Three Composers We Could Live Without 

I hesitate to name any composers I could live without, because in the past I would have written off several composers I later came to appreciate (C.P.E. Bach, for example). An interesting follow-up theme would be "Three Composers I USED to Think We Could Live Without".

I should also mention I have a Boulez CD. I only play it when guests have stayed over too long and need to go home.

Sometimes what you dislike can tell a lot more about you than what you like. Liking everything is akin to not liking anything. Criticizing other works often demands more objective explanation compared to blind praising which often lacks this objectivity. It takes a lot of guts to do this I'm assuming so hats off to you.

I love your take-no-prisoners approach to thinning the herd, Dave! 🎶 Over the centuries, the great god of HYPE has championed "miserable" and "wretched" music of many stripes, indeed! 😁

Anyone remember Richard Nanes? Amateur pianist and composer who issued oodles of CDs on his own label and then sent them to all the radio stations he could. Output is divided between tonal wallpaper and chromatic sludge.

Thanks to your video I discovered Wuorinen’s music, fantastic composer!

@7:14...Yes, I really needed to have my morning tea come out of the nostrils. Thanks Dave! X-D

I totally agree about Wuorinen. I’ll never forget being at a rehearsal at Texas Tech University many years ago when he was preparing the orchestra to perform a work he would guest conduct that evening. In the middle of total cacophony and chaos, he suddenly stopped the group and let loose a sneering scream at a trombone player, “E natural, not E flat!!” You could feel it across the room-the unspoken response, “Like it . . . matters?” Before or since, I've never encountered such vicious negation of both people and beauty. Ugly, Stupid, Contemptuous. An arrogant impostor. A fool who dressed himself in a polyester king's costume in order to get away with berating dukes and knights. Train wreck of a composer. Train wreck of a person.

I was dubious, but from the moment you mentioned Wuorinen I was eating out of your hand.

When Boulez died, all I could think of was the fact that when Schoenberg died, Boulez (aged 26) wrote a blistering essay entitled "Schoenberg is dead" writing off all of his music, in a thinly veiled attempt to promote himself, which evidently worked quite well. I think Schoenberg has stood the test of time better than Boulez.

Thank you. You know Desert Island Disks. Perhaps this episode could be rebranded as "Music you would take to hell with you."

You have a very mischievous streak...to say the least! 😀

I find it quite difficult to dismiss a composer. First, because I have not heard everything by that individual. Second, and more important, my taste has changed over time, and so I do not want to give up on anyone. As the years have passed, I have liked some composers more and more and others less and less.

You’re hilarious Dave! Thank you so much for your reviews

Happy to read "Cancrizans" and understand what Dave was referring to. Greetings from Argentina!

I'm curious about which classical Era composers you could do without? I just enjoy the variety of not hearing only the top tier but also the emulators who often have original things to say.

I periodically go back to Boulez's music thinking that the problem must be all mine for not trying hard enough with it. Initially I always find myself thinking, 'This is such interesting stuff, I really ought to make more effort'. And then by around 10 minutes in, my attention is starting to wander in a big way... Much though I love Walton, I could do without the official bombast like Crown Imperial. The absolute pits has to be Karl Jenkins, though. I once sang in a choir that was going to do a cantata by him. I lasted half way through a rehearsal before deciding that it was unspeakable crap and walking out.

RE your comment at 7:55 about who would be upset if Boulez's music disappeared, I think many music theory professors, authors and publishers of post-tonal music theory textbooks, and maybe some old-school musicologists (as opposed to practitioners of "new musicology") would be since Structures I and II for Two Pianos are often cited as exemplars of "integral serial" compositional technique.

Dear Dave, what is your opinion about the Concerto for guitar and orchestra op 72 by Bacarisse? I think it is a splendid party record.

This is a very funny video. I have a list of composers we could do without, but it keeps changing, so I'll restrain myself. But it's an interesting exercise just to think about it. Thanks.

Wow this topic really opened up the floodgates. I wonder if any other comments section has filled up so quickly! In a way, I have sympathy with the commenters who wish to be civil, perspicacious, and discreet. In another, much more visceral way, I couldn't have been happier for this list to start with Charles Wuorinen. I'll add John Eaton and Bernard Rands.

I like how Dave is playing the long game with Cancrizans, identifying his capricious and mutable nature and getting him to see reason. Keep on Him. That said, we all love and worship you, Cancrizans, and know you will do the right thing in the end. (I can butter him up, too.)

