of inspiration, but I can't say that the entire Star Wars score is derived from older works. The obvious bit is the end of Mars, and I'm sure lots of other bits of the score are inspired by this piece. But, some of the more abstract pieces like 'Attacking a star fleet', and 'The Asteroid Field' (think thats the one) don't sound particularly like anything that's been written before. (Ok, may be in the same/similar style as the golden age composers, but to me that's definitely a good thing).

I agree that Hermann, and Newman wrote some incredibly emotional, and incredibly competent music. For me, Williams is a bit of a mixed bag of a composer. Some of his stuff is as good as the great film composers (imo) but a lot of it isn't. However, the fact that he wrote the Star Wars score, ET, close encounters proves to me at least, that he is an exceptionally talented composer.

Btw, if you like 'golden age' composers, you should listen to some of Georges Auric's stuff and definitely listen to the score for on the waterfront.

PS. if you're going to talk about film composers ripping off other works, have you heard that podcast about James Horner? He actually lifts whole passages, mainly from Prokofiev it seems.

Brahms is absolutely utterly totally amazing! Many angry emoticons to those who disagree! :angry::angry::angry:

Brahms is absolutely utterly totally amazing! Many angry emoticons to those who disagree! :angry::angry::angry:

YouTube - Brahms - Piano Quartet No. 1 - IV - Pierre-Laurent Aimard

Worth watching, despite the crazy camerawork which actually makes it kind of hilarious in parts... Probably best to just listen then!

Ok. I'm caught on that argument about Brahms. I havn't really listened to all that much of him. But what I have heard was boring.

For Williams, I'm going to go back to the scores and listen to those and see what my view is. 'Till then...

He may be tallented, but that goesn't make him great or even good. I quote Mahler: "The longer you live and the more you learn, the more clearly you will feel the difference between the few men who are truly great and the mere virtuosi."

Brahms is absolutely utterly totally amazing! Many angry emoticons to those who disagree! :angry::angry::angry:

*Fistfight ensues*

No. As said above, Williams was not original.

That really flew above your head, didn't it?

*Fistfight ensues*

I'll gladly step into the ring both for Brahms and Koopman! I'm sure there were more than those we wanted to fight about but I forgot who.

Disclaimer: THIS IS AN OPINION!!!

I have listened to his score, almost the entire score from the Star Wars series. I write him off because he is ridiculiously unoriginal. Everything he writes was written before. Personally, the scores of Hermann and Alfred Newman are much richer and have more depth than Williams. Even Miklos Roszca (sp?) did more interesting stuff. A good composer takes something else and reworks it to make it sound new and fresh even though it may be the same thing, just in a different lens. Williams did not do this. He just copied the score from Mars, put it in 4/4 and got his check in the mail. Lucas should just have bought a CD of the LSO playing the Planets and used that. He would have saved a heck of a lot of money and 98% of movie-goers wouldn't have known the difference.

I love the way people base their entire opinions on Williams' music on Star Wars, as if that was the only thing he ever wrote.

I can literally say I have heard just about every single note John Williams wrote, both for the screen and for the concert stage. And to base an opinion on that single series of soundtracks is as faulty as basing an assessment of Webern on his Passacaglia opus 1 for orchestra.

And going by the age of many of the users of this forum, I suspect too many are basing their "star wars" opinions on the prequel trilogy soundtracks, which are, in my opinion, among Williams' most feeble attempts at film scoring.

By the way, Williams did far more in the Star Wars scores than copy a few measures of Holst and change the time signature. Saying anything like that is simply a sign of pure ignorance on the matter.

I'll gladly step into the ring both for Brahms and Koopman! I'm sure there were more than those we wanted to fight about but I forgot who.

Actually I think Brahms is ok. Sometimes. Koopman can still screw himself.

incredibly moving Brahms, I'm playing it in a recital soon

Brahms!!! Definately Brahms! There are billions of composers I haven't heard yet, but Brahms is the only one that makes me fall asleep. If I were a Furby, I'd say: "Booooring!". I'm not a Furby but I still say "Booooring!" to Brahms...

NOoooooo:O:O!!! Brahms is Amazing:angry:!!! All composers have dull moments but I love Brahms and how he phrases his music its unlike many other composers.

I love the way people base their entire opinions on Williams' music on Star Wars, as if that was the only thing he ever wrote.

I can literally say I have heard just about every single note John Williams wrote, both for the screen and for the concert stage. And to base an opinion on that single series of soundtracks is as faulty as basing an assessment of Webern on his Passacaglia opus 1 for orchestra.

And going by the age of many of the users of this forum, I suspect too many are basing their "star wars" opinions on the prequel trilogy soundtracks, which are, in my opinion, among Williams' most feeble attempts at film scoring.

