A chess composer is a person who creates

endgame studies In the game of chess, an endgame study, or just study, is a composed position—that is, one that has been made up rather than played in an actual game—presented as a sort of puzzle, in which the aim of the solver is to find the essentially uniqu ...

chess problem A chess problem, also called a chess composition, is a puzzle set by the composer using chess pieces on a chess board, which presents the solver with a particular task. For instance, a position may be given with the instruction that White is to ...

s. Chess composers usually specialize in a particular

genre Genre () is any form or type of communication in any mode (written, spoken, digital, artistic, etc.) with socially-agreed-upon conventions developed over time. In popular usage, it normally describes a category of literature, music, or other for ...

, e.g. endgame studies, twomovers, threemovers, moremovers,

helpmate A helpmate is a type of chess problem in which both sides cooperate in order to achieve the goal of checkmating Black. In a helpmate in ''n'' moves, Black moves first, then White, each side moving ''n'' times, to culminate in White's ''nth'' mov ...

selfmate A selfmate is a chess problem in which White, moving first, must force Black to deliver checkmate within a specified number of moves against their will. Selfmates were once known as sui-mates. Example The problem shown is a relatively simple examp ...

s, fairy problems, or

retrograde analysis In chess problems, retrograde analysis is a technique employed to determine which moves were played leading up to a given position. While this technique is rarely needed for solving ordinary chess problems, there is a whole subgenre of chess pr ...

. Moreover, composers have their own preferred style of composing, allowing their sorting according to composition schools. Some chess composers produce huge numbers of chess compositions, while others try to achieve as much quality as possible and present new works only rarely. It is possible for chess composers to gain official

FIDE The International Chess Federation or World Chess Federation, commonly referred to by its French acronym FIDE ( Fédération Internationale des Échecs), is an international organization based in Switzerland that connects the various national c ...

title A title is one or more words used before or after a person's name, in certain contexts. It may signify either generation, an official position, or a professional or academic qualification. In some languages, titles may be inserted between the f ...

s, usually for a given number of problems published in

FIDE Album The FIDE Albums are publications of the world chess governing body, FIDE, via the Permanent Commission of the FIDE for Chess Compositions (PCCC), containing the best chess problems and studies of a certain period (usually three years in length). ...

s. For example,

Milan Vukcevich Milan R. Vukcevich (born Milan Radoje Vukčević; March 11, 1937 – May 10, 2003) was a Yugoslav-American chemist, a grandmaster of chess problem composition and writer. Biography Milan Radoje Vukčević was born in Belgrade. In 1955 he w ...

was an International Grandmaster of Chess Composition, as well as an

International Master FIDE titles are awarded by the international chess governing body FIDE (''Fédération Internationale des Échecs'') for outstanding performance. The highest such title is Grandmaster (GM). Titles generally require a combination of Elo rating and ...

player. The WFCC (World Federation for Chess Composition), formerly known as PCCC, is a branch of

regulating the awarding of titles such as International Grandmaster, International master, Master FIDE and International Judge for chess composition.

Schools of composition

Composition school in chess composition is a particular style of creating chess problems, putting emphasis on different aspects of the problem contents and attracting the interest of an important number of chess composers. The best-known composition schools, as they evolved historically, are: * Old German school put emphasis on complexity and difficulty of solution and

model mate A model mate is a type of pure mate checkmating position in chess in which not only is the checkmated king and all vacant squares in its field attacked only once, and squares in the king's field occupied by friendly units are not also attacked by ...

in the main variation, the most suitable genres being fourmovers and fivemovers; * Bohemian school puts emphasis on artistic beauty and number of variations finished by model mates, the most suitable genres being threemovers and fourmovers; * English school demanded dual-free play in all variations and put emphasis on varied motivation in high number of variations; * American school puts emphasis on originality and presence of surprising elements in the solution; * New German school (also known as ''logical school'') requires logical structure of solution and purity (or economy) of aim, the longer genres are more suitable; * New Bohemian school combines requirements of new German school and Bohemian school; * Strategical school puts emphasis on complexity of motivation in high number of variations, both defence and harmful motifs should be unified whenever possible, mostly in twomovers and threemovers; * Soviet school is a highly developed level of strategic school; * New-strategical school requires changes of variations or move functions between phases; * Slovak school requires changes of motifs between phases. Many chess problems are clearly attributable to a specific one of these schools, but there are many problems that might be attributed to none of these or to more than one of them. Today, many chess composers regularly do work in the area of multiple schools.

