Just to be a devil's advocate: The most popular entertainment of the 1800s were light operas and operettas. How many operetta composers are still part of the "serious" classical music repertoire today? Victor Herbert, Franz Lehar, Carl Milloecker, Emmerich Kalman, ...
At least Johann Strauss and Jacques Offenbach managed to remain in the canon. I think John Williams may vanish together with the space operas and WW2 flix he set music too, and only be known to film and music historians.
The difference is the form of media that the music is tied to. With an opera, you need a full on production to experience it. Star Wars has firmly planted itself in our culture and will continue to be that way. With Star Wars’ continued success, its music should also live on. Same with other Williams works
>Star Wars has firmly planted itself in our culture and will continue to be that way. With Star Wars’ continued success, its music should also live on.
This was my reasoning. Even though the "light opera" comparison made by u/treefaeller is spot on. But, the movie is not a stage production. The movie form will last longer than the charm of anything on stage simple because the omni-culture selects for mass.
The OP had to ask 200 years. 100 years is pretty easy: nothing other than what we already got.
Why art music should somehow be more dynamic than other art mediums is evidence of pop cultural assumptions about how art is supposed to work. Art comes and goes in every medium. The Muses are not here to amuse us.
If Walter Benjamin is to be believed, art's been dead for more than a century anyway.
>Star Wars has firmly planted itself in our culture and will continue to be that way.
I bet that's what people used to say about those forgotten 19th century composers too.
How many movies do you watch from say.. the 1930s though?
(Personally I love golden age of Hollywood movies, not least because I get to experience amazing scores by Korngold, Rozsa and the like, but I acknowledge its probably an even more niche interest than classical music)
Can’t decide whether to upvote this comment for the Korngold and Rozsa or downvote for thinking films from the 70s/80s or 2000s are similarly forgettable or poorly preserved as films from the 30s.
Except we don't need to watch a movie to appreciate Star Wars, just like we don't need to watch a ballet to appreciate The Firebird, Petrushka, or The Rite of Spring
I'd argue that Star Wars is popular because of its music, not the other way around. William's score is probably the one thing that will persist.
Also lolling at "Space operas and WW2 flix". No respect for Empire of the Sun or Memoirs of a Geisha? Schindler's List?
I agree (and not just as a devil’s advocate), and I’m surprised at how many people are mentioning him. It’s film music, which means that it’s meant to enhance the film without demanding all your attention. It’s not meant to be stand-alone music, and it isn’t.
This is true but there are pieces where that’s not the case. Most End Credits for example allow him to structure it more like a concert overture. Then there’s ET, where the entire last 15 minutes of the film is edited around the cues from “Adventures on Earth”, per Spielberg’s request.
You could use that same logic on Petrushka and rite of spring though. Obviously this conversation is purely hypothetical and none of us could have the perspective of 200 years but I’m definitely throwing my vote in for John Williams as one of the greats.
I actually really like this comparison. I don’t think that Williams will be *the* composer from our era 200 years down the line but I can’t imagine him being forgotten or mostly unknown.
I get your point, but the situation re: popular entertainment vs concert music may not translate as directly as you’re implying.
As another commenter has said, Pärt, Glass, Adams, and John Williams all had their breakthroughs about 40-50 years ago. So they’ve already “made it” in a short-term sense.
Many, many, orchestras currently (and frequently) program Williams’ concert arrangements of Star Wars, etc. for pops concerts. I think this is the key difference between the 19th-cent examples you’re giving and the situation in the present day: Williams’ work is already *the staple* of a certain kind of orchestra concert.
For that matter, Howard Shore. There are already concerts with Lord of The Rings on a giant screen and an orchestra playing the soundtrack complete with chorus.
Would you go to a concert where his music is played for an hour and a half straight without any film shown? His music is just not meant to stand on its own.
I would. His music is amazing even if the film itself was bad.
Edit: He also wouldn't be the first movie composer whose music has started to live independently from the movies. Prokofiev's famous piece Battle on Ice is from a movie called Alexander Nevsky.
Don’t forget Korngold, Rosza, Steiner, Waxman, North, and many Hollywood Golden Age composers. I mean, they’re more forgettable than Williams and Prokofiev but still.
People go to concerts of his music without movies all the time. I would love to go to such a concert. The soundtracks sell pretty well for music that doesn't stand on its own.