By the way, Williams did far more in the Star Wars scores than copy a few measures of Holst and change the time signature. Saying anything like that is simply a sign of pure ignorance on the matter.

Well said!!:thumbsup:

I think lots of composers have been called lots of things during the course of history. It doesn't really prove much. (I definitely agree with your appreciation of Brahms, but I don't see why there has to be a showdown with Mahler. Brahms and Mahler are something totally different, each with some very interesting aspects.)

To those kids bashing Brahms, you'll appreciate him when you get older and realize that he's a lot better than Mahler and Holst.... Well, Holst at least, I think a lot of people are better than Holst. A lot of people on this site write better music than Holst.... Not that he didn't provide great music for the orchestral rep, not so much for band though, but isn't that the story of band anyway?

Anyway, judging from what I've been reading on this board, people bash on John Cage because they don't understand him, and I've seen bashing on Brahms because he's "boring" (I guess he doesn't have enough blatty trombone solis like Mahler and Tchaikovsky?) I really don't understand how one of the greats can just bashed like that with no real intelligent base. Christ, have you heard the piano concertos??? INCREDIBLE! Brahms symphonies are great as well.

No, see, the main problem with people bashing composers is they don't have enough information to even properly conduct a critique on them. Nevermind, of course, the fact that saying "When you grow older--" means absolutely nothing. I can as well say "When you grow older, you'll appreciate Jimi Hendrix and ditch all classical music" or "When you grow older, you'll know X and Y composers are the best, so now you're just a young ignorant fool."

I personally find Brahms to be rather stale sometimes, though I like some of his pieces, I'd much rather listen to Schumann (for example) or Hugo Wolf. The thing is, I've studied Brahms enough to get a good taste of what his music sounds like (to me) and so I think it's fine if I have an opinion about it. Likewise, because I've studied, I also know that there are a bunch of things he wrote that I really thought were cool.

No proper or well-studied opinion is black an white. It has nothing to do with "Growing older" unless that means actually studying composers and music altogether. People are generally happy to grow old listening to the same things their entire lives unless they feel it's simply not enough for them. I mean, it's not like its hard to find examples of people who die thinking Mozart is the greatest thing ever and thus they only listened to his music.

But the difference is, a composer shouldn't, can't, and must NOT be like that. A composer's opinion of something in the musical world should be one of the more complex and well-elaborated, because if you can't describe and elaborate on music then what the hell are you doing writing it?

And THAT surely comes with training and studying (which take time), but the attitude of responsibility probably should be there first or no matter how much studying goes on the person may still end up backwards.

To those kids bashing Brahms, you'll appreciate him when you get older and realize that he's a lot better than Mahler and Holst.... Well, Holst at least, I think a lot of people are better than Holst. A lot of people on this site write better music than Holst.... Not that he didn't provide great music for the orchestral rep, not so much for band though, but isn't that the story of band anyway?

As for Holst, I personally do not find a lot of his works particularly captivating, but the planets alone is enough to qualify him as a great composer in my opinion.

Someone may disagree with me, but I think B

"Grosse" Fuge. Perhaps it should be renamed as the "Gross" Fuge. Only one letter less.

WAGNER!!!

Booooo. Have you listened to the prelude for Parsifal? Oh man. I'm joking of course though. You're free to dislike whoever you want.

Threads like this seem counterproductive to me for the most part. Every composer/musician that has ever existed will have someone out there who absolutely hates them even if every other person in the world thinks their name should replace the word god in the dictionary.

I guess this kind of activity could be good to remind people how little criticism really matters though. Honestly, I'm just going to check out the composers that you people hate and possibly find some new stuff that I love. :P

Someone may disagree with me, but I think B

Someone may disagree with me, but I think B

Being someone who has had heard roughly half his total compositional output, I'm sketpical as to how much you've really heard to make a statement like that. Mind sharing what you've actually heard from him?

Note: This is not an attack. I just am really curious to know what sort of basis someone could have to not like him at all.

You are right, I've only heared few of his pieces and played also some (perhaps not his best ones), but I think I already know his style. If someone can recommend me a good Bart

You are right, I've only heared few of his pieces and played also some (perhaps not his best ones), but I think I already know his style. If someone can recommend me a good Bart

My favourite Bartok pieces are the Sonata for two pianos and percussion, Bluebeard's castle, concerto for orchestra, viola concerto, and his string quartets (can't decide which most). The three piano concertos too of course (I think I like the first one best). Maybe the Sonata for two pianos and percussion is my personal favourite.

For me Bartok is certainly amongst my favourite composers. And really high up there.

Oh, and Beethoven's Grosse Fuge is simply marvellous. I don't find the version for two pianos very interesting though, but I adore the string quartet.

John Cage, he was definitely one of the most important musical philosophers, but if I have to listen to someone argue that chance music is just as difficult to compose as traditional composing, I may scream.