Music History Literature Exam III
Iannis Xenakis
Greek composer of stochastic music; wrote acoustic music that imitates electronic music; an engineer and architect that saw mathematics as a fundamental to music; (1922-2001): This Greek-born, French-naturalized composer, theorist and architect-engineer was one of the most important post-World War II avant garde thinkers. He is most known for his post-modernist stochastic music and orchestral soundmass compositions based on probability theory. Metastaseis (1954)
Modernism
A cultural movement embracing human empowerment and rejecting traditionalism as outdated. Rationality, industry, and technology were cornerstones of progress and human achievement; An art movement characterized by the deliberate departure from tradition and the use of innovative forms of expression that distinguish many styles in the arts and literature of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries; An intellectual movement that has roots in the European Enlightenment of the 1700's and encourages scientific thought, the expansion of knowledge, and belief in the inevitability of progress.
Integrated Musical
A musical comedy in which the songs grow out of and further the dramatic situation, working with other elements such as dance, acting, costumes, set design and lighting to create a unified artistic effect; Integrating music into more realistic actions and common situations. They try to transcend the trials of daily life. Ex: Rent, singing in the rain
Tone clusters
Highly dissonant combination of pitches sounded simultaneously; a group of tones that are all played together; chord built on seconds; term coined by Henry Cowell for the chord of diatonic or chromatic seconds.
Gebrauchsmusik
Hindemith's term for useful music; music for use, a term used in the 1920s by Paul Hindemith to designate his compositions for amateurs or for everyday settings; also used by Kurt Weill for music of artistic value that was accessible to a general audience
Collage
In music, montage (literally "putting together") or sound collage ("gluing together") is a technique where newly branded sound objects or compositions, including songs, are created from collage, also known as montage. This is often done through the use of sampling, while some playable sound collages were produced by gluing together sectors of different vinyl records. In any case, it may be achieved through the use of previous sound recordings or musical scores.[1][not in citation given] Like its visual cousin, the collage work may have a completely different effect than that of the component parts, even if the original parts are completely recognizable or from only one source.
Socialist Realism
An art form that's purpose was to advance the Socialist Ideal; A realist style, developed in the USSR, attempting to relate formal artistic culture to "the masses". Imagery of participation in communal efforts (work, athletics, patriotism,etc). Begun under Joseph Stalin. Rejection of most traditions in of Western European art; can be understood as antithesis of Western avant-garde;
Aaron Copland
Appalachian Spring; Composer most associated with American populism, although he studied in Paris and experimented with a variety of modernist idioms, including serialism; his most famous work is Appalachian Spring (1944); america's best known classical composer; American composer responsible for inspiring the "Americana Style" heard in many western scores.
Alfred Schnittke
Composer born in the Soviet Union who immigrated to Germany and whose works often suggest a "polystylism" ranging from Vivaldi to Schoenberg; (1934-1998) a Russian composer who worked in the film industry and became exposed to serialism, chance, and electronic music. Wrote Concerto Grosso No. 1; twelve-tone composition, collage/pastiche, quotation, whole-tone scale, post-modernism
Kurt Weill
Considered an exponent of New Objectivity, he worked extensively with playwright Bertolt Brecht and had a second career as a composer for Broadway; German Composer. Threepenny opera. Collaborated w/ Bertolt Brecht; Germany, "Mack the Knife" from The Threepenny Opera; Die Dreigroschenoper: Prelude, Die Moritat von Mackie Messer
Bebop
Dizzy Gillespie and Charlie Parker were instrumental in creating the genre of jazz known as; -Reaction to swing in 1940; 1940s invented by Dizzy Gillespie (trumpet) and Charlie Parker (sax). it was a reaction to Big Band Jazz. combos of only 3 or 4 musicians. and a emphasis on solos that play a incredible fast, virtuosoic instruments. Flourished in the 40s and 50s. Similar arrangements but more improvisation. More complex melodies and harmonies than swing.
Karlheinz Stockhausen
German composer important both for acoustic and electronic music; one of the major figures of the postwar avant-garde who wrote integral serial music; Pioneer in electronic music, and his role as directer of an electronic studio; German composer and primary composer of elektronische musique; Wrote first European works of total serialism?
British Invasion
Influx of bands and musicians from Britain during the 60's. Huge influence on the American music scene. The coming up of The Beatles and The Rolling Stones during the same era is known as this.