Notable chess composers

* Fadil Abdurahmanovicbillwall
"Great Chess Composers"
Chess.com, August 7, 2007. *

Edith Baird Edith Elina Helen (Winter-Wood) Baird (22 February 1859 – 1 February 1924) was a chess composer who in her day was the most prolific composer of chess problems in the world. She published under her married name as Mrs. W. J. Baird and was somet ...

Pal Benko Pál C. Benkő ( hu, Benkő Pál; July 15, 1928 – August 26, 2019) was a Hungarian-American chess player, author, and composer of endgame studies and chess problems. Early life Benko was born on July 15, 1928 in Amiens, France, where his ...

Gijs van Breukelen Plaskett's Puzzle is a chess endgame study created by the Dutch endgame composer Gijs van Breukelen (February 27, 1946 – December 21, 2022) around 1970, although not published at the time. Van Breukelen published the puzzle in 1997 in the Nethe ...

Vladimir Bron Vladimir Akimovich Bron (14 September 1909, Mykolaiv – 1985, Sverdlovsk, USSR) was a Soviet The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from ...

André Chéron André Chéron (September 25, 1895 – September 12, 1980) was a French chess player, endgame theorist, and a composer of endgame studies. He was named a FIDE International Master of Chess Composition in 1959, the first year the title was awar ...

* Eugene Cook *

Thomas Rayner Dawson Thomas Rayner Dawson (28 November 1889 – 16 December 1951) was an English chess problemist and is acknowledged as "the father of Fairy Chess". He invented many fairy pieces and new conditions. He introduced the popular fairy pieces grassh ...

* Vincent Lanius Eaton *

Karl Fabel Karl Fabel (October 20, 1905 in Hamburg – March 3, 1975 in Egenhofen) was a German chess composer. Fabel received a doctorate in chemistry and worked as a mathematician and civil judge at the federal office of brands and patents in Munich, of ...

* Edgar Holladay *

Bernhard Horwitz Bernhard Horwitz (1807 in Neustrelitz – 1885 in London) was a German and British chess master, chess writer and chess composer. Horwitz was born in Neustrelitz and went to school in Berlin, where he studied art. From 1837 to 1843, he was part ...

* Henrik Kasparian * Cyril Kipping *

Josef Kling Josef Kling (19 March 1811 – 1 December 1876), also found in English-language sources as Joseph Kling, was a German chess master and chess composer. He has been called "a pioneer of the modern style of chess." Although Kling was an expert on e ...

Leonid Kubbel Leonid Ivanovich Kubbel (russian: Леонид Иванович Куббель; 1891 or 1892 – 1942) was a Russian composer of chess endgame studies and problems. Life He was born in Saint Petersburg at the end of 1891, or beginning of 1892 ...

Sam Loyd Samuel Loyd (January 30, 1841 – April 10, 1911), was an American chess player, chess composer, puzzle author, and recreational mathematics, recreational mathematician. Loyd was born in Philadelphia but raised in New York City. As a chess com ...

Comins Mansfield Comins Mansfield (14 June 1896 – 27 March 1984) was a chess problem composer. He gained the title International Grandmaster for chess compositions in 1972 and 94.33 points in the FIDE Album. Mansfield was born in the village of Witheridge, n ...

* William Meredith *

Geoffrey Mott-Smith The Mott-Smith Trophy, named for writer and cryptographer Geoffrey Mott-Smith, is awarded to the player with the best overall individual performance in the Spring Nationals, the spring event of the American Contract Bridge League (ACBL) North Amer ...

Vladimir Nabokov Vladimir Vladimirovich Nabokov (russian: link=no, Владимир Владимирович Набоков ; 2 July 1977), also known by the pen name Vladimir Sirin (), was a Russian-American novelist, poet, translator, and entomologist. Bo ...

* Geoffrey Peckover * Vasily Platov * Henri Rinck * Aleksei Selesniev * William Shinkman * Alexei Troitsky *

* Alain Campbell White

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Composer, Chess es:Escuelas de composición (ajedrez)

Schools of composition

Notable chess composers

See also

References