MUSIC 1010 Exam 2

Which of the following was an important innovation of the early Baroque era?

opera

What is the basso continuo (or, simply, continuo) in Baroque music?

The performance of the bass line by a melodic instrument such as cello with chordal reinforcement from harpsichord or organ.

In the Baroque ground-bass form, how is music constructed?

The bass instruments play a single short melody many times, generating a set of repeated harmonies. Upper instruments or voices then play melodies that are adjusted to the harmonies determined by the bass.

What is an aria?

an extended vocal number for a solo singer with orchestral accompaniment

Who composed the operas Orfeo and The Coronation of Poppea?

Claudio Monteverdi

In Dido and Aeneas, what is Dido doing as she sings the aria usually referred to as "Dido's Lament"?

preparing to commit suicide

What were the main sources for the development of instrumental music in the early Baroque era?

dance, virtuosity, and vocal music

What is a dance suite?

a piece consisting of a set of dances to be played by instruments or an orchestra

During the late seventeenth century, Arcangelo Corelli was the foremost

violin virtuoso

Opera began in Florence, but the first public opera theater opened in which Italian city?

Venice

A trio sonata is performed by

two solo instruments and basso continuo.

Which instrument, capable of extraordinary expressive power and dexterity, rose to prominence in the Baroque period?

the violin

What did not happen to madrigals at the end of the sixteenth century?

madrigals started being performed on stage

In what cathedral in Venice did Giovanni Gabrieli work?

St. Mark's Basilica

Baroque composers developed what important system still in use today?

the major/minor system

What is the standard accompaniment for most recitatives?

one or two continuo instruments

Where did Henry Purcell work as organist?

Westminster Abbey

What was the source of Purcell's only true opera?

Virgil's Aeneid

What is the basis of a fugue?

one main theme developed with imitation

Two other names for the Baroque period are

the Age of Absolutism and the Age of Science.

Which statement describes the role of art in the seventeenth century?

Art was supported by rulers who paid artists to create works that glorified them.

Which of the following aspects of Baroque opera differs from opera today?

Baroque opera plots indirectly paid tribute to the royal sponsors who paid for them.

Composers in the Baroque period strove to create

regular rhythms and clearly ordered forms.

Which institution provided Baroque composers with the most contact with the public?

opera house

In the Baroque period, composing music was regarded as

a craft practiced by skilled artisans.

A central characteristic of late Baroque music is

a thorough, methodical quality, with a lot of repetition and variation.

What were the core instruments of the Baroque orchestra?

strings with harpsichord or organ

For special, festive occasions, which instruments did composers often add to the Baroque orchestra?

brass, woodwinds, and percussion

Which is true of Baroque melodies?

They tend to be quite complex and intricate.

While other textures can be found in Baroque music, the predominant texture is

contrapuntal (polyphonic).

What is ornamentation?

the practice of improvising extra bits of melody

What is "continuo" in Baroque music?

the combination of a bass line and chords to support melodic lines

What effect did the patronage system of the Baroque period have on musical forms?

Composers developed more standard, regular musical forms that they could apply quickly to meet demands from the church and the court.

It was believed in the Baroque period that music should mirror a wide variety of affects, or

emotions.

What was one way that new scientific attitudes infiltrated music?

More exact tuning systems allowed composers to write in all major and minor keys.

Which of the following was not part of the regular duties of a church organist?

write religious poetry to set to music

What was the usual emotional content of an aria in Baroque opera?

one specific emotion, feeling, or mood

To what does the term "figured bass" refer?

basso continuo

Whose famous orchestra was known as "The Twenty-Four Violins of the King?"

King Louis XIV

What does Baroque music have in common with jazz music?

improvisation by singers and instrumentalists is valued

Where might homophonic texture appear in Baroque pieces?

alternating with polyphonic textures

What helped Baroque music grow in popularity in the last seventy-five years?

recordings of Baroque music

What was an important advantage that court musicians had over church musicians?

Court musicians traveled with their employers and kept in better touch with musical developments.

Which is a true statement about dynamics in Baroque music?

Composers allowed for natural variations in dynamics but did not go beyond that.

In Baroque instrumental music, what did composers rely on to let listeners know what to expect and roughly how long a piece would last?

conventional forms and genres

The most important orchestral genres of the Baroque era were the concerto and the concerto grosso. What is the basic idea underlying these genres?

contrast between the orchestra and a soloist or small group of soloists

What is a movement?

a self-contained section of a larger work of music

What is ritornello form?

a form in which the opening orchestral material recurs many times, alternating with passages of music for solo instruments

Which is true of a ritornello?

It usually returns only in part and in different keys as the movement proceeds.

What is a mandolin?

a plucked string instrument that is a kind of lute

In what movement(s) of Baroque concertos do we usually hear ritornello form?

the first and/or third

Which composer was an internationally famous virtuoso violinist?

