Classical Music Magazine asked 167 top international musicians to vote for the best British composers of all time. Here are the results… Do you agree - and who was voted number one?
So, hold on to your hats…
Illuminati: in at 22 are no less than four of the best: Elizabeth Maconchy (1907-94), Herbert Howells (1892-1983), Samuel Coleridge-Taylor (1875-1912) and Malcolm Arnold (1921-2006).
Steve: OK, I’ll give you lot Ms Maconchy but the others, maybe not.
Illuminati: in at 19 we have three worthies: Oliver Knussen (1952-2018), Helen Grime (b.1981) and Jonathan Dove (b.1959).
Steve: No.
Illuminati: at 15 we have four luminaries: Judith Weir (b.1954), Gustav Holst (1874-1934), John Dowland (c.1563-1626) and George Benjamin (b.1960).
Steve: Judith Weir and Dowland and possibly Holst.
Illuminati: in at 14 we have Ethel Smyth (1858-1944).
Steve: Nah
Illuminati: 13 is Frank Bridge (1879-1941).
Steve: OK
Illuminati: at 12 we have Sir Harrison Birtwistle (1934-2022).
Steve: I would put him in the closing pack, surely.
Illuminati: two vie for the 10th place; Thomas Tallis (c.1505-85) and James MacMillan (b.1959).
Steve: bit lofty for the impressive Sir James but Thomas Tallis at 10, you have got to be pulling my leg. Joke.
Illuminati: at 9 is George Frideric Handel (1685-1759).
Steve: Handel, at No.9, Handel? Ok, he might have been born in Germany and we are no longer part of the EU…
Illuminati: at 8 Thomas Adès (b. 1971).
Steve: Adès ok but greater than Handel. And Tallis?
Illuminati: number 7: Michael Tippett (1905-98).
Steve: one of my favourite composers. Higher up surely?
Illuminati: Six: William Walton (1902-83).
Steve: OK but not ahead of Tippett.
Illuminati: then…Five; William Byrd (c.1540-1623).
Steve: a true great.
Illuminati: Four: Ralph Vaughan Williams (1872-1958)
Steve: Good call but a bit too high up. Probably The Lark wot did it.
Illuminati: Three: Henry Purcell (1659-95)
Steve: Yup
Illuminati: Two: Edward Elgar (1857-1934).
Steve: yup
Illuminati: One and blast off… Benjamin Britten (1913-76).
Steve: a true great but I demand a recount.
Well, the list is clearly inclusive and presumably the survey was conducted (good, eh?) in a bar with maybe Sir John Curtis buying the drinks. Well, who should be wearing the crown?
Presumably Tallis, Byrd, Handel (if we can claim him as one of us - a Brit) and Purcell with Elgar breathing down their necks and maybe Tippett and Britten breathing down his. All blokes, I know.
So, who is missing? Well, of the living composers: Michael Finnissy, Nicola LeFanu, James Dillon and, a wild card, Michael Nyman? Those no longer with us: Jonathan Harvey, Arnold Bax and, of course, Frederick Delius. But then we can’t include a composer born in Bradford of all places, who lived in France and ‘suffered the effects of syphilis’, as Wikipedia politely puts it.
But I’ll sign off with a question: why is there a photo of a youthful Sir Paul McCartney instead of (Dame) Ethel Smyth?
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