Great Unsungs: A Question

[saxtromba]

A little while ago Alan Howe attempted to start a discussion regarding the elevation of unsung composers to the pantheon.  For various reasons that discussion never quiet worked.  Here's a different approach which I hope might generate some interesting discussion.

Bach: B Minor Mass; Toccata & Fugue in D Minor; Cello Suite #5
Mozart: Piano Concerto #20 in D Minor; The Magic Flute; Symphony #40 in G Minor
Beethoven: String Quartet in C# Minor, Op. 131; Piano Sonata #32 in C Minor; Symphony #9 in D Minor

I start with a brief list of indubitable masterworks of music (that is, anyone who disparages them had better have some pretty strong reasons, way beyond "I don't like that piece", if they want their opinion to be taken at all seriously) to set the stage.  These are composers and works widely known to, and influential among, the serious musicians of our specific period.  These are great works-- and we consider their composers great because, a) they produced works of equivalent quality in a wide range of musical categories (choral/vocal. symphonic. concerted, chamber, solo instrumental, etc.), and, b) they did so repeatedly.

The questions are these: 1) are there unsung works which could keep company with such works as these; if so, how so?  2) Are there unsung composers whose overall body of work sustains comparison with composers such as these; if so, how so?

Please note that this isn't a question about the particular works I've listed; I chose them more or less at random to suggest the scope of the music written by recognized great composers.  I am certainly not saying that to be a great composer you need to have written a choral symphony or an opera or a string quartet.  But I am suggesting that you need to have done more than produce pleasant music in a few genres or have composed one or two really striking works amid an overall body of competent but otherwise unimpressive music.  So I hope that people will not respond with lists of favorite composers, but with short (or maybe not so short ) discussions of why the pieces they mention indicate that the unsung composer is worthy to rank with the greats.

[Gauk]

All the same, I can't forbear pointing out that the so-called Toccata & Fugue in D Minor by JS Bach is

Not by Bach
Not a toccata and fugue
Not in D minor
And not for organ!

It is actually a transcription/arrangement for organ by an unknown hand of a violin sonata in A minor by an unknown composer of the gallant school. This is why the music sounds so weird; if you hear a reconstruction of the original it sounds quite normal. The melodic outine of the fugue subject, for instance, reflects violin bowing in a very natural way.

So it is ironic that one of the first works you put forward as an indisputable masterpiece is actually by a composer so obscure, we don't even have his name! I entertained a hope at one time it might have been Reincken, but that doesn't seem feasible.

[Alan Howe]

Frankly, I don't think this thread will work either. With unsung composers - by definition - there is no agreed body of opinion to guide us and so I suspect we'll pretty quickly end up with a further exchange of personal opinions.

In any case, the composers mentioned by saxtromba are all absolute greats, and I'm pretty sure there aren't any of those among the unsung covered by our remit. However, what I am sure about is that there are some great unsung composers at the next level down - say, that of Dvorak or Schumann. In my own mind I think I know who they are, but I'm unwilling to go down the same road as before, so I'll keep the names to myself...

[Mark Thomas]

I'm so much in agreement with both the points which Alan makes that I'm not going to say any more.

[eschiss1]

Gauk- unknown, but believed to be likely?? by one of his pupils?? (well, I don't know about likely, but I gather that's one of the guesses, now'days. So many once-popular works have ended up having dubious attribution (or at least, as Alfred Einstein wrote, coming down to us in editions of dubious authenticity- in Beethoven's case, e.g, there is no good edition of the last three of the Op.18 string quartets, for an entirely different reason (Mollo messed it up, as the composer complained, and there's no manuscript to refer back to)) - that in a hypothetical good broad-based forum about classical music in general that would make a fascinating topic of discussion

[petershott@btinternet.com]

I'm afraid I line up with the Alan and Mark axis on this one. There aren't any objective benchmarks against we can judge answers, and thus (once again) all we can do is trot out lists of things some of which we'd be prepared to go to the barricades over. The thread would continue indefinitely, we'd all get cross, hot under the collar, and probably even bad-tempered....and I guess none of us would actually learn anything from the experience. I'll give it a miss - with apologies to Saxtromba.