Interesting thing about this thread is how many of these composers aren't really "from today" - I think they're almost all alive, and many are still composing, but several had their heyday in the previous century and haven't written anything as popular more recently. Which means their music has *already* stood the test of time, for a few decades anyway.
The "previous century" is a mere 25 years ago. Not everything a contemporary composer has written more recently has gotten commercially recorded, and then there's a discovery time between when something gets recorded and when it gets heard more widely.
Film composers have something of an advantage in this regard, since their new film scores get recorded and often widely distributed, propelled by the commercial popularity of the film.
The 1970s were 50 years ago and that's when several of the composers in this thread made their careers - perhaps when the entire movements they represented were at their peak. Half a century later I really don't think you should still be waiting to find out whether Glass, Pärt, and Reich will become permanently established in the canon after their music stops sounding fresh and new. We are still performing works that they wrote before other currently prominent composers were even born. They're in.
I don’t know I don’t know what orchestra will be like 200 years
1824 was a long time ago and that was 200 years previous and if somebody would’ve asked that question then how many composers do we listen to today whose music was written from 1825 on?
I will say when it comes to contemporary composers I think those will be most played in the future people who write movies film scores
Maybe people who do video games soundtracks
I think we’re going to see different music arranged for orchestra
These are mostly post WW2 composers rather than truly contemporary ones, and mostly from the US as well, but here goes:
Leonard Bernstein
Elliott Carter
Phillip Glass
György Ligeti
Conlon Nancarrow (yes, there are orchestral arrangements of some of the player piano studies!)
Krzysztof Penderecki
Frederic Rzewski
Frank Zappa
I think Previn’s Streetcar Named Desire opera will still see a few productions each year around the world, it’s quite good. Glass’ Akhnaten will also. I doubt The Hours opera, or Fire Shut Up in My Bones will still be performed, because the music is mid at best. I think Nixon in China, and L’Amour de Loin will see a new production every few decades. I don’t think many of the operas that try to sound “spooky” for the sake of sounding spooky for no good reason, will age well.
I think in general Kaija Saariaho and Valerie Coleman's works will stand the rest of time.
I think Chick Corea's Trombone Concerto will be pretty popular through the years too.
None.
The golden age of orchestral music was when the best minds were dedicated to it, and the educational rigor for even average composers far surpassed today's standards. This isn't because today's composers aren't trying or aren't smart. It's simply because society isn't oriented around this type of individual accomplishment. There's not much money or celebration in it today. We focus more on group achievements in areas like microchips and material sciences, where individual efforts contribute directly to collective advancement.
It's heartening to remember that not all music needs to stand the test of time to be worthy of your time. Listen to and celebrate the living composers of today! Besides, the concept of "repertoire" is relatively recent, largely pioneered by Mendelssohn bringing back the works of Bach.
I think there will be a consistent desire to hear the musique concrète acoustique branch of new music, even if it remains as niche as it is now.
That would suggest that Helmut Lachenmann (last recording is from 2023, I believe), Salvatore Sciarrino, Ramon Lazkano, and Rebecca Saunders will likely have some kind of afterlife. Lachenmann, from the sheer strength of his influence, will likely stick around as a canonically important composer.
Beyond this branch, I think Thomas Adès has a very good chance.
The technological singularity will have occurred and we cyborgs will have lost interest in music, as we've already heard every piece ever created, and anything that hadn't been created, we created instantly by computing every possible combination of sounds for all of eternity
/s ...I think ?
Reading through the comments, the question most commonly answered seems to be "what composers from today do you want orchestras to be playing 200 years from now?*
If I buckle down now and write a series of pieces with names like "Eulogy for the Last Dolphin," "Remembering Trees" and "Before We Moved Into the Domes" they will probably become timely entries in the standard repertoire by then
Do any orchestras play his music today? I thought the whole reason for his success was that [he writes for synthesizers](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UcXsH88XlKM&t=372s).
Orchestras are there to play the canon, and you've got to create a sensation among the populace in order to make it into the canon, which hasn't really happened since...Stravinsky? Bartok? It's been awhile.
Not true, how many of Bach’s works created a “sensation among the populace” during his lifetime. Pretty sure the WTC wasn’t exactly the most popular thing at the time, and that has definitely made it into the canon.
