Thread: In what 20-year period was MOST of your FAVORITE classical music written?

So...we're not allowed to like Monteverdi?

I would have made the poll 30 year periods instead of 20. That way we could start much earlier, and we could squeeze in the last three years

Carter, yeah, a poll can only have fifteen options, so I couldn't go earlier than the early 18th c. without short changing the 20th. I'd happily vote on a 30-year poll if you set it up! Plus I'd be able to take more music to my desert island.

This can only be a compromise, and a terrible one at that. But I chose 1890-1909: late Brahms, early Schoenberg, Sibelius, Richard Strauss, Fauré, Bruckner, Scriabin and Mahler.

I choose 1950 through 1969.

The resurgence of dodecaphony in a post-WWII climate by serialists co-existed during this time period with the still-tonal endeavors of elder composers. The late 1950s saw the Darmstadt school and the Warsaw Autumn transpiring as well as past masters expiring (Florent Schmitt & Ralph Vaughan Williams & Aarre Merikanto passed away in 1958, while Ernest Bloch & Heitor Villa-Lobos & Bohuslav Martinu died in '59). Stravinsky didn't die at this time so he changed camps and utilized 12-tone techniques after Schoenberg died.

As 1959 turned into 1960, textural/sonorism compositions by Xenakis, Ligeti, Penderecki, etc., became prevalent. By 1961, alternative paths and methods were being forged by secluded composers such as Jon Leifs and Giacinto Scelsi - though the world didn't know of their accomplishments until decades later when a number of early-'60s works were eventually published and/or performed during the late 1980s.

By '62/'63 composers as divergent as Toru Takemitsu and Arne Nordheim began to produce works with tapes on an almost regular basis. This was not exactly new because Edgard Varese was doing such experiments all through-out the 1950s & '60s.
Other composers plugged away during these 2 decades just being themselves, like Karl-Birger Blomdahl, Carlos Chavez, Henri Dutilleux, Morton Feldman, Andre Jolivet, Maurice Ohana, Jean Prodromides, Alexandre Tansman, etc.

While I also love music from the 1st half of the 20th century, and I follow contemporary musc from the 1970s onwards into the present, I feel the period 1950-1969 is the most important to me in terms of both artistic movements and the resultant diverse output of works by composers from this time.

Originally Posted by stomanek

The poll begins at 1790 - and mozart died in 1791 - fat lot of use that is. And what about Bach? handel?

Stomanek,
The Amazon voting game you refer to is ongoing. It is moving back in time. 1780-89 is going on now; 1770-99 is next. So your criticism of it is ill-conceived.

1990-2009 was the age of Disco and Britney Spears! I wonder who voted for those things!

Maybe the voter meant Hovhaness, John Adams or Ligeti ...

Originally Posted by CarterJohnsonPiano

I would have made the poll 30 year periods instead of 20.

Well- I did (kind of), in the thread Survey- favorite time-span for Classical Music. Of course, back there, someone opined...

Originally Posted by Praine

Wow, increments of 33 years? Could you make them any smaller?

... so I guess we can't please everyone no matter how we slice it.

Originally Posted by Xaltotun

I went for 1870-1889 for a maximum dose of Bruckner, a very nice smattering of Brahms, Wagner's Siegfried, Götterdämmerung and Parsifal... Franck's output falls here, too, as a nice bonus, as well as almost all great Tchaikovsky with the notable exception of the Pathetique... Saint-Saëns "avec orgue", too! Not a bad period!

Plus Aïda, plus CARMEN, plus Scheherazade, plus Mahler's First, plus R. Strauss's first two major tone poems (Don Juan and Death & Transfiguration), plus the great Gilbert & Sullivan operetta trio (Pinafore-Penzance-Mikado... got to have some humor on that island, too!).

I'd miss me some Beethoven-- but to me, a significant portion of Wagner, a significant portion of Brahms, a significant portion of Bruckner, the preponderant portion of Tchaikovsky, and the preponderant portion of The Mighty Five: > one Beethoven.

Originally Posted by Arsakes

1990-2009 was the age of Disco and Britney Spears! I wonder who voted for those things!

Maybe the voter meant Hovhaness, John Adams or Ligeti ...

Pfffft. Ligeti's best works appear in the 1970-1989 slot.

1990-2009:

Dhomont
Bokanowski
Ferreyra
Amacher
Steen-Andersen
Mulvey
Karkowski
eRikm
Theriault
Tetreault
Noetinger
Marchetti (Lionel)
Yoshihide
Tone
Barrett (Natasha)
Lachenmann
Cerha
Radigue
Groult
Merzbow
Neumann
Bruemmer
Ferrari
Romitelli
Nelson
Kubisch
Andre
Czernowin

and so forth...

1830-1849

For obvious reasons. Almost everything written by Chopin or Schumann dates from this period.

1790-1809 for me as it includes the following:

Mozart's Clarinet Concerto, Magic Flute, and Requiem
Haydn's London Symphonies, The Creation, and Trumpet Concerto
Beethoven, Early and Middle Piano Sonatas, Symphonies 1-6, Piano Concerto 4, Violin Concerto, and the first nine string quartets

I'll go for 1910-1929.

Originally Posted by Tero

There was classical in 1710? I though it was preclassical.

Tero, I wonder you don't object to the name of this discussion board, "Talk Classical." Can you believe people are Talking Baroque here? Really, you must take this up with the moderators.

It would take me at least five hours to go through my entire collection and figure this out. I honestly have no idea how to answer this poll.

Here are some pieces of (mostly orchestral) music in my personal Top 50:

Monteverdi - L'Orfeo / Madrigals

Bach - Violin Concerti

Handel - Water Music

Haydn - Symphony 45, 88, 96 / Trumpet Concerto

Mozart - Symphony 39 / The Magic Flute

Schubert - Symphony 6

Mendelssohn - Symphony 3

Schumann - Fantasie Op 17 / Genoveva and Manfred Overtures

Brahms - Alto Rhapsody / Piano Concerti

Dvorak - Symphony 8

Bruckner - Symphony 4, 9

Elgar - Enigma Variations / Marches

Alfven - Legend of the Skerries / Symphony 3

Nielsen - Symphony 3, 5 / Concerti

Vaughan Williams - Symphony 2, 7

Barber - Symphony 1 / First Essay

Arnold - Symphony 1, 2

Harbison - Symphony 1

and I'm still finding new ones all the time from every conceivable period.

Originally Posted by Prodromides

[T]he period 1950-1969

That was good times, to be sure.

You'll be happy to know that Wergo has finished reissuing Earle Brown's 18 avant garde LPs from 1960-1973 (on 18 CDs). Happy, but sad that there were only 18. Bittersweet.

Anyway, they're all out there again, now.