Samuel Coleridge-Taylor (again, NOT Taylor-Coleridge) must have been a serious wunderkind to have been noticed by Edward Elgar and C. V. Stanford, two of England’s best-known Victorian Imperial composers. He wrote this “Ballade for Orchestra” for the famous Three Choirs Festival when he was 20; the maturity of this composition puts the genius of Coleridge-Taylor on par with Mendelssohn (who wrote his famous “Midsummer Night’s Dream” overture at 17).

Sorry, hippies. Somebody beat you to it.

Justin Holland (1819-1887), was a civil-rights activist, moving around the same circles as Frederic Douglass. He worked with whites to free slaves in the Underground Railroad. Oh yeah, and he also played a mean guitar.

He became nationally known for his guitar method books – his approach to teaching was considered very conservative for the time (sorry, hippies; I guess he was a square). And, while not a composer himself, he was famous for arranging famous works of other composers, including this one, which includes some popular tunes from Carl Maria von Weber‘s opera, Oberon.

No BBQ here. Just a really stupid joke.

All the Bach children were musical, and probably not by choice. Most musicians agree that Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach was the best composer among them. After all, when Mozart said “Bach is the father, and we are his children,” he was not referring to J.S., but C.P.E.

C.P.E.’s music is a perfect midpoint between the Baroque and Classical musical eras, combining the ornateness and richness of the baroque with the transparency and grace of the classic. This isn’t the heavy, confusing sound of his father’s late compositions, nor is it the mindless, simple noodling of Scarlatti.