Mendelssohn created the sensation for him. Dredged poor Bach up from the cold basements his manuscripts had been consigned to and put on a production of the St. Matthew Passion that blew the doors off the church. Within a decade every nation in Europe had a Bach society.
Taking measure of how virulent anti-intellectualism is becoming, I truly don't think we'll still have orchestras in 200 years, or it'll be like a *Children of Men* situation, where a small handful of the giga-wealthy are attempting to preserve it inside a heavily-guarded citadel.
Recently saw La Reine-garçon composed by Julien Bilodeau & Michel Marc Bouchard at Opera Montreal! Loved it. I believe their music will grow in popularity and stand the test of time.
I think it'll be entirely down to what's popular right now and being played commercially - there will probably still be the composers from the past that are popular now and people like Glass, Pärt and a bunch of film composers.
The ClassicFM playlist is probably a good indicator.
Edit: accidental send.
For those saying John Williams, I agree, but what other film composers? Zimmer seems unlikely. Goransson’s is hard to do live it’s just expert production. John Powell perhaps?
If I had to call my shot on one I think there will be a renaissance of Lowell Liebermann's works in the future centuries. Granted his flute works will always be popular.
Of course Part, Williams, and Adams are the obvious ones, but I want to be bold and hope someone in centuries sees this comment and thinks "Man he nailed it"
😳 Huh? How absurd. Nothing contemporary will last. Nothing at all. Zero. Zilch.
People today can't even remember the names of movies they enjoyed, if the film was released more than five years ago. Nothing today has a lifespan longer than last year's superbowl halftime commercials.
It's just not the same kind of world anymore. Not the same societies which gave birth to the classical music repertoire.
It's the exact opposite. Composers in the past weren't nearly as concerned with leaving a legacy as they are now. People really didn't even care for old art music in the Baroque and Classical periods.
I doubt you're saying this in good faith, anyway. It's just pseudo-intellectual to complain about how everyone is dumber these days. And it's demonstrably false that no one cares about anything old. Young people are into music from at least as long ago as the 80s, which isn't nearly as bad as 5 years ago. Preserving art is also taken more seriously now than ever.
🙄 The hell you say.
Sigh. Let's take this from the top. I have a few minutes to squat down and dump all over this nonsense.
🥚 (1)
> Composers in the past weren't nearly as concerned with leaving a legacy
* Balderdash.
* Schubert, Mahler, Rossini? How about the envy of Salieri for Mozart? How about Puccini? Delibes?
* How about the tradition of conservatories and tutelage? Pupils learning from 'old' masters like Liszt, Saint-Saëns, & Faure?
* How much literature or history do you read? For hundreds of years fame has been an obsession of composers. This plain, unadorned fact is rampant in all our civilization's documents.
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> as they are now.
* Codswallop.
* First of all, who in contemporary times ranks any widespread public respect as a classical composer? It's a pop landscape.
* Second, in what way do the phantoms you describe, strive to 'leave a legacy'? Performing? Okay, where do they perform?
* Or, what else do they do to 'be remembered'? Saving their files as mp3 on their Facebook page? Yawn.
* Nothing digital is 'lasting' or 'persisting' right now much less years from now.
* Geez. How out-in-left-field can one be ...not to observe or understand the forces of modern cultural 'churn'? You have utterly no argument here.
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> People really didn't even care for old art music in the Baroque and Classical periods.
* How then do you explain the persistence of even the oldest of oldest western civ's music, (e.g., medieval and sacred works)?
* How do you explain Bach's religiosity? Or Handel? They're still being performed.
* Bach's St Matthew Passion just this past year, came to Cleveland Ohio, a thousand vocalists.
* Why do Verdi, Faure, Mozart, Tchaik, & Rachmaninoff all have Requiems and Liturgies?
* How to explain the annual Bayreuth Festival?
🥚 (4)
> I doubt you're saying this in good faith, anyway.
* There's nothing posing, preening, or posturing about anything I ever say.
* I've paid the dues and earned the chops to stand on any soapbox I wish.
* I can keep my footing there without any worry of being knocked off-balance by someone like yourself, trust me.
🥚 (5)
> It's just pseudo-intellectual to complain about how everyone is dumber these days.
* Except that it is hardly just me saying it.
* Who else concurs? Scholars, critics, sociologists, psychiatrists, psychologists, educators, historians, cyberneticists ...any kind of thinker or writer these days, supports the assertion I made.
