Greg Conn suggests:

>I would suggest that there are NONE today who can compose music at the
>level of Brahms or Haydn.

I'd love to know why you believe that.  Now I happen to believe that Brahms
does every facet of composition as well as I can imagine it done and that
Haydn has at least 5 astonishing ideas on every page of his music, but I
don't know how in heaven's name to compare meaningfully either of their
music to that of Arnold Rosner, Benjamin Lees, Elliott Carter, or Milton
Babbitt - to name four quite different contemporary composers.  If it's
merely a matter that you like the earlier music better than contemporary
music, that's fine, but that has nothing necessarily to do with "the level"
of composition.

Steve Schwartz