OK--here goes.  I was wondering what the list members felt was the one
composer they would like to have seen lived longer.  Granted, this does
seem stupid to propose but I have read several favorite list selections
here.

Here are the questions that run through my mind.

Who had the greatest potential to grow?
Who left the great unfinished work on the table?
Who would have gone on to dominate other areas of music had he or she live?

Mozart is not praised for his symphonies as much as other works, but
what if he had lived.  I realized how futile it is to know who would have
influenced who, like Mozart hearing Beethoven music being played, only to
be driven to do better because a new stimulus is there.

In my mind, I have thought of two ways of approaching this scenario.
One is to add a limited time to all composers, like 1 to 5 years, thus
all composers start from where they left off.  The one I like is that
each composer continues to live a natural life span until ...  you know
until the creative juices dry up.

So Beethoven now has--what 15 more years
Shubert-only 31--now has 40years of composing!
Mozart--30+ years
Haydn--did he not fulfill his potential?
Mahler?--
Mendelssohn?--

There are certain composers who died young and showed great promise, yet
not producing great works in their last few years--does Mendelssohn fit
this description? So I am wondering if he would have gone on to become
great in many areas.  For me, it is hard to pick just one, but I decided
that Schubert would be the one who interests me in what he would have gone
on to produced.  Beethoven, my favorite composer is now deaf, getting older
(by those standards), does he have it in him to produce masterworks in
those few years, to consider over the younger Schubert? And so on.  Those
who cannot stand these silly arguments--well I apologized ahead of time.
Any way, those who want to participate I am interested in your ideas or
favorite composers who would have go on to...

Glenn Miller