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Well, not the composer haha but his piano music. My choice would be Brahms. The only happy pieces I can think of among his output I can think of are some of his Waltzes and the C major Intermezzo from Op. 119. I don't mean to imply the rest of his works are all sad, but I would describe the non sad ones with adjectives like "majestic, love songs, peaceful", etc.

So who do you think wrote the least amount of happy piano music?







































the non sad ones with words like "serious, majestic, love songs," etc.

For me, Scriabin comes first to mind as not much happy piano music.

Much of Schumann to me is not happy music. Much of it sounds passionate but tortured. Often wistful, full of melancholy. He does some march like segments, but not sure if I would call those happy.

Good answers -- but from among the great and near-great composers I think we'd have trouble really finding anyone that we'd be "happy" giving him/her that title.

Brahms: Admittedly this piece is usually played more wistfully than this (at least at the opening), but this is how I see it....




Schumann:




Scriabin:




I know, I know -- one piece by each guy, big deal.

But I don't think we'd have that much trouble finding others if we wanted to.

But good answers.

Never heard this Horowtiz recording. What a ridiculous(and ridiculously effective) way to play it. I'm use to the Richter doom and gloom version. I think this is a better example though for what your looking for:

Mahler

Shostakovich.

Hi, Pianoloverus! For me, the pretty clear choice is Rachmaninoff. Of all the major composers I can think of, his piano music is never no-doubt-about-it happy, and IMO his most personal music is exquisitely sad. I agree, though, that both Brahms and Shostakovich are not far behind in that category

I forgot about Rachmaninov and I think he would also be a very good choice. I can only think of a very small number of happy pieces by him...Polka de V.R., Humoresque, and the Hopak transcription.

I was thinking maybe Wagner, but got surprised by his waltzes and Polonaises and Polka, and the B-flat sonata:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ESmpugzQF0I

Definitely not a happy guy, and he wrote (by his standards) very little piano music, only two and a half hours.

I agree about Scriabin, but I'm not so sure about Schumann. Undoubtedly there's a lot of deeply poetic, introspective music. On the other hand, though, I can't think of much that is as unashamedly joyful as the last movement of his Piano Concerto:



And there's plenty of other "happy" piano music, e.g. in the Novelettes, Scenes From Childhood, etc., and who among us has not hummed or whistled along to "The Happy Farmer", about as ingenuous and carefree as music gets:

He was miserable while composing and always critical of his own playing. There is a rather dour statue of him in Knoxville, BTW, the city of his last recital.

Rach in Knox

More on Rach in Knoxville. Great program. 😀

Even those have sad sections in them. Middle theme of Humoresque is very wistful.

Mussorgsky?

I think you have a good point there, I didn’t think of those Schumann examples.

Franz Joseph Haydn

That's a choice that certainly defies conventional ideas. I must admit to being stumped on that one. I'd opt for Schoenberg. His piano works are not sad, I wouldn't say, but they certainly are not happy. Ever. Anxiety laden.

Brahms was dour, but I think he believed in the possibility of happiness. He just couldn't find it. It's said he never got over his early teenage experience with prostitutes, nor, perhaps Clara Schumann whom he was passionately in love with for years.

Schoenberg, on the other hand, had a long happy marriage and enjoyed playing tennis with George Gershwin and hanging around with Charlie Chaplin. You wouldn't think so listening to Pierrot Lunaire, though.