Ferruccio Busoni (1866-1924). A child prodigy eventually forced to make his living as a teacher, Ferruccio Busoni was continually frustrated in his efforts to find success as a composer. Noted for his ability to teach composition, Busoni counted among his students such future luminaries as Kurt Weill and Edgard Varиse. In his book The New Esthetic of Music, Busoni made a series of astonishingly accurate predictions about the paths avant-garde composers would take in the coming century.