October 12, 2004

Thomas Ades is a young composer from the UK who might just be the best composer to come along in a very long time. Although composers such as John Adams, John Corigliano and Harrison Birtwistle et. al at various times have been dubbed standard bearers of contemporary classical music, I ,along with many others, feel that Ades may eclipse them all. His acceptance is not quite complete as some claim "emperor's new clothes staus" for him, but I beg to differ.

His music encompasses all that has come before it without being the slightest bit derivative. His timbral and textural imagination is at least the equal of Ravel, Stravinsky and Ligeti. His ideas pour forth with astonishing abundance and thus far he has not repeated himself. His work can be thorny and difficult or radiant and transcendent and I, for one, see in him a genius on the order of Beethoven, Brahms or Stravinsky. Time will tell, but you heard it here first! For a fairly accessible introduction to his music: check out America: A Prophecy though each of his CDs are quite different and worth checking out.

posted by kamus 19 years ago
  • how come the quotes don't display on the FP? What did I screw up? Sorry!
  • If he doesn't have green hair it's not a classical music revival.
  • Sarcasm aside, thanks for the tip.
  • What did I screw up? Nothing. Look at the quotes on this page. What instruction says "mung it on the front page but keep it clean on the inside"?
  • Thanks for trying to explain my error. Unfortunately I didn't understand your explanation. I'm one dumb monkey
  • Thanks for trying to explain my error. Unfortunately I didn't understand your explanation. I'm one dumb monkey
  • And a repetitive one at that!
  • kamus - no need to have everything on the front, people will step inside if they're interested. thanks for the post, i'll definitely check this out.
  • I wish I could hear this stuff live, I'm a sucker for live performance (much more so than recordings, however good they may be). Don't you wish there was some kind of Pollstar thing so you could sort upcoming performances by composers being performed in your region?
  • I once met Thomas Ades at a party. He totally ignored me, turned to the person next to me, and began a long gossipy conversation about Prince Charles's private life. Ades is very cool, very clever and very frightening, and he had obviously taken one look at me and instantly summed me up as Not Interesting Enough. However, I think his music is brilliant.
  • Appreciate the tip, too, kamus. Thank you.
  • Yeah, I forgot to mention that a lot of people think he's a real brat.
  • Also, thanks for the tips on making posts- I'll get better