Survey of Music Test 3 Terms

Romanticism

(1820-1900)

• Emotion, Imagination, Individualism.​

• ​Breaking conventions, and freedom of expression.

• Fantasy, supernatural, world of dreams, folk inspirations

• Medieval inspirations in art

• Neogothic style: revival of medieval Gothic art and architecture, known for dramatic designs, pointed arches, and dark or romantic themes

Characteristics of Romantic Music

Individuality of Style – music reflects the personality of the composer

Nationalism – Music that reflects a country’s culture and identity, often inspired by folk songs, dances, and legends.

Exoticism:
Music inspired by the cultures, sounds, and traditions of distant or foreign places.

Program Music:
Instrumental music that tells a story or represents a scene, idea, or poem, usually explained by the title or notes called a program.

Expressive Tone Color:
The Romantic orchestra became larger and more varied in sound, using more instruments and richer tone colors for emotional expression. The piano was especially popular.

Harmony: Use of new and more complex chords, creating more tension, dissonance, and frequent key changes.

• Dynamics: Wider range of volume, from extremely soft to extremely loud.

• Pitch: Expanded range of notes, from very low to very high sounds.

• Tempo: More changes in speed, including speeding up, slowing down, and rubato (flexible timing).

• Form: Music ranged from very short pieces to extremely long works.

• Thematic Transformation: Reusing and changing a theme throughout different parts of a piece.

Thematic Transformation

• Reusing and changing a theme throughout different parts of a piece.

Romantic Composers:

Composers focused more on personal expression and writing music for themselves, though some still worked through commissions or wealthy patrons.

Romantic Music Culture:

Composers wanted to leave a personal legacy,

often writing for middle-class audiences instead of aristocrats as wealthy patronage declined.

Conservatories:

Music schools where women were mostly allowed to study performance, while composition was restricted until the late 19th century.

Instrumental Virtuosity:

Shown through Chopin, Liszt, and Paganini.

Music Criticism:

new profession and source of income; R. Schumann, H. Berlioz.

Private music making

Piano in every middle class home. Increased demand for solo piano piecesand songs. ​

Art Song (Lied):

A German Romantic song

A Romantic vocal genre for solo voice and piano using high-quality poetry,

Piano is an equal partner to the voice in expressing the text and mood.

Romantic Song Themes:

Including unrequited love, longing, nature, legends, folk tales, and lost love.

Composers dig a little deeper - to the depths of the soul.

Prelude, Interlude, Postlude:

Sections in art songs where the piano plays alone—at the beginning (prelude), middle (interlude), or end (postlude) of a song.

Song Form:

Structure of a song, including strophic and through-composed

strophic (same music for each verse)

through-composed (new music for each stanza)

Song Cycle:

A group of songs connected by a common theme, story, musical idea, or poems by the same poet.

Symphonic Poem:

A one-movement orchestral work that tells a story or depicts an idea, often in free or traditional forms (rondo, sonata, etc.), developed by Franz Liszt.

The Sorcerer’s Apprentice (Paul Dukas):
A symphonic poem based on a magical story about a broom that comes to life and causes chaos.

Danse Macabre (Camille Saint-Saëns):
A symphonic poem depicting Death playing music and summoning skeletons to dance at midnight.

Incidental Music:

Music written to accompany a play, helping set mood or enhance scenes (today similar to movie soundtracks).

Felix Mendelssohn – A Midsummer Night’s Dream (Wedding March):
Famous incidental music used in Shakespeare’s play, especially the well-known Wedding March.

Italian Opera/Composers:

A highly popular 19th-century musical genre in Italy, known for dramatic stories, beautiful melodies, and emotional expression.

Bellini, Rossini, Verdi, and Puccini—major composers who shaped Romantic Italian opera.

Theme- Tragedy often comes from human behavior and relationships rather than supernatural forces.

Popularity in Italy:

Opera was the main form of entertainment; everyone knew the melodies, and street musicians performed opera tunes for money.

Verismo:

A style of Italian opera (late 19th–early 20th century) that focused on realistic stories about everyday life, often involving ordinary or lower-class people, moving away from romantic and mythological themes.

Verismo Characteristics:

• Realistic settings and characters (focus on everyday, often working-class people and their struggles)

• Emotional intensity (strong, dramatic emotions and often violent situations)

• Declamatory vocal style (more direct, speech-like singing instead of heavy ornamentation)

• Social and political themes (inequality, industrialization, and effects of social change)

Composers (Verismo/late Romantic opera):

Puccini and Verdi—major Italian opera composers known for emotional, realistic, and dramatic works.

“Fallen Woman” Theme:

A common opera idea, especially in La Traviata, where a woman is judged and suffers socially due to love and relationships, reflecting 19th-century morality and class hypocrisy during industrialization.

Totentanz (1859) – Liszt:

A dramatic piano and orchestra work by Franz Liszt based on the “Dance of Death” theme, showcasing intense virtuosity and dark, powerful Romantic expression.

Leitmotif:

• Short musical theme linked to a character, idea, object, or place

• Developed earlier by E.T.A. Hoffmann

• Popularized and heavily used by Wagner in his operas

The Rhine Gold (Interlude before Scene 3):

• From Wagner’s opera Das Rheingold

• Uses 16 anvils for heavy, metallic sound effects

• Features 64 string players for a large, powerful orchestral texture

French Organ Tradition:

A 19th-century French school of composers trained as church organists (often studying Bach), including Franck, Fauré, Charpentier, and Saint-Saëns, known for structured, spiritual, and harmonically rich music.

