This blog hasn’t had a game in a while, so it’s time for everybody’s favorite: Is it Schnittke OR Sondheim?
See, Stephen Sondheim was born in 1930 and became the USA’s greatest composer. Alfred Schnittke was born in 1934 and became the USSR’s greatest composer. They both lived and worked in the 1970’s. It was during that decade that they both rocked the exact same, shoulder-length straight hair cut:
Too easy? Let’s make it a little harder:
that was really fun.
Dazzling. When do we get the answers?
Oh Right!
1) Sondheim
2) Schnittke
3) Schnittke (the big clue here is that he appears to be out on a collective farm somewhere)
4) Sondheim
5) Schnittke (from his score for the 17-part Soviet TV series, “My Past and Thoughts” based on the autobiography of Alexander Herzen)
6) Sondheim (from his score for the 1974 French film Stavisky) Of particular note is that this is the only time Sondheim ever orchestrated his own music. He said that he would orchestrate as much as he could, and when he got stuck, he would go over to a friend’s house who was an expert in the orchestra field. That friend: Leonard Bernstein.