Music History: Exam 3

Das Lied von der Erde, III

Mahler

Prelude to “The Afternoon of a Faun”

Debussy

Romanesque song from Don Quixote to Dulcinea

Ravel

The Rite of Spring, Part I

Stravinsky

Pierrot lunaire, No. 18

Schoenberg

Symphony, Op. 21, II

Webern

Concerto for Orchestra, IV

Bartok

Country Band March

Ives

Appalachian Spring

Copland

Mambo from West Side Story

Bernstein

Gustav Mahler (1860-1911)

• A piano student at the Vienna Conservatory

• Worked at many opera houses

• 1886: Started his 1st symphony → major flop

• “Songs of  a Wayfarer” - his first cycle

• took up Chief Conductor for NY Philharmonic

Gustav Mahler Symphonies

• Shifted to tragic human experiences

  • A change from his spiritual experiences and ideas

Symbolism

• Belgian and French literary movement- 19th c.

• Images and associations convey experiences

• Words/objects represent abstract ideas

• Suggestion of mood or emotion without direct reference

Impressionism

• Centered in France

• Emphasis on color and timbre

• Emphasis on light

• Emphasis on color

• Avoidance of dark pigments

• Non dramatic paintings

Symbolism/ impressionism: Flower representation

• Rose: love, romance 

• Lily: beauty, perfection 

• Violet: shyness

Symbolism/ impressionism: Colors

• Red: danger, love, passion

• Yellow: decay, violence, or hope, cheerfulness

• Blue: peacefulness, calm 

• Purple: royalty

• White: purity, innocence

• Black: mystery, death, or evil

Symbolism/ impressionism: Object representation

• Chain: coming together of two ideas

• Ladder: ascension, earth to heaven

Achille-Claude Debussy (1862-1918)

• Most represented composer in impressionism

• Created the term impressionism, but prefers symbolism

• Went to Paris Conservatory

Traditional order of importance:

1. Form

2. Harmony

3. Melody

4. Rhythm

5. Timbre, color

Debussy’s order of importance

1. Color, timbre

2. Rhythm

3. Melody

4. Harmony

5. Form

Debussy’s Style

• Color and rhythm

• Ambiguity of tonality

• Parallel chord movement

• Exoticism: Javanese gamelan music

• Suggestion: the music captures a feeling, mood

• Use of new scales; pentatonic, whole tome, modes

Maurice Ravel (1875-1937)

2nd Industrial Revolution ~1870-1914

• Industrialization: 

  • Large industries, factory complexes, high rate of production

  • Electrification, use of steel, chemicals

  • Advances in transportation

    • Railroad, steamship, cars, planes

• Rapid social change: larger and wealthier industrial class, labor unions, a new middle class

• Advances in science and medication

  • Medicine: vaccines, penicillin, insulin

Turn of the Century Arts (1893-1914)

• Modernism: defying tradition in an extreme way 

• Architecture: more industrial, functional, utilitarian

• Literature: stream of consciousness

• Art: abstract, non representational, ect;

Expressionism/ Atonality

• Primarily centered in Germany

• Intensified realism

• Takes emotions to the limit

Serialism

• Denial of melody

• Abstract

• Detached from the public

• Concentration on technique

• Centered in Germany and the United States

Primitivism

• Centered in Russia (France)

• Used primitive subjects

• Primitive, driving rhythms

• Narrow range melodies

Neoclassicism

• Russia, Germany, United States

• Rejection of 19th century in favor of a return to the principles of the 17th and 18th centuries

• Detached

• Objective

• Absolute Music

• Clear forms

• Craftsmanship, balance, objectivity

Stravinsky’s Style

• Primitivism and Ballets (1910-1913)

• Chamber music (during WWI) (1914-1922)

• Neoclassicism (1923-1951)

• Serialism (1950s)

Igor Stravinsky (1882-1971)

• Met Sergei Dyatlov: founder of russian ballet 

• Commissioned to write a ballet: Firebird

  • Most popular works ever → famous overnight

• Second ballet: Patrischa 

  • Russian folk tunes

  • About a sad clown

• Got into Polytonality: two chords/ harmonies that happen simultaneously