Top 15 Greatest Composers Of All Time

15 Franz Joseph Haydn..................................................................................................................................

14 George Frederick Handel...........................................................................................................................
13 Sergei Rachmaninov..................................................................................................................................
12 Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky...........................................................................................................................
11 Gustav Mahler...........................................................................................................................................
10 Giuseppe Verdi..........................................................................................................................................
9 Johannes Brahms.........................................................................................................................................
8 Franz Liszt...................................................................................................................................................
7 Frederic Chopin...........................................................................................................................................
6 Robert Schumann........................................................................................................................................
5 Franz Schubert.............................................................................................................................................
4 Richard Wagner...........................................................................................................................................
3 Ludwig van Beethoven................................................................................................................................
2 Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart.........................................................................................................................
1 Johann Sebastian Bach................................................................................................................................

15 Franz Joseph Haydn

The father of the modern symphony and the inventor of the string quartet. He wrote 340 hours of music,
more than any other composer. His symphonies, though, leave a lot to be desired, as he himself said on his
deathbed, I have just figured out how to use the winds. They are more like 1 symphony with 103 variations.
He invented the string quartet when only three members of an ensemble were able to attend a recital. A
violinist, a violist, and a cellist. Haydn quickly re-orchestrated one of his composition scheduled for that
evening, for a quartet including himself as a second violinist. He liked the sound so much that he decided to
write more music for the orchestration.
Also an outstanding opera, oratorio and mass composer, although his operas were intended for Count
Esterhazys personal opera house. Haydn explained that they should never be performed anywhere else. His
string quartets and piano sonatas approach the melodic genius and pristine formality of Mozarts. Haydns
greatest work: his cello concerto, or his Creation oratorio (clip above), or his string quartets.

14 George Frederick Handel

Born in Germany, but traveled Europe and settled in England, as the kings court composer. He wrote
315 hours of music, second only to Haydn for prolificness. His mastery of all the complexities of the Baroque
style is evident in all his works. He invented the modern oratorio, when he wanted to make money during the
holy seasons of the year. During those seasons, operas were expressly forbidden to be performed, as they were
secular. Handel requested from the king that he compose a musical setting of some story in the Bible. The
king allowed this, and Handel wrote in 1732, Esther, which was performed by an orchestra and a choir, with
soloists singing the parts of the characters, but without acting or costumes.

Handel is known today primarily for The Messiah, (video above) the greatest oratorio ever composed,
in which some of the most famous music in history lies, especially the Hallelujah Chorus, which ends the
Easter section.
Handel also wrote hundreds of concerti grossi, which were the forerunners of the Classical and
Romantic concerto.
Handels greatest works are the Messiah, Water Music, and Music for the Royal Fireworks.

13 Sergei Rachmaninov
One of the few composers who was equally virtuosic at performance (piano), and conducting an
orchestra. He legendary for his second two, of four, piano concerti, the third being probably the most difficult
and pianistic concerto every written, containing one of the finest piano cadenzas. He is known for writing
large chords of up to 5 notes per hand, which he could perform easily with his gigantic hands.
His shorter works include large-scale piano sonatas, epic enough to be considered concerti without
orchestras, and preludes, of which his most famous is the Prelude in c-sharp minor, a work which became so
famous in his lifetime that he grew sick of playing it.
His greatest works are the 2nd Piano Concerto, the 3rd Piano Concerto, the Rhapsody on a Theme
of Paganini, (video above) and his sonatas.

12 Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky

One of the finest orchestrators, and one of the supreme melody writers in all of music. Not surprisingly,
his favorite composer was Mozart, in honor of whom he wrote Mozartiana, an elaboration of several of
Mozarts melodies. Tchaikovsky is the all-time master of the ballet, and all of his are world-famous: the
Nutcracker, Swan Lake, Sleeping Beauty. He wrote two operatic masterpieces, Eugene Onegin, and
The Queen of Spades.
His ballets are well known for their melodic magnificence, but he also wrote 6 symphonies, the last
three of which are universally accepted as legendary for the resplendent orchestration and development of
their lyrical melodies. The fourth is also noted for the bombastic, violent, celebratory spirit of its final
movement. The fifth is famous as an elaboration of this same spirit, culminating in a complex final movement
of victorious, fanfare quality. The sixth is considered by many to be more affecting and better than the fifth or
fourth. It is nicknamed Pathetique, for its somber, sad emotion.
Tchaikovsky was also a master of the concerto, and wrote three piano concerti, the first of which is one
of the most famous in history, and one of the most superb for its hyper-Romantic, lyrical qualities, and the
famous octave passages. Its first movement famously ends with a 1-4-1 cadence, unique to all music up to that
time. His violin concerto is world renowned for its technical demands and lush, lyrical beauty. Joshua Bell has
compared the final movement to running a three minute mile.