Philip Glass
Major minimalist composer who studied with Nadia Boulanger and Ravi Shankar and is perhaps most famous for his opera Einstein on the Beach (1976) and his film scores; Uses simple harmonic progressions and studied Indian music; started ensemble with doubling lines & amplification from synthesizers/microphones; "the composer is the performer" wanted to transcend gap btwn classical and popular; wrote Einstein on the Beach
Max Steiner
Scored Gone with the Wind and Casablanca; Wagnerian style, use of Micky mousing in King Kong, mimicking physical movement; father of film music; stated that "if Richard Wagner would have lived in this century, he would have been the #1 film composer"; Film composer whose music had an extraordinary influence on the techniques, approaches, and conventions that remain the foundations of film music in the western world.
The Beatles
a British band that had an enormous influence on popular music in the 1960s; helped propel rock music into mainstream America; Ed Sullivan paid this band $75,000 for three, record-breaking shows in the early months of 1964. Their appearances were the first and third highest-rated shows of the decade; Begin the British invasion of music
Free Jazz
form of jazz developed between 1950-1960 that emphasized individual performers and collective improvisation as opposed to adhering to pre-established frameworks; Subset of Avant-Gard; the breakdown of standard jazz conventions, no fixed tempo, rhythm or meter
Avant-garde
innovative; new and unusual ideas or experimental ideas; a group active in inventing and applying new techniques, esp. in the arts
John Adams (the composer)
is an American composer of classical music and opera, with strong roots in minimalism; short ride in a fast machine; was born ten years after Steve Reich and Philip Glass, and his writing is more developmental and directionalized, containing climaxes and other elements of Romanticism.
Quotation
is the practice of directly quoting another work in a new composition. The quotation may be from the same composer's work (self-referential), or from a different composer's work (appropriation).
Motown
is the term that refers to the style of music that emerged in Detroit, Michigan in the late 1960's. The Sound was a mixture of several popular musical styles and can be considered a form of soul music; Studio that was conscious of black music and civil rights issues. Founded by Barry Gordy Jr. Recorded Marvin Gaye, Michael Jackson and the Jackson 5
Diegetic (or Source) Music
music in a film that originates from the scene in the film itself; music that can be heard by the characters; music that is produced within a scene of a film
Polystylism
term coined by Alfred Schnittke for a combination of newer and older musical styles created through quotation or stylistic allusion; Postmodern practice mixing historical and current musical styles is known as; term coined by Alfred Schnittke, the abandonment of serial technique out of a conviction that no single manner was adequate to reflect contemporary reality and stylistic eclecticism (Schnittke Third String Quartet)
Dissonant Counterpoint
term coined by Charles Seeger to refer to counterpoint in which the traditional roles of consonance and dissonance are reversed; Ruth Crawford Seeger, preference dissonance, resolve consonance to dissonance, worked with Ives to develop
Elvis Presley
"the King of Rock n' Roll" appeared on the Ed Sullivan show in 1955. He recorded at Sun Records. Honorably served in the Army when he was drafted. Home in a former church (Graceland) located in Memphis, Tennessee; 1950s; a symbol of the rock-and-roll movement of the 50s when teenagers began to form their own subculture, dismaying to conservative parents; created a youth culture that ridiculed phony and pretentious middle-class Americans, celebrated uninhibited sexuality and spontaneity; foreshadowed the coming counterculture of the 1960s; made rock music popular when he integrated African American gospel tunes into the music he played
Dizzy Gillespie
trumpet player, innovated bebop trumpet, put together bop-style big band, was interested in afro-cuban jazz; miles davis inspiration; virtuoso trumpet player; after Louis Armstrong, provides the model for jazz trumpet playing until Miles Davis; most important in developing the cubop style; A Night in Tunisia; Salt Peanuts; Known as an extravagant performer who wore glasses and a beret, he also had a bent trumpet and would puff his checks out; he was the best trumpet player of the bebop era though, with great command over the high register of the trumpet
Darius Milhaud
(1892-1974) Composer and member of Les Six. Extremely prolific, uses jazz elements and brazillian elements; Les Six. Extremely prolific and composed in a wide variety of genres comprising stylistically diverse works. ("The Ox on the Roof," "Christoph Colomb," "Sacred Service.") Also incorporated sounds from the Americas ("Souvenirs of Brazil," "Creation of the World"). Also employs "jazzy" elements like blue notes/melodies, syncopation, riffs, and "modernist" elements like fugue, polytonality, and polyrhythms.
