Music 101 - 20th Century

Impressionism

• The composer attempts to convey the impression of something

• Not telling a story, grey area between absolute music & program music

• note clusters, use of tone color, unusual scales, static harmony

Note Clusters

clusters of notes that blend into a new “color”

• often dissonant

Scales

• Whole tone scale

• pentatonic scale

• octatonic scale

Tonality

When a piece of music has a distinct tonic

• atonality → when a piece of music avoids maintaining a tonic

• polytonality → when there are two or more tonal centers present at the same time

• bitonality → two separate tonalities at the same time

  • melody in B major w/ B-flat minor harmony

Ballet

• sound mostly similar to the Romantic Era, composers often introduce modern techniques

• Many ballets have been created w/ music not originally intended for Ballet

Serialism

A compositional technique in which a specific series of notes is used repeatedly in order to avoid a sense of tonality

• twelve-tone system → a synonym for serialism

• twelve-tone row → drawing the 12 tones between an ocatave to create a random figuration

• compose by adjusting the original row

  • inversion

  • retrograde

  • retrograde inversion

  • twelve-tone matrix

    • 48 different possibilities in how to arrange a 12 tone row

Sprechstimme

the singer doesn’t sing the pitches indicated, but rather speaks the pitches

• indicated by putting a little “x” through the stem of the note

Art Song / Song Cycle

• popular genre, sound similar to the romantic era, composers introduce modern ideas

Chamber Music

Mostly the same

• Pierrot ensemble

  • 1 flue, 1 clarinet, 1 violin, 1 cello, and 1 piano

    • possibly a vocalist or percussionist

• Brass quintet

  • 2 trumpets, 1 horn, 1 trombone, 1 tuba

  • developed as a direct response to wind quintets

Concerto

Around the same, just modern styles of composing

One instrument + orchestra

Mass

Opera

Anything is possible lol

• composed in styles of all eras, including modern era

• any combination of anything is possible

Symphony

a multimovement work for orchestra

• still popular, just not as much

• many composers still use traditional full orchestra, but there’s experimentation and stuff

Nationalism

Composer’s nationality or homeland is reflected in some way within their music

Quoting / Borrowing

Using preexisting music in a new composition

• Became popular, particularly in nationalistic music

Extended Techniques

anything an instrumentalist does to create a sound outside the normal sounds of their instrument

• multiphonics → an instrument creates 2 pitches at a time instead of the only intended 1

• flutter tongue → fluttering the tongue while blowing on a wind instrument

• pitch bend/smear → bending the pitch downward, smearing the notes together (kinda like a glissando, but smoother)

Indeterminacy

Part of the performance is not predetermined, but left up to the whims of the performers

• aleatory music → latin word for gambling

• chance music

Prepared Piano

John Cage → adding things to the piano to make it sound different than it’s intended

Instrument Choirs

Choirs for one type of instrument

Unaccompanied Solos

Solos for an instrument or solo voice without accompaniment of any sort

• keyboard pieces are not usually considered unaccompanied

Electroacoustic Music

When electronic means are employed to create music

• synthesizers → a musical instrument that creates electronically generated sounds

• tape music → electronically generated sounds captured on a magnetic tape

• computer music → replaced tape music

• musique concrete → recorded sounds that are played back as part of a musical performance

  • sounds can be manipulated, sped up, slowed down, or played correctly