@
helenS :D
I think some of his music can be by more contemporary standards quite over-simplistic, and he doesn't have the harmonic inventiveness, always, that much earlier composers like J.S. Bach could manage even on his worst day!
The iconoclastic bit of my brain whispers that he is partly so famous and well-regarded because of his early death. (The same can be said to a far greater extent, about Chopin, who wrote some nice (and often quite difficult!) music, but is quite overrated IMHO, and had the fortune to have something of a 'tragic waif' figure - and was also Polish, which counted for double for 19th century romantics!)
But then you hear some of what WAM composed and it just
fizzes with such irrepressible joy and brilliance. I don't know if he's my favourite composer but he's guaranteed to bring a smile to my face :)