Impressionism:

A late 19th–early 20th century music style focused on atmosphere, color, and mood instead of strong drama or structure, using composers like Debussy, Ravel, Fauré, and Satie.

Chopin – Forms:

• Nocturne

• Mazurka

• Polonaise

• Étude

• Prelude

• March

Nocturne

• Slow, lyrical piano piece inspired by night and calm moods

Mazurka

• Stylized piano dance based on Polish folk dance

Polonaise

• Majestic Polish noble dance (name means “Polish” in French)

Étude

• Technical “study” piece designed to develop piano skill, often very expressive

Prelude

• Short piano piece, often expressive and standalone or part of a set

March

• Piece with steady rhythm imitating marching movement

Rusalka:

A Romantic opera by Antonín Dvořák based on Slavic mythology about a water spirit who falls in love with a human prince.

Impressionism in Music:

• Late 19th–early 20th century style focused on mood, atmosphere, and emotion

• Inspired by French Impressionist painting, especially Monet’s Impression, Sunrise

• Treated chords like colors on a canvas rather than following traditional harmonic rules

• Used coloristic harmony, parallel chords, diminished and augmented chords

• Broke traditional composition rules to create dreamy, flowing sound effects

Expressionism:

A modern music style (early 20th century) that emphasizes extreme emotion, tension, and distortion, often creating intense, unsettling, or “savage” sound worlds.

Primitivism:

A style of music that uses raw, driving rhythms and simple, repetitive patterns to evoke a sense of ancient, tribal, or primitive energy.

Primitivism in Music:

• Early 20th-century style reacting against Impressionism

• Focused on raw energy, rhythm, and “primitive” or ancient sounds

• Inspired by non-Western cultures, folk traditions, and nature

• Characteristics: strong rhythms/polyrhythms, large orchestras, dissonance, folk influence, and mostly tonal harmony

Avant-Garde Style in the USA:

• Experimental modern music style focused on new and unconventional sounds

• Uses extended techniques, unusual sounds, amplification, symbolism, and new music notation

• Often includes quotations from older/preexisting music

• George Crumb – Black Angels: Thirteen Images from the Dark Land (1970): protest piece against the Vietnam War

• Uses electric string quartet, electronics, bowed water glasses, and eerie sound effects to create dramatic atmosphere

Sonorism:

• Music style focused on discovering new instrumental sounds

• Emphasizes timbre and texture over melody and harmony

• Uses soundmass (overall sound texture and atmosphere)

• Includes microtonal pitch changes and extended playing techniques

• Uses new notation symbols for unusual sound effects

American Music (19th–early 20th century):

• Influenced by European traditions and African American musical styles

• Ragtime (1890s): Syncopated piano music style popularized by Scott Joplin

Blues and Jazz:

• Blues: Originated from African American work songs, spirituals, and field songs of the South

• Uses blue notes (flattened pitches) different from European major/minor scales

• Features call-and-response between voice and instrument or solo and group

• Often follows AAB bar form (European structural influence)

• Jazz: Developed from blues and African American musical traditions

• Influenced by European immigrant music, including klezmer and polka, brought by Eastern European Jewish immigrants

Before Musicals:

• Black Minstrels and Blackface: Popular 19th-century entertainment where white performers caricatured Black people using makeup and stereotypes

• Vaudeville: Variety stage shows with music, comedy, dance, and short acts

• Operetta and Ballad Opera: Light theatrical works combining spoken dialogue and music, often humorous or romantic

American Stage Genre – Musical Theatre:

• The Black Crook (1866): Often considered the first musical theatre production in the U.S.

• Show Boat (1927) – Kern & Hammerstein: First “modern musical” with a serious, continuous storyline and deeper themes

• Oklahoma! (1943) – Rodgers & Hammerstein: First true “book musical,” where songs and story are fully integrated into one unified plot

Golden Era of Musical Theatre (1940s–1960s):

• Peak period of American musical theatre with fully integrated story, music, and character development

• Rodgers & Hammerstein: Major creators of classic musicals like The Sound of Music, South Pacific, The King and I, and Carousel

• Other famous musicals: West Side Story, My Fair Lady, Gypsy, Fiddler on the Roof, The Wizard of Oz, Guys and Dolls

Mega Musicals (Andrew Lloyd Webber & modern era):

• Large-scale, commercially driven musical theatre style (mainly UK/US) with spectacular staging and global appeal

• Andrew Lloyd Webber: Major composer of mega musicals like Cats, The Phantom of the Opera, Evita, and rock opera Jesus Christ Superstar (JCSS)

• Other major mega musicals: Les Misérables, Hamilton, Chicago, Wicked

Rock Musical:

• Musical theatre style that uses rock music instead of traditional Broadway sound

• Includes shows like Jesus Christ Superstar (JCSS), Rent, The Rocky Horror Picture Show, and Little Shop of Horrors

Jukebox Musical:

• Musical built around pre-existing popular songs rather than original score

• Includes Mamma Mia!, Moulin Rouge!, and Tina