Timeline oddities: Composers

These observations are not huge deals, but just a bit odd from my perspective. I thought I'd look up some baroque and classical composers just for fun.

1. Interestingly, "Life of composer Antonio Vivaldi" is only one year (1741).

2. If you type in a filter of "composer", you get greats like Mozart (under "Life of composer Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart") and Schubert (under "Life of composer Franz Schubert"), but J.S. Bach is under "Life of Johann Sebastian Bach". That is, the word "composer" is left out.

3. The lives of Handel and Beethoven are left out altogether, although performance dates of some of their works are included.

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Comments

MJ. Smith

Dates are not added in a logical pattern ... unless you consider "when we hit it in a book we're linking to the timeline" to constitute a logical pattern. I'm especially fond of those who have died but not been born. [;)]

Rosie Perera

3. The lives of Handel and Beethoven are left out altogether, although performance dates of some of their works are included.

That doesn't seem to be the case for me:

But other greats are missing: Albinoni, Brahms, Bruckner, Holst, Strauss (both Johann and Richard), Telemann, and many, many others. Gershwin, Stravinsky, Schoenberg, and Verdi's lifespans are missing but the composition dates of some of their works are listed. Mahler shows up only under "Gustav Mahler's musical career." And the word "composer" is missing in Mendelssohn's lifespan. The inconsistencies in wording should be cleaned up, but I guess we can't expect Logos to have a complete database of all the great composers and their lives. It's not particularly their area of expertise. And where do you draw the line? Olivier Messiaen is listed, but most people have never heard of him while Brahms is better known. Do they list only composers who were known to be Christians or who composed sacred music? I dunno. It gets complicated. There were hundreds composers who made their mark on history. This isn't the primary tool I would use to study them. Unless Logos were to get Stanley Sadie's The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians (20 Volume Set). Now that I would jump for!

Rosie Perera

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/699279#Comment_699279

I'm especially fond of those who have died but not been born.

P.D.Q. Bach was noted for having died before he was born:

Lew Worthington

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/699280#Comment_699280

That doesn't seem to be the case for me:

That's odd. But here's why: The life spans of these two composers are included in the subject "Biblical Studies". That's even more odd. At least it explains why Aram Khachaturian doesn't come up, good Soviet that he was.

[quote]

Indeed, if this had been their area of expertise, it might be worth "complaining" about. I just thought it was odd. And I pointed out Handel and Beethoven simply because they are household words to most westerners. Since music history is not their bailiwick, the "line" they choose to draw can be as arbitrary as they wish, even if it bizarrely includes Messiaen.