MUS 010

Gesamtkunstwerk

- "A total artwork" - Perfect union of music, staging, poetry, scenic design - Concept by Wagner

Hector Berlioz

- 1803-1869 - French composer - Created the term idea fixe meaning recurring theme - "The creator of modern orchestra" - Program symphonies Symphony fantastique, Harold in Italy, Romeo and Juliet, King Lear - He had unique sense of sound

Robert Schumann

- 1810-1856 - German composer & pianist - Compositions are poetic, full of emotions, overflow with impassioned melody, novel changes of harmony, and driving motor rhythms (used syncopation, hemiola, cross-rhythms) - Wrote piano cycles (Poets love, Woman's life and love, and Song cycle) - His four symphonies are influenced by structural innovation of Beethoven; romantic in their emphasis on lyrics themes and in their use of thematic transformation - Composed Six Fugues in the Name of Bach for organ based on the notes BACH (Bb-A-C-B) - He was a music critic

bebop

- 1st revolution jazz with principles from black musicians and theirnNew Orleans style - A new type of jazz originating in the 1940s and characterized by complex harmony and rhythms. It is associated particularly with Charlie Parker and Dizzy Gillespie. - Features songs characterized by a fast tempo, complex chord progressions with rapid chord changes - The word itself is drawn from scat singing and expresses the kinds of accents the musicians preferred - The first kind of modern jazz, which split jazz into two opposing camps in the last half of the 1940s - Considered new, modern jazz; for listening, not dancing

Johannes Brahms

- A German composer and pianist of the Romantic period - Influenced by Gypsy & folk music, Beethoven, and Brahms - He composed for symphony orchestra, chamber ensembles, piano, organ, and voice and chorus - Famous for Hungarian Dances

Mazurka

- A Polish folk dance in triple meter, usually at a lively tempo

Idee Fixe

- A fixed idea, recurring theme - A symphony's recurrent theme (fixed idea) ad acts as a musical thread unifying the five diverse movements, though its appearances are varied in harmony, rhythm, meter, tempo, dynamics, register, and instrumental color

Romanticism

- A movement in the arts and literature that originated in the late 18th century, emphasizing inspiration, subjectivity, and the primacy of the individual - Also the Romantic era or the Romantic period - Was an artistic, literary, musical, cultural and intellectual movement - Originated in Europe - The primary importance of the free expression of self

blues

- A music genre and musical form originated by African Americans in the Deep South of the United States around the end of the 19th century - Genre developed from roots in African musical traditions, African-American spirituals, work songs, field hollers, shouts and chants, and rhymed simple narrative ballads. - Most commonly used instruments Guitar; piano; harmonica; bass; drums; blues harp; slide guitar; xylophone

Absolute Music

- A musical piece with no storyline. - Is music for music's sake; in this kind of music the composer has no other specific intent or content in mind besides the musical ideas themselves. This type of music was used most in the Classical era. - Tells NO STORY and REPRESENTED nothing but ITSELF

Lied (plural form of Lieder)

- A new genre, German texted solo vocal song with piano accompaniment - A type of German song, especially of the Romantic period, typically for solo voice with piano accompaniment

John Cage

- A pioneer of indeterminacy in music, electroacoustic music, and non-standard use of musical instruments - Developed the idea of musical experiences generated random choices, as in throwing coins or dice to select the materials for a happening (Music of Changes, 1951). - Cage music was an important American contribution to the avant-garde movement - - The piece "4'33" is his most famous. A piece where there is no sound at all, other than the ambient noise of the venue. - Revolutionized modern music, changed approach to composition, and broke down the divisions between various realms of art production

Furiant

- A rapid and fiery Bohemian dance in alternating 2/4 and 3/4 time, with frequently shifting accents; or, in "art music", in 3/4 time "with strong accents forming pairs of beats

Piano Cycles

- A set of related songs, often on a romantic theme, intended to form a single musical entity - Individually complete songs designed to be performed in a sequence as a unit - Short character pieces with descriptive titles connected by extra-musical associations, musical mottos and thematic transformation

syncopation

- A shifting of the normal accent, usually by stressing the normally unaccented beats - syncopation involves a variety of rhythms which are in some way unexpected which make part or all of a tune or piece of music off-beat

Bel Canto Opera

- A style of operatic singing that originated in Italian singing of polyphonic (multipart) music - beautiful singing- operatic style - Italian courtly solo singing during the late 16th century and that was developed in Italian opera in the 17th, 18th, and early 19th centuries.

