Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of composers who studied law


 * The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review).  No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was delete.  Sandstein  12:07, 2 March 2021 (UTC)

List of composers who studied law

 * – ( View AfD View log )

This list was created as the result of a CFD (Categories for discussion/Log/2010 May 5) where users said it was "interesting" enough to warrant a list. I disagree, and would argue that such a trait is not defining nor meaningful. It seems an unhelpful collection of trivia, and I have trouble understanding how readers would benefit from such information. The user that created this list initially even said "I don't think the creation of this list is a particularly good idea..." This article is essentially an orphan article as well...! Aza24 (talk) 08:38, 20 February 2021 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Music-related deletion discussions. Aza24 (talk) 08:38, 20 February 2021 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Law-related deletion discussions. Aza24 (talk) 08:38, 20 February 2021 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Lists of people-related deletion discussions.  Spiderone (Talk to Spider) 10:08, 20 February 2021 (UTC)


 * Comment - I suspect people will disagree but I'm struggling to see how this is anything other than a non-encyclopaedic cross-categorisation Spiderone (Talk to Spider) 10:16, 20 February 2021 (UTC)
 * Please see the article again, I've added several sources from academic literature which demonstrate there is a noticeable connection between the practice of law and music. This isn't just something found in random law blogs online.--Prisencolin (talk) 22:02, 22 February 2021 (UTC)
 * Prisencolin, I appreciate you work here, but the sources you added are almost all independent of each other—they're separate accounts of composers studying law and seem to still be WP:SYNTH (regardless of more than half of them being incomplete citations). This whole situation continues to stand out to me as blatant Non-encyclopedic cross-categorizations, unfortunately. Aza24 (talk) 22:14, 22 February 2021 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the feedback, I will complete those references at some point when I have time. As far as the SYNTH issues goes, I believe there is a longstanding precedent on WP to allow for large categorizations of people who fit WP:LISTPEOPLE criteria which otherwise don't exist in outside sources. For instance we have lists and categories such as Lists of people from London which have existed for years and I can't imagine anyone outside of the government or big tech is compiling this information elsewhere. This is perhaps indicative of a larger problem of standalone lists systematically violating SYNTH principles... Seeing the precedent that is established, I don't see an issue with this list of lawyer/composers in particular.--Prisencolin (talk) 22:35, 22 February 2021 (UTC)
 * , WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS, I quckly found ... Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus&#124; reply here 02:37, 23 February 2021 (UTC)
 * Keep There are readers who appreciate this. A quick browse soon finds some coverage and so it seems likely that there's more to be found:  Legal Writing and Music: It’s Called Composition for a Reason; A Curious Synchronicity – Lawyers and Musicians.  WP:NEXIST; WP:LISTN and WP:ATD therefore apply: "If editing can improve the page, this should be done rather than deleting the page." Andrew🐉(talk) 10:29, 20 February 2021 (UTC)
 * Neither of the articles you've linked are high-quality sources, and it doesn't look like either of them have the authority to speak on the subject... I will also gently note that the "readers who appreciate this" is an average of 3 a day per page views so I'm not following your logic here. Aza24 (talk) 23:46, 20 February 2021 (UTC)
 * Delete. WP:TRIVIA. Not suitable for encyclopedia. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus&#124; reply here 13:12, 20 February 2021 (UTC)
 * Weak keep: The intersection is less trivial than it sounds at first glance -- as Andrew says, it's a confluence people comment on outside of Wikipedia. It's very niche, which raises the question of just how worthwhile a niche it is, but overall "subject is of interest to a small circle of people" is hardline not a deletion criteria and this seems in the end to justify its existence. Vaticidalprophet (talk) 16:53, 20 February 2021 (UTC)
 * Delete per nom. Clearly a non notable cross categorisation and lack of sourcing to provide any sense of notability. Ajf773 (talk) 08:12, 21 February 2021 (UTC)
 * Delete agree this is trivia. Rhino131 (talk) 13:38, 21 February 2021 (UTC)