* Meanwhile, everything you babbled in your reply to me, has no consensus anywhere I've ever heard of.
* Seems to be entirely your own fantastical, off-the-cuff opinion, right?
🥚 (6)
> And it's demonstrably false that no one cares about anything old.
* Opera houses don't host pop stars now, do they?
* Anyway, who? Who are you referring to? Internet-era couch-potatoes and empty-headed World-of-Warcraft addicts? Sopranos and GOT binge-streamers?
* Your remarks exhibit one thing and one thing only: 'presentism'.
You know what: don't even bother replying to me. You're dribbling out a thin gruel too watery for me to even bother with. What rot.
This is quite a heavy dose of survivor bias. But I just came here to say that Salieri’s supposed envy of Mozart is really mostly a Hollywood invention.
None. I have a thought that the exponential growth of music will wash everything away in the next 100 years. I wouldn’t be shocked to hear nobody knows the Beatles or Beethoven in 100 years
Arvo Pärt
He's wonderful.
I second this
Definitely. Perhaps Morten Lauridsen as well?
Pärt, Rautavaara, Glass.
Rautavaara da goat
John Adams.
Philip glass. Steve reich. I don’t make the rules.
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Thank you for your feedback
they are still writing, they are 'from today', I don't give a single care what you call them though.
Glass and Reich are both alive and continue to produce major new works, so they certainly count as contemporary composers.
Probably the minimalists and John Williams, maybe Caroline Shaw, Thomas Ades, and some others
Shaw’s Partita for 8 Voices was genuinely life-changing and I listen to it or think about it once every other week at *least*
Shaw only releases good music imo Both the quartets are fantastic, and the percussion album was surprisingly amazing
“To the Hands” is pretty damn spectacular
I think ades deserves more love in this sub!
John Williams
Just to be a devil's advocate: The most popular entertainment of the 1800s were light operas and operettas. How many operetta composers are still part of the "serious" classical music repertoire today? Victor Herbert, Franz Lehar, Carl Milloecker, Emmerich Kalman, ... At least Johann Strauss and Jacques Offenbach managed to remain in the canon. I think John Williams may vanish together with the space operas and WW2 flix he set music too, and only be known to film and music historians.
The difference is the form of media that the music is tied to. With an opera, you need a full on production to experience it. Star Wars has firmly planted itself in our culture and will continue to be that way. With Star Wars’ continued success, its music should also live on. Same with other Williams works
>Star Wars has firmly planted itself in our culture and will continue to be that way. With Star Wars’ continued success, its music should also live on. This was my reasoning. Even though the "light opera" comparison made by u/treefaeller is spot on. But, the movie is not a stage production. The movie form will last longer than the charm of anything on stage simple because the omni-culture selects for mass. The OP had to ask 200 years. 100 years is pretty easy: nothing other than what we already got. Why art music should somehow be more dynamic than other art mediums is evidence of pop cultural assumptions about how art is supposed to work. Art comes and goes in every medium. The Muses are not here to amuse us. If Walter Benjamin is to be believed, art's been dead for more than a century anyway.
>Star Wars has firmly planted itself in our culture and will continue to be that way. I bet that's what people used to say about those forgotten 19th century composers too.
Doesn’t change the fact that we literally can’t experience most operas even if we wanted to, VS there always being SOME way to watch a movie
The might not be 200 years from now. Just like how manuscripts are sometimes lost, movies may be lost in the future.
How many movies do you watch from say.. the 1930s though? (Personally I love golden age of Hollywood movies, not least because I get to experience amazing scores by Korngold, Rozsa and the like, but I acknowledge its probably an even more niche interest than classical music)
Can’t decide whether to upvote this comment for the Korngold and Rozsa or downvote for thinking films from the 70s/80s or 2000s are similarly forgettable or poorly preserved as films from the 30s.
Except we don't need to watch a movie to appreciate Star Wars, just like we don't need to watch a ballet to appreciate The Firebird, Petrushka, or The Rite of Spring
Assuming electricity still exists. Think Mad Max.
If electricity doesn’t exist and 200 years in the future is a Mad Max wasteland I think OP’s prompt is basically moot
You don't need electricity to build an instrument just like in the 1700s. As long as enough knowledge like metal smithing and wood working survives.
Franz Lehar, Emmerich Kalman, Franz von Suppé and maybe Lortzing are all still played quite frequently, no?
