Pieces MH3

• G: Russian Opera
• C: Musorgsky
• N: Russian
• D: 1868-74
• SF:

• “sensitive musical treatment” of revered text by Aleksander Pushkin
• vocal lines: syllabic, rhythms and pitches enhance RUssian language’s natural accents; resemble liturgical or operatic recitative
• non-functional harmonies (tritone relations, modes, chromatic mediants, etc)
• non-developmental: instead “accumulative blocks”
• chorus sings actual folk melody

• G: opera Comique
• C: Bizet
• N: French
• D: 1875
• SF:

• despite tragic ending, Carmen uses OC conventions
• written with spoken dialogue (recits + after GB’s death)
• Ingenue, femme fatale, dutiful soldier
• set form: couplet and refain (aaB aaB) in habanera
• illustrates EXOTICISM (depiction of foreign cultures, esp. popular in France), here Spanish setting, gypsy “culture)
• habanera = Cuban dance, slow duple meter, repeatted dotted rhythm
• Bizet borrowed melody by Sebastian de Yradier (1809-65)

• G: Character piece
• C: Schumann
• N: German
• D: 1835
• Significant Features:
• - some CPs depict members of NZfM’s League of David;

• Florestan = impulsize extrovert, music suddenly changes tempo, range, dynamics (dance-like)
• Eusebius = introverted dreamer, nebulous cross rhythms, unusual rhythmic subdivisions = reverie
• March of David’s League Against the Philistines = virtuosit, vut a march in 3/4?!; uses hypermeter
• Coquette = flirtatious waltz during Mardi gras
• Schumann loved word games, motive of Carnaval is A-Eb-C-B, in German = ASCH, hometown of Schumann’s girlfriend Ernestine von Fricken

• C: Bruckner
• G: motet
• N: Austrian
• D: 1884
• SF:

illustrates principles of Caecilian Movement

• named for patron saint of music
• centered in German speaking lands
• sought to restore Catholic Church’s music to its status during Renaissance
• emulates Renaissance polyphony: a capela, textual clarity through homophony and light imitation, occasionally modal
• some “word painting”; obediens = imitation; mortem = low range dissonance
• but highly chromatic dissonances unprepared internal cadences far removed from tonic

• C: Wagner
• N: German
• D: 1854
• G: Music Drama
• SF:

• first of 4 MDs in tetralogy, Der Ring des Nibelungen
• Illustrates conventions of music drama, esp “Helden” vocal style, multiple leitmotifs used in all 4 RIng MDs

• G: GRO (German Romantic Opera)
• C: Weber
• N: German
• D: 1821
• SF:

Wolf’s Glen Scene

• where devil (Samiel) appears to mortals
• tonal relations (C-F#) = tritone
• melodrama (dialogue spoken against a musical background)
• Eerie orchestration (tremolos, extreme ranges, echoes)

• W=song cycle= group of songs by 1 composer
• Poems normally by 1 poet
• Usually tells story
• Often musically unified
• C: Schubert
• N: Austrian *
• G: Lied
• D: 1827
• Significant Features:
• - mimetic accompaniment imitates wind in leaves, but also reflects character’s interior agitation

AABA’=medieval bar form (romanticized)

• G: Song Cycle
• C: R. Schumann
• N: German
• D: 1840
• Significant Features:
• Key scheme:

secondary key in one song becomes primary key in the next

1st lied:

• In wunderschonen Monat Mai (In the wonderful month of May)
• textual image (yearning) = delayed resolutions
• simple strophic form
• long piano postlude (typical