Studied by 2 people
Swing Low Sweet Chariot
A spiritual written before the 1840s
may have been created by a slave named Choctaw Willis who worked at a native american boarding school in Oklahoma
A white reverend heard the song and popularized it within the African American community
This song was arranged and rearranged multiple times by different artists of the early 20th century
Harlem Renaissance
An attempt by African American artists and philosophers to claim a “high culture” space for their people in order to counteract the racism they experienced in America
This led to spirituals being presented alongside European music as valid american art
This was a time where African American writers and Musicians gained popularity in the process of finding where their art fit into the European centered world which they lived in
Spiritual
Semi-improvised tradition of sacred songs
developed by black slaves and freedmen
often involved monophonic signing with some heterophonic elaboration
were full of rhythmic and melodic traits which were very different from the European norms
Ring Shout
An extended call and response
would build into a religious fervor
developed by slaves from African traditions
Camp meetings
Days of weeks when African American and European American people gathered to sing hymns of praise
A-B-A’
Statement - departure - return (a familiar pattern for orchestral work)
Ninth chord
A set of five notes in which the interval between the lowest and highest tones is a ninth
The effect was one of hovering between tonalities, creating elusive effects that evoke the misty outlines of impressionist painting
Impressionism
A musical style of composition in which clarity of structure and theme is subordinate to harmonic effects
characteristically using the whole-tone scale
Impressionism is also a literary or artistic style that seeks to capture a feeling or experience
Melodrama
One element that characterized the German musical theater of the early 1800s
Leitmotifs
Recurring themes, that represent a person, place, or idea. (leading Motives)
Music Dramas
Integrated music, poetry, drama, and spectacle
Singpiel
Music genre, of a light, comic drama with spoken dialogue (in Germany)
Bel Canto
Beautiful Singing
Opera Buffa
Comic Opera
Opera Seria
Serious opera
Shakespeare’s Comedy
A type of Shakespeare
EX: A Midsummer Nights Dream
Symphonic Poem
AKA: Tone Poem
Formed out of the composers need for large orchestral forms
A program music for orchestra in one movement with contrasting sections that develop a poetic idea, suggest a scene, or create a mood
Most common type of orchestral program music through the second half of the century
Incidental Music
A form of program music
Consisting of an overture and a series of pieces performed between the acts of a play and during important scenes
Overture
A rousing orchestral piece in one movement
Due to the popularity of program overtures, overtures became separate concert pieces and eventually disassociate from opera
Program Overture
A type of program to come out of an opera house
Where the overture served as an introduction to an opera or play
Character Piece
Short lyric piano piece, equivalent to the song
Rubato of “robbed time”
In which certain liberties are taken with the rhythm without upsetting the basic beat
Polonaises
A slow dance of Polish origin
in triple time
consisting chiefly of an intricate march or procession
études
Highly virtuosic study pieces
Minstrel shows
Racially charged theatre through which songs were popularized
Minstrelsy
A form of entertainment associated with minstrel shows
featuring songs, dances, and formulaic comic routines based on stereotyped depictions of African Americans
typically performed by white actors with blackened faces.
parlor songs
Usually performed by amature musicians in parlors
Often sweet, sentimental, and nostalgic.
Modified strophic
The same melody may be repeated for two or three stanzas, with new material introduced when the poem requires it
through-composed
Proceeds from beginning to end without repetitions of whole sections
Strophic Form
The melody is repeated with every stanza/strophe of the poem
hymns, carols, as well as most folk and popular songs are strophic
Song Cycle
Groups of Lieder that were unified by a narrative thread or descriptive theme
The Lied
A German-texted solo song
generally with a piano accompaniment