Dmitri Shostakovich
(1906-1975). His work was emblematic of both the Soviet regime and his attempts to survive under its oppression. His operas, such as The Nose (1928) and Lady Macbeth of the Mtsensk District, were well received at first--until Stalin severely criticized his work in Pravda in 1936. Fearful for his security, he wrote several conciliatory pieces (Fifth, Seventh/Leningrad, and Twelfth Symphonies) in order to get out of trouble. He made enemies, however, with his Thirteenth Symphony (Babi Yar). Based on the Yevtushenko poem, Babi Yar condemned anti-Semitism in both Nazi Germany and the USSR; Amazing composer, played every instrument, learned by ear, wrote for Stalin propaganda.
Arthur Honneger
1892-1955. French. Les Six. Excelled in music of dynamic action and graphic gesture. Short-breathed melodies, ostinato rhythms, bold colors, dissonance. Pacific 231, King David; Swiss born; wrote a locomotive imitation and oratorio for amateurs
New Objectivity
1920s-1933 CE (20th century); term coined in the 1920s to describe a kind of new realism in music, in reaction to the emotional intensity of the late Romantics and the Expressionism of Schoenberg and Berg; Response to war experiences during WWI. Captured devastation war inflicts on humans and landscapes; Art/Artists interested in confronting problems with modernity, presenting direct and honest images of war
Experimental Music
20th c technique that focuses on exploration of creating new musical sounds and instrumental techniques; Used particularly to describe John Cage and other American composers who attempted to abandon the European classical tradition by, for example, incorporating noise and using elements of chance in their music; a type of music in which most of the traditional rules were preserved, but other rules were changed
Spectralism
A new compositional technique that emerged in the early 1970s that uses spectral analysis to help composers manipulate sound, in particular timbre; - Focuses on the perception of sound, its acoustics, and tone color (The series of overtones in a specific set of pitches is the center of a work); term referring to music composed mainly in Europe since the 1970s which uses the acoustic properties of sound itself (or sound spectra) as the basis of its compositional material; compositional decisions are often informed by sonographic representations and mathematical analysis of sound spectra - Grisey and Murail
Rhythm and Blues
A style of early popular music characterized by a pounding quadruple meter and a raw growling style of singing set within a twelve-bar harmony; 1950s Black popular music. Ensembles were usually loud, often featuring an electric guitar or other electrified instruments. Strong emphasis on vocals because vocalists has to shout over the loud instrumentation. Lyrics are blatantly sexual
Bessie Smith
African American blues singer who played and important role in the Harlem Reniassance; American singer; after working in traveling shows she went to New York City, where she made (1923-28) recordings, accompanied by such outstanding artists as Louis Armstrong, Fletcher Henderson, and James P. Johnson. She quickly became the favorite singer of the jazz public. The power and somber beauty of her voice, coupled with songs representing every variety of the blues, earned her the title "Empress of the Blues."
Harry Partch
American composer, theorist, inventor of musical instruments like the Chromelodeon; Invented own musical system with microtonality, invented own instruments, didnt expect any followers; invented microtonality (breaks octave into 43 parts); "An American Original", Invented his own musical system: break the 12-equal part octave into 43 equal parts, but there are no instruments to play that.
Ruth Crawford Seeger
American ultramodernist who stopped composing to pursue a career in ethnomusicology, focusing on American folk music; woman American composer; Wrote String Quartet; String Quartet 1931: 4th movement, Allegro possible
Henry Cowell
American ultramodernist who won a certain fame for his pieces requiring extended techniques on the piano; The Banshee; American pianist and composer. Pioneered tone clusters. Known for The Banshee and the Aeolian Harp; Influenced John Cage, plays the actual strings on the piano, tone clusters
Chuck Berry
An African-American rock 'n' roll musician and composer, who influenced many musicians of the 1950s and 1960s, including the Beatles and Bob Dyan; Johnny B. Goode; considered to be the best guitar player of the 50's; First African American popular singer who united blacks and whites with his music. Roll Over Beethoven
Performance Art
An American avant-garde art trend of the 1960s that made time an integral element of art. It produced works in which movements, gestures, and sounds of persons communicating with an audience replace physical objects; art presented to an audience, traditionally interdisciplinary. may be either scripted or unscripted, random or carefully orchestrated; spontaneous or carefully planned with or without audience participation. It can be any situation that involves 4 basic elements: time, space, the performer's body, or presence in a medium, and a relationship between performer and audience.