About 1979, with the Two Part Symphony, Wuorinen turned some sort of intangible corner and his music became very interesting to me. I don't care for his operas, but there are many pieces of his that I often return to and would not like to lose: Five, New York Notes, The Golden Dance, Trio for Bass Instruments, Genesis, Mass, Trombone Trio, Microsymphony, etc. So I can't write him off as you can. The guy I CAN write off is Elliott Carter -- I've never been able to get anything out of his music, with the exception of the very early tonal ballets. And I've tried countless times.

At first this topic sounded like fun, but after reading the comments it is more frightening. And wasn't the game actually to give the reason, why you could live without a given composer and not just dropping names?

I come across both known and obscure composers from all periods with whose works I am unfamiliar. I do them the courtesy of listening to a representative sampling and deciding if I want to hear more. There are a great many I find of no consequence, but I still wouldn't wish them to be expunged. After all, someone else might enjoy them. But, in the spirit of fun, I have listened to all 3 of these, and can't fault your selections.

I’m always ready to be contrary - but I can’t disagree here. They’d none of them be missed.

The donkey by the ears mate Thank for respecting your critical faculties and putting them above mere fashion and fads Couldnt agree with you more

It was until yesterday that I lived peacfully, depraved of Telemann's 3000 compositions. Should I embark now on a Telemann Crusade?

If you ever plan on going back to the old format and can only choose one work by Ligeti, I think it should be either Atmospheres or the Chamber Concerto. Atmospheres really is his breakout work and where he took the leap away from the serialized direction of music and decided to work with sounds directly. His micropolyphonic textures aren’t quite as refined at this stage, but the core essence is there. It reflects almost every criticism he has of serialism; that it’s a roundabout way to deal with working with sound, especially when the compositional goal does not match the intent of the serialist process. Atmospheres also brought in other facets of composition at the time such as taking a massive amount of inspiration from compositional techniques in electronic music. The chamber concerto is another potential good one because it really is a culmination of all of his work up to that point. He uses Net structures and maximally smooth harmonic and rhythmic additive processes from Ramifications. His micropolyphonic textures are slowed down and refined to be more melodic, but still retain that core element of goal orientation and gradual, almost imperceptible evolution of the soundscape. He uses quasi canonic structures such as in Lux Aeterna or Lontano to organize and regulate his micropolyphonic textures. Even that Pattern-Meccanico of the third movement can be seen as an outgrowth of his experiments in Poeme Symphonique, which is also seen in his second string quartet. This piece is part of his continuous explorations of how to create a new sense of musical syntax all over again for his musical age. There are so many things in here that make it a culmination of his work and make it worthy to be the one spared by the great god of classical music

I was very fond of Wuorinen's "Time's Enconium" when I was a teenager. Haven't listened to it in many years, but I suspect it isn't without merit.

OMG, I have several discs of Fasch and enjoy his music. I most certainly agree with the other two you picked.

When you said "Boulez", I actually physically *shuddered*. He's a marvelous conductor, especially of Debussy and Messiaen. His music is dry as sawdust. I had a composition teacher who thought Charles Wuorinen hung the Moon. My upper limit of a Wuorinen piece is about three minutes.

1:13: I thought you were about to say, "Charles...Ives" - and my heart stopped momentarily.

these three omitted won't winnow my cd collection, sadly

Some days ago I saw your program and I think you said something like "Parsifal is so boring", and even though I love "Parsifal" (maybe I love boring things) I had to laugh heartily because I think, your way to express your opinion fearlessly and humorously is very refreshing. Well, the discussion about composers that one could do without (as an individual or as humanity as a whole, that's a difference) is of course much fun, but such a discussion also encourages stupid resentment. By the way, I can accept your opinion towards Boulez, but nevertheless I really enjoy listening to some of his pieces, yes, actually. Maybe I just love boring things.

I could live without Riccardo Broschi, Carl Czerny and Philip Glass. I couldn't live without Bach, Beethoven and Messiaen.

Le marteau sans maitre.. I can live without it.

My personal favorite for oblivion has to be Thea Musgrave. In 1977, her Voice of Ariadne premiered at NY City Opera to jeers, catcalls, and thrown programs. The performance stopped.

Boulez, Spohr and Kotzwara

When Boulez heard Zappa he realized he was hearing music he wished he had composed and became an avocate of Frank’s and settled into conducting his work. Say what you might, Boulez had the humility to recognize genius.

When you said Boulez, I laughed out loud!

I have heard a couple of Wuorinen pieces that were downright likable (which always comes as a shock). And I basically agree that at its best Boulez is just shimmery atonal Debussy, but that’s kind of nice. The intellectual posturing and bullying that went along with it is more problematic than the music itself. But I wouldn’t be heartbroken to lose either. There’s no shortage of second tier baroque composers to delete. I particularly dislike the ones that are structurally flabby, and would probably get rid of Froberger or something, Or moving into the classical period, I can do without Dittersdorff even though he’s perfectly competent. If Cancrizans has a hunger for sheer volume of music deleted, it’s tempting to offer up Leif Segerstam, as the evil god gets to eliminate over 300 symphonies in one go.

