Franz Peter Schubert was an Austrian composer who basically invented the modern art song. He churned out roughly 600 Lieder along with nine symphonies (the "Unfinished" being the one everyone knows), a heap of chamber music, solo piano works, operas, and liturgical stuff. What sets him apart is an almost effortless gift for melody and harmony that still sounds fresh.

He grew up in a musical household and got proper training early on, which gave him a solid foundation. The weird part about his life is that despite having a tight circle of devoted friends—the singer Johann Michael Vogl was a major supporter—he never really caught on with the public while alive. He couldn't land a stable job, so he spent most of his career basically being subsidized by friends and family, scraping together money from published compositions and the occasional teaching gig. Things started looking up in his final year, but he didn't get to enjoy it long.

He died November 19, 1828, at just 31 years old, likely from syphilis complications.

The irony is that Schubert's reputation skyrocketed after he died. Nineteenth-century heavyweights like Liszt, Schumann, and Mendelssohn made it their mission to dig up and promote his works, and musicologist George Grove did serious spadework too. Today he's firmly planted in the canon as one of the greatest composers who ever lived.