Sir John Kenneth Tavener was born in Wembley. Coincidentally, he studied alongside John Rutter at Highgate School before enrolling in the Royal Academy of Music where he studied under Lennox Berkeley. Tavener wrote many choral works influenced by his personal life and conversion to the Orthodox Church.
Giuseppe Tartini was born in Pirano in the Republic of Venice. He studied music in the monastery of St. Francis in Assisi. He served under several different patrons and is believed to be the owner of the first violin made by Antonio Stradivari.
Francisco de Asis Tárrega Eixea was born in Villarreal, Spain. He studied at the Madrid Royal Conservatory and then embarked on a career in guitar performance, composition, and teaching. He transcribed many of the greats into his instrument including Chopin, Beethoven, and Mendelssohn. He was known as the Sarasate of the guitar.
Alexander Tansman was born in Łódź, Poland. He studied at the Lodz Conservatory and then at Warsaw. He emigrated to France and was drawn to the music of Ravel, Stravinsky, Milhaud, and Honegger. The latter two attempted to recruit him into Les Six but he remained an independent early example of neoclassical thought. He eventually became a naturalized French citizen, did a world tour, and was given the Order of the Arts and the Letters by the French Academy.
Thomas Tallis was probably born during the reign of Henry VII. He served in the royal courts of four successive monarchs, from Henry VIII to Elizabeth I. He somehow managed to avoid the upheaval characterizing those monarchies and left an immensely impactful repertoire of Renaissance compositions.
Takemitsu was born in Tokyo. He was conscripted into military service but worked with the Allies after the occupation. He developed a form of electronic music and drew the attention of contemporaries Igor Stravinsky, Aaron Copland, and Karlheinz Stockhausen. He also lectured with Cage and was an important member of the 20th-century avant-garde community.
Nationalities
American 7
German 7
English 6
Russian 5
Austrian 5
Czech 3
French 3
Hungarian 2
Spanish 2
Finnish 2
Papalini 1
Irish 1
Lombard 1
Neapolitan 1
Swiss 1
Sicilian 1
Norwegian 1
Dutch 1
Greek 1
Polish 1
Earliest
Composer - Jan Sweelinck (1562-1621)
Composition - Scheidt's Tabulatura Nova III (1624)*
*Earliest dated composition
Latest
Composer - Auslin Sallinen (b. 1935)
Composition - Schuller's String Quartet (2014)
Total Compositions Sampled - 240
Karol Maciej Szymanowski was born in Tymoszówka, Russia to Polish gentry. He studied at the Warsaw Conservatory He founded the Young Polish Composers' Publishing Company and did much to support the work done by his fellow countrymen. He briefly served as the director of the Warsaw Conservatory and produced a respected body of work.
Jan Pieterszoon Sweelinck was born in Deventer, Netherlands. His father and father's father were organists and he followed in the family business. He served as the principal organist for Oude Kerk for over 40 years. He is considered the pinnacle in keyboard complexity prior to the arrival of J.S. Bach.
Franz von Suppé was born Francesco Ezechiele Ermenegildo in Spalato, Dalmatia which is in modern-day Croatia, then in the Austrian Empire. He simplified and Germanized his name and spent much of his career in Vienna. He was a very successful stage composer and producer with a large catalog of works.
Arthur Seymour Sullivan was born in London. His father was the bandmaster at the Royal Military College in Sandhurst. Arthur became proficient in multiple instruments and began composing as a child. He studied at the Royal Academy of Music and the Leipzig Conservatoire. He met dramatist W.S. Gilbert and the pair are rarely considered apart from each other as they produced a litany of brilliant and hilarious musical plays.
Josef Suk was born in Křečovice, in modern-day Czechia. Suk studied under his country's greatest composer, Antonín Dvořák. The teacher appreciated his student so much, Suk married Dvořák daughter. He was an excellent violinist and decorated composer. In fact, he won the Silver Medal in music at the 1932 Summer Olympics.
Igor Fyodorovich Stravinsky was born in Oranienbaum, west of Saint Petersburg. He eventually became an ex-patriot Soviet in France and the United States. He studied under Rimsky-Korsakov and like many of his contemporaries was commissioned by Sergei Diaghilev to compose. He went through several distinct phases and pushed 20th-century theory into what is now known as modernism.
Richard Georg Strauss was born in Munich. His father was the principal horn player for the Court Opera. Richard was precocious and began composing at age 6. Eight decades later, he died as one of the most successful German composers of the Late Romantic period. His music was celebrated by the Nazis but he negotiated the relationship deftly. He was captured by American soldiers at the end of the war and one of them asked him to compose an Oboe Concerto.
Johann Baptist Strauss II was born near Vienna. His father was also a successful composer. Johann Jr. became perhaps the most prolific waltz composer of all time. He and his father developed a rivalry in his early years but eventually, he eclipsed him and became internationally renowned.
Karlheinz Stockhausen was born in Cologne. He studied at the Hochschule für Musik Köln and with Messiaen in Paris. He is considered an important figure in the development of electronic music, aleatoric music, and spatialization. He also taught in several countries and four of his children are musicians.
Robert Still was born in London. He studied at Eton, Trinity College, Oxford, and the Royal College of Music. He served in the artillery orchestra during World War II. He spent much of his career composing and giving lessons but also wrote on psychology and psychoanalysis.
Sir Charles Villiers Stanford was born in Dublin. He studied at Cambridge, Leipzig, and Berlin. He was one of the founding professors at the Royal College of Music and had many significant students including Gustav Holst and Ralph Vaughan Williams.
Carl Philipp Stamitz was born in Mannheim, Germany. His father, Johann, was the last composer in the dictionary and the founder of the Mannheim school of composing. Carl continued his father's legacy and was a virtuoso violinist. He composed 50 symphonies and a number of other works despite a relatively short career.
