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→Artists: Reply, um, essay to Joaquín
:: Thank you for your reply. I like Brahms and Händel, but are they as famous as Chopin? --[[User:Joaquín Martínez]], [[User talk:Joaquín Martínez|talk]] 07:14, 22 November 2008 (EST)
:: Thank you for your reply. I like Brahms and Händel, but are they as famous as Chopin? --[[User:Joaquín Martínez]], [[User talk:Joaquín Martínez|talk]] 07:14, 22 November 2008 (EST)
G'morning, Joaquín. Chopin wrote just for the piano. Apart from a couple of piano concertos and a cello sonata that is all he is known for....solo piano music. Some of the best ever written and much of it of an emotional intensity that can grab you. And for that - as well as for a strange sort of relationship with a strange sort of woman (George Sands) - he has grabbed the imagination of the public's attention (and Hollywood's) as one of the "great" composers. Which he is...''for the piano''.
Handel is known as one of the top 2 high baroque composers. People say "Bach and Handel" in the one breath - he is that good. Completely different in temperament and style in his output of course - he made and lost fortunes writing for the stage. But posterity owes him as much for his concerti grossi, organ concertos, chamber works, the two suites for augmented military band that have come down to us as the ''Water Music'' and ''Fireworks Music'' (one of which caused the first recorded traffic jam in history) his anthems and other church music, keyboard music - the lot. He is a part of every British coronation: and Christmas and Easter would not be the same in the English speaking countries without the enumerable ''Messiahs'' popping up, not only in concert halls but churches and town halls, and parks - many of them amateur productions. Grass roots stuff. I bet you that you can hum more Handel tunes than any other classical composer. He is part of the fabric of western culture right down to the farmer who turns up at his church hall to rehearse a bit of Handel for the service on Sunday.
As is Brahms, but in a different way. Brahms ain't "popular". Just great. When I say popular I mean amongst the general classical-illiterate public. And he is not for the young....you seem to grow into Brahms with age. He is recognised, though, as one of the truly great composers of "pure music"; that is music not written to a program. He is also considered the true symphonic heir to Beethoven. Like Bach and Handel mark the peak of the high baroque, and Beethoven the classical era, Brahms represents the pinnacle of the Romantic period. After him the movement started breaking up. He wrote four of the 20 great symphonies, two of the twenty great piano concertos, one of the top 4 violin concertos; he is one of the top 5 most popular writers of chamber music. His "Requiem" is in the top 5. He is one of the top four 19th century song composers. Pianists enjoy his many short piano pieces. He is second to none as a writer of "variations". When he died there was a state funeral and procession through the streets of Vienna attended by foreign heads of state...not to mention scores of thousands of ordinary citizens.
Are you sorry you asked? If you're going to hit me at 4:30 in the morning with something close to my heart.... :-) [[User:AlanE|AlanE]] 14:06, 22 November 2008 (EST)