Wuorinen and Boulez sure, I will go with that. Fasch however has written two works that I come back to from time to time, namely the lute concerto in d minor (FWV L:d1) and a sonata for four strings (FWV N:d3), also in d minor. The lute concerto is fun to listen to and even more fun to play. It has a W. F. Bach vibe to it with some italian influences. Give those a listen too, before giving them the final axe…

I expected to see Wuorinen on your list. But not all his work should be so easily dismissed. He was a hit-or-miss composer, but I recommend in particular the 3rd string quartet, the horn trio, the first piano quintet, and Time's Encomium.

Reminds me of a Tovey essay where he mentions a Viennese Whos Who journal circa1825 There were l think abour 7 Schuberts included but none of them were .the Franz we know and love today

The vast majority of composers who have lived languish in obscurity. Some are discovered by musicians who discover some quality in the music. If others also apprehend that quality over time, the music endures. The opinion of Old Father Time is the only one worth taking notice of.

More please!

Carter, Telemann, and Boulez. If the local classical station plays any more Tafelmusik, I’ll have to break the radio. Carter: I’ve tried to get his music and never succeeded. Boulez I can’t added anything to what you said.

What have you done David? Even Beethoven, Mozart, Brahms, Mahler, Schubert and Bruckner have been proposed by some participants here. This is literally apocalyptic. I suppose by tomorrow Chopin, Debussy and Ravel will also pop up. By the end of the week only Froberger and Solage will have survived.

Well, from classical period I'll suggest Bernhard Hendrik Crusell, I'm not sure what he wrote beside those clarinet concerti but I pretty sure we can leave without them. Now, regarding composer of questionable content I'm more than happy to nominate Sorabji and Granville Bantock for total obliteration

One general comment: good musicians will always try to find the music in even the worst composition. Which is fortunate for us rather average composers and possibly saving the awful ones. I was playing 2nd clarinet in an Asian festival orchestra a couple of years ago. The rehearsal began eventfully with the principal bass letting the conductor know that the harmonics that filled the opening page of his score were not playable on the instrument. After about ten minutes of back and forth, the conductor told the basses 'play whatever you like.' My principal turned to me mischievously and suggested that between a couple of score letters that he chose, in a loud passage of total cacophony, that we go aleatoric and see what happens. The principal oboe turned around and suggested that all the winds do this. The passage lasted about 30 seconds - we just had fun and tried to create something beautiful as we listened to each other and used our best improvisatory chops! I don't think a conductor with the greatest ear could have detected that we were not playing the scrawl on the page (which all of us had diligently studied and practiced.) The conductor smiled at the orchestra and said 'let's continue.' The solo oboe raised her hand and asked if he minded if we played the same passage again for security. No problem. We played it again playing as many of the right notes as we could. It didn't seem to make a difference - but we still did our best to give this composer the best chance for her music to be heard in as close a form to the score as we could.

considering multitudes of composers who couldn't even get a moment of attention, it looks like an honor to be included in this list 😂

Rather than banishing this composer or that, for the sake of efficiency, I wonder if we might select a note, say Ab, and ban its further use?

Fascinating question. It would be so easy to pick three fairly obscure or rarely played composers, but what about really major ones who are frequently played? There are some where I don't warm to many of their works - Elgar and Richard Strauss for example - but they still wrote enough great pieces that I would want to save them. Personally I wouldn't really miss Berlioz or Delius despite all their originality, to go alongside obvious options like Schoenberg, Webern, Stockhausen and Boulez.

Thanks for the warning.

I'm a complete Boulezbian. He would not be on my list. His music is lush, fruity, and visceral. But this is a fun exercise. My randomish three: Bruckner, Scarlatti, Gorecki

There’s really nobody I would name. First, your choices were all obscure to me - I have no idea if I’d miss their music since I don’t know it but might in the future. Second, I can already see most people are naming composers they just don’t like, and sometimes coming up with absurd reasons in an attempt to make it seem like a learned and analytical opinion rather than an instinctive one. I know of composers I can do without but I wouldn’t want to impact someone else who likes them by saying “go ahead, take it all away, who cares?” Just my 2¢.

I’m a trumpet player, and the Fasch is my wife’s favorite piece in my repertoire! I like it too. 😢

Dave, how could you have missed off Michael 'Important' Nyman? - Yeuk

I could live without Miaskovsky, without conductor Benjamin Zander and without Tihon Hrenikov.