Indeterminacy
An approach to composition, pioneered by John Cage, in which the composer leaves certain aspects of the music unspecified. Should not be confused with CHANCE; certain aspects of the music are unspecified; John Cage originally defined it as "the ability of a piece to be performed in substantially different ways"
Duke Ellington
Born in Chicago middle class. moved to Harlem in 1923 and began playing at the cotton club. Composer, pianist and band leader. Most influential figures in jazz; was an American composer, pianist and bandleader of jazz orchestras. He led his orchestra from 1923 until his death, his career spanning over 50 years; -was one of the most important composers, arrangers, and band leaders of the swing era; Great composer, master of "swing" music. "It don't mean a thing if in ain't got that swing"
Heitor Villa-Lobos
Brazilian composer who, like Bartók, attempted to synthesize modernist and nationalist elements; his most famous work is Bachianas brasileiras, which partakes in neoclassicism; Choros, a series of fourteen pieces that blend Brazilian vernacular music with modernist techniques;
Pierre Schaeffer
Coined the term music concrete, 1948; created first tape music 1948 in France, musique concrete; French (1940-1990); experimentalist, musique concrete, sampling and recording
Luciano Berio
Italian postwar avant-garde composer particularly interested in extended techniques and a modernist virtuosity, nowhere better observed than in his series of Sequenzas; Italian composer that encorporates tonal elements into music. inspired by John Cage, uses chance techniques. wrote "Sequenza III" for solo voice; His songlike compositions are examples of the of the thinking of the 1960s and 1970s during which composers continued to explore and search for new styles but dropped doctrinaire attitudes to look for ways that modern music could communicate and regain the interest of audiences. He relied on sound per se to enhance the poetry that he set to music.
Third Stream
Jazz style that synthesizes characteristics and techniques of classical music and jazz; term coined by Gunther Schuller; Late 1950s blend of classical and jazz
Pierre Boulez
Le Marteau Sans Maitre; French, Modernist/avante-garde controversial(violent punk-like dude), studied with Messiaen Total serialis; French composer who, along with his German colleague Karlheinz Stockhausen, advocated "Total serialism" in the post WWII 1950s and 60s. total serialism would apply to Schoenberg's concept of the tone row to ALL musical parameters: rhythm, timbre, form, dynamics, etc;
Louis Armstrong
Leading African American jazz musician during the Harlem Renaissance; he was a talented trumpeter whose style influenced many later musicians; West End Blues; was the first great soloist in jazz and he introduced scat singing
John Cage
Major American avant-garde composer, whose 4'33" (1952) represents perhaps the ultimate extreme of indeterminacy in the concert hall; wrote music for prepared piano; Explored creative means to making music, challenging even the very concept of musical sound. Rebelled against technical and mathematical techniques fro producing music and experimented with sounds from objects that were not technically instruments. Really interested in CHANCE MUSIC. Discovered the gamlan and applied its concept to the piano with the prepared piano idea. (LE: Sonata V)
Neoclassical
Major Western artistic style from 1600s to 1800s. Symmetry, Greek/ Roman influence, patterns, simple in color; relating to a simple, elegant style (based on ideas and themes from ancient Greece and Rome) that characterized the arts in Europe during the late 1700s; Art movement to reflect Roman and Greek art. unemotional form of art harkening back to the grandeur of ancient Greece and Rome. Its rigidity was a reaction to the overbred Rococo style and the emotional charged Baroque style.
Cool Jazz
Miles Davis, created because of the complexity and exclusive nature of Bebop. Larger bands were formed that included more sensuous instruments (West Coast); a substyle of bebop characterized by a restrained, unemotional performance with lursh harmonies, moderate volume levels and tempos and a new lyricism; often associated wiht Miles Davis cool and low-key trumpet in the 1950's and 60's
New Accessibility
Minimalism reopens door to tonality. Acceptable in some circles
Electronic Music
Music based on sounds that are produced or modified through electronic means; a music which sounds are created or modified with an electronic synthesizer or other recording devices like a computer; Sub Style of Post-Modernism: sounds produced and manipulated by magnetic tape machines, synthesizers and/or computers began in 1950s
Steve Reich
Music for 18 Musicians; a pioneer in minimalism; Composer who does alot of minimalism and reptition, inspiration from Africa, learned African drumming; minimalist composer that developed phase rhythm (counterpoint in which the same rhythm moves in and out of phases like a canon). Later started to use traditional harmonies; developed a minimalist effect called "phasing"; (b. 1936) Developed a quasi-canonic procedure in which musicians play the same material out of phase with each other. Later known as a postminimalist, reflecting the influence of minimalist procedures while moving beyond the original minimalist aesthetic to include traditional methods, more varied material, and renewed expressivity.