expressionism

- A style of painting, music, or drama in which the artist or writer seeks to express emotional experience rather than impressions of the external world - trait is to present the world solely from a subjective perspective, distorting it radically for emotional effect in order to evoke moods or ideas - Originating in Germany at the beginning of the 20th century - The period where painters and musicians express inner extreme emotion, anxiety, fear, hysteria

Sacred Harp Singing

- A uniquely American tradition that brings communities together - Sing four-part hymns and anthems - Sacred Harp singing is a tradition of sacred choral music that originated in New England and was later perpetuated and carried on in the American South of the United States - American religious style of music influenced by unaccompanied; only human voice

Form

- A way to organize music (3 forms)

W. C. Handy

- African American composer and musician - known as the "Father of the Blues" - Handy was one of the most influential American songwriters - He was one of many musicians who played the distinctively American blues music, and he is credited with giving it its contemporary form - Blues, jazz Songs - "St. Louis Blues", "Sweet Child", Memphis Blues", "Careless Love"

Bessie Smith

- African-American Blues singer - Actress - Had an influence on jazz singers - Nicknamed The Empress of the Blues she not only sung the blues, but she sang jazz too in the 1920's and 30's - Sang about tragedies and heartbreak, much of which she experienced in her own life. it was said that she was a revolutionary singer who put the struggles of African Americans into music - Bessie started out as a street musician in Chattanooga

Thematic Transformation

- Alternation of the character of a theme by means of change in dynamics, orchestration, or rhythm, when it returns in a later movement or section - Is a musical technique in which a theme, is developed by changing the theme by using transposition, modulation, augmentation or fragmentation - A type of unification that serves the huge, expansive form of Berlioz's symphony

Scott Joplin

- American - During his brief career, he wrote 44 original ragtime pieces, one ragtime ballet, and two operas. - Called the "King of Ragtime" - Wrote "The Entertainer", "Maple leaf Rag", "The String" - The Maple Leaf Rag, which appeared in 1899, capped his fame and made both him and his Sedalia publisher rich

Duke Ellington

- American Jazz artist, pianist and composer - Performed in night clubs in the early 1920's as a band leader - " It don't mean a thing if it ain't got that swing." - "Take the A Train" - "In a Sentimental Mood" - Duke's music, which reflected the black experience in Harlem with its bluesy melodies and exotic rhythms, fell into popularity with black and white audiences - In his early "jungle" period, he developed his trademark nocturnal sound, with brass and reeds and the support of low drumbeat and pizzicato bass; later, he investigated jazz colors, not just blue but in one famous case Black, Brown and Beige (1943). - Profile composer of jazz and swing era and a big band leader. - Used more complex Harmony than any previous jazz composer - Played a major role in the Harlem Renaissance as the band leader of the Cotton Club - He played a major role in popularizing jazz music in Harlem.

Amy Beach

- American composer and pianist born in Boston - 1st female american composer to achieve international recognition - BEACH: FROM VIOLIN SONATA IN A MINOR, OP. 34 - She was the first successful American female composer of large-scale art music - Four of her symphony's themes were traditional Irish-Gaelic melodies, hence the designation, "Gaelic." - Modern/contemporary, American Classical Music

Leonard Bernstein

- American composer, conductor, author, music lecturer, and pianist - Tapped the imagination of his era by his creative use of television - Accomplished crossing over in both classical and popular (pop) music - Known for his flamboyant conducting style, and for his pedagogic flair, especially in concerts for young people - Composed West Side Story, Kismet, Man of La Mancha, Symphony No. 2: The Age of Anxiety, Chichester Psalms, On the Town and Wonderful Town

Milton Babbitt

- American composer, music theorist, and teacher - Was a true pioneer in musical thinking of our time. - Noted for his serial ordering - Philomela. Twelve-tone technique. - Known for his pioneering works in electronic sound, is one of the most celebrated composers of the 20th century. - He has influenced many contemporary musicians, and is also well known for his talents in jazz and his wide range of compositional skills.

