Stephen E. Bacher wrote:

>A while ago there was a thread on this list posing the question of which
>composer's premature death had been the greatest loss of potential musical
>genius.
>
>In this particular contest, I'd cast my vote for Schubert.  Not because
>he was necessarily the greatest of those who died young, but because he
>was just beginning to achieve a level of brilliance that could have been
>far more.

My vote would have been for Juan Crisostomo (Jacobo Antonio) Arriaga (y
Balxola), sometimes called "the Spanish Mozart" who died in 1826, just
ten days before his twentieth birthday.  His three string quartets are
almost beyond belief.  I wonder what he would have accomplished had he
been only given Schubert's years.

Walter Meyer