Birth Location, Migration and Clustering of Important Composers: Historical Patterns

This article examines the 522 most important composers
in the last 800 years, as identified by Charles Murray (2003), in
terms of their birth location and migration. It also examines detailed
patterns of migration and tendencies to cluster in certain cities for
those composers born between 1750 and 1899. This information is
compiled from the large, Grove Music Online (2009) encyclopedia.
There is also some discussion of the biases evident in choosing
“significant” composers. The data show a marked level ofmigration
of important composers going back many centuries suggesting that
the phenomenon of globalization had impacted on composers many
centuries before its effects were more widespread. The data also
show a marked level of clustering in certain cities.