Rodgers and hammerstein
Oklahoma; South Pacific; The Sound of Music; wrote Oklahoma, Sound of Music; considered Shakespeares of musical theater; The King and I; Duo who introduced the musical play form in 1943
Benjamin Britten
Peter Grimes; One of England's most iconic and (at times) controversial composer. Heavily influenced by Vaughn Williams, Stravinsky, and Shostakovich. Connected to many homosexual artists. Notable Works: Variations and Fugue on a Theme of Purcell (1945), Peter Grimes, Night Mail (1936), and War Requiem (1962); BRITISH-- 1925-1975. Most important 20th c. English composer. Revived English opera. Rejected modernist ideology of evolution toward 'necessary' obscurity. Developed tonal language.
Milton Babbitt
Philomel, Part I; One of the most innovative of all SERIALISTS! Used a more mathematical approach; composed using the twelve-tone tequnique, this gave his compositions supreme mathematical precision; Composed total serial music.
Edgard Varese
Poeme Electronique; Which composer is not associated with minimalism; Postmodern; Which composer is noted for promoting the use of sound as a central element in musical composition rather than intervals, lines or accompaniments; pioneer in the use of percussion and noise-like sounds, 1st composer to use musique concrete
Witold Lutoslawski
Polish composer and orchestral conductor; indeterminancy; Venetian Games; He studied composition and the piano but was prevented by WWII from studying in Paris. During the war he eked out a living as a cafe pianist with his fellow composer Panufnik. After the war he completed his first major orchestral work, the First Symphony, whose concept and language owed much to Bartok, Roussel, and Prokofiev. When it was unexplicably banned by the Stalinist authorities in 1949, he tried to keep a low profile, complying like many others with mass songs and small-scale occasional pieces. Nevertheless his folk-based works of the early 1950s, such as his music for children, and, most notably, the Baroque-influenced Concerto for Orchestra (1954), are acknowledged highlights of the period of socialist realism in Poland.
Polytonal
Presenting two different key areas(or tonal centers) to the listener at the same time;
Revues
Productions consisting of dramatic sketches and musical numbers; programs of numbers in a musical with little or no narrative linkage between them; in the 1920s and 1930s ---- productions consisting of dramatic sketches and musical numbers were extremely popular
Paul Hindemith
Prolific composer who sought to close the gap between composers and audiences by writing Gebrauchsmusik--that is, "music for use"--which would be challenging, modernistic, but accessible; Mathis der Maler 1895-1963. German. Quartal harmony. Started composing in a late-Romantic style then developed his expressionist style (Murderer, Hope of Women). All his music was neotonal. Gebrauchsmusik (music for use). Children's musical, Mathis der Maler, Symphony Mathis der Maler. Bad boy of German contemporary music.
