This is an interesting subject actually. Here is a link to that very subject. I'm amazed at how many household names were gay. Not sure that it influences style of composing though!..

http://www.spiritus-temporis.com/list-of-gay,-lesbian-or-bisexual-composers/

 

They seem to have left out Schubert.

- Bill

 

Tchaikovsky wasn't gay, most of his life he was in ralationship with women.

 

Tchaikovsky lived in a place and time where you had to be gay in secret. Even today, many closeted gay people will marry and have children because they haven't much of a choice.

I think most serious scholarship states Tchaikovsky was a closeted gay male.

 

A very interesting article indeed. Many American favourites were gay and plenty of the artists in classical now are as well. One tireless champion is Michael Tilson Thomas. He does not broadcast it though and keeps a low profile. I love the music from Diamond,Copland,Barber and other American composers.
Their orientation does not matter to me (unless the music or lyrics reflect that). While I do not share the exact same orientation as the gay composers, I admire their work for the most part. I do find it interesting how gay men are mentioned but never bi or lesbian composers.. There were bi men as composers. Those who had wives and still had men on the side would be bi,yes? I know my gay and bi friends don't like labels but there you are.I call it how I see it.

Very interesting thread. Glad to see it has developed into an immature flame throwing mess that some other forums tend to be. There are too many mature and intelligent men and women here on this list.

Jim

 

I'm not very familiar with gay composers. Tchaikovsky was, of course, but his idiom wasn't entirely different than other heart-on-sleeve, emotionally tormented composers of the Late Romantic. Post-romantic I'm really not at all sure about, though. Leonard Bernstein I haven't heard a lot of. He just seemed to put together several disparate styles in his music. I doubt that's significant, as just about every major modern composer in America is virtually forced into doing this.

 

Honestly, I'm not sure I agree with the article's assertion that there is a "softer" side to the music of gay composers in the 20th centrury, while heterosexual composers like Schonberg and Ives took pleasure in "masucline" dissonances and mathematics.

There were also a lot of straight composers who did not go the same musical route as the 2nd Vienesse School or the very avant-garde.

But I have often wondered if they hyper-romanticism in Tchaikovsky is the expression of very repressed feelings that he could only dare express in music. Many of his scores are ultra-romantic, and by that, I mean it sounds like music of love and extacy. But yet this is a man who probably experienced very little of that in his life, at least the way he would have wanted to.

 

There were many composers that were gay: Copland, Tchaikovsky, Copland, Bernstein, Barber, etc. This doesn't and shouldn't have any affect on their music I think. Their private lives was simply that...private.

While I personally don't agree with the lifestyles that many composers chose, I'm thankful and grateful for their music.

 

There were many composers that were gay: Copland, Tchaikovsky, Copland, Bernstein, Barber, etc.

Copland was twice as gay!

 

How do you figure that Rachmaninov was gay? Never knew that one after 3 books worth of reading.

Jim

 

I'm terribly you are right. Rachmaninov married his cousin. Sorry about that. I forgot about that!

 

I read that Lou Harrison was gay. His suite for Symphonic Strings is fairly special.

To be honest, gay, straight, or whatever, it really doesn't make a jot of difference to me.

I certainly didn't know Copland was gay, and certainly would never have guessed. Then again, it is something when listening to his music, or any other composers' for that matter, that would never really cross my mind.

 

I read that Lou Harrison was gay. His suite for Symphonic Strings is fairly special.

Yes, he is probably one of the better known gay composers. He was also an outspoken gay rights activist.

 

Exactly!!!!

And Mr Harrison was indeed a very kind man. With his white beard one could imagine him as a Santa figure during Christmas instead of a composer. His partner also attended the party and looked a lot like Lou himself! Both had white grandfatherly type beards with very nice smiles. It was a meeting I will always remember.
I have also corresponded with Ned Rorem, another gay composer. Again, his music is enjoyable to me due to it's originality. Someday I hope to meet him in person as well.

Jim

 

Exactly!!!!

And Mr Harrison was indeed a very kind man. With his white beard one could imagine him as a Santa figure during Christmas instead of a composer. His partner also attended the party and looked a lot like Lou himself! Both had white grandfatherly type beards with very nice smiles. It was a meeting I will always remember.
I have also corresponded with Ned Rorem, another gay composer. Again, his music is enjoyable to me due to it's originality. Someday I hope to meet him in person as well.

Jim

That's all great stuff...hopefully you will be able to meet Mr. Rorem one day.

 

Do you folks agree with this article that gay composers worked with a "softer" sound than the grittier and more dissonant styles of the heterosexual composers of the time?

Also, do you think being gay had an influence on the style and sound of earlier composers, say like Tchaikovsky?

I think it's difficult generalise, especially with Copland & Bernstein, as their output can be divided into different periods, and the sound of their works varies alot. For example, Copland's jazzy Piano Concerto sounds more hard-edged than his later more popular works, and Bernstein's Serenade on Plato's Symposium (actually a work about love) sounds softer than some of his later works (eg. the Symphonic Dances from West Side Story). But even this is generalising greatly.

I think that sometimes, being an outsider makes an artist see the world more critically, and this can lead to them to having a different take on life. People like Oscar Wilde and Noel Coward had a very witty view of things. This can't really be discerned that much in music, which is an abstract form. Alot of Tchaikovsky's music has passion, but so does Brahms' or Janacek's, for that matter.

So to me, the article is just generalising, which is admitted by the author when they refer to Copland's serialist period, for example. But it does make some valid points about the era in which these composers lived, for example, why they kept a low profile.

& whatever you think about Bernstein's art, he must have been a wonderful human being. Just look at how he looked after his wife when she was dying of cancer. A great person, even if you don't like his music.