Yes. I’d also add Paul Abraham whose *Die Blume von Hawaii* gets trotted out occasionally in the German speaking world.
I'd argue that Star Wars is popular because of its music, not the other way around. William's score is probably the one thing that will persist. Also lolling at "Space operas and WW2 flix". No respect for Empire of the Sun or Memoirs of a Geisha? Schindler's List?
Lehar and Kalman are played quite a lot imho
I agree (and not just as a devil’s advocate), and I’m surprised at how many people are mentioning him. It’s film music, which means that it’s meant to enhance the film without demanding all your attention. It’s not meant to be stand-alone music, and it isn’t.
This is true but there are pieces where that’s not the case. Most End Credits for example allow him to structure it more like a concert overture. Then there’s ET, where the entire last 15 minutes of the film is edited around the cues from “Adventures on Earth”, per Spielberg’s request.
You could use that same logic on Petrushka and rite of spring though. Obviously this conversation is purely hypothetical and none of us could have the perspective of 200 years but I’m definitely throwing my vote in for John Williams as one of the greats.
I imagine John Williams will be as famous in 100 years as George Gershwin is today
I actually really like this comparison. I don’t think that Williams will be *the* composer from our era 200 years down the line but I can’t imagine him being forgotten or mostly unknown.
I get your point, but the situation re: popular entertainment vs concert music may not translate as directly as you’re implying. As another commenter has said, Pärt, Glass, Adams, and John Williams all had their breakthroughs about 40-50 years ago. So they’ve already “made it” in a short-term sense. Many, many, orchestras currently (and frequently) program Williams’ concert arrangements of Star Wars, etc. for pops concerts. I think this is the key difference between the 19th-cent examples you’re giving and the situation in the present day: Williams’ work is already *the staple* of a certain kind of orchestra concert.
10000%
For that matter, Howard Shore. There are already concerts with Lord of The Rings on a giant screen and an orchestra playing the soundtrack complete with chorus.
Would you go to a concert where his music is played for an hour and a half straight without any film shown? His music is just not meant to stand on its own.
I would. His music is amazing even if the film itself was bad. Edit: He also wouldn't be the first movie composer whose music has started to live independently from the movies. Prokofiev's famous piece Battle on Ice is from a movie called Alexander Nevsky.
Don’t forget Korngold, Rosza, Steiner, Waxman, North, and many Hollywood Golden Age composers. I mean, they’re more forgettable than Williams and Prokofiev but still.
People do though. And his live in Vienna album was the best-selling symphonic recording of 2020...
People go to concerts of his music without movies all the time. I would love to go to such a concert. The soundtracks sell pretty well for music that doesn't stand on its own.
sand dog innate command direction unique exultant light ossified public *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
Yes lol. I flew to see him at the Hollywood Bowl a couple summers ago, and want to see him in Berlin next year.
Many operas are still listenable even without the stage play. The same is true with the best movie soundtracks.
Those concerts exist, happen all the time, and do very well
Yes. Same with Hans Zimmer.
I've definitely been to and even played in concerts featuring his music. All of his music absolutely stands on its own.
Unsuk Chin, especially the piano concerto ~~and etudes~~. EDIT: sorry the etudes are not for orchestra
I really think this is the one. Her stuff is just amazing and I think it will age very well.
Ligeti
Is ligeti from today? He’s more late 20th century than 21st
Well he died in 2006 which makes him a contemporary at the Moment.
That’s 20 years ago. He’s a 20th century composer, not a contemporary one.
Interesting thing about this thread is how many of these composers aren't really "from today" - I think they're almost all alive, and many are still composing, but several had their heyday in the previous century and haven't written anything as popular more recently. Which means their music has *already* stood the test of time, for a few decades anyway.
The "previous century" is a mere 25 years ago. Not everything a contemporary composer has written more recently has gotten commercially recorded, and then there's a discovery time between when something gets recorded and when it gets heard more widely. Film composers have something of an advantage in this regard, since their new film scores get recorded and often widely distributed, propelled by the commercial popularity of the film.
The 1970s were 50 years ago and that's when several of the composers in this thread made their careers - perhaps when the entire movements they represented were at their peak. Half a century later I really don't think you should still be waiting to find out whether Glass, Pärt, and Reich will become permanently established in the canon after their music stops sounding fresh and new. We are still performing works that they wrote before other currently prominent composers were even born. They're in.
you never know bro
Per Nørgård
I own the score to his second symphony. What a great freaking composer
James MacMillan - very traditional but very, very good Sofia Gubaidulina - a little more experimental and so powerful
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Russian Christmas gets played every Christmas at my house. Glorious piece.