Havergal Brian, Michael Finnissy, Hans Pfitzner

My three: Nepomuk Hummel, Morton Feldman and Boulez. An interesting exercise Dave thank you. Please reply if you think my three Worthy

Dear Dave, This is a first note....I've been watching you on my television, but this morning I decided to try RU-vid on my computer. First, it's "CLOYt-ens"...according to the French conductor to helmed our LAKME in Seattle; Second, when you gave the Thumbs Up to the Jochum Brahms Symphonies, you restored my faith in Music Critics. I first found the Jochum in a cassette box set on a remainder table and have loved it ever since....Thank you for many hours of great criticism.

Agree on Charles Wuorinen. I listened to a CD with his music many times (because Carla Bley mentioned the composer in an interview) but the music never meant anything to me. But then again, 99,9% of contemporary music is played, marketed and performed because the composer has to make a living.

Boulez: So much "Importance" accorded to so little. He was dictator of French music thru arrogant personality, theorizing + political connections, embodying all that's (still) wrong with Modernism. The tyranny of Modernism: the overthrow of traditional orthodoxies, bringing artistic freedom & new ideas, ended up substituting one dogma for another, another stylistic straight jacket, music for elites. Stravinsky said Music is essentially powerless to express anything. So why has it had such an "essential" role in the history of civilization?

If there was one composer I'd be happy never to listen to again (besides Boulez) it would have to be Sorabji. This lone figure produced vast piano compositions which are truly unlistenable. I tried once and had to lie down in a dark room for several hours to recover.

This sounds like the kind of "reverse" psychology that could appeal to a Cancrizans. 🤣 I have to give my "lizst" some thought.

Poor Charles; such a dour fellow. I was part of the cast in "Haroun and the Sea of Stories" at NYCO, and I always felt bad for the guy. He just never seemed very happy. The piece was fun, however...

Here are my three, with a brief explanation as to why in my not-so-humble opinion: Kaikhosru Shapurji Sorabji - Long winded sonic muck Karlheinz Stockhausen - Pretentious avant-garde that hasn't aged well at all Antonio Soler - Creator of rather bland and forgettable keyboard works.

For me it will have to be Sorabji, Mereaux and Spohr

'Hey, Cank....' 🤣

When he started to say "I think, personally..." I really thought he was about to say, "Purcell" (as in Henry) and wondered why he so disliked the composer of Dido and Aeneus

This is why folks are afraid of "classical music." The fear of liking a work an "expert" dismisses as trash and being embarrassed for liking that work.

Can I suggest Hummel and 9:07 07 Peter Maxwell Davies? I would say that Fasch did write some lovely orchestral suites that sound like Telemann. Agreed about Wuorinen apart from his Reliquary, a large part of which is by Stravinsky!

JF Fasch is thoroughly enjoyable!

My offering to Cancrizans: Kuhlau, Reger and Smythe

I agree about Wuorinen, but many composers I've talked to argue with me. On the other hand, I enjoy Boulez's orchestral and ensemble music. Indeed, his Sur incises is a favorite work. The piano music I find ugly and turgid. My three: 1. Johann Christian Bach - Although admired by no less than Mozart, his blandness bores me, but I'm not big on the pre-Classical style anyway. 2. Cesar Cui. As far as I know, he never wrote an interesting piece. Because I love Rimsky, Mussorgsky, and Borodin and think Balakirev crazy enough to be stimulating, I really went out of my way to explore. I've even heard, God help me, his opera William Ratcliff. 3. Albert Ketèlby - too quaint for me.

You did open the hate fest Pandora's box here for spluttering rage against almost anyone who wrote the music! Proving again how the arts, in general, are not always enjoyed with rational intelligence, but to a great degree emotional cues unrelated to the pure music itself. Many proto-Cancrizan's here-most interesting results of your post, eh!? I do agree with your choices, by the way-look forward to the next slug-fest.

Force Cancrizans to listen to all those works we don't like!

I add my comment just to bring a different, sincere as much as discordant point of view: Boulez is for sure one of the composers I would less ready to do without. I can easily mention Marteau, Rituel, Derive, Memorial, Sur incises among the works I listen to with true pleasure, since several decades, without ever getting bored or tired. from the other side, I am perfectly aware that if I list a few names of composers I could do without this express my limits rather than my understanding or even taste. I would be probably prone to include Telemann, Saint-Saëns and Glass. Dave, I'll do without Fasch as well! I agree with so many of your opinions about music, and I can agree on this point as well!