I must also add that two other musicians I know who were gay were the French composer Francis Poulenc & Hungarian conductor Janos Ferencsik.

 

I think much speculation has been made about Ravel's orientation. He was a very private man. Not much is known about him other than his family history, where he was born, etc., things that we all know and can find out easily, but I would interested in finding out more about his relationships. Ravel once said that there is only one true love in his life and it's music. The closest person to him in his life was his mother. When she died, it devastated him. That is really the only known relationship he has had to my knowledge.

 

'Schoenbergian serialism was the heterosexual high road.'

that statement destroys any credibility the article may have (which i think was 0, anyway).
it's general parctice that should define one's sexuality, not a claimed orientation. if you're banging both women and men, a la a personality or two mentioned in the list, you're bisexual.

dj

 

David Del Tredici and Thomas Adès are both gay, as were Tippet and Britten.

 

It also amazes me that the vocal GLBT groups are setting special categories aside for themselves.
I noticed this even more blatantly when looking through applications to add to my ipod touch. Here i see a couple of "gay" radio station apps. What type of music would one consider "gay"? Why would they have their own "style" of music as there are no actual types that define a gay person or not? Maybe it would be the commercials in between the songs that are geared toward those with that lifestyle Not sure.
But I consider it a bit much when gay composer is listed as being accessible and understandable only to gay men and women.

Jim

 

Again, I have always mused that the emotional impact in Tchaikovsky is the musical expression of deeply repressed emotions. Seems like Elgar agrees with me that this very well could be the case with him.

Hehehe, yeah, Russia sure has had a history or repressing and scaring the hell out of some of its greatest artists, in particular, composers. It great though, isn't it, that despite sociatal/political odds, the artists eventually won as their music lives on and resonates while the repressors are long gone.

 

Haha, I just remembered that Britten was gay also. Well that kind of kills the whole argument of gay peoples' music being somehow "softer" or whatever; much of Britten's output is quite the opposite.

And... Debussy was not gay. That also completely derails the argument.

 

And... Debussy was not gay. That also completely derails the argument.

Oh no he wasn't he had daughter he loved very much. He wrote "Children's Corner" for her.

 

About marrying cousins, the third marriage of Jerry Lee Lewis (not exactly classical, I know) was with his thirteen year old cousin (first cousin, once removed) - about a month before his divorce with his second wife.

Whether Debussy was gay or not, his having a daughter proves nothing. Bernstein and Wilde (both of whom have been mentioned in this thread) had children. Here in the southern United States there is a quip that you can recognize a gay man, because he has been married twice and has children from each marriage.

 

Off Topic - Cousin Marriage

Re first cousins marrying, just read this:

http://www.straightdope.com/columns/read/2564/whats-wrong-with-cousins-marrying

It happens to be legal here in Florida.

Now, back on topic.....

Personally I've never cared what sex a composer slept with. I only care about the music they make. I've never thought that sexual orientation would have a big influence on that music, certainly not the defining influence.

Always felt sorry for people who lived (and those who still live) in times and / or places where they had to hide their sexual orientation.

 

It's certainly a lot easier today for an artist to be openly gay then even 30 or 40 years ago. In Copland and Bernstein's time, to be sure, it was probably to their advantage to keep things on the down low.

 

Okay, about Debussy, I specifically said that Debussy was NOT gay, and therefore sort of puts another nail in the coffin of "softer-edged" music belonging more to the homosexual crowd. I'm sorry I brought it up. I don't think it really has much to do with the argument at hand anyway, but still.

 

Oh well I didn't say Debussy was gay either. Who said he was?

I did, however, say something about Ravel in some posts back, but I was just merely speculating given the information that I have read. None of us really know and I certainly haven't read anything about it.

By the way, you shouldn't feel sorry for ever bringing up anything, WV. I'm on your side.

 

About Benjamin Britten, I read somewhere that some of his operas reflect the experiences of being an outsider. Say the main characters in Peter Grimes or Death in Venice. I guess this is true, but the sound of his music is not soft or feminine, as has been said above.

I also understand that partly due to his relationship with the tenor Peter Pears, Britten left the UK for the USA during the 1940's, where supposedly homosexuals were more tolerated. If anyone knows more about this, please elaborate.

 

Yes, the operas are definitely about being an outsider.

And as to his going to the States, that was primarily for the outbreak of World War II; both he and Pears were very strongly pacifistic, and were conscientious objectors. They returned to Britain later, so that can't be fully justified by their homosexuality.

 

There's been a lot of devout composers through the years who have had relationships...so one never knows.

 

Does anybody know how it is with Saint-Saens? Just interested. There is some guesswork, but I never red about it in "serious" literature or encyclopedia (as I red about Britten or Poulenc, who were open gays) But:

http://www.glbtq.com/arts/saintsaens_c.html

 

I don't believe Saint-Saens was strictly homosexual, but believe he was bisexual. I've read a lot about him. He lived a very suspenseful life with the death of his children and an ex-wife that was a real (insert derogatory word here). I also think he suffered heavily from depression. There's no evidence backing this claim up of course, but I do seriously believe he was a very troubled individual with a very unstable mentality.

 

I have "read" and heard of Saint-Saens being a pedophile but put no stock in that. He was gay though from the books and articles I have read.

http://gayfortoday.blogspot.com/2007/10/camille-saint-sans.html

Jim

 

But how many clearly gay compositions have actually been written by now? I'd say very few. The only ones I can think of are Tippett's String Quartet No.1 (Lento cantabile) and the opera Knot Garden (in which, however, one of the gay characters finds the 'right way' in the end...).

 

I am not familiar with Tippett's output. I wonder, what is intrinsically "gay" about his String Quartet no. 1?