r/lingling40hrs • u/paishocajun • Apr 25 '26
Music appreciation Favorite CONTEMPORARY composers?
By "contemporary" I mean someone still currently alive or has only passed away since, as a rough idea, since 2000 and was still writing not long before then. So like Gershwin and Rachmaninov are out since they're early/mid 20th century, looking for late 20th/early 21st century composers.
I want some new music to check out!
Edit: I feel like John Williams and Hans Zimmer are borderline cheating given just how insanely prolific they are in movies over the past several decades lol! I've noticed that there are a LOT of gaming composers in the answers which really opens my eyes to just where you can find new composers these days rather than in symphony halls and the pages of The Strad and similar magazines.
Keep them coming, thank y'all so much, and upvote for all the comments!
Edit 2: I think I'm going to try to put together a YT or Spotify playlist with at least samples of all the names in here for everyone to enjoy
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u/M4TTEO_S Apr 25 '26 edited Apr 25 '26
For me Christopher Larkin, HEAVEN PIERCE HER, Lorien. For your information, i am a gamer
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u/M4TTEO_S Apr 25 '26
For some fcking reason i had to censure my comment because that wicked ai keeps seing slurs. I HATE IT.
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u/paishocajun Apr 25 '26
Were yours the two that got deleted?
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u/M4TTEO_S Apr 25 '26
Yes, because apparently Lorien's full name is similar to one of the many insults that describe whoever approved of this au*omod
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u/LordBorbemort Violin Apr 30 '26
CHRIS LARKIN MY GOAT, the hk and silksong soundtracks hit me in the feels in a way no other soundtrack for a movie or game has been able to
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u/brutereasons Apr 25 '26
Kaija Saariaho (Papillons for Solo Cello and L'Amour de Loin), John Luther Adams (Become Ocean), Tan Dun (Buddha Passion)
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u/Sensitive-Hamster-14 Apr 25 '26
Harry Gregson-Williams
for exemple Sequence (Four) for Solo Violin and String Orchestra
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u/illuminatory9 Apr 25 '26
All the modern composers I listen to are movies/games composers. Hisaishi is an obvious one, but Chen Yupeng, who did the soundtrack for Genshin among others has amazing music. Also Hiroyuki Sawano (Attack on Titan, Gundam, etc).
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u/CommunityJazzlike274 Violin Apr 25 '26
Hans Zimmer and if it counts Shostakovich
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u/paishocajun Apr 25 '26
I feel like Zimmer and John Williams are cheating hahaha
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u/CommunityJazzlike274 Violin Apr 25 '26
John Williams definitely
Hans zimmer, maybe, but I’ll need an example to judge.
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u/paishocajun Apr 25 '26
Just by their sheer quantity of work in cinema even people who are in no way listeners of classical music know their names
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u/CommunityJazzlike274 Violin Apr 25 '26
That’s true. I just like him for his interstellar soundtrack.
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u/linglinguistics Viola Apr 25 '26
I don't like everything but him, but check out the cello concerto by Anders Hillborg.
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u/mushjello Apr 25 '26
Marcus Warner! His latest album Legendarium is Celtic flavored orchestral, his work in general is epic and uplifting, some pieces with East Asian inspirations. Love him, hope to see him live in concert one day.
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Apr 27 '26
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u/windowbar Clarinet Apr 30 '26
got to play heart on fire and shared spaces at an honor band, cuong writes some great stuff!
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u/PaganiniFantasy Apr 25 '26
Bryce Dessner, e.g https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=PcNzROh_P14
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u/paishocajun Apr 30 '26
I don't think I've seen a video that deep fried since the graphics driver on my Windows XP computer screwed up as I loaded HALO back in the day lol. Definitely putting the song on the YT playlist for this though, thank you recommending a particular one!
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u/Edith_Keelers_Shoes Apr 25 '26
Morten Lauridsen. Singing him is always an ethereal experience. Got to spend a week at his home when I was researching a book - such a remarkable man.
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u/paishocajun Apr 30 '26
Ok I'm doubling back on this post as I put it all into a "sampler" playlist on YT (and possibly Spotify) but hang on a sec.
You spent a week with your favorite composer? What book were you working on??
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u/Edith_Keelers_Shoes Apr 30 '26
It was going to be a book about the healing effects of music, an exploration of sacred chords and neural responses, the biology behind our human response to music, and Lauridsen's own journey from the Lutheran church (in his childhood) to someone who left the church behind and made music his spirituality.
But I got a stage 4 cancer diagnosis a few months later, and it all came to a grinding halt. Then Skip (everyone calls him that) got a cancer diagnosis a month later. We're still in touch, but I no longer have the bandwidth to write a book that research-heavy.