Tchaikovskys greatest works are his 1st Piano Concerto, his Violin Concerto, his last three
symphonies, his ballets, Eugene Onegin, the famous Overture to 1812, (finale video above listen for the
canons!) and Capricio Italienne.

11 Gustav Mahler
The symphonist of death, you could call him. Mahlers repertoire is quite small compared to that of any
other on this list. He only wrote 10 symphonies, the last of which he had not orchestrated before he died. He
wrote a symphonic song cycle, Das Lied von der Erde, which has been called his finest symphony, though
he did not intend it to be considered one, and he wrote dozens of other songs, many preoccupied with death.
His first symphony is largely imitative of a more Classical sound, but his second begins the career of
the Mahler everyone knows when they hear his music. It is nicknamed the Resurrection, and its final
movements premiere was said to have made women pass out, and grown men weep. His third is the longest
symphony ever written, at an average performance length of 1 hour and 30 minutes. It also ends with a
majestic bravura climax.
His sixth is called the tragic, and returns to his roots of a preoccupation with death. The seventh is
notable for its last movement, a fanfare extolling the happiness of life on Earth.
His eighth is nicknamed Symphony of a Thousand, though he hated this epithet, because of the
monstrous orchestra it calls for. It is the only symphony scored entirely for orchestra and chorus, the chorus
present in all but 12 minutes or so of its 1 hour and 20 minute duration.
It ends with the most glorious, heavenly, galactic climax in the history of music, as the characters of
Goethes Faust sing the final scene, and are lifted to Heaven.
Das Lied von der Erde is a song cycle of 6 Chinese Poems praising Earth, which Mahler translated into
German. They are the maturation of his compositional style.
Mahlers greatest works are his 2nd, 3rd, 5th, 6th, 7th, 8th symphonies and Das Lied von der Erde.
(video above).

10 Giuseppe Verdi
Italys greatest opera composer. Verdis operatic output is staggering, with 28 operas, many of which
contain arias that have made their ways into popular culture and become mainstays. His mature period
produced Nabucco, Ernani, Macbeth (after Shakespeare), Luisa Miller, Rigoletto, Il Trovatore,
La Traviata, Un Ballo in Maschera, Don Carlo, his most famous work: Aida, Otello, and Falstaff
(both after Shakespeare).
But his finest hour came with the Messa di Requiem per Alessandro Manzoni. Verdi, devoutly
Catholic, composed in this, some of the most deeply religious, majestically glorious, and terrifying music ever
heard. The most famous section, and rightly so, is the Dies Irae (video above), or Day of Anger, which depicts
Gods wrath inflicted upon Mankind in Armageddon. This is the most furious incarnation of melody and
harmony ever put on paper. The Tuba Mirum, which follows, is the loudest un-amplified music ever written.
The score calls for a bass drum played fffff, five fortes.

Verdis greatest works are his mature operas and the Requiem.

9 Johannes Brahms
Brahms was one of the finest craftsmen in music history, refusing to write retrogressions, and adhering
very strictly to form. He wrote 2 piano concerti, of which the 2nd is the most titanic concerto for piano ever
composed. It is not as technically difficult as Rachmaninovs 3rd, but the piano is required to overpower the
entire orchestra much of the way through, and this demands a Hercules at the keyboard.
He wrote 4 symphonies, all outstanding, a Requiem in German, his finest work, and one of the greatest
violin concerti in history. He was a superb fugue composer.
His finest works are 2nd Piano Concerto, Variations on a Theme of Paganini (the same theme
Rachmaninov chose), Variations on a Theme of Haydn, A German Requiem (video above Denn alles
Fleisch), and his Violin Concerto.

