Romantic & 20th

Years of the Romantic Period

1820-1900

What did the Romantic Period stress?

Emotion, imagination and individuality.

What was celebrated in the Romantic?

Rebellion.

What did composers break away from in the romantic?

Compositional rules.

What did composers begin using in the romantic instead of compositional logic?

Inner emotions.

What was music directly linked to and what did it help composers do? (In the Romantic)

Directly linked to literature, it helped composers accentuate self-expression and individuality.

What was the main characteristic of the romantic?

Individuality of style.

Expressive subjects

Romantic music was inspired by mythology, interest in the fantastic and diabolical, nature, death and unattainable or devastating love.

Nationalism

Occurred when composers used folk songs, legends, dances and history of their homelands in music.

Exoticism

Composers wrote melodies to infuse into their music to make a more romantic association to all things exotic. This may have been influenced by instruments associated with different lands or aspects of Asian music.

Virtuosity

Compositions were influenced by virtuosos.

Virtuosos

Masters of their respective instruments. (Dazzled audiences and created super-personas for both on-stage and reputation)

What did most homes begin to have in the romantic?

Pianos.

What were amateurs now given the opportunity to do during the romantic?

The opportunity to perform concerts.

The Art Song

A composition for voice and piano.

What was The Art Song considered?

One of the greatest forms of Romantic Music.

What was crucial for The Art Song?

Accompaniment.

What form was The Art Song composed in?

Composed in Strophic form.

Strophic Form

The same music was repeated for each stanza of the poem.

Through-Composed Form

New music was composed for each stanza.

Song Cycle

Usually contained a story line that ran through all the poems, linking the songs.

What was Franz Schubert considered?

The greatest composer of the German lied in the Romantic Period.

How many lieder did Schubert compose in his life?

Over 600 lied.

What was Schubert’s first lied?

“Gretchen Am Spinnrade”

What language was “Gretchen Am Spinnrade” in?

German.

What was Schubert’s greatest and most famous lied?

“Erlkonig”

What was “Erlkonig”?

A musical narrative of the supernatural, on a poem by Goethe.

What was one of Robert Schumann’s greatest contributions?

A career as an editor to the New Journal of Music.

New Journal of Music

Reviewed premiers of compositions of young, upcoming composers, such as Chopin, Berlioz and Mendelssohn.

Who married Schumann?

Clara Wieck.

Who was sent to a sanitarium for schizophrenia and died there in 1856?

Schumann.

Piano Cycles

Only grouped with piano pieces, much like Schubert’s song cycles.

Who composed “Carnaval, Kinderscenen” (Scenes from Childhood)?

Composed by Schumann.

Who composed “Nachtstücke” and “Fantasiestücke” (fantasy pieces)?

Composed by Schumann.

What were the two greatest song cycles in the Romantic?

“Winterreise” (Winter’s Journey) and “Dichterliebe” (Poet’s Love)

Who composed “Winterreise”?

Schubert composed this song cycle.

Who composed “Dichterliebe”?

This song cycle was composed by Schumann.

Who composed “Im Wünderschönen Monat Mai”?

Composed by Schumann.

Chopin treated the piano as this.

A vocal instrument.

Chopin incorporated this technique into his piano pieces.

The Bel Canto technique.

Bel Canto

Singing line.

Who composed “Nocturne in C# minor, OP. Posth.”?

Chopin composed this piece.

What does “Nocturne in C# minor, OP. Posth.” contain?

Improvisatory ornamentation (improved) turns, trills and decorative tones.

Who composed “Etude Op. 10 no. 12 in C minor “Revolutionary””?

Composed by Chopin.

What revolutionized piano technique in the Romantic?

“Etude Op. 10 no. 12 in C minor “Revolutionary””

Etude

A specific piece intended to develop and master technique.

What was “Etude Op. 10 no. 12 in C minor “Revolutionary”” written as?

A response to Russia’s invasion of Poland in 1831.

Who was considered the “Original Elvis”?

Franz Liszt.

Who gave Liszt their blessing and deemed him “A child of musical genius”?

Schubert and Beethoven.

What was Liszt’s most influential music pieces?

“Transcendental Etudes” for piano pieces.

What of Liszt’s revolutionized piano techniques and advanced the piano design?

Liszt’s “Transcendental Etudes”.

What did Liszt’s pieces contain?

Hungarian Rhapsodies, which included tinges of nationalism.

Who composed “Transcendental Etude in F Minor, No. 10”?

