Underrated rather than overrated?

[sbeckmesser]

Who has favorite composers they think are underestimated by the majority of music lovers? To qualify, a composer should not be one that would score in the top 10 if one took a general poll of everybody's favorite or greatest composers of a particular era. Nobody is going around underrating Bach, Handel, Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven, Chopin, Wagner, Debussy, Stravinsky, Berg and the like. I'm also looking for composers whose work is reliably high-quality, not one-hit wonders.

As an example, and to start things off here are some suggestions:

Manuel de Falla
Walter Piston
Franz Schreker
Paul Dukas
Albert Roussel
Jan Ladislav Dussek (as he is spelled at IMSLP)

[Deinonychus]

Alan Rawsthorne
Frederick Delius
John Ireland
Charles Tomlinson Griffes
Alan Hohvhaness

I'm sure I could think of others

[dwil9798]

Arnold Schoenberg (by some, not all)
Carl Orff
Charles Ives
Alexander von Zemlinsky
Erich Wolfgang Korngold
Frank Bridge

[allegroamabile]

ALEXANDER GLAZUNOV
Mily Balakirev
Josef Rheinberger
William Schuman
Carl Maria von Weber
Darius Milhaud
Max Bruch (many people think he is a one hit wonder (Violin Concerto No. 1) but I beg to differ)
Walter Piston
Erich Wolfgang Korngold
Roy Harris
Johann Nepomuk Hummel
Leroy Anderson
Franz Krommer

[Lyle Neff]

Polls are overrated.

How many of you agree with me?

[allegroamabile]

I don't. It's interesting to see what other people think about music. Plus, what else is there to talk about?

[Yagan Kiely]

How many of you agree with me?

Polls, yes; surveys, no. Polls, however, being the best that forums have…

Plus, what else is there to talk about?

Well, listing composers' names is hardly talking at all. How about discussing the music? Analysis, aesthetics, philosophy, harmony, theory, history; heaven forbid, even politics etc.

[SeanMartin]

Well, I"m game. And again, bear in mind that I' dont have the level of musicianship most of you do, so what I might or might know is pretty superficial. However, as the learned judge said, "I may not know art but I know what I like".

In my operetta research, I'm come across a composer named Arthur Penn. Born in New Jersey, spent most of his life there, retired to Arizona, split most of his time between there and Florida. Died in 1956 (if I remember right).

Penn wanted to be the G&S of the US. Desperately. His early scores -- YOKOHAMA MAID, LASS OF LIMERICK TOWN -- are almost by-the-book "appropriations", as we might say, of the format built at D'Oly Carte, even though his sense of satire was a bit too scattershot for the works to be seen as anything more than mindless musical fare with some amsing commentary. Then something started to click, and Penn not only found his own comic voice but also hit his stride with CAPTAIN CROSSBONES (1918), a mad little farce about a man who devises the plan to steal away the woman he loves from her overbearing father and convinces his friends to drop their various day jobs as executives and accountants and lawyers and take up piracy as a lark. It's loosely PIRATES OF PENZANCE but with a distinctly "American" approach. There's a wonderful ensemble scene at the top of the second act when the "pirates" are complaining there's nothing to do, only to be joined by their wives (!) who are staying at a nearby seaside hotel and having a perfectly marvelous time. The pirates' ensemble sings:

A pirate's life is a terrible life
When he has to act politely
He finds it hard to keep on his guard
And say his prayers nightly
A pirate really out to be
An animal wild and untamed
But when his claws are drawn or clipped
A pirate cant help but feeling hipped
And he naturally feels ashamed
Oh a pirate's life is a terrible life
A terrible life indeed —

Their wives' response:

Thus we show appreciation
Of your generosity
We're enjoying our vacation
By the Caribbean Sea
It's so nice to know you are busily employed
With your scheme adventurous we're overjoyed
Tell us when you're through, my darlings,
We can pack up any day
To return with you, my darlings,
Back to the dear old USA.

It's all very weird and quite wonderful and could be mounted today without breaking a single sweat.

