20th Century Music

Many things changed in music during the 20th Century. Although some music of the 20th Century can be seen as extensions of the Romantic period, much of the music was seen as a rebellion. Composers began creating music freely and using sounds that went against the grain instead of building on what was standard. Music from the 20th century is hard to define is musical terms as it didn't fit into the Romantic Era's requirements, and also because of it's own orchestral technique and expression. Because of this the music fits into only it's own category. Many new terms for musical styles were created during this time because of the diversity of music being written including atonality, neo-Romanticism, neo-Classicism, and expressionism. Nationalism, or the love of one's country; expressed by composers of the Romantic period and again 20th century music, was still an important music device. Composer used folk songs to enrich their music. Examples include Heitor Villa Lobos from Brazil and Aaron Copland from the US. Popular music styles and jazz influenced composers from both Europe and the United States. Traditional structures and forms were broken up and recreated or compused using non-Western musical techniques and abstract ideas during the 20th Century. Another important factor in the music making of the period was technology; composers have been known to use recording tape as a compositional tool. Played together with traditional music instruments, electronically created sounds are used in combination with other electronic sounds. Recently however, the use of computers has affected the music making world by manipulating the performance of instruments in real time. 20th Century music can be described as being more regined, delicate, having a mysterious atmosphere, and vauge in form.
One of the composers well known from the 20th Century is Aaron Copland. Born in Brooklyn, New York in 1900 his personality often clashed with his compositions as he was a quiet and soft-spoken man, and his music was loud, brilliant, and tense. Copland studied the piano and music theory as a child. Copland traveled to France when he was old enough to leave home to further immerse himself in the music world. While there he made his first business mistake by selling a short composition, The Cat and The Mouse, for $25 and later did not recieve any royalities from the song when thousands of copies were sold. Once he arrived back the the United States he composed his famous symphony Symphony for Organ and Orchestra and went on the become the director of many musical foundtions such as the International Society for Contempory Music, the League of Composers, and his own foundation. Copland was very interested in education people about modern music and gave comcerts with fellow friend and compoers Roger Sessions. The concerts served to educate audiences about the new and dissonant music that he and Sessions composed. After the great conductor Serge Koussevitzky died Copland because the director of the Berkshire School of Music in Tanglewood, Massachusetts. Copland composed many compositions but his most famous works and Lincoln Portrait, which is a large orchestral piece with text from the Gettysburg address, and Appalachian Spring, a ballet which won the Pulitzer Prize and Critic's Circle of New York. Copland was a very versatile composer and composed music for choruses, orchestras, theater, and chamber music groups. He was one of the first major composers asked to write a piece fo music for a radio broadcast. He additionally wtote the scores for the films The Heiress, The City, Our Town, and Of Mice and Men. His film compositions are emotional and have also been performed in concert halls.
Aaron Copland retired from composing in 1965 due to the fact that younger composers were ignoring him and the general public didn't recieve his newer works well. Inscapes, one of the great postwar American scores, was one of these ignored works. From that time on Copland focused on conducting as a career, specializing in his own scores.
http://library.thinkquest.org/15413/history/history-mod.htm
http://library.thinkquest.org/15413/history/history-mod.htm

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Ahh romance...The Romantic Period

The Romantic Era is estimated to have lasted from 1850 to 1920 C.E. and was a period of emancipation and great change. The Romantic Period moved away from the strict laws of restraint and balance by allowing artstic freemdom, creativity, and experimentation. During this time melody became the dominant feature and the music was very expressive; composers used this expressive means to display nationalism, which became a driving force in the late Romantic period as composers used of folk music to help express their cultural identity. During this time composers began to experiment with the length of compositions, tonal relationships, and new harmonies along with the increased use of dissonance along with the extended use of chromatism.
The use of color, where compsers not only began adding new instruments but trying to get new or different sounds out of the ones already being used, was also an important feature.
 One of the most well known composers from the Romantic Era is Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky. Tchaikovsky was born in Russia in 1840. He was an extremely fragile, sensitive, and charming yet breakable person. Tchaikovsky was greatly upset when his first symophony was not well recieved after he had spent so much time and effort on the work. When he showed his teacher of the time Nikolai Rubinstein his piece B Flat Minor Piano Concerto, Rubinstein critized the piece, angering Tchaikovsky to the point where he took back the dedication to his teacher and left his house.  Although Tchailovsky is well known for his compositions The Romeo and Juliet Overture, the opera Eugen Ongin, and the Violin Concerto, he more widely known as the composer of the score to the ballet The Nutcracker. Usually performed around