8 Franz Liszt
The greatest pianist of all time. Liszt sightread Griegs Piano Concerto, playing it perfectly the first time
he saw the music. He wrote hundreds of short pieces, songs, preludes, etudes, two piano concerti, symphonic
poems, and was an al-around master of every genre in which he composed. Most of his piano works are
among the most technically demanding, almost impossible, to play, but of note are his Transcendental Etudes,
designed for the piano student to master all forms of piano performance. They are probably the most difficult
pieces of music ever written for any instrument, and even veteran professionals refuse to play No. 5, Feux
Follets. (video above)
If not the Transcendental Etudes, his Sonata in b minor is extraordinarily difficult to play. It is his finest
composition.

7 Frederic Chopin
The most idiomatic composer for the piano who ever lived. Chopin did not understand orchestration,
which he freely admitted, and had help from friends, including Liszt, in scoring his two piano concerti. Even
so, the orchestra takes a back seat while the piano indulges in the finest filigree work any composer has ever
managed.
Chopins melodic genius is superlative in all respects, and he composed primarily short works piano
works, of which the most notable are his ballades, etudes, sonatas, mazurkas, waltzes, nocturnes, preludes, and
impromptus. Chopin was the most innovative composer for all of these genres except the sonata. His finest
work is his Ballade No. 1, in g minor (video above).

6 Robert Schumann
The quintessential Romantic composer. His music is the most German sounding of all. He was a genius
in all genres, producing masterpiece symphonies, especially his 3rd, nicknamed the Rhenish, for its
triumphantly Bavarian quality, his chamber music, especially his Piano Quintet, a monument in the history of
music, and his Piano Concerto in a minor, perhaps the finest ever written. His finest works are the Piano
Quintet, and the Piano Concerto. He is also well regarded for his huge quantity of vocal music.

5 Franz Schubert
The greatest songwriter of all time, and the second greatest master of melodic, lyrical composition.
Schubert had a natural mastery of all the forms of the day, but loved songs the most, and wrote them so
quickly that as soon as he was finished with one, he threw it to the floor and grabbed another sheet of paper to
start another. He wrote Hark, Hark, the lark, one of his finest, on the back of a beer hall receipt, in one
sitting. He wrote approximately 650 songs in the sixteen years of his career.
His most famous work is his Piano Quintet, nicknamed the Trout, for the inclusion of one of his songs
as a movement. He also wrote masses, 9 symphonies, of which the last two are universal brilliancies, sonatas,
ballets, string quartets, and operas.
His finest works are his 8th and 9th symphonies, his Trout Quintet, ballet music to Rosamunde, Marche
Militaire, and some of his songs, Gretchen at the Spinning Wheel, The Erl-King, and Nacht und Trume
(video above) among them.

4 Richard Wagner
One of the most hateful and unpleasant people who ever walked the earth. Wagner despised Jews, and
blamed all the problems of the world on them. But you cant hold any of that against him when you hear his
music. It transcends all the idiocy of the man himself. He only wrote operas, which he termed music
dramas. But of them, his finest masterpieces are Tannhauser, Lohengrin, in which youll find the world
famous Here Comes the Bride theme, Tristan und Isolde, which some consider his finest achievement, Die
Meistersinger von Nurnberg, Parsifal, and his gargantuan four-opera cycle Der Ring des Nibelungen.
These last four operas are the single most famous masterpiece in opera history. Of the top ten longest
operas, 7 are by Wagner. The average opera length is 3 hours. Gotterdamerung, the last of the Ring cycle, is 6
hours long. More importantly, Wagner invented the leitmotif, a very short melody which represents a
character, emotion, event, or object. He revolutionized the art of opera, and operas are not written in any other
style today except his, or the Classical style which preceded him. There has been no progress beyond him in
operatic art. It has also been said that the art of filmmaking would be set back 500 years, had Wagner not
existed. Film soundtracks owe their ability to enhance the story to Wagner alone, who owes his ability to the
next composer, and almost all film composers, including John Williams, agree that Wagner is the greatest film
composer in history. Films can be set to his music.
His finest work is probably Tristan und Isolde, but the Ring cycle could well be equal to it. Everything
he wrote, from Tannhauser on (video above), could be his finest work. All his mature works are unparalleled
in orchestration, and he is one of the very few opera composers who wrote his own libretti.

