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Halloween Topic - Musicians and deals with the Devil

As the superstitious believe, if a musician is too young to be so talented and successful they must have purchased their talent and fame in exchange for their soul. The most famous of these of course is Robert Johnson, but that’s just in American culture. I was thinking of a living and celebrated classical musician who is also young, beautiful and incredibly knowledgeable about classical music, especially American composers, and for a moment I had to genuinely wonder if her talents came from other-worldly pacts.

What musicians would you place in this category? So good and so young that you have trouble believing it?

Composers and even musical instrument makers are fair game here.

erik_squires
bdp24's avatar
bdp24
9,821 posts
 

Mozart is of course the first who comes to mind.

chayro
2,996 posts
 

Not really up on the new up and comers, but Clifford Brown was in his early 20’s when he recorded most of his records. He died at 25. When you listen to the maturity of his playing, I always asked myself how it was possible that such a young musician could play at that level. 

erik_squires OP
16,133 posts
 

According to WHRB we can also put Niccolo Paganini into the list of suspiciously gifted artists.

tylermunns
601 posts
 

To tie in another current thread on this forum, I’m not sure from whence Stevie Wonder got his unfathomable gifts (‘talent’ doesn’t do him justice - I’m inclined to believe a less nefarious, more divine source would be at play here), but “human” doesn’t seem to cut it for these ears.

erik_squires OP
16,133 posts
 

@tylermunns 

You are going to have to help me out here.  I grew up with Stevie Wonder and to me it just sounded like any other pop.

Educate me, without gushing too much, what made SW special to you please.

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