Olivier Messiaen
Quartet for the End of Time; French composer who combined interests in modernism with fascination with Indian classical rhythms, birdsong, synaesthesia, and Catholic mysticism; Most important French composer born in the twentieth century. Extended techniques from Debussy and Stravinsky to create personal a post-tonal musical language based on artificial modes, harmonic stasis, nonmetric rhythms, and colorful harmonies and timbres. (1908-1992); Influential teacher of several European avant-garde composers after World War II
Soul Music
Ray Charles; Arethra Franklin; James Brown; was created by and for African Americans through the merging of black Gospel with rhythm 'n' blues that began in the late 1950s
George Gershwin
Rhapsody in Blue; A Jazz Age composer who was the son of Russian immigrants and, like many others during his time, mixed symphony and jazz together to create an entirely new style that represented how America was a mixture of peoples; took jazz into the mainstream by combining it with classical style and popular song; First to combine classical music styles with jazz; America's most famous composer; Famous songs include "Rhapsody in Blue" and "Summertime"; advanced european music compositon techniques using leitmotifs and even shoenbergs tone row concept
Les Six
Six French composers of the 20s whose music reflected the strong influence of popular styles; A group of French composers who embraced popular music, jazz, and theater music as an alternative to the "serious" artistic movements of the modern period were called; Honegger, Milhaud, Poulenc, Tailleferre, Auric, Durey; a younger group of composers absorbed the strong influence of neoclassicism but sought to escape the old political dichotomies; seen as seeking to free French music from foreign domination; drew inspiration from Satie
Country Music
What is the "music of the white working people?"; blend of gospel, jazz, blues, and folk music, usually associated with the American South
Sofia Gubaidulina
Soviet woman composer whose works often suggest a spiritual dimension, a trend found in many Eastern European composers' music from the 1970s forward; Russian woman composer who wrote "Rejoice!". Interest was in spirituality and made her a target for the Soviet Union; for voices and instruments // lots of silence, semi tonal activity.- very cold atmosphere/ texture/ timbres (liminalism, abstract progressions; Sonata: Rejoice! Sonata for Violin and Violoncello: Fifth movement, Listen to the still small voice
Sound masses
Term coined by Edgard Varese for a body of sounds characterized by a particular timber, register, rhythm, or melodic gesture, which may remain stable or may be transformed as it recurs; diminished importance of individual pitches, values texture above all else (Charles Ives); Blocks of sound or cluster chords in which individual pitches no longer have importance. Melody, chords, and meter no longer matter. Attention shifts to density, register, dynamics, and color.
Arvo Part
The music of this Estonian composer mirrors the evolution of the broad changes in modern music following World War II: his music was serialist in the 1960's, followed by an eclectic style that is mixed modern elements with quotations from the past, and in the late 1970s developed a personal style that is outwardly related to Renaissance polyphony; self-invented compositional technique - tintinnabul; Studied Gregorian chant, early polyphony, juxtaposed modernist and Baroque styles, tintinnabuli (bell-like sonorities method), Seven Magnificent Antiphons; "Cantante Domino"; Seven Magnificent Antiphons;
Krzystof Penderecki
Threnody for the Victims of Hiroshima; Graphic Notation, Polish
King Oliver
United States jazz musician who influenced the style of Louis Armstrong (1885-1938); New Orleans jazz; pioneer of the mute in jazz music; brought Louis Armstrong to Chicago in 1922
Leonard Bernstein
West Side Story; A twentieth-century American composer and conductor. He served for many years as the director of the New York Philharmonic Orchestra but is probably best known for his Broadway productions, such as West Side Story; composer who wrote serious/popular music in influence of George Gershwin
Ultramodernism
a french baroque keyboard genre, usually the first movement in a suite, whose nonmetric notation gives a feeling of improvisation; Current in American music between the World Wars that focused on developing new musical resources; Edgard Varése, Henry Cowell, Ruth Crawford Seeger; - Throughout the Americas a growing number of composers won international reputations with music that represented their nations on the world stage. An experimental tradition emerged in the United States alongside a growing nationalist trend, both representing assertions of independence from Europe.
Prepared Piano
a piano outfitted with screws, bolts, washers, erasers, and bits of felt and plastic to transform the instrument from a melodic one to a percussive one; invented through John Cage's love of percussion instruments, and used grand piano with screws, bolts, washers, erasers, felt, and bits of plastic between strings
Minimalism
an art movement in sculpture and painting that began in the 1950s and emphasized extreme simplification of form and color; a style of modern music that takes a very small amount of musical material and repeats it over and over to form a composition;
Non-diegetic (or Underscore) Music
background music; film music that is added to the scene from the outside for purposes heightening the mood or feeling of a scene; when the film contains music that we do not expect the characters to hear
Cole Porter
considered one of the most sophisticated Tin Pan Alley composers, who received a conservatory education in music; A twentieth-century American songwriter. His songs, such as "Anything Goes," "I Get a Kick out of You" and "I've Got You Under my Skin," are renowned for their witty, sophisticated lyrics; This artist was very different from his/her contemporaries in that he/she was from the Midwest, born into wealth and was not Jewish. He/she also lived the "high life" and referred to it in his/her work
Carl Orff
developed the concept of total theater; Most famous for the choral-orchestral work Carmina burana (1936), which matches medieval texts with an accessible modernism; also extremely influential, like Kodály, for his approach to music education; German composer and educator who had a school for dance and music that was closed by the Nazis but he still continued to be musically active; most of his compositions have Latin lyrics and he flavored them with German folk songs that had vigorous rhythm but his harmonic vocab was largely tonal
Total Serialism (or Integral Serialism)
extremely complex, totally controlled music in which the twelve-tone principle is extended to elements of music other than pitch; Boulez and Stockhausen; The extending of Schoenberg's methods by Webern to include rhythms, timbres, and dynamics moving towards complete control of all the elements.