3 Ludwig van Beethoven

The inventor of Romantic music. Before him, all that could be said in music had been said (by the next
two composers). Beethoven began his career by imitating the styles of Mozart and Haydn, and is considered
the third greatest Classical composer after them. With his 3rd Symphony, nicknamed Eroica, and his 4th and
5th Piano Concerti, the world of music entered its Romantic Era, out of which it may not yet have emerged.
The advent of film required that Romantic music not be done away with, as the more modern music of
Schoenberg, Berg, Webern, etc., was not suitable for the enhancement of drama. Thus, as films musical
lineage goes directly back to Wagner, it goes back farther, to Beethoven, who influenced Wagner the most.
It was Beethovens temperament that created his finest, and most idiosyncratic works, among them his
3rd to 9th symphonies, his last three of five piano concerti, his violin concerto, the finest ever written, two
masses, one of which is the Missa Solemnis, the second greatest mass ever written, his chamber music,
especially his string quartets, the last 6 of which, the Late Quartets, are universally considered to be among the
greatest musical works in history. Of these, Igor Stravinsky deemed the Grosse Fuge of the second to last
quartet the greatest piece of music ever written. Beethovens 5th Symphony (video above) begins with the
single most famous melody in music history. People who dont even know who he was hum it every day.
Beethovens finest works are also the finest works of their kind in music history: the 9th Symphony, the
5th Piano Concerto, the Violin Concerto, the Late Quartets, and his Missa Solemnis, although this last work is
not quite as glorious as a mass composed by #1 on this list.
And he achieved all this despite being completely deaf for the last 25 years or so of his life.

2 Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

The most gifted musical genius in history, the most famous genius of any field in history, and the
perfecter of Classical music. He wrote 41 symphonies, 27 piano concerti, a large amount of chamber music,
23 operas, 18 sonatas for piano, 36 for violin, for cello, church sonatas, organ pieces, 18 masses, including one
Requiem, 4 horn concerti, 20 string quartets, serenades, divertimenti, and many others.
He was the supreme composer of melody and lyrical quality in music history. All other melodic
composers aspired to his greatness, including Schubert, Chopin, Tchaikovsky, Saint-Saens, etc. He wrote his
music in full orchestral scores, without corrections of any kind, until late in life when he was sick. His first
drafts were his final drafts. His greatest works are all legendary, and cannot be listed entirely, but of them, his
Requiem Mass, the greatest ever written, although he only finished half. The second half was finished by his
pupil, Sussmayer. His last 20 symphonies or so, his last serenade, nicknamed Eine Kleine Nachtmusik, his
20th through 24th piano concerti, his 15th and 17th masses, in C Major and c minor, respectively, his 12
variations on Ah, vous dirais-je, Maman, which is commonly known as Twinkle Twinkle, Little Star, and there
are many others.
It was because of his perfection of the Classical mode, that Beethoven decided not to imitate, but rather
to create a new mode. Mozarts work features, among other things, the finest balance between solo
instruments and orchestra.

He was one of the finest pianists to ever live, and equally adept at the violin.
Probably his greatest single work, for its pristine clarity in all respects, is his opera Don Giovanni
(video above).

1 Johann Sebastian Bach

The greatest composer of music who has ever lived. Bach did not invent any new styles of forms of
music, but rather perfected every single one of them which existed in his day. He remains the all-time master
of the fugue, a form which is so difficult to write that even Mozart and Beethoven, both of whom wrote fugal
masterpieces, hated writing them. Bach, however, improvised fugues for 2 hours at a stretch, and then wrote
them down from memory afterward.
Bach wrote universal masterpieces in every genre, including the 6 finest concerti grossi ever written,
nicknamed the Brandenburg Concerti (clip above). He also wrote the finest single work of sacred music in
history, the Mass in b minor, which has been argued by many musicologsts and composers to be the single
greatest work of music of all time, in any genre, in any style.
Whereas, most composers did not typically relish complexity, Bach was at home in it. The Sanctus from
his b minor Mass is a 6-part chorus, including a 4-voiced fugue. In the annals of fugal composition, no
composer as ever attempted what Bach accomplished, and he did so without difficulty: his monumental Art of
Fugue, which is a thorough examination of all the methods by which fugues are written. Using one theme,
Bach explains in music all the possibilities of contrapuntal composition inherent in a single musical subject:
the fugue, the double fugue, the triple fugue, the quadruple fugue, the stretto fugue, the mirror fugue,
canonizing the fugues, etc. If you were to turn the scores of the two mirror fugues upside down and play them,
they would sound the same.
He wrote in the Baroque style, but his music is as Romantic as anything Beethoven or Wagner or
Schumann ever composed, and films can be set to it. He is the greatest of all composers, of all time, because
of the intellectual depth of his music, the technical demand, and the artistic beauty.