The numerous fans of his music and the composers who were influenced by him? Duh. I mean, we could use your rubric for dozens of composers. Handel? Schumann? Brahms? Dvorak? R. Strauss? (note: I love Schumann, Dvorak and Strauss’ music)

“And Stravinsky. He influenced music and its evolution, but what impact did he have on a small sub-set of music lovers who actually want to listen to his specialized expression?”

What on earth does that mean? I suspect you meant “but what impact did he have EXCEPT for that on a small sub-set etc.”

Stravinsky’s influence on 20th century music is vast and profound and I don’t even like his music apart from “The Firebird” and “Le Rossignol”! Neo-classicism, primativism, his ballet scores, using blocks of music as a mean to assemble larger structures, rhythm as a major factor in composition and on and on. He’s also the acceptable face of serialism to a lot of people. He’s certainly had more impact on classical music than Chopin and his influence even extends to the rock genre as well.

“But Chopin has influenced — to the great positive in all of life’s measure of enjoyment and expression of feeling”

Yikes! My pretentiousness meter just went in to the red.

” — every pianist”

not all of us are pianists

“every music-lover”

EVERY music-lover? Every single one? I know of two people personally that find Chopin’s music lightweight, same-y and insubstantial, and they aren’t alone. I love his music, but you overstate your case.

“every romantic who ever heard his music”

Not all of us are romantics, in fact some of us are anti-Romanticism. Really, it’s true! Some of us would rather listen to Debussy when dining by candlelight with a loved one if that’s what you meant by “romantic”.

“To pick Bartok as greater than Chopin is utterly absurd”

To YOU. I don’t rate Chopin because he was a one-trick pony. That trick was amazing -writing great solo piano music- but where’s Chopin’s opera or vocal music? The symphonies or other orchestral pieces? His chamber output is small and is never played as far as I can tell. His orchestrations are routinely snickered at, because….he was a one-trick pony.

Bartok wrote one fantastic opera, 2 terrific ballets, 3 great piano concertos, some terrific solo piano music, 6 string quartets that are widely played and admired, some terrific orchestral pieces (the early 4 Pieces, Music for S, P & C, the masterpiece that is the Concerto for Orchestra) and so on. Not to mention, Bartok was crucial in the movement to record and notate folk-songs, which has had a wide influence.

“His reasoning seemed, frankly, trite and superficial”

Well, if your cases would be made like the one that you made for Chopin, I’ll pass.

So that’s the metric then, aspiring to be profound? Brahms aspired to be profound yet his music bores me to tears.

I prefer Jim Svejda of KUSC radio here in Los Angeles and his idea that there’s been 4 revolutions in music:

Beethoven with form
Wagner with harmony
Debussy with sound/tone color
Stravinsky with rhythm

Although I adore Schubert, his placing him at number four is indefensible. Needless to say, Wagner was a much greater composer and he deserves to be placed fourth followed by Debussy at fifth. His omitting Chopin is just unforgivable. And sorry but this Bela (Bartok) doesn’t ring, not for the precious tenth spot, anyway.

Greatness has to involve impact on music in general and on untold numbers of listeners over time. If Bartok had never composed, who would know the difference? What impact did he have on anything outside dedicated musicians who care to explore the confines of expression? And Stravinsky. He influenced music and its evolution, but what impact did he have on a small sub-set of music lovers who actually want to listen to his specialized expression?

But Chopin has influenced — to the great positive in all of life’s measure of enjoyment and expression of feeling — every pianist, every music-lover, every romantic who ever heard his music. To pick Bartok as greater than Chopin is utterly absurd. I just don’t see by what measure Bartok or could be rated as top-ten great. I think Tommasini and the average reader is picking his/her favorites, not evaluating greatness as this series claims. So who should take Bartok’s place? Either Mahler or Schoenberg both of whom dwarf him in inspiration and output.

I think it’s fun and intellectually stimulating to consider “greatness” as a measure of these composers. But that measuring stick is more objective than most people can adhere to — even Mr Tommasini! I will admit that at times I felt rather turned off by this article. His reasoning seemed, frankly, trite and superficial. If I’m going to read an NY Times article about what made the masters great, I want it to go a little deeper than a Wikipedia article would.