Antonio Vivaldi

Which composer was a church organist and worked for a time in a court position for the Duke of Weimar and later at a church in Leipzig, Germany?

Johann Sebastian Bach

The principal theme of a fugue, which appears again and again in each of the instrumental or vocal lines, is called the

subject.

Passages of music that separate subject entries in a fugue and provide contrast to them are called

episodes.

What does Bach's The Well-Tempered Clavier contain?

preludes and fugues written in every key and in both major and minor modes

Chords that are "broken," meaning their pitches are played in quick succession rather than simultaneously, are called

arpeggios

A common practice in the Baroque era was to put a collection of miscellaneous dances together in a genre called a

suite.

Baroque dance form is also called binary form, meaning

it has two sections, a and b, each of which is repeated (a a b b).

Pianist Glenn Gould is famous for playing the works of what Baroque composer?

Johann Sebastian Bach

What is true of the preludes that are paired with the fugues in Bach's The Well-Tempered Clavier?

like the fugues, the preludes display a wide variety of moods

At what celebration was Handel's Royal Fireworks Music played?

the end of the War of the Austrian Succession

What is the main difference between a concerto and a concerto grosso?

the concerto has one soloist; the concerto grosso has more than one soloist

What are the general tempo designations for the movements of a concerto?

fast, slow, fast

For what solo instrument did Vivaldi compose most of his concertos?

violin

Because Vivaldi's The Four Seasons depicts activities, sights, and sounds of the seasons, we can classify it as what kind of music?

program music

What instruments form the soloist group in Bach's Brandenburg Concerto No. 5?

flute, violin, and harpsichord

What is a cadenza?

an improvised or improvisatory solo section within a larger work

Which statement about Johann Sebastian Bach is false?

He enjoyed fame throughout his life and was admired by the musical public at the time of his death.

In Baroque instrumental music, what did composers rely on to let listeners know what to expect and roughly how long a piece would last?

conventional forms and genres

The singing style that emphasizes virtuosic technique with fast, brilliant runs, high notes, and vocal cadenzas is called

coloratura.

Composers of Italian Baroque opera seria mostly derived their plots from

ancient history

Speechlike singing in an opera, usually used to present dialogue and plot action, is called

recitative

Which of the following accompany secco recitative?

basso continuo

A set piece for solo singer in an opera, usually used to show a character mulling over his or her emotions, is called

an aria

In a Baroque Italian opera, the standard form for an aria is

da capo, or A B A, form.

Who were the castrati?

prized male opera singers in Italy who had been castrated at puberty to preserve their high vocal range

The plot of Handel's Julius Caesar deals with

the relationship between Julius Caesar and Cleopatra, as well as Sextus's desire for revenge on Cleopatra's brother Ptolemy.

What are two general factors that are important in all Baroque sacred-music genres?

the participation of the choir and the tendency to borrow from opera

An oratorio is basically

an opera on a religious subject, presented in concert form without scenery, costumes, or acting.

What makes Handel's Messiah different from most other oratorios?

Instead of using characters to depict the story, Messiah uses anonymous narrators and commentators.

A piece of music for voice and instruments written to be performed during Lutheran church services that in esence functioned as a musical sermon is

a church cantata.

Lutheran hymns, which were often used in church cantatas, are called

chorales.

The church cantata functioned as a

musical sermon during church services.

In his maturity, Handel wrote as many as forty Italian operas for which city?

London, England

What dazzling aspect of performance could audiences expect from a da capo aria?
Correct!

a highly ornamented version of the second A section with improvised runs and cadenzas

What was the most common musical job held by women in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries?

opera singer

Martin Luther, father of the Protestant Reformation, believed music—specifically ________—was very important in religious services.

congregational singing

What happened to Handel's Messiah after its premiere in 1742?

It has never fallen out of fashion and has been performed continuously since.

Oratorios gained an important place in the musical life of some cities because

the somber season of Lent made opera seem too extravagant.

In Handel's Messiah, what role is not performed by the chorus?

performing the dialogue of two important characters

Who sang the primary solo roles in opera seria?

sopranos and mezzo-sopranos (including castrati)

What do we call the book containing the words of an opera?

the libretto

What were opera fans like in the early days of opera?

They gambled, flirted, and gossiped while waiting for their favorite singers to perform.

The musical style known as the Classical style was developed by composers active in several major European cities, but especially those in

Vienna

What eighteenth-century intellectual movement focused on using reason to solve problems of public morality, education, and politics?

the Enlightenment

In keeping with an age that valued intelligence, wit, and sensitivity, the eighteenth century was a time of social inventions, one of which was

the salon

What was seen as the main purpose of art in the eighteenth century?

to please and entertain

Rousseau's criticisms of Baroque opera as artificial and overly complicated encouraged the development of

comic opera, which portrayed everyday people singing simpler music.

What literary genre first captured the European imagination in the mid-eighteenth century?

the novel