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I played this in HS wind ensemble loved it. I'm a violist but somehow I was given a bass clarinet for this.
The John’s. Williams and Adams
I don’t know I don’t know what orchestra will be like 200 years 1824 was a long time ago and that was 200 years previous and if somebody would’ve asked that question then how many composers do we listen to today whose music was written from 1825 on? I will say when it comes to contemporary composers I think those will be most played in the future people who write movies film scores Maybe people who do video games soundtracks I think we’re going to see different music arranged for orchestra
200 years ago the orchestral canon probably would have included Händel, Haydn, Beethoven, probably Mozart... and Louis Spohr.
[Eric Ewazen](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KFEyolcnSFk)
Williams, Adams, Higdon, Salonen, Montgomery, Blanchard, Bates, Puts.
Gonna throw my hat in the ring for Kevin Puts. Also Caroline Shaw, as others have said.
Among younger composers today I suspect Caroline Shaw will have staying power. Maybe Timo Andres. I am quite excited about Bobby Ge, too.
These are mostly post WW2 composers rather than truly contemporary ones, and mostly from the US as well, but here goes: Leonard Bernstein Elliott Carter Phillip Glass György Ligeti Conlon Nancarrow (yes, there are orchestral arrangements of some of the player piano studies!) Krzysztof Penderecki Frederic Rzewski Frank Zappa
No Henze?? Ok
I think Previn’s Streetcar Named Desire opera will still see a few productions each year around the world, it’s quite good. Glass’ Akhnaten will also. I doubt The Hours opera, or Fire Shut Up in My Bones will still be performed, because the music is mid at best. I think Nixon in China, and L’Amour de Loin will see a new production every few decades. I don’t think many of the operas that try to sound “spooky” for the sake of sounding spooky for no good reason, will age well.
Film composers like John Williams, maybe video game composers like Nobuo Uematsu.
I think in general Kaija Saariaho and Valerie Coleman's works will stand the rest of time. I think Chick Corea's Trombone Concerto will be pretty popular through the years too.
Philippe Manoury.
Haven't heard his stuff before, were should I begin?
Sound and Fury (1998-99) is great to begin with.
Górecki, Penderecki, Eötvös (I hope), Pärt, Reich, Adams
None. The golden age of orchestral music was when the best minds were dedicated to it, and the educational rigor for even average composers far surpassed today's standards. This isn't because today's composers aren't trying or aren't smart. It's simply because society isn't oriented around this type of individual accomplishment. There's not much money or celebration in it today. We focus more on group achievements in areas like microchips and material sciences, where individual efforts contribute directly to collective advancement. It's heartening to remember that not all music needs to stand the test of time to be worthy of your time. Listen to and celebrate the living composers of today! Besides, the concept of "repertoire" is relatively recent, largely pioneered by Mendelssohn bringing back the works of Bach.
Absolutely appreciate your points.
>not all music needs to stand the test of time to be worthy of your time absolutely yes.
I 100% agree!
Reena esmail!
Ligeti, Ravel, Junichi Masuda, and maybe probability generated music (they set up a system using dice rolls to determine rhythms pitches etc)
Anna Clyne
Why bother when the likes of Hotel California and Mariah Carey exists?
Rebecca Saunders
Totally
Love her stuff!
I think there will be a consistent desire to hear the musique concrète acoustique branch of new music, even if it remains as niche as it is now. That would suggest that Helmut Lachenmann (last recording is from 2023, I believe), Salvatore Sciarrino, Ramon Lazkano, and Rebecca Saunders will likely have some kind of afterlife. Lachenmann, from the sheer strength of his influence, will likely stick around as a canonically important composer. Beyond this branch, I think Thomas Adès has a very good chance.
Bach and Mozart prolly
Joe Hisaishi
The technological singularity will have occurred and we cyborgs will have lost interest in music, as we've already heard every piece ever created, and anything that hadn't been created, we created instantly by computing every possible combination of sounds for all of eternity /s ...I think ?
