Decomposing Composers

Beethoven's gone, but his music lives on And Mozart don't go shopping no more You'll never meet Liszt or Brahms again And Elgar doesn't answer the door Schubert and Chopin used to chuckle and laugh Whilst composing a long symphony But one hundred and fifty years later There's very little of them left to see They're decomposing composers There's nothing much anyone can do You can still hear Beethoven But Beethoven cannot hear you Handel and Hayden and Rachmaninov Enjoyed a nice drink with their meal But nowadays, no one will serve them And their gravy is left to congeal Verdi and Wagner delighted the crowds With their highly original sound The pianos they played are still working But they're both six feet underground They're decomposing composers There's less of them every year You can say what you like to Debussy But there's not much of him left to hear Claude Achille Debussy, died, 1918 Christophe Willebald Gluck, died, 1787 Carl Maria von Weber Not at all well, 1825, died, 1826 Giacomo Meyerbeer Still alive, 1863, not still alive, 1864 Modeste Mussorgsky,1880 Going to parties, no fun anymore, 1881 Johan Nepomuk Hummel Chatting away nineteen to the dozen With his mates down the pub Every evening, 1836, 1837, nothing