I was just thinking, there must be many composers with relatively small output whose works are passionately liked & listened to by people like us.

Three of my favourites were Varese (most of his early works destroyed in a warehouse fire), Durufle (too self-critical) & Berg (died quite young at 50).

But, as you know, quality is just as important as quantity, and composers like this made an immense contribution to music. Take Varese's use of taped material in Deserts (early 1950's), Durufle's use of the modes of ancient Christian church music in his choral works (i.e. the Requiem), or Berg's exploration of the 12 tone serial system of composition (the Violin Concerto 'To the memory of an angel' comes to mind, probably one of the best of the C20th).

So who are some of the less prolific composers people like?

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"Contrary to general belief an artist is never ahead of his time but most people are far behind theirs" - Edgard Varese

Webern, Corelli, Mahler (not in length, but in size). I think Webern is in the same category as Durufle. Regarding Corelli - weren't many of his works destroyed?

Mahler can be forgiven though!

Probably the "smallest" example of this is Bellini, who wrote 10 operas and nothing else... oh, never mind. He apparently wrote a few vocal works and one concerto for the oboe. Not a very big output, but I wonder if there's a reason we never hear about his non-operatic works (not even listed in Wikipedia)...

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“I thought with fury of the wonderful American orchestras that cared nothing for my music; of the critics who repeated for the hundredth time, 'Beethoven is a great composer,' while balking violently at new works; of the managers who arranged long tours for artists playing the same hackneyed programs fifty times over.” ~ Serge Prokofiev

Henri Dutilleux is one of the composers who has had an immense influence on the music of the 20th century, and still has (at 94). His output is relatively small.

My favorite of these composers is definitely Borodin. He wrote only a few hours of music, but a remarkable percentage of his music is great and in the standard rep - quite an acheivement for a less than "major" composer.

Including his early, tonal works Webern only wrote something like 6 hours of music. Definitely a composer with a unique and original musical voice.

Chopin. His mature works are very few. Two sonatas, few ballades and two-three longer one-movement pieces. Rest are miniatures.

Two piano concertos are works of youth, the 1st is probably his first mastepiece but it is still not mature piece.

Many people don't realise that he was one of most wasted talents in history of music. Died aged 39, if he would live ten years longer with good health, I belive he would write much more pieces like 3rd piano sonata - works that would be without any doubt first grade piano music. Maybe another piano concertos with much better orchestration.

Dukas is another one. He was a perfectionist and destroyed a lot of his music.

If we are including composers who tied way too young to reach maturity but could have become "great" had they lived, I'd like to mention Griffes, Arriaga, and Lili Boulanger.

I would add to the list Zoltán Kodály and Ernst von Dohnányi.

I can’t remember the exact quote any more, but Kodály once said that before writing anything down, he always considered whether what he was hearing in his head was truly worth committing to paper. He wrote quite a lot of short choral works, but few big works. What he did write down, however, are true gems!

Henri Duparc:

Duparc is best known for his seventeen mélodies ("art songs") with texts by poets such as Baudelaire, Gautier, Leconte de Lisle, and Goethe. These pieces are considered by many to be among the greatest compositions by any composer in this form.

A mental illness, called "neurasthenia", caused him to abruptly cease composing at age 37, in 1885. He devoted himself to his family and his other passions, drawing and painting. However, he began losing his vision after the turn of the century, which eventually led to complete blindness. He destroyed most of his music, leaving fewer than 40 works to posterity

-from Wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henri_D...%28composer%29

Chopin. His mature works are very few.

And yet his collected oeuvre easily fills more than 12 discs... not even counting his rarely recorded Krakowiak for piano and orchestra; Fantasia on themes from Polish songs with accompanying orchestra, Trio for violin, cello and piano; Sonata for cello and piano, Grand Duo in E major for cello and piano, and 19 Polish songs for voice and accompanying piano.

Many people don't realise that he was one of most wasted talents in history of music. Died aged 39, if he would live ten years longer with good health, I belive he would write much more pieces like 3rd piano sonata - works that would be without any doubt first grade piano music. Maybe another piano concertos with much better orchestration.

Yes... and what might Mozart or Schubert or even Bach have achieved with another 10 years. I'd take another 10 years of them any day. But then I don't consider Chopin to be a minor composer by any measure. The fact that his oeuvre is predominantly composed of miniatures does not make him a minor composer any more than the fact that Keats and Baudelaire wrote "only" lyric poems makes them minor poets. Certainly Schubert's reputation owes more to his lieder than to anything else... as much as I love his symphonies. Chopin's Nocturnes are enough to have assured his place in history.

And Mahler?? Nine completed and very large (in scale and length) and all the rest of the works to be found here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of..._Gustav_Mahler

I suppose in comparison to Bach or Haydn he was a slacker... but seriously... a "small output"?

I would never even think of Chopin or Mahler as composers of a small oeuvre.

Holst comes to mind, although he did write quite a few obscure works -- or rather they have been obscured by his big hit.

Trio you mention was written even before the concertos AFAIR. It is very immature, even if enjoyable. The problem is that most of his works are those little waltzes, mazurkas, polonaises many of which are also early ones.

The serious works: sonatas, concertos, any longer pieces that you can sit and listen to for some satysfying amount of time are really, really few.

Manuel de Falla didn't exactly focus on quantity either, but he managed to produce a few masterpieces:

• The Three-Cornered Hat
• Love, The Magician
• Nights in the gardens of Spain
• La vida breve
• Harpsichord concerto

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of...anuel_de_Falla

I also like those other Frenchmen mentioned, Duparc, Dukas & Dutilleux.

Duparc's songs are probably some of the few that I can listen to & get something out of emotionally, even though I don't know French, they seem to grab me more than others for some reason (although I also like the vocal works of other French composers like Berlioz & Messiaen).

Dukas, I only know his famous Sorcerer & La Peri, but I enjoy his music immensely, even though I tend not to enjoy most "impressionist" works, other than Debussy (but I don't like the term, I'd rather use "modernist," but anyway...)

& Dutilleux is one of my favourite composers of the C20th. Much like Messiaen, he trod his own path, not getting involved in the "tonal" vs. "atonal" wars (which were meaningless anyway). His works are quite post-modern in the way they deal with literary themes, like the disintegration/maintenance of memory (I'm getting a bit arty farty here).

I suppose Chopin & Mahler both died pretty young, so their output is not as great as it could have been. But I suppose the question is that is an avid listener of these "satisfied" with their output as it exists? I think 12 discs of Chopin is more "satisfying" than only 3 discs of Varese. I am very dissapointed that all of Varese's early symphonic poems are gone, for example. Is that disappointment greater than someone contemplating the fact that Chopin died in his 30's or Mahler at about 50? I don't know, it depends on the individual, and how big a fan of a particular composer you are. One thing's for sure, most of the composers mentioned above wrote relatively little (some like Duparc not much at all), but the overall quality of their works are top-notch, & that's why they have not been forgotten after such a long time...

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"Contrary to general belief an artist is never ahead of his time but most people are far behind theirs" - Edgard Varese

Ravel had a somewhat small output..