Charles Ives

- American modernist composer. - Ives's had a offbeat humor - He is one of the first American composers of international renown, though his music was largely ignored during his life - He use of quarter tones - Ives's creative world had little to do with the daily hustling of securing performances or paying for the groceries - Substance over manner : You can do weird things in music over preserving technique - Wrote "Central Park in the Dark", "The Hills Join in the People's Outdoor Meeting", "The Unanswered Question" - Transforms American and European material - Complex - He would ask for 1 of 2 pianos to be detuned by a quarter tone. - He never had any professional musical obligations so he worked in insurance

Vincent Bellini

- An Italian opera composer, who was known for his long-flowing melodic lines for which he was named "the Swan of Catania" - Early Romantic era

Scena

- An extended operatic vocal solo, usually including an aria and a recitative. - A scene in an opera

Music Drama

- An opera whose structure is governed by considerations of dramatic effectiveness, rather than by the convention of having a series of formal arias - Developed by Richard Wagner, characterized by a continuous flow of orchestral music, with an integrative use of musical themes (leitmotifs), and singing that is free from formal division into arias, recitatives.

Rodgers & Hammerstein

- Are two composer Richard Rodgers and lyricist-dramatist Oscar Hammerstein II - Together were an influential, innovative and successful American musical theatre writing team - Broadway musicals includes recordings of Oklahoma!, The King and I, South Pacific, Carousel, Flower Drum Song, Cinderella, Allegro, Pipe Dream, Me and Juliet, State Fair and what is probably the most famous musical of all time, The Sound of Music

Franz Schubert

- Austrian composer - Born on January 31, 1797 - He is considered the last of the classical composers and one of the first romantic ones - Bridged the worlds of Classical and Romantic music - Credited with creating the German Lied - Compositions he wrote between 1813 and 1815 are known for their variety & intrinsic worth - Noted for the melody and harmony in his songs (lieder) and chamber music Most known for "String Quartet in G Major" and the "Piano Sonata in G Major, Winterreise, Symphony No. 9 in C Major (The Great; 1828), Symphony in B Minor (Unfinished; 1822), masses, and piano works

Anton Webern

- Austrian composer & conductor - A member of the so called Second Viennese School with Alban Berg - thought in microcosmic terms, trying to distill to its essence every musical concept that preoccupied him - His works are very brief: Webern's whole output fits on three CDs. - Known for Twelve-tone technique/serial music - Webern's music was among the most radical of its milieu

Arnold Schoenberg

- Austrian composer, music theorist, and painter - Associated with the expressionist movement in German poetry and art, and leader of the Second Viennese School - His work was considered too modern at the time - Expressionism - Known for sprechstimme - when singer touches the notated pitch only for a moment and then leaves

Charlie Parker

- Bird, known as one of the founders of bebop and probably its most important musician, he helped define the style through extended solos where he would improvise by harmonizing his notes with the underlying chord structure, not just melody - Bebop Period, Alto-Saxophone; aka "Bird"; Most influential bebop saxophonist/musician; could masterfully incorporate dissonances but then resolve them; changed concept of improvisation; Kansas City born bop pioneer; "Just Friends"/"Scrapple from the Apple" - Banned from performing in NY nightclubs -Nicknamed Yardbird -The birdland jazz club in NY opened in his name

12- bar blues form

- Refers to the number of measures, or musical bars, used to express the theme of a typical blues song - Changes is one of the most prominent chord progressions in popular music - The most common musical form of blues is the 12-bar blues

Igor Stravinsky

- Born to a famous Russian operatic bass singer -Many of his works reflect his Russian background -Forefront of neo-classicism. Neo-Classical style adopted with emphasis on formal design, absolute music -Music was more tonal -Moved to LA during WW2 - Famous pieces were the Firebird, Petrushka, the Rite of Spring, The Wedding, Apollo, The Fairy's Kiss - Embraced Arnold Schoenberg's twelve-tone method - He was emotional restraint, balance, discipline, cool detachment

Ragtime

- Evolved by black American musicians in the 1890s and played especially on the piano - Stylistic origins are from Blues, Cakewalk - Characterized by a syncopated melodic line and regularly accented accompaniment

Rubato

- Expressive- no real tempo - An expressive and rhythmic freedom by a slight speeding up and then slowing down of the tempo of a piece at the discretion of the soloist or the conductor - Is an expressive shaping of music that is a part of phrasing - Suggest expressive freedom of Chopin playing

Claude Debussy

- French composer - Impressionist musician (one of the first of this kind) - His works were a seminal force in the music of the 20th century - He developed a highly original system of harmony and musical structure that expressed in many respects the ideals to which the Impressionist and Symbolist painters and writers of his time aspired - Wrote Clair de lune

Lili Boulanger

- French composer - The younger sister of the noted composer and composition teacher Nadia Boulanger - First female winner of the Prix de Rome composition prize in 1913 - A child prodigy - Studied privately with Georges Caussade and Paul Vidal

