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Paul Dukas
Dukas was a French composer who rarely published his works. He was also a teacher and a critic. -
Jean Sibelius
Sibelius was a Finnish composer who wrote tone poems and symphonies. His later works were more modern. -
Amy Beach
Amy Marcy Cheney Beach was an American composer and pianist who was very successful in Europe. She wrote with a more conservative style, and she was the first successful female American composer of large-scale art music. -
Scott Joplin
Joplin was an American composer who is credited with popularizing ragtime. While he did write some marches, waltzes, and one opera, he focused more on the style of ragtime. -
Ralph Vaughan Williams
Williams became the leader of English music with his many compositional works, and was a teacher and conductor as well. He was also the music editor of the English Hymnal. -
Aleksandr Skryabin
Skryabin was a composer who was influenced by impressionism and chromaticism. He had his own complex original harmonic language that he put into his works. -
Sergei Rachmaniov
Rachmaniov was not focused on the nationalist movement at the time, and was a master of melodies. He was also a virtuoso pianist who traveled the U.S. -
Gustav Holst
Holst was an English composer who found influence in folksong and Hindu mysticism. He was an original composer, and an important teacher of many. -
Manuel de Falla
de Falla was the principal Spanish composer of the 20th century. He gathered international fame for using Spanish folk and popular music in his works. -
Béla Bartok
Bartok was a Hungarian composer and ethnomusicologist who incorporated his own native folk music into his works. He was known for his favoring of rhythm in his music. -
Zoltán Kodály
Kodály is credited with creating a solfege system starting on "do". He was a Hungarian ethnomusicologist and music educator. -
Edgard Varèse
A French-American composer who focused on more atonal compositions. Varèse was an innovative composer who was interested in creating organized sound as music, and found other things to be more important than pitch in his works. -
Heitor Villa-Lobos
Villa-Lobos was a Brazilian composer and cellist of the 20th century. He favored drama in his pieces. -
Sergei Prokofiev
A 20th century Russian composer and pianist, Prokofiev was an important Russian voice in Western culture. -
Pail Hindemith
Hindemith was a German conductor, composer, and author. He wrote Gebrauchsmusik, which translates to utility music, which means music written not just to exist, but for a very specific and identifiable purpose. -
William Grant Still
Still was a very notable African-American composer, and the first one to have a symphony of his played by a leading orchestra at the time. In addition, he was the first black American to conduct a major orchestra, as well as the first black American to write for media like film and radio. -
George Gershwin
Gershwin was a notable composer who was well-known for his work in Hollywood. He is also credited with fusing pop and jazz music together. -
Duke Ellington
Ellington was a jazz composer of the 20th century who broke boundaries with his music. A band leader, pianist, and jazz musician, Ellington created a unique style of big band jazz music. -
Carlos Chávez
An important figure in Mexican culture, Chávez was not only a composer, but a conductor, teacher, and government official as well. -
Aaron Copland
Known as the most popular composer of the 20th century, Copland was best known for the lasting impact he's made on American people, even today. He was a teacher, conductor, and author as well. -
Louie Armstrong
Armstrong was a popular African-American jazz musician of the 20th century. He was a singer, band-leader, and trumpeter, and is credited with revolutionizing jazz today. -
Dimitri Shostakovich
Shostakovich was the most notable Russian name of his time. He was a very important composer and was known for how versatile he was with his works. -
Elliott Carter
An innovative composer recognized for his treatment of rhythm and form, Carter's compositions are still quite prevalent in the 21st century. He was a teacher in an addition to being a composer. -
Olivier Messiaen
The first to advocate for tonal serialism, Messiaen was an innovator in rhythm in his works. He was a French organist, author, and composer who used nature and natural sounds in his compositions. -
Samuel Barber
A child prodigy and gifted melodist, Barber became popular due to his conservative tonality in the broad experimentation of the 20th century. In addition to being an accomplished composer, Barber was also a talented singer. -
John Cage
The center of avant-garde music of the 20th century, Cage changed the definition of music with his compositions. He was also a philosopher in addition to being a composer, and one of the most innovative composers of the 20th century at that. -
Benjamin Britten
The most well-known and prolific English composer of the 20th century, Britten helped keep opera alive in English countries. -
