The Classical period, lasting about 90 years from AD 1730 to 1820, falls between the Baroque and Romantic eras. Art during this time drew inspiration from Classical antiquity, particularly ancient Greece.
Music became simpler and more elegant, with clear, singable melodies and balanced phrases, making many themes from this era still familiar today.
To clarify, in this post, “Classical music” (capitalized) refers specifically to this period, while “classical music” (lowercased) encompasses the entire tradition of Western art music, including the Baroque and Romantic eras.
Exploring 10 of the greatest Classical period composers, we’ll see key musical developments like the invention of the piano and the birth of the string quartet. While Mozart, Haydn, and Beethoven are the most famous, other composers also produced significant works. Read on to find out who they are!
1. Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach (1714–1788)
C. P. E. Bach was the fifth child of Johann Sebastian Bach, a leading composer of the Baroque era, and his godfather was George Phillip Telemann, another major Baroque figure.
Building on his father’s influence, C. P. E. Bach became an innovative Classical composer, known for the expressive empfindsamer Stil (“sensitive style”).
A harpsichord virtuoso, he worked at the court of Frederick the Great in Berlin before replacing Telemann as the musical director of several Hamburg churches.
He composed keyboard sonatas, concertos, and religious music, and wrote an influential text on keyboard technique. He was also one of the first composers to write autobiographically about his life.
C. P. E. Bach influenced Haydn, Beethoven, and Mozart, who said, “Bach is the father. We are the children!”
2. Christoph Willibald Gluck (1714–1787)
Opera had developed as an art form during the Baroque era, but it was during the Classical period that it really began to flourish. Christoph Willibald Gluck, who wrote first in Italian and then French, was one of the main architects of this.
He felt that the form needed to be stripped back so pioneered a new style in which drama was at the forefront, with elements such as music, dance, and staging all subservient to this.
His Orfeo ed Euridice is based upon the ancient Greek myth of Orpheus. The “noble simplicity” of both its plot and music would influence Mozart’s famous operas, as well as late-Romantic works by Richard Wagner.
3. Muzio Clementi (1752–1832)
The Baroque era’s dominant keyboard instruments were the harpsichord and organ, but the Classical period saw the invention of the piano.
Muzio Clementi, born in Italy and moved to England as a teenager, composed 110 piano sonatas and was one of the first to write specifically for the piano. He is often called the Father of the Piano.
A virtuoso player himself, he famously took part in a piano competition against Mozart for the entertainment of Holy Roman Emperor Joseph II, who declared a tie.
Clementi also possessed a keen business sense, running both a piano manufacturing company and a music publishing house in London.
4. Joseph Haydn (1732–1809)
The symphony is a large-scale orchestral piece with three or four movements, while the string quartet has a similar structure but is written for two violins, viola, and cello. Both forms became staples of Western art music, tackled by almost every major composer; and both were pioneered by Joseph Haydn.
One of the most popular composers of his day, the Austrian had a keen musical sense of humor, as demonstrated by his use of numerous false endings and the famously shocking loud chord in his Surprise Symphony.
Meanwhile, his Sturm und Drang period in the 1760s and ‘70s saw him writing in a more deeply emotive and individualistic manner.
5. Chevalier De Saint-Georges (1745–1799)
Joseph Bologne, or Chevalier de Saint-Georges, was born the illegitimate son of a black slave and a white plantation owner in Guadeloupe, making him the first known classical composer of African heritage.
Not only did he serve as a colonel in the French army during the Revolution, but he was a champion fencer and a virtuoso violinist and conductor, leading Paris’ top symphony orchestra.
As a composer in the court of Marie Antoinette, he wrote operas, symphonies, and sonatas. He also pioneered the symphony concertante, a new form that combined elements of the symphony with the concerto grosso, a Baroque piece for multiple soloists.
6. Antonio Salieri (1750–1825)
In the 1984 film Amadeus, Antonio Salieri is portrayed as a jealous villain plotting to kill Mozart, an idea first popularized in an 1830 play by Alexander Pushkin where Salieri murders Mozart onstage.
However, evidence suggests they likely promoted each other’s work and had mutual respect, despite competing for jobs in Vienna.
Salieri, born near Verona, became a key figure in Italian opera, composing for opera houses across Europe and working at the Habsburg court. He was also an influential teacher, counting Beethoven, Schubert, Liszt, and Mozart’s son among his pupils.
7. Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756–1791)
One of the most beloved composers of all time, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s name has become virtually a byword for precocious musical talent.
Famously, he began composing at just five years old, by which point he was already proficient on multiple instruments.
A versatile composer, he wrote over 600 works, including symphonies, concertos, string quartets, and an unfinished Requiem. His pieces are filled with sublime, elegant melodies, many of which remain familiar today.
He built upon Gluck’s developments to write The Magic Flute and The Marriage of Figaro, some of the most popular operas of all time.
Mozart died, aged just 35, never achieving financial security, despite his huge musical renown.
8. Ludwig Van Beethoven (1770–1827)
Another towering figure in the Western art world, Ludwig van Beethoven was a transitional composer whose music spans the Classical and Romantic periods.
His early style was influenced by Mozart and Haydn as he studied their compositions. Later, he started to anticipate the Romantic era with large works like his Ninth Symphony. This symphony includes the famous “Ode to Joy” theme and was one of the first to feature a choir and vocal soloists with an orchestra.
He also expanded upon the previously strict rules surrounding form and structure, writing adventurous and increasingly emotive music. His works are among the most performed in all of classical music.
9. Franz Schubert (1797–1828)
Franz Schubert was another transitional composer between the Classical and Romantic eras. Although he died at 31, he was very prolific, writing over 1,500 pieces. He had a remarkable gift for melody, with memorable works like the Trout Quintet.
He was an innovator in the realm of Lieder — art songs that set German Romantic poetry to music — and writing orchestral works, including his famous Unfinished Symphony, and lots of other chamber music.
The Classical period is sometimes referred to as the era of Viennese Classicism because Schubert, Gluck, Haydn, Mozart, and Beethoven were all based in Vienna for extended periods.
10. Niccolò Paganini (1782–1840)
Niccolò Paganini, the most acclaimed violinist of his time, would compose his own works to showcase his virtuosity, and the Italian’s 24 Caprices for Solo Violin are among the cornerstones of the violin repertoire.
Perhaps the most famous of these is the Caprice no. 24 in A Minor, which is considered one of the most difficult violin pieces ever composed and has had dozens of variations written upon it.
Summing Up Our List Of Greatest Classical Period Composers
Thanks for reading our guide to the most important composers of the Classical period, an era of beautiful simplicity that saw the popularisation of new forms like the symphony and the string quartet and technological developments such as the invention of the piano.
We’ve covered household names, like Beethoven and Mozart, as well as some fascinating figures who are a little less well-known, so we hope you’ve enjoyed discovering some wonderful new music.
