Tom,
That's a great list. I don't know all of them but those I do know receive my hearty support. The song from Purcell's Dido is one of my personal favourites--what an inadequate word "favourite" is.
When I was a very young singer who had never set foot outside New Zealand I gave my first song recital. Here are the composers I included in my confused program of "I can do this" singing. I had to be persuaded to leave a great many others out of the program.
Schoenberg (an entire song cycle that drove my father to desperation)
Dowland; Handel; Mozart; Hugo Wolf; Canteloube (Auvergne songs); Mahler; Strauss; Falla; Charles Ives; J. C. Bach (Vauxhall Garden songs).
My audience must have had even more stamina than I did.
I observe from my shelter that "young people today" (I knew I'd have to say that eventually
are so overwhelmed by mediocre quantity that the big picture is lost. Most people operate in a continuous wall of sound. They need it to reduce their body tension in the midst of cars and sirens and news stories that terrify us all. They play sound at us in supermarkets and shopping malls, elevators, airports--everywhere. Sound is devalued and because of this people are less receptive to it. It is one of the worst forms of pollution. I think it has greatly affected poetry and the way people think about poetry.
Janet
PS: Right now my neighbours are keeping themselves on the rails as their two toddlers scream by playing extruded music with a loud bass beat that is combining with the screaming to drive me up the wall. No poetry from me this morning.
[This message has been edited by Janet Kenny (edited January 25, 2005).]