Catalog of Composers: A Musico-Political Odyssey

by guest contributor Jeffrey M. Gross

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With his dying breath, the obscure but brilliant Habsburg musicologist Anton van Bortebertje bade me take care of a mysterious manuscript page. Though in extremis, he claimed to have translated it from Homeric Greek. One can well believe that in those less enlightened, less inclusive times people may have frittered away the hours studying the ancient Hellenic tongue. Thus I present to you this fragment of an unknown Homeric epic as it was thrust into my eager hands. To crib from another epic, the Old Testament, quomodo ceciderunt robusti et perierunt arma bellica. Not being a learned man, I have little Latin, but I believe this means, “how are the mighty canceled in battle and the tropes of war distorted.”

First came Josquin des Préz, he of counterpoint the master, son of Bossart. Setting forth from fair Cambrai in Picardy’s wheat-laden fields, he deftly deployed the modes, even those of ancient Phrygia. Known as the “Princeps Musicae” or “Prince of Music,” though to potential employers as “a pain in the ass,” Josquin set sail on as yet unknown seas of polyphony. Taming his teacher Ockeghem’s long-voiced style into something humanistic, he thus sent into war’s strife 18 Masses and 50 motets. With full many chansons he also discomfited his foe, including “Allégez-moi dessous la boudinette” — “Soothe me below the navel.”

Next Sebastian Bach, from the strong city of Eisenach with its oak trees. As his name, so his fame: a mighty “Brook” emptying, via many turnings, into the ocean of the numinous. A complicated man, he disarmed his enemies with maskirovka and camouflage. Thought by many to be an Enlightenment figure, he set sail upon a deep current of faith. He lined up along the shore over 1100 works, so that those that fought alongside him were filled with a warrior’s Thumos.

Next Mozart — of this great heart what bard can sing so as to move men enough? Though thought by those of little wit a mere buffoon, when he fit the strings to his lyre and aimed, no foe could resist his grace. All yielded before him, and thus to the churning strife he sent 41 symphonies, one however written by Haydn’s brother, 27 piano concertos, 23 string quartets, and operas and songs near uncountable. Thus did even the most skilled in composition fall before him, and accounted themselves glad of the honor. 

Then short and perhaps pockmarked Beethoven, hero, above average composer from the above average city Bonn. Valiantly he laid siege to mighty Vienna with its Prater violets. Wresting the forms of stiflingly canonical classicism into new, also stiflingly canonical shape, he almost alone of warriors created Romanticism in music. Thus, by Eris, goddess of strife, he dispatched nine well-benched symphonies to plow the Rhein-dark sea — the mighty Ninth perhaps the only one of its genre about a “frustrated rapist” — plus five piano concerti, 16 well-tuned string quartets, and 32 piano sonatas. Also “Wellington’s Victory.”

Next Schubert, tiny giant of the Biedermeier, Kierkegaardian “Knight of Infinite Resignation,” and maker of creamy Viennese pastry. A native of that great city whose twin gods were Ares and Apollo, the wily composer baffled his foes with unyielding gemütlichkeit. Though a youth who was to live but 31 years, his music set sail on a pure but pitiless light from Beyond. Thus he marshaled unto the fight peerless solo piano pieces, treacherous string quartets, and above all nine symphonies, or seven, or eight and a half, depending how you count them. 

Then the mighty Schumann, discloser of unparalleled worlds of imagination. The works deployed by this great spirit of the Romantic included a piano concerto in A minor, and many songs to toughen the mettle of warriors. Robert, her husband, an ink-stained wretch, also wrote stuff. 

And Frédéric Chopin, who though only 5’7”, bestrode the salons of Paris like a Colossus. His fury at the keyboard was unmatched, and thus he dispatched into battle three sonatas, four ballades and scherzi, 24 preludes, and a flotilla of etudes upon which rocks many rival pianists ran aground and were undone. The “Raindrop” Prelude is playable, however. 

Next Liszt, from the fertile plains of Magyarország, which only the bravest dare pronounce, or Hungary, set forth with many tone poems. Also first was he of the host to join battle accompanied by groupies, a thing hitherto unknown. With tone poems, etudes, and piano transcriptions, brutally he crushed the wrists of friend and foe alike. 

Next Brahms, great-hearted son of proud Hamburg’s ramparts. Early did he steer his ship from the North Sea’s unquiet waves to the blue Danube and Vienna. Yet while he fought many campaigns, always he girded himself with acid wit and self-deprecation. Thus the Muses say only that he shot many arrows, and all of them flew true.

Then Wagner–the man, not the mercenary, though sometimes it’s a tough call. Hurling the spear of his Gesamtkunstwerke from the eagle’s nest of Bayreuth, a hero was this very German son of the Germanest of countries, Germany — of great heart was he, and great debts to many, including a Jewish guy. So feared was his repertoire that many of his captives prayed to Pallas Athena that they would make it to intermission. A flotilla of 13 operas did he send into battle, and each was better than it sounded.

Next Mahler, too Jewi-

[Conclusion deest]

Jeffrey Gross is a flâneur & entrepreneur in Brooklyn—a flântrepreneur. He is currently writing a book about music.

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photo taken in Ikaria, Greece