Leonard Bernstein
An incredibly influential American musician of the 20th century, Bernstein was quite versatile as a pianist, composer, teacher, and composer. He brought classical music to the general public using various media sources. -
Iannis Xenakis
A French composer of Greek and Romanian background, Xenakis advocated for music based on mathematic calculations, known as Stochastic music. He was also a proponent of aleatoric, or chance, music. -
György Ligeti
An Austrian composer of Hungarian descent, Ligeti wrote sound blocks into his textural style of compositions. He has been described as one of the most important avant-garde composers of the 20th century. -
Pierre Boulez
He is a French composer who advocates for total serialism in music. He believes all "art of the past should be destroyed" as the composers Boulez admires have not followed tradition, but had tradition follow them. -
Karlheinz Stockhausen
A pioneer of electronic music as well as new forms of modern notation, Stockhausen has been one of the most important post-WWII innovators on the musical field. -
George Crumb
Crumb became most popular for expressing despair during the Vietnam War, specifically during the times of 1962 to 1973. He is an American composer. -
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Great Depression
After the Roaring 20s, the stock market crashed heavily and American went into the Great Depression until the late 1930s. -
Stephen Sondheim
Sondheim is an American composer and lyricist. He has written many musicals and musical numbers, such as Into the Woods and Sweeney Todd. -
John Williams
Considered one of the best film score composers in America, with notable works in Star Wars and Harry Potter, Williams is a composer and conductor. In addition to his 80 film scores, he also has written orchestral works. -
Krzysztof Penderecki
Hailed as Poland's greatest living composer, Penderecki's atonal music has attracted great popularity amongst the public. His compositional style also feature textural music with the use of sound blocks. -
Terry Riley
An American composer and performer influenced by jazz and classical Indian music, Riley became one of the founders of minimalism with his work "In C." He also was interested in tape and electronic music. -
Steve Reich
Also a pioneer of minimalism, Reich is a percussionist and composer. He has written tape and electronic music, orchestral music, and chamber music. -
Philip Glass
One of the most influential minimalist composers of the 20th century, Glass is one of the innovators of the minimalist style. He is an American-Jewish performer and composer who has written several well-known vocal pieces. -
John Corigliano
Corigliano is an American composer who uses his sometimes intense works to address important social issues. He has been noted as one to watch for the future generations and his impact on them. -
Ellen Taaffe Zwilich
The first female to win a Pulitzer Prize for her piece (in 1982), Zwilich is a popular and busy composer. She has created several noteworthy pieces, and is a talented violinist and composer. -
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World War II
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Paul Lansky
Lansky is a pioneer in the synthesis of digital sound. He has written chamber music, as well as an electronic opera and other electronic and computer music. -
John Adams
A leading composer of the post-minimalist movement, Adams helped expand the minimalist and neo-romantic compositional language. He is an American composer and conductor. -
Andrew Lloyd Weber
A contemporary British composer, Weber's works have been extraordinarily successful. He is quite famous for his film scores, stage works, and choral-orchestra pieces. -
Electronic Music
The computer to make electronic music was invented. -
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Sitcoms
Sitcoms were popularized with memorable jingles, such as the Brady Bunch, MASH, and Gilligan's Island. -
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Vietnam War
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Koji Kondo
Kondo is a Japanese composer who has been the sound director of Nintendo since 1984. He is most known with his incredible works on the "Legend of Zelda" and "Super Mario" video game series with Nintendo. -
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British Invasion
The Beatles and other British groups were popularized in America. -
Eric Whitacre
Famous for his "Virtual Choir" project, Whitacre has created several notable online musical performances. His compositions are written in a neo-tonal style, and he is a conductor and lecturer in addition to being a composer. -
Kyle Kindred
An American composer and teacher at SHSU, Kindred is an active composer of the 21st century. He has written band, chamber, orchestral, and stage works. -
Phantom of The Opera
Phantom of the Opera debuted. This is the longest running musical, and is still going today.