Understanding Music Genres

Grandiose

A type/categorization of composition

These works draw on extra-musical factors for coherence

• Text or program provides story or ideas

• Music adds emotional conviction

More movements, more instruments, longer time spans, etc.

Often blended poetry, philosophical or religious ideas, and drama

Ex) program music, opera

Miniature

A type/categorization of composition

These works bypass the spontaneity vs. form problem

• The work ends before listener wonders where it’s going

Shorter, fewer instruments

Ex) Lieder

Chamber music

• Ensemble music for small groups, with one player per part

• Standard ensembles include: strong quartets, piano trios, brass quintets

The lied

• “Song” in German

• Piano accompaniment

• Romantic poetry

• Imitate mood

  • Not intended for concert hall

  • Performers seem to share emotional insights with the listener

• From the Romantic period

• Ex) The moon rises silently

(Romantic) opera

• A musical drama

• Ties into Romantic themes

  • Transcendence of artistic barriers

  • Music as the most profound art

• Message and meaning are taken seriously

  • Not just for entertainment anymore

  • Subjects from respected literature

Program music

• Non-vocal music written in association with a literary source or visual arts

  • A blending of music and literature, or music and visual arts

• Can tell a story

• Can paint a mood, personality, or concept

• From the Romantic period

Electronic music

• Recording equipment reproduces sounds

• Electronic sound generators create sounds from scratch

• Advent of magnetic tape created new possibilities

Computer music

• 1955: first computer-composed work

• Late 1950s: first computer sound synthesis

• 1983: MIDI revolution

• Today: sequencer software, interactive computer music

• From Postmodernism and later

Chance music (aleatoric music)

Music in which certain elements are not specified by the composer but are left up to chance