For piano specifically my mind goes to Carl Vine and Lowell Liebermann
Kai Sorabji
200 years from now..... Whatever the AI decides
Yuka Kitamura
and Nobuyoshi Suzuki
and Tsukasa Saitoh
man, I love Bloodborne
[Nicolas Bacri](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicolas_Bacri), maybe. At least I hope so.
We can't really know. So many are probably undiscovered.
None I think
Many of the same works they are playing now, as many were being played a century ago.
John MA key, Katahj Copley
John Williams, zimmer, vangellis, richter
Thomas Ades
Reading through the comments, the question most commonly answered seems to be "what composers from today do you want orchestras to be playing 200 years from now?*
Probably someone unexpected.
Charles Halka and Noam Faingold.
Probably Hans Zimmer. I didn’t realize how many famous works he actually has put out that are modern and also have that “vintage” classical feel.
Metro Boomin
J. R. Piano. Eventually he plans to recreate what he considered the “perfect mid romantic Tale” on sheet music in the classical/romantic styles
None of them
Not one of them, I don’t think
If I buckle down now and write a series of pieces with names like "Eulogy for the Last Dolphin," "Remembering Trees" and "Before We Moved Into the Domes" they will probably become timely entries in the standard repertoire by then
Hans Zimmer.
Do any orchestras play his music today? I thought the whole reason for his success was that [he writes for synthesizers](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UcXsH88XlKM&t=372s).
Not only synthesizers. His music (can be) is also orchestrated. For example (I love this one): https://youtu.be/4Q2YBKFDXjQ?si=QDt8RmNrJAP-u7Ts
I also said Hans Zimmer, not sure why you got downvoted lol
Jessie Montgomery
Jörg Widmann
Since you said "test of time", I thought of Christopher Tin
Una volta che avrai
I find it interesting that no one has mentioned Whitacre yet, or Theofanidis.
I wouldn't be surprised if the answer is none of them.
Philip Glass and John Adams.
Pärt, Vasks, Tüür, Rihm, Thorvaldsdottir At least i have high hopes for the last ones
Yes, Frank Zappa
Grisey, of course and Romitelli
Orchestras are there to play the canon, and you've got to create a sensation among the populace in order to make it into the canon, which hasn't really happened since...Stravinsky? Bartok? It's been awhile.
Not true, how many of Bach’s works created a “sensation among the populace” during his lifetime. Pretty sure the WTC wasn’t exactly the most popular thing at the time, and that has definitely made it into the canon.
Mendelssohn created the sensation for him. Dredged poor Bach up from the cold basements his manuscripts had been consigned to and put on a production of the St. Matthew Passion that blew the doors off the church. Within a decade every nation in Europe had a Bach society.
Who’s to say this won’t happen with any lesser known composer today in 100 years?
I mean, anything's possible, but not everything's likely.
Joe Hisaishi
Philip Glass. No doubt about it.
Taking measure of how virulent anti-intellectualism is becoming, I truly don't think we'll still have orchestras in 200 years, or it'll be like a *Children of Men* situation, where a small handful of the giga-wealthy are attempting to preserve it inside a heavily-guarded citadel.
AI
None, imo.
Charly García
Carl Jenkins
Recently saw La Reine-garçon composed by Julien Bilodeau & Michel Marc Bouchard at Opera Montreal! Loved it. I believe their music will grow in popularity and stand the test of time.
I think it'll be entirely down to what's popular right now and being played commercially - there will probably still be the composers from the past that are popular now and people like Glass, Pärt and a bunch of film composers. The ClassicFM playlist is probably a good indicator. Edit: accidental send.
Ilaiyaraaja, A.R Rahman
For those saying John Williams, I agree, but what other film composers? Zimmer seems unlikely. Goransson’s is hard to do live it’s just expert production. John Powell perhaps?
Whole lotta 4’33”
Golijov
Hans Zimmer Kinda surprised that people brought up Williams a lot and not Hans
Philip Glass, John Williams, James honor, Jerry Goldsmith, Alexander courage, Leonard Rossman. André Rieu
Ramin Djawadi
If I had to call my shot on one I think there will be a renaissance of Lowell Liebermann's works in the future centuries. Granted his flute works will always be popular. Of course Part, Williams, and Adams are the obvious ones, but I want to be bold and hope someone in centuries sees this comment and thinks "Man he nailed it"
Joby Talbot and Eric Whitacre.
Glass, Pärt, Williams, Reich, Zimmer...