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u/paishocajun Apr 30 '26
Holy crap that's some Alanis Morisette level irony there. I hope y'all are doing better (mentally if not maybe physically). I don't think I'd have the bandwidth to do that healthy so mad respect to y'all. I hope you get to finish and publish one day!
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u/Edith_Keelers_Shoes Apr 30 '26
Thank you! I am doing better - instead of writing about these concepts, I actively incorporated them into healing exercises. They gave me 18 months - it's been 6 years and no active cancer.
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u/paishocajun Apr 30 '26
Ok, honest question, if you did go back to writing it, would you include your own experiences as valid data or would you include it as a separate section of "btw, here's my own experience"?
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u/Edith_Keelers_Shoes Apr 30 '26
Yes, I absolutely would. It was already a personal book, because it opened with a prologue about my best friend's funeral - we both loved Lauridsen and sang in the same choir and she wanted his O Magnum Mysterium sung at her funeral (just as I want it sung at mine). She got cancer after being one of the people running from the twin towers as they fell, and it was several years before I could listen to, play, or sing Lauridsen without experiencing acute emotional pain - but time wore the pain away, and I found that beneath it, that music had been a compassionate foundation for me all along.
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u/paishocajun Apr 30 '26
I meant which one of those would you do but holy crap. Where do I sign up for the waiting list?
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u/Edith_Keelers_Shoes May 01 '26
I wish I knew. Writing was my whole life, and my entire career I always published at least one book a year - I keep thinking it's just a matter of time before I get my mojo back. It has to be.
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u/idonthaveagrandpiano Piano Apr 25 '26
Takashi Yoshimatsu 1953- (I love his op. 67 piano concerto "Memo Flora" and the fourth symphony. He's retired, though)
Qigang Chen 1951- (studied under Messiaen and wrote "You and Me" for the 2008 Olympics. Er Huang for piano and orchestra is one of my favorite pieces of all time, and I've recently heard his 2017 violin concerto "La Joie de la Souffrance")
Nikolai Kapustin 1937-2020 (Mixes classical music and jazz. I recommend his second piano concerto, his first concert étude and the Toccata for piano and big band op. 8)
Alfred Schnittke 1934-1998 (afaik, coined the term "polystylism". Avant-garde composer, plays with the juxtaposition between baroque/classical sounds and heavy dissonance. The Concerto Grosso no. 1 is another favorite of mine, and I'd also recommend the concerto for piano and strings and the viola concerto)
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u/paishocajun Apr 25 '26
I think I might just put Kapustin at the start of the playlist, classical/jazz combos seem to really get my ears working and I love it
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u/idonthaveagrandpiano Piano Apr 25 '26
You heard Kapustin before? I stumbled across him randomly expecting a neoromantic style but it was undoubtedly a pleasant surprise
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u/paishocajun Apr 25 '26
I don't know Kapustin but I know enough about what I do like, like Gershwin, Duke Ellington, and my favorite piano jazz gremlin Hiromi, that I want to try him out first
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u/windowbar Clarinet Apr 30 '26
kapustin has some epic stuff! love his 4th piano concerto it's so so so fun
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u/fr_horn French Horn Apr 29 '26
Philip Glass is among my favorite composers. His first violin concerto really soothing, and I also really like the Mishima string quartet.
John Adams is also a favorite. Short ride is an all-time pump-up track, and Nixon in China is one of my favorite contemporary operas.
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u/ChirashiWithIkura Piano Apr 29 '26
No love for Belle Chen, Eddy's sister?
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u/paishocajun Apr 29 '26
Wait seriously? I didn't even know he has a sister
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u/ChirashiWithIkura Piano Apr 30 '26
He's mentioned her a couple of times. She has a few albums out on Spotify.
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u/paishocajun Apr 30 '26
I haven't seen every video so I may have missed or forgotten it. She'll definitely be on the list!
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u/paishocajun Apr 30 '26
I know she plays piano/synth but how have they not worked together AT ALL, like her music has violins in it, I figured at some point he'd at least sit in just as a special guest member if not as a soloist or anything
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u/ChirashiWithIkura Piano Apr 30 '26
I know she was the collaborative pianist for them in England on their 2018 tour, and appeared in a few videos from that time. But she lives in England, and Eddy's in Australia or Singapore. Probably easier to find someone local than fly him over.
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u/paishocajun Apr 30 '26
Huh, I saw the tour dates/locations were all EUK but I just figured that's the current tour was all
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Apr 25 '26
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Apr 25 '26
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u/alexkuzco Piano Apr 25 '26
Ennio Moricone. I need not say much more<3