Primitivism

- Gave rise to one of the greatest works of the early twentieth century, Stravinsky's Rite of Spring - ) is tonal, but the tonality is not achieved through expectation of resolution - It seeks to express ideas or images related to antiquity or to some "primitive" culture or attitude. - Primitivism can also be understood as a late development of 19th century nationalism. - Igor Stravinsky and Bela Bartok

Ludwig van Beethoven

- German composer and pianist - Transition between the Classical and Romantic eras in Classical music - One of the most famous and influential of all composers - About 1800, he discovered that he was slowly becoming deaf. By 1820, when he was almost totally deaf, Beethoven composed his greatest works

George Gershwin

- Gershwin was an American composer and pianist - His songs were highly sophisticated and crafted with great polish. - He successfully combined jazz and symphonic music with his Rhapsody in blue - "SUMMERTIME," FROM PORGY AND BESS - Gershwin began his somewhat reluctantly but ended up setting the world on fire with "Rhapsody in Blue" - Delighted in pleasing the public - Worked in Tin Pan Alley - Wrote - Porgy and Bess, Rhapsody in Blue, An American in Paris, Lady, be good. Oh, Kay! Girl crazy. - He wrote primarily for the Broadway musical theatre, but important as well are his orchestral and piano compositions in which he blended, in varying degrees, the techniques and forms of classical music with the stylistic nuances and techniques of popular music and jazz. - He was able to combine the Tin Pan Alley style with African-American and classical traditions. - He died in 1936 from a brain tumour at the age of 38.

Louis Armstrong

- He stated the first big jazz band which is called Fletcher Henderson - nicknamed Satchmo, Satch, and Pops - American trumpeter, composer, singer and occasional actor who was one of the most influential figures in jazz - Known for songs like "Star Dust," "La Via En Rose" and "What a Wonderful World" - He left school at the 5th grade to help support his family

Ring Cycle

- Is a cycle of four German-language epic music dramas composed by Richard Wagner - Full Title Ring of the Nibelung

March

- Is a piece of music with a strong regular rhythm which in origin was expressly written for marching to and most frequently performed by a military band - The true "march music era" existed from 1850 to 1940s - American composer John Philip Sousa revolutionized the march

Giuseppe Verdi

- Italian - 28 operas that embody the spirit of Romantic drama and passion - Most famous work Rigoletto based on a play by Victor Hugo - Some of his opera...Macbeth, Rigoletto, The Troubadour, The Lost One, A Masked Ball, The Force of Destiny, Don Carlos, Aida, Otello, Falstaff - During Italy's fight for indepence, Verdi's opera Nabucco as well as he himself were used as symbols for the resistance

The Mighty Handful

- Known as The Five and The New Russian School - Were five prominent 19th-century Russian composers who worked together to create a distinctly Russian classical music - The "5" composers were Mily Balakirev, Cesar Cui, Modest Mussorgsky, Nikolai Rimsky Korsakov, and Alexander Borodin) and Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky.

Richard Wagner

- Most controversial composer who ever lived some loved him some hated him - Operas are full of social and political ideas • Born in Germany - Studied the music of Beethoven - Series of positions as a conductor - Famous for his complex operas and infamous for his anti-semitic writings, - Oversaw the building of the Opera house and all the performance there's a RING CYCLE Opera all operas like to the next and cycled back • He had real power and intensity

Leitmotiv

- Musical phrases associated with objects , charters , events , thoughts, and feelings. - A recurrent theme throughout a musical or literary composition, associated with a particular person, idea, or situation.

Symphonic Poem/Tone Poem

- One movement & alters sonata form because of program - Created by Liszt - Inspired by something outside of music: allegory, historical figure, etc - A one movement work for orchestra , sometimes with contrasting sections may be based on literary reference or on a painting or a scene from nature. - Originates from Beethoven Leonore Overture no. 2 because of no recap

Frederic Chopin

- Polish pianist - Considered the best in his days - He was not a showman - He was a composer of the Romantic period (1820-1900) - The Poet of the Piano, he wrote almost exclusively for the piano - By age 7 he had already composed and published 2 pieces (Polonaise G minor was his first) - First concert by age 6 - Well-known pieces... Revolutionary Étude (Op. 10, No. 12) and the Minute Waltz (Op. 64, No. 1

Sergei Diaghilev

- Russian art critic, patron, ballet impresario and founder of the Ballets Russes - Founder of the Ballets Russes, from which many famous dancers and choreographers would arise - He was the iconic art connoisseur and produce

Piotr Tchaikovsky

- Russian composer of the romantic period - Romeo and Juliet, the 1812 Overture, and his three ballets: The Nutcracker, Swan Lake, and The Sleeping Beauty

serial music / twelve tone technique

- Serial composition first called twelve-tone composition - Style of music defined by Arnold Schoenberg - A piece of music for which there is an order to the progression of events - Twelve Tone only refers its 12 transpositions - The idea here is that the composer preselects a series of the twelve pitches, arranging them in a row with the contours and relationships he seeks to explore in his composition - Dissonance, awkward intervals, extreme dynamics

Big Band (Swing)

- Swing era - Naturally freer to indulge in rhythmic nonprecisions - Big bands aren't that big: 20 people or less - Three Sections of a Big Band is Brass, Rhythm, Saxophone - There were famous white bands, famous black bands, and some tentative crossings over. - A big band is a type of musical ensemble that usually consists of ten or more musicians with four sections: saxophones, trumpets, trombones, and a rhythm section. - Typical big band arrangements are written in strophic form with the same phrase and chord structure repeated several times

Tan Dun

- Tan Dun is a Chinese contemporary classical composer and conductor, most widely known for "Marco Polo" and "Symphony 1997: Heaven-Earth-Mankind" - Continues to build aesthetic bridges between Asia and the West - Inspired by a live performance of Beethoven's Fifth Symphony - Studied composition at Beijing Conservatory and from there to Columbia University for doctoral studies in music - he strength of its reception has earned him 436 exclusive contracts with Sony Classical for his recordings and G. Schirmer for his music publications.

avant-garde

- The avant-garde; from French, "forward guard" or vanguard of new music - The advancement of people or works that are experimental, radical, or unorthodox with respect to art, culture, or society - The avant-garde thrived in Poland in the shadow of Witold Lutoslawski (1913-94). In part, this was a political activism in response to the Soviet regime. - John Cage - Pierre Boulez

Electronic Music

- The combination of tape recording with artificial sound synthesis that opened the eyes of progressive composers to the possibilities of electronic music. - Martinet's machine generated sound with an oscillator and loudspeaker, the right hand playing a keyboard and the left controlling knobs for tone color and volume - The Theremin, or ether phone, was played by moving the hands between two radio antennas positioned at right angles to one another: one controlling pitch and the other volume. - The effect is of watching a magician waving his hands in the air to produce weird and wonderful surrealistic sounds.

Theme and Variations

- Theme is the main melody - Variations is a a way to change the melody in a musical way

Impressionism

- This designation, which was first applied to painters of the same era, refers to the evoking of a mood using harmony and tone color. - Music influenced by art

Program Music

- This type of music tells a story or paints a picture of things outside of music. The composer intends to use music to describe nonmusical things. - Instrumental music associated with poems, stories etc - Tells a story. Represents something outside itself

Franze Liszt

- Was first to use symphonic poem - Hungarian composer & Concert pianist - Known for innovations for piano 1. Profile playing (turned the piano sideways) 2. Lifting hands (played wildly) 3. Solo recitals 4. Transcriptions (playing orchestral music on piano) - Friends with Chopin

Minimalism

- Widely noticed in the 1970s and 80's- Style of Western art music that uses short rhythmic, melodic and harmonic motifs that evolve over numerous repetitions - The defining characteristic is repetition. -The marketplace liked minimalism because it made few demands on the ear; academics tended to hate it. - An important precursor of minimalist works was In C, composed by Terry Riley - Originated in 1960s New York. Important composers include Steve Reich, Philip Glass and Terry Riley

John Philip Sousa

- Wrote "Stars and Stripes Forever" which is the official march of US - Perfectionist and wore white gloves - Nickname "The March King" - Conductor of Marine band

Strophic

- having the same music for each successive stanza - Also called verse-repeating or chorus form, is the term applied to songs in which all verses or stanzas of the text are sung to the same music - Song structure in which the same music is repeated with every stanza (strophe) of the poem.

nationalism

- refers to the use of musical ideas that are identified with a specific country, region, or ethnicity, such as folk tunes and melodies, rhythms, and harmonies inspired by them

Passacaglia

-talian, from Spanish passacalle, or pasacalle: "street song" - A composition similar to a chaconne, - Typically in slow triple time with variations over a ground bass