TOP 10 most famous composers in the world
Classical music is nowhere near as popular today as it was in its golden age from the 17th century to the early 20th century, but it is still impressive and an inspiration to many. The famous musical composers who created these great works may have lived hundreds of years ago, but their masterpieces are still unsurpassed.
Notable German composers
Ludwig van Beethoven
Ludwig van Beethoven is one of the most important names in the history of classical music. He was an innovator of his era, expanding the scope of the symphony, sonata, concerto, quartet, and combining vocals and instruments in new ways, although he was not so interested in the vocal genre. The public did not immediately accept his innovative ideas, but fame did not take too long to wait, so even during the life of Beethoven, his work was duly appreciated.
Beethoven's entire life was marked by a struggle for healthy hearing, but deafness nevertheless overtook him: some of the great composer's most important works were created during the last ten years of his life, when he was no longer able to hear. Some of the most famous works of Beethoven are "Moonlight Sonata" (No. 14), the play "For Elise", Symphony No. 9, Symphony No. 5.
Johann Sebastian Bach
Another world famous German composer is Johann Sebastian Bach - a brilliant author, whose works in the 19th century aroused interest even among those who were not interested in serious, classical music. He wrote both organ music, and vocal-instrumental, and music for other instruments and instrumental ensembles, although he still managed to bypass the operatic genre. Most often, he was engaged in writing cantatas, fugues, preludes and oratorios, as well as choral arrangements. It was Bach, along with Georg Friedrich Handel, who were the last composers of the Baroque era.
Throughout his life, he created more than a thousand pieces of music. The most famous works of Bach: Toccata and Fugue in D minor BWV 565, Pastoral BWV 590, "Brandenburg Concertos", "Peasant" and "Coffee" cantatas, mass "Matthew Passion".
Richard Wagner
Wagner was not only one of the most influential composers in the entire world, but also one of the most controversial - because of his anti-Semitic worldview. He was a supporter of a new form of opera, which he called "musical drama" - in it all the musical and dramatic elements merged together. To this end, he developed a compositional style in which the orchestra plays as strong a dramatic role as the performing singers.
Wagner himself wrote his own librettos, which he called "poems". Most of Wagner's plots were based on European myths and legends. He is best known for his eighteen-hour cycle of epic operas in four parts called Der Ring des Nibelungen, the opera Tristan und Isolde, and the musical drama Parsifal.
Famous Russian composers
Mikhail Ivanovich Glinka
Glinka is usually referred to as the founder of the Russian national tradition in music, but his Russian operas offered a synthesis of Western music with Russian melodies. Glinka's first opera was A Life for the Tsar, which was well received at its first production in 1836, but the second opera, Ruslan and Lyudmila, with a libretto written by Pushkin, was not so popular. Nevertheless, it was a new type of drama - the heroic-historical opera, or epic.
Glinka became the first of the Russian composers who achieved world recognition. The most famous works of Mikhail Ivanovich: the opera "Ivan Susanin", a fantasy waltz for a symphony orchestra and an overture-symphony on a circular Russian theme.
Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky
Tchaikovsky is one of the most popular and famous composers in the world. For many, he is also the most beloved Russian composer. Tchaikovsky's work, however, is much more Western than the works written by other composers of his contemporaries, as he used both folk Russian melodies and was guided by the legacy of German and Austrian composers. Tchaikovsky himself was not only a composer, but also a conductor, music teacher and critic.
No others famous composers Russia, perhaps, is not famous for creating ballet productions in the way that Tchaikovsky is famous for. Tchaikovsky's most famous ballets are The Nutcracker, Swan Lake and The Sleeping Beauty. He also wrote operas; the most famous are The Queen of Spades, Eugene Onegin.
Sergei Vasilyevich Rahmaninov
The work of Sergei Vasilyevich absorbed the traditions of post-romanticism and took shape in a unique style in the musical culture of the 20th century, unlike any other in the world. He always gravitated towards large musical forms. Basically, his works are full of melancholy, drama, strength and rebellion; they often displayed images of the folk epic.
Rachmaninov was known not only as a composer, but also as a pianist, so piano works occupy a significant place in his work. He began learning piano music at the age of four. Rachmaninov's defining genre was the piano concerto and orchestra. Rachmaninoff's most famous works are the Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini and four concertos for piano and orchestra.
Famous composers of the world
Giuseppe Francesco Verdi
It is difficult to imagine the 19th century without the music of Giuseppe Verdi, one of the classics of Italian musical culture. Most of all, Verdi strove to bring musical realism to the opera production, he always worked directly with singers and librettists, interfered in the work of conductors and did not tolerate false performance. He said that he liked everything that was beautiful in art.
Like many composers, Verdi gained the greatest popularity thanks to the creation of operas. The most famous among them are the operas Othello, Aida, Rigoletto.
Frederic Chopin
The most famous Polish composer Frederic Chopin always illuminated the beauty of his native land in his works and believed in its greatness in the future. His name is the pride of the Polish people. Chopin stands out in the field of classical music in that he wrote works only for piano performance than others. famous composers with their variety of symphonies and operas; now Chopin's works have become the basis for the work of today's pianists.
Chopin was engaged in writing piano pieces, nocturnes, mazurkas, etudes, waltzes, polonaises and other forms, and the most famous among them are the Autumn Waltz, Nocturne in C sharp minor, Spring Rhapsody, Impromptu Fantasy in C sharp minor.
Edvard Grieg
The famous Norwegian composer and musical figure Edvard Grieg specialized in chamber vocal and piano music. Grieg's work was tangibly influenced by the legacy of German romanticism. Grieg's bright and recognizable style can be characterized by such a direction as musical impressionism.
Often, when creating his works, Grieg was inspired by folk tales, melodies, and legends. His work had a huge impact on the development of Norwegian musical culture and art in general. The most famous works of the composer are the overture "In Autumn", the concerto for piano and orchestra of 1868, the music for the play "Peer Gynt", the suite "From the time of Holberg".
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
And, of course, the most famous composers of all time cannot do without this name, which even people who are far from classical music know. An Austrian composer and virtuoso performer, Mozart created a number of operas, concertos, sonatas and symphonies that had a huge impact on classical music and, in fact, shaped it.
He grew up as a child prodigy: he learned to play the piano at the age of three, and at five he was already creating small pieces of musical works. The first symphony was written by him at the age of eight, the first opera at the age of twelve. Mozart had a phenomenal ear for music and an amazing ability to play many musical instruments and improvise.
During his life, Mozart created more than six hundred musical works, some of the most famous among which are the opera Le Nozze di Figaro, the symphony No. 41 Jupiter, the 3rd part of the sonata No. 11 Turkish March, the concerto for flute and harp with orchestra and "Requiem" in D minor, K.626.
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Have you ever heard a good song somewhere and thought: “How cool it would be to play it!”. And indeed, knowing the basics of musical notation, one can discover endless musical possibilities. How to learn notes - find out in our article.