Christmas, the score is a multi-movement work and includes "Dance of the Sugar Plum Faries", "Trepak", "Arabian Dance", "Chinese Dance", "Dance of the Reed Flutes", and "Waltz of the Flowers" along with a few other pieces. Tchaikovsky is regarded as one of the greatest and most popular symphonists, second only to Beethoven, and as one of the most expressive Romantic composers to come from Russia.

http://library.thinkquest.org/15413/history/history-rom.htm

http://library.thinkquest.org/15413/history/history-rom.htm

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Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

Recently in Music Appreciation we watched the movies Amadeus, which tells about Mozart's life from the time he was little and playing for kings up until his early death at the young age of 35. Mozart's full name at birth was Johann Chysostom Wolfgang Theophilus. We get the name Amadeus from his last name of Theophilus which is Latin for Amadeus. Mozart began to study the keyboard at age 4 from his father, who also taught him mathematics, Latin, and German, after playing a piece he heard his sister play perfectly by  ear. At age 5 he began composing music and mastered the violin. Wolfgang was introduced to the world as a child prodigy at age 6 after his father took him to Vienna and he played for the Austrian emperor. Once Mozart traveled to Italy he instantly fell in love with the opera. The herione of his most famous opera, The Escape from the Sergaglio, is named after his beloved wife Constanze. Although many people in Vienna praised this opera, his patron Emperor Joseph was not impressed. Often on Sunday mornings Hydn and two other musicans which were friends of Mozart would come and play string quartets. Hydn is quoted telling Mozart's father that "I declare to you upon my honor that I consider your son the greatest composer that I have ever heard."

http://library.thinkquest.org/15413/history/history-bar.htm

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If It's Not Baroque, Don't Fix It (The Baroque Period)

 The Baroque Era was a style or period of music in Europe between 1600 and 1750. The word Baroque itself means "a pearl of irregular shape" and finds it's origin in the Portuguese language. At first used more describing art then music, it was used to imply abnormality, strangeness, and extravangance. The music of the Baroque time was characterized by rich counterpoint, a highly decorated melodic line, and can be seen as being lavishly texturized, intense, and highly ornate. Defining characteristics of the Baroque period include the use of the basso continuo and the belief in the doctrine of the affections, which allowed composers to express emotions and feelings in their compositions. Emphasis on texture, contrast of volume, and pace in the music was another distinguishing characterastic of the Baroque period. During this new musical period new forms of polyphonic music were developing at once although homophonic music was becoming more and more popular. Popular during the Baroque period, cannons and fueges were two extremely strict forms of imitative polyphony. The first great opera, Orfeo, was written by Claudio Monteverdi in 1607.
 One of the most well known of the Baroque period composers is Johann Sebastian Bach. Bach was born in 1685 and was the son of Johann Ambrosius, a court trumpeter for the Duke of Eisenach. As a child Bach learned to play the organ and clavichord and sang in a choir. He had innate musical talent and by the time he was 15 he could support himself by his music and had several organist positions in surrounding towns. Bach was a master at composing oratorios, chorales, cantatas, piano inventions, and other religious music. Considered the father of counterpoint, the organ and clavichord were his instruments of choice for most of his life. Although he was not introduced to the piano until he was sixty years old, once he discovered it he wrote a six-part fugue as a musical offering to King Frekerick. That same fugue is now considered one of the most remarkable fugues in all of music history. Late in life Bach sadly became blind. He underwent an operation to try and correct it, however this was unsucessful and only aggravated the condition. He suffered a paralytic stroke as a result and died. He is considered one of the most influential composers of all time.
http://library.thinkquest.org/15413/history/history-bar.htm
http://library.thinkquest.org/15413/history/history-bar.htm

Music composed by Bach