20th Century

First Three decades composers were profoundly affected by nationalism, technological advances social, instability, ravages of World War 1

  • Influence of religious institutions declines

  • social justice becomes very prominent

Lily Boulanger

born in Paris

Child prodigy

  • Perfect pitch at 2

  • attended Paris conservatory at 5

First female winner of the Prix de Rome composition prize

Style:

  • Heavily influenced by debussy and faure

  • Colorful harmony and instrumentation; skillful text setting

  • Often writes of greif and loss

Works

Les Sirenes

  • Soprano solo and choir

Pie Jesu

  • Dedicated to sister, nadia

  • High voice, string quartet, harp and organ

Sous Bois

  • Impressionistic sound

  • twinkling piano

  • Two lovers in love

Hymn to the Sun

  • Settings in both English

  • Piano is marcato

Igor Stravinsky

Background

Father was a famous bass at the Imperial opera

Style

Percussive Vocal writing: Extreme syllabic accentuations

  • Didn’t like romantic sounds

  • Setting text for sonorous effect rather than textual amplification

Primitivism

  • Les Noces

    • A suite of typical wedding episodes told through quotations of typical talk

    • SATB, soli, chorus, 4 piano, large percussion section

Neo-Classicism

  • Ave Maria

    • Revised and set to Latin text in 1949

    • No marking

    • Meant to be performed in a direct, non-expressive manner

  • Symphony of Psalms

    • SATB Chorus, many winds, timpani, 2 pf, hp, vlc, bs

  • Mass - 1948

    • 17 minutes for liturgical use

Serialism

  • Canticum sacrum ad honorem Sancti Marci Moninis

  • Anthem

    • Serialism; tone row not used strictly

Carl Orff

  • Born in munich

  • Taught music to children and the unlearned adult

  • Influenced by Stravinsky

Carmina Burana

  • Originally intended as a ballet but often performed as a concert work

  • Derived from Bavarian folk pieces

  • The chorus is either in octaves 3rds or 6ths

Bela Bartok

  • Initial influence of R. Strauss and Lizst

  • Complete overhaul of aesthetic principles

  • Collected foklsongs from Hungary, ROmania, Slovokia, Servia, Ukraine & Turkey

  • Stlye:

    • Hungarian peasent rhythms

    • Vertical sonorities

    • 2nds an 4ths

    • Modal melodies

      Four Slovak Folk songs

    • Four Hungarian Folksongs

    • Many Choruses for Treble Choir

      • Leanykero - The wooing of a girl

        • SAA

        • Very bouncy

Zoltan Kodaly

  • Mostly choral compositions

  • Collected folksongs

    • However was not fully centered on folk music

  • Psalmus Hungaricus Op. 13

    • Large scale work

    • T soli, SATB, orcehstra

  • Pange Lingua

  • Esti Dal - Evening song

    • Very consonant

Gyorgy Orban

  • HIngarian

  • Studied music at the music academy in Transylvania

  • Prof at the Lizt academy of music in Budapest

Style:

  • Tonal

  • Rich full romantic harmonic

  • Dissonance polytonality

  • Rhtymically

Daemon Irrepit Callidus

Pange Lingua

  • Very percussive and rhythmic

  • driving 16th notes

  • Tonal

Gloraia mass no. 6 b

Arvo Part

  • Estonian composer minimalist

  • first wrote 12 tone music

  • Tintinnabuli: Compositional style derived from his mystical experience with chant music

    • One voice arpediates tonic triad

    • Second voice moves diatonically in stepwise motion

  • Solfeggio

    • Exaushtive exploiration of a c major scale

Veljo Tormis

  • Estonian composer - middle of intense period of nationalism

  • Experimented with 12 tone composition

  • Invested in estonian folk songs

  • Curse upon iron

    • SATB or TTBB choir w/shaman drum

    • Based on Spells found in Kalevala (Finnish national epic)

    • Cluster chords

    • Mystical

    • Drum, percussive - rhythmical, text heavy