Composed my Liszt.

What form is “Transcendental Etude in F Minor, No. 10” in?

A-B-A form.

What was Berloiz’s most famous composition?

“Symphonie Fantastique”

“Symphonie Fantastique”

Contained a program and the elements of the bizarre, diabolical and pagan. Was one of the first examples of program music in the romantic period.

Program Music in the Romantic Period

Instrumental music associated with a story, poem, idea or scene.

Who won the “Prix De Rome” in 1830?

Berloiz was awarded this.

Symphony Fantastique Movements

5 movements, instead of the standard four.

Symphony Fantastique 1st Movement

“Reveries, Passions”

Symphony Fantastique 2nd Movement

“A Ball”

Symphony Fantastique 3rd Movement

“Scene in the Country”

Symphony Fantastique 4th Movement

“March to Scaffold”

Symphony Fantastique 3rd Movement

“Scene in the Country”

Symphony Fantastique 5th Movement

“Dream of a Witches Sabbath”

Idee Fixe

Used to represent Berloiz’s beloved wife, Smithson. It was influenced by Thomas DeQuincey’s novel “Confessions of an Opium Eater” as well.

What does “Dream of a Witches Sabbath (5th Movement)” feature?

An Idee fixe, or a fixed idea.

When and where did Wagner compose his opera, “Rienzi”?

In Germany, Dresden. 1842.

What caused Wagner to become the director, as both a composer and conductor for 6 years, of the Dresden Opera?

His immediate success from his first opera.

What did Wagner work on in Switzerland?

Several essays, including “Das Judentum In Musik” (The “Jewishness” in Music).

Who started antisemitism?

Wagner started this.

Which operas does Wagner’s fame rest on?

The four operas that create “Der Ring Des Nibelungen” (The Ring of the Nibelung)

“Der Ring Des Nibelungen”

Based on Nordic Myth. The set contains four operas that takes nearly 3 days to perform in its entirety.

What operas was Wagner famously known for?

“Tristan Und Isolde”

“Tannhauser”

“Parsifal”

“Tristan Und Isolde”

Composed in (1857-1859) by Wagner.

“Tannhauser”

Wagner’s opera, Bombed at the Paris Opera.

“Parsifal”

Wagner’s last opera.

Who did Wagner marry?

Cosima von Bulow, the daughter of Franz Liszt.

What term did Wagner coin?

“Music Drama”, which he preferred over operas.

What term did Wagner create?

“Gesamtkunstwerk”, which he described as a “total art work” that his music dramas represented.

Gesamtkunstwerk

Combined elements of music, art, literature and theatre.

Leitmotif

A short musical idea associated with a person, object, or a specific thought in a drama. When presented as a theme or melody, in represents an individual or theme/idea.

“Die Walküre” (The Valkyrie: 1856)

The second of the four operas in the “Ring” Cycle.

The first characteristic of Western Art Music

Disintegration of Tonality (Emancipation of Dissonance).

The second characteristic of Western Art Music

Polychordal Combinations (Two chords at different tonalities heard at once).

The third characteristic of Western Art Music

Tone Clusters (Tones randomly added together to create masses of sound).

The fourth characteristic of Western Art Music

Atonality (The absence of tonality or any key signature).

The fifth characteristic of Western Art Music

Irregular Rhythm (Meters such as 5/8, 11/8 and 4/8)

What was named after a movement in Paris that was taking the world by storm?

French Impressionism/Symbolism.

Who were the most famous symbolists?

Stéphane Mallarmé,

Paul Verlaine,

Arthur Rimbaud.

French Symbolists

Rebelled against the conventions of French poetry.

Who were revered Impressionist painters in France?

Claude Monet

Camille Pissarro.

What did symbolists emphasize?

Emphasized suggestion, fluidity and musicality of words.

Who was considered an “impressionist” composer and hated it?

Claude Debussy.

Who won the Prix de Rome in 1884?

Debussy won this.

What kind of artist was Debussy?

A bohemian artist.

What put Debussy on the musical map?

His string quartet in 1893.

Which of Debussy’s pieces was a triumph?

His opera, “Pelleas and Melisande” (1903).

Which pieces of Debussy’s were considered descriptive titles?

“Reflects Dans L’eau” (Reflections in the Water)

“Nuaged” (Clouds)

“Fetes” (Festivals)

What was Debussy’s music based on?

Pentatonicism and Whole-Tone Scales.