Oh, thank you for this! I SO agree! The music to Wuorinen's BROKEBACK MOUNTAIN opera had NOTHING to do with what was going on onstage by a gifted cast and stage director. NOTHING but irrelevant shrieks and random squawks from the orchestra; it amazed me that the singers could even find their pitches! The audience was fleeing in droves. P.S. Thank you for including Boulez, the most overrated composer of the 20th Century IMO, an often brilliant conductor and musician, but a TERRIBLE composer of unlistenable "music!"

I am shcoked by the replied here some very juvenile! I have very eclectic tastes and seek to explore plenty which I don't know,. Wuorinen is similar to Miton Babbit in that they are academic composers composing from the outside in.

I feel you are going to upset a lot of people with your third choice - and that probably won't worry you one iota.

I'm an amateur composer in Montreal 76 years old In the 1960's I couldn't get into modern classical music I thought I must be to conservative but twenty years later after the atonal I worship i really like new music now . When you mentioned Boulez I started to laugh yes yes I like from Part to Stephanie Ann Boyd

This really gets to a highly personal level. For instance, I personally could get along very well indeed without Rachmaninoff's music. But I would never contemplate depriving anybody else of his music.

I totally agree with your take on Boulez. I would happily live without Philip Glass. I saw him and his ensemble in the 1970s playing some of his Music in 12 Parts. It drove me crazy, it was so loud and my head was spinning after. I'm not particularly fond of "Minimalism" and could live without any of it, but he is the bitter end for me. Along side him I add Michael Nyman and Karl Jenkins - what pointless composers, they add nothing to my life. From the "Golden Age", I can live without Telemann, every time I hear him I think "so what?"

Dave: I am afraid as Boulez passes the exit door, I'll have to grab Repons, at least the Matthias Pintscher performance. Perhaps Telemann, but saving the violin fantasias. I think at the head of the queue is presently any music written by AI.

For me it's Giovanni Benedetto Platti from Baroque, Judith Weir and Giacinto Scelsi from more recent times. Of course there are dozens of others I could think of!

I could not live without Boulez😢

Spohr, Michael Haydn, Previn (and music of other conductors: Futwängler, Dorati, Maazel……)

Annie Proulx's Brokeback Mountain is a ±30-page short story, not a novel.

Excellent concernant Boulez 👍, en français ce n'est pas loin de boulet 🤣. . . il faut que je vérifie, j'ai au moins un CD avec son nom dessus (interprète, ou compositeur, je ne sais même pas, tellement je l'écoute peu) 😮

John Adams. I revere the Cleveland Orchestra, my hometown band, but for the life of me cannot understand why they are so smitten by Adams' music. I cannot think of a single composition by him I've heard, some of them in person, that I would want to hear again.

The idea of eliminating all of Pierre Boulez' compositions is such a horrifically wrong opinion. (The piano sonatas could go, and I wouldn't miss them, but how can one not appreciate "Le Marteau sans maître," "Le Visage nuptial," "Sur incises" or many other quite listenable and enjoyable works of his?) Why can't you eliminate Adolphe Adam or Fromental Halévy instead, if you need a French composer?

François Couperin, Niccolò Paganini and Mark-Anthony Turnage (everybody fondly).

There are a lot of minor baroque composers who end up being played on radio 3, it just sounds like notespinning! And any composer of minimalist music! I just dont get it!

My three: Albinoni - His most famous work isn’t even his, and most of his stuff is lost anyway. Gubaidulina - Willing to bet that 10 years after she croaks, no orchestra will play anything she’s ever written. Boulez - not just due to his insignificance as a composer, but due to what an a**hole he was, calling Hindemith “second-rate” and Shostakovich “a second or third pressing of Mahler”. Well, where are they and where is he now?

What's with the massive Spohr vote?? I find him subtlely really inventive in the chamber works. That inventiveness is perhaps obscured by the smooth presentation of his music - the result of a consumate and masterful technique. Thumbs up to save Spohr!!

I can't think of any composers I'd dismiss completely, but I have the Hyperion box set (6 CDs) of orchestral music by Granville Bantock, er, ahem, I mean _Sir_ Granville Bantock, and all I heard was a lot of late-romantic stuff with much sturm und drang and rich, well-recorded orchestral colors, but I'll be damned if I could find anything like a memorable melody on any of the 6 CDs, except perhaps in his very late "Celtic Symphony," which used folk melodies--and I tried hard, listening to it many times before giving up. It seemed like a lot of "sound and fury, signifying nothing." The box has been collecting dust for years.

Music has so much important in my life, that removing the soundtrack nothing remains. Said that there's one musician i don't listen to: Marin Marais