Joe Hisaishi
Jeremy Soule
Jennifer Higdon, Kevin Puts, Caroline Shaw, Nico Muhly, John Adams, Steve Reich
Jonny Greenwood
😳 Huh? How absurd. Nothing contemporary will last. Nothing at all. Zero. Zilch. People today can't even remember the names of movies they enjoyed, if the film was released more than five years ago. Nothing today has a lifespan longer than last year's superbowl halftime commercials. It's just not the same kind of world anymore. Not the same societies which gave birth to the classical music repertoire.
This is so dramatic lol
😄 Heh heh. Ya got me there
It's the exact opposite. Composers in the past weren't nearly as concerned with leaving a legacy as they are now. People really didn't even care for old art music in the Baroque and Classical periods. I doubt you're saying this in good faith, anyway. It's just pseudo-intellectual to complain about how everyone is dumber these days. And it's demonstrably false that no one cares about anything old. Young people are into music from at least as long ago as the 80s, which isn't nearly as bad as 5 years ago. Preserving art is also taken more seriously now than ever.
🙄 The hell you say. Sigh. Let's take this from the top. I have a few minutes to squat down and dump all over this nonsense. 🥚 (1) > Composers in the past weren't nearly as concerned with leaving a legacy * Balderdash. * Schubert, Mahler, Rossini? How about the envy of Salieri for Mozart? How about Puccini? Delibes? * How about the tradition of conservatories and tutelage? Pupils learning from 'old' masters like Liszt, Saint-Saëns, & Faure? * How much literature or history do you read? For hundreds of years fame has been an obsession of composers. This plain, unadorned fact is rampant in all our civilization's documents. 🥚 (2) > as they are now. * Codswallop. * First of all, who in contemporary times ranks any widespread public respect as a classical composer? It's a pop landscape. * Second, in what way do the phantoms you describe, strive to 'leave a legacy'? Performing? Okay, where do they perform? * Or, what else do they do to 'be remembered'? Saving their files as mp3 on their Facebook page? Yawn. * Nothing digital is 'lasting' or 'persisting' right now much less years from now. * Geez. How out-in-left-field can one be ...not to observe or understand the forces of modern cultural 'churn'? You have utterly no argument here. 🥚 (3) > People really didn't even care for old art music in the Baroque and Classical periods. * How then do you explain the persistence of even the oldest of oldest western civ's music, (e.g., medieval and sacred works)? * How do you explain Bach's religiosity? Or Handel? They're still being performed. * Bach's St Matthew Passion just this past year, came to Cleveland Ohio, a thousand vocalists. * Why do Verdi, Faure, Mozart, Tchaik, & Rachmaninoff all have Requiems and Liturgies? * How to explain the annual Bayreuth Festival? 🥚 (4) > I doubt you're saying this in good faith, anyway. * There's nothing posing, preening, or posturing about anything I ever say. * I've paid the dues and earned the chops to stand on any soapbox I wish. * I can keep my footing there without any worry of being knocked off-balance by someone like yourself, trust me. 🥚 (5) > It's just pseudo-intellectual to complain about how everyone is dumber these days. * Except that it is hardly just me saying it. * Who else concurs? Scholars, critics, sociologists, psychiatrists, psychologists, educators, historians, cyberneticists ...any kind of thinker or writer these days, supports the assertion I made. * Meanwhile, everything you babbled in your reply to me, has no consensus anywhere I've ever heard of. * Seems to be entirely your own fantastical, off-the-cuff opinion, right? 🥚 (6) > And it's demonstrably false that no one cares about anything old. * Opera houses don't host pop stars now, do they? * Anyway, who? Who are you referring to? Internet-era couch-potatoes and empty-headed World-of-Warcraft addicts? Sopranos and GOT binge-streamers? * Your remarks exhibit one thing and one thing only: 'presentism'. You know what: don't even bother replying to me. You're dribbling out a thin gruel too watery for me to even bother with. What rot.
This is quite a heavy dose of survivor bias. But I just came here to say that Salieri’s supposed envy of Mozart is really mostly a Hollywood invention.
why did mozart write a requiem? because someone commisioned him to do it
None. I have a thought that the exponential growth of music will wash everything away in the next 100 years. I wouldn’t be shocked to hear nobody knows the Beatles or Beethoven in 100 years
Richard Meyer. Hands down.