Glenn Miller wrote:
>Who had the greatest potential to grow?
Juan Crisostomo Jacobo Antonio Arriaga y Balzola, who died ten days before
his twentieth birthday in 1826. Just listen to any or all of this three
quartets and you'll agree w/ me. (Look for him in the bins under Arriaga.)
>Who left the great unfinished work on the table?
J.S. Bach's Art of the Fugue, Schuber's "Unfinished", Mozart's Requiem and
other great masses come to mind.
>So Beethoven now has--what 15 more years
I would imagine him to have spent those years composing chamber music
predominantly. Having chosen, unlike Mozart, to ignore string quintets
(other than his early one), and instead to push quartet writing to an
envelope probably not to be experienced again until Bartok, he might now
write more string trios, and/or write more contemplative sonatas for violin
and piano. Perhaps another opera, of which Verdi's Falstaff would then be
considered an acceptable imitation.
>Shubert-only 31--now has 40years of composing!
I could expect anything and everything from him. I would assume that he,
rather than Brahms, would be viewed as the outgrowth of Beethoven. (I
always thought Schubert's Great C major symphony, rather than Brahms'
First, to warrant the designation of "the Tenth Symphony".) Maybe some
concertos.
>Mozart--30+ years
The mind boggles. He'd already done everything. So he'd do more of all.
More operas, more symphonies, more concertos, more string quartets and
quintets, more choral works, more pieces for winds, etc. Would they be
as good or better that what he had already written? W/ somebody other than
Mozart, one would wonder if that's possible, but who would have considered
Mozart possible if he hadn't existed?
>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.
How about Chopin? Would he have continued to confine himself essentially
to piano music? And how successful would his ventures into writing for
other instruments have been?
Walter Meyer
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