 * Keep sources will be added soon. This is a phenomenon that has been described in literature.--Prisencolin (talk) 19:48, 21 February 2021 (UTC)
 * An 100 year old newspaper article from a small town in California—Lompoc Record—how is this "literature"? The other sources are from individual articles or entries on composers, clear WP:SYNTH. Aza24 (talk) 23:05, 21 February 2021 (UTC)
 * Maybe it's not the best source... there should be more. However it's a testament to the WP:LASTING notability of this subject. --Prisencolin (talk) 23:17, 21 February 2021 (UTC)
 * There's this paper written by a law school publication.--Prisencolin (talk) 23:19, 21 February 2021 (UTC)
 * Delete When someone is listed just because "he almost certainly attended lectures" I struggle to see how this isn't SYNTH. The sources note a coincidence that a small fraction of composers studied law in some way or another, but I can't see how this is anything more than an unencyclopedic cross-categorization from a contrieved analysis. It's in no way surprising that the wealthy and connected people of centuries past who "registered for law school" but "withdrew after one semester" could overlap to some unquantified extent with the wealthy and connected people who composed music, not to to mention also studied philosophy, political science, and mathematics. Reywas92Talk 23:53, 22 February 2021 (UTC)
 * Okay that particular example will be removed pending review.--Prisencolin (talk) 01:25, 23 February 2021 (UTC)
 * Prisen, your work is now expanding the list far beyond its scope. This is specifically a list of composers who've studied law, discusses the connection between music and law in general is far beyond the list. Aza24 (talk) 02:13, 23 February 2021 (UTC)
 * The article I cite does include a list of at least 7 people...--Prisencolin (talk) 08:53, 23 February 2021 (UTC)
 * If I were to copy the prose portion of the article to a new article and then have a small “List” section with those seven individuals in bullet points, what’s to stop it from just being deleted for WP:G4.—Prisencolin (talk) 15:41, 23 February 2021 (UTC)
 * Delete utter nonsense, elitist crap, nobody gives a shit. Acousmana (talk) 14:08, 23 February 2021 (UTC)
 * Judging by your flippant use of profanity I’m assuming that you are unfamiliar with WP:ARGUMENTSTOAVOID in deletion discussion...—Prisencolin (talk) 15:34, 23 February 2021 (UTC)
 * i see no evidence of notability for this particular cross-categorization, there also appears to be general scarcity of scholarly sources with respect to evidencing that the observed correlation is noteworthy, and thus far, the argument for inclusion fails to provide a convincing rationale. Is that better? Acousmana (talk) 15:43, 23 February 2021 (UTC)
 * See the footnotes on page 38 of this article a from  a BYU J. Reuben Clark Law School professor. It lists a dozen or so other other papers on this particular subject. I tried copying that list to this article but it got removed for copyvio, in the process of getting it restored.--Prisencolin (talk) 20:36, 23 February 2021 (UTC)
 * the individual postulating notes: "Perhaps it  is  more  than  a  coincidence  that  a  striking  number  of  musicologists,  composers, and theorists have also been lawyers,including Handel, Schumann, Tchaikovsky,Stravinsky, Bartok, Sibelius, and Schenker." Relative to the number of "musicologists, composers, and theorists" there have been throughout history, "striking  number" seems like a bold claim? No? He also states: "This article  is  a  tentative  attempt  to  examine some  of  the  similarities  between  musical and legal composition, and to reflect upon the paradoxes that arise in each field." I still don't see how any of this supports the inclusion of a "List of composers who studied law." The connection remains tenuous. I get it, some lawyers want to be viewed as "creatives," so drawing parallels with musical composition probably seems appealing.Meh.Acousmana (talk) 21:05, 23 February 2021 (UTC)
 * I understand your concerns, as well as the fact that the authors themselves realize that their own writing is rather speculative, but the encyclopedia is not in a position to judge the merits of arguments, just to present them in a neutral perspective. This subject has been written about in reliable sources, and as such the information presented in said sources are WP:VERIFIABLE and suited for inclusion.--Prisencolin (talk) 04:16, 25 February 2021 (UTC)
 * Delete Yes, we know, Händel studied law; etc... Anyway, this was never a defining characteristic for any of them (hence this was indeed rightly removed as a category even 11 years ago), and the list as it stands does not show WP:LISTN, thin air mentions by two high-minded law school elitists far off on their cloud notwithstanding. RandomCanadian (talk / contribs) 03:30, 28 February 2021 (UTC)


 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.