His later works -- MAM'ZELLE TAPS, ROSE OF THE DANUBE, THE CHINA SHOP, amoung others -- sharpened his comic vision: ROSE is a hysterical 1933 musical in which a Hollywood producer rents an entire European country (for the amazing amount of one million dollars) to shoot his latest extravaganza. In tone it has that genuinely whacked-out lunacy of musical films of the 30s, in which the plot can turn on a dime for the flimsiest of reasons... and generally does. THE CHINA SHOP makes its own points about women's rights -- a young Chinese girl, engaged to the town mayor, is sent to the States for two years to learn how a "proper woman" acts: she returns emancipated to the nth degree.

His final works -- LADY OF THE TERRACE, for example -- are Penn essentially giving up. The composition isnt as strong, and he now collaborates with lyricists who clearly do not share his love of the comic. TERRACE all but has "contractual obligation" scrawled across it in bright red letters. As a result, the music is much more pedestrian: you can actually hear him creatively shutting down.

But during his heyday, his musicianship is flawless and commandingly funny, evoking a giggle or two just with a sequence of notes. He took great joy in breaking the fourth wall, giving his work a luminous surreality. His parts work is, at times, breathtaking: the finale of CROSSBONES has sixteen vocal lines, and the result rivals MAKE OUR GARDEN GROW. He apparently prepared his own orchestrations, but I havent been able to uncover any; I imagine most, if not all, have been lost.

I seriously doubt any of you have heard of him -- certainly not his music for the stage: none has been recorded, as far as I can find. I'm working on a virtual version of CROSSBONES in an effort to get it mounted, and the more I recreate, the more I shake my head at this incomprehensible loss.

[allegroamabile]

If his works haven't been recorded, how are you are you so enthusiastic about his music. Do you even know what they sound like? just wondering....

[Melodia]

If his works haven't been recorded, how are you are you so enthusiastic about his music. Do you even know what they sound like? just wondering....

There's a neat little invention called a piano...

Another one called a brain...

(I'd even go so far as to mention another one called a synthesizer, though unlikely in this case)

[SeanMartin]

LOL @ melodia...

Yes, allegro, I know what they sound like. As noted, I'm recreating his scores, through a music software called Notion.

And yes, they're stunning.

C'mon, I cant be the only one passionate about the obscure. Anyone else?

[tickle88]

I could argue that in order to be underrated, a composer must be rated. Otherwise a more accurate description would be neglected, or undiscovered, or just plain forgotten. But the word is unimportant; I think one of the purposes of this site is for musicians and music lovers to pool their knowledge and experience, thereby increasing their own pleasure and decreasing the chances of real talent being neglected. That being said: I could find no info on SeanMartin's Arthur Penn, but my curiosity is certainly piqued. None of his work is available here, and I would love to see some. The singers I know are always looking for new material. I think Saint-Saens is underrated, by any definition. Schoenberg is overrated. (If you disagree on this last, please throw tomatoes. It's been a bad year for them here in New England.) And I agree with Allegroamabile about Glazunov. Aside from a natural affinity due to a natal coincidence, I have found much of his piano music first-rate. His masterpiece in this genre is the Theme and Variations, Op. 72, available here.The theme itself seems curiously lacking a measure--it has only seven--but Glazunov adds the balancing measure, the sixth, in the first and all subsequent variations. The first three stick to the F#minor theme with added texture; then the variations expand out into fantasies. The variety of harmony, mood, and piano technique is amazing. Every pianist should attempt this masterpiece, but it is not for the faint of heart. Best wishes to all.

[allegroamabile]

I appreciate your words, Tickle88. I think Glazunov's orchestral writing is what truly makes him glow though. He has a neat Waltz for the piano (Op. 41) written in 1893, but aside from that, his piano music doesn't interest me that much. It's too bad he stopped writing pieces inspired entirely by Russian nationalism rooted through folk music in the mid-1890s. I just love how Russian he can make music sound. If you really want to be amazed at his ability to create an orchestral piece inspired entirely by folk music, listen to the second movement of his Third Symphony (1890). I recommend the recording by the Moscow Symphony Orchestra conducted by Alexander Anissimov on the Naxos label. There is this trio-like section with a flute solo towards the middle of the movement that will just stun you.

[Yagan Kiely]

Closed see this thread.