So what are we doing here? Someone suggests a composer is bad and then a
whole bunch of people write back in the composers defense? I'd like to try
a few.

Schumann

I often thought he just wrote his piano music for little old ladies. I was
very surprised when I read him making this same complaint about other
composers. He seemed to criticise many composers who were better than him.
Maybe he was jealous?

Beethoven

Charles Dalmas wrote:

>This genius actually compared Beethoven to Cow Manure.

I wouldn't go that far, but most of Beethoven's music isn't very good.
The stuff he wrote later in his life is good, but the stuff from his heroic
phase isn't good.  Most of his symphonies are pretty random and repetitive
and don't make any sense.  His music is usually extremely extroverted and
impersonal.  There are a few gems here and there, but he's a very overrated
composer.

While I'm thinking about it.  It's been said Spohr's clarinet music isn't
any good and the clarinet is a hard instrument to listen to.  I've always
liked the way clarinets sound, but who wrote good clarinet music?

Joe Hagedorn