Top 10 Classical Composers

5  

Conrad's "Four Violins" is positively acidic in sound. It feels as if, at any moment, it could just disintegrate into a pile of some evil chemicals. It starts off with all four musicians playing, with slight shifts in sound over the course of 30 minutes, each one feeling like a revelation

An early minimalist pioneer, and a likely influence on both drone and industrial, Conrad was certianly ahead of his time. And he also did a collaboration with Faust, major avant garde cred

Best Work: Four Viloins

0  

Guerro, much like Penderecki (who I'll get to talking about soon), was a master at using dissonance to his advantage. Unlike Penderecki, however, his pieces will not scar your mind with terror. Whether or not this is a good thing is up for debate, but I will not hear any denial of Guerrero's brilliance

Best Work: Antar Antman

0  

What do you get when you cross avant garde jazz with modern classical? The incompareable Lawrence D. "Butch" Morris, that's what. In all of his pieces, or "Conductions" as he called them, he emlpoyed a sort of spoadic nature commonly found in free jazz to make something strikingly original that is equal parts terrifying and awe-inspiring

Best Work: All of the conductions are roughly of the same quality, just get 'em all

8  

What's the worst nightmare you've had. It's okay, take your time, no hurry. Did you think of it yet? Good, now multiply by 1000 and you've got the music of Krzysztof Penderecki. Pieces like "Anakalis" and "Threnody for the Victms of Hiroshima" are so terrifyingly intense, it's hard to believe they're the work of a human and not some demon music spirit

Best Work: Threnody for the Victims of Hiroshima

8.9  

I don't think I need to justify this one

Best Work: Symphony No. 5, obv.

m08221196's rating:

9  

Nancarrow used a player piano for his pieces, which let him make music that proabaly couldn't be performed by real humans otherwise. Naturally, his music is some of the most strikingly original you can find. And it's not just originalty his pieces have going for them, they can be playful and sporadic, intense and terrifying, and sometimes downright beautiful. My friend Zaire described his "Studies for Player Piano" as souning like "Super Mario Brothers on crack" ie utter genius

Best Work: Much like with Lawerence D. "Butch" Morris, just get the entire "Studies for Player Piano"

8.1  

Arguably the most important composer of the last century, Stravinsky's pieces caused quite an uproar, most famously in 1913, when his debuting of "Le Sacre du Printemps" incited a riot. As you can imagine, it's pretty powerful stuff. Even today, nearly 100 years later, his pieces can still get you in the gut everytime

Best Work: Petrushka

m08221196's rating:

9  

Incredibly underrated, most likely because the classical community was unwilling to accept the genius of a gay black man psycho minimalist at the time. Eastman was a master of minimalism, and knew exactly what ideas to repeat and how long to repeat them. Perhaps the greatest aspect of Julius Eastman's music was his concept of each piece containing the ideas of the last, and slowly removing them as it moved on

Best work: Stay On It

m08221196's rating:

8.5  

Along with Stravinsky, Schoenberg was the composer who helped shape classical into the dissonant mess it is today. His pieces were indescribeably powerful, evoking literally every emotion you can feel, and then some. A curmudgeon, yes, but much like John Fahey, Charles Mingus, Christian Vander, and most other geniuses, he made up for it by making the greatest music ever

Best Work: Streichquartette I-IV

m08221196's rating:

9.5  

There are simply no words for the genius of Feldman. The man's slow moving and repetitious pieces are very likely the most beautiful and stirring works of music ever

Best Works: String Quartet No. 2 and For Philip Guston

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