Francis Poulenc
french composer, member of les six. strongly influenced by the dramatically different personalities of his parents. his earlier music was more in line with his mother's personality... light hearted and frivalos, neocalssical in nature. his later music drew from his devoutly catholic dad and is influenced by chant; 1899-1963. French. Les Six. Drew on Parisian pop. song, cabaret, revues; I studied independently rather than at the Paris Conservatoire, and my music shows a variety of influences from both music and literature. As a songwriter I set many avant-garde poets, and as a member of Les Six I fought against "Wagnerian clouds" and the "mists of the Debussyists." I also partnered Pierre Bernac in many recitals of my own and other composers' works.
Post-Modernism
genre of art and literature and especially architecture in reaction against principles and practices of established modernism; A movement that came to the fore in the 1980's. Post-Modern Artists rejected Modernism and in many cases returned to depicting the figure (as opposed to abstraction) and turned to appropriating mass produced images and mining popular culture for image sources; emphasizes that there are no originals: only copies...and copies of copies; after WWI; 1960s-1970s. things CAN'T be put back together - NO PROGRESS. hopelessness. popular art and common art CAN be grouped together. (ex. andy warhol)
Contrafact
in jazz, a piece that borrows the chord progression from another, preexisting piece; a new tune composed over a harmonic progression borrowed from a particular song
Neo-Romaticism
is used to cover a variety of movements in philosophy, literature, music, painting, and architecture, as well as social movements, that exist after and incorporate elements from the era of Romanticism. It has been used with reference to late-19th-century composers such as Richard Wagner particularly by Carl Dahlhaus who describes his music as "a late flowering of romanticism in a positivist age". He regards it as synonymous with "the age of Wagner", from about 1850 until 1890—the start of the era of modernism, whose leading early representatives were Richard Strauss and Gustav Mahler (Dahlhaus 1979, 98-99, 102, 105). It has been applied to writers, painters, and composers who rejected, abandoned, or opposed realism, naturalism, or avant-garde modernism at various points in time from about 1840 down to the present.
Charlie Parker
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; interjected quotes of popular songs in his improvised solos; Birdland in New York and Birdhouse in Chicago were two jazz clubs named for; Alto Sax, Bebop, "Bird"
Germaine Taillefere
les six. film scores, orchestra, chamber ensembles; This member of Les Six was a composer of many film scores as well as works for orchestra and chamber ensembles.
Musique concrete
music made up of natural sounds and sound effects that are recorded and then manipulated electronically; music created by recording sounds and subjecting them to various modifications such as adjusting the speed, editing, filtering out parts of the sound, altering the sound, or revising the sound; Early school of electronic music in Paris 1945-1960. Recorded real world sounds and shaped/manipulated them into a composition; genre of electronic music, uses tape which natural voice sings over
Rock and Roll
music that grew out of rhythm and blues and that became popular in the 1950s; This was a new type of music that blended traditional blues and electronic instruments to become "American music." (Included Elvis Presley and Chuck Berry); Alan Freed coined the term
Irving Berlin
probably the most prolific and commerically successful Tin Pan Alley composer, who wrote White Christmas, God Bless America, and Alexander's Ragtime Band; it has been said of this Russian born immigrant that "he has no place in American music- he is American music"
Folk Music Revival
was a phenomenon in the United States that began during the 1940s and peaked in popularity in the mid-1960s. Its roots went earlier, and performers like Josh White, Burl Ives, Woody Guthrie, Lead Belly, Big Bill Broonzy, Richard Dyer-Bennet, Oscar Brand, Jean Ritchie, John Jacob Niles, Susan Reed, Paul Robeson and Cisco Houston had enjoyed a limited general popularity in the 1930s and 1940s. The revival brought forward styles of American folk music that had, in earlier times, contributed to the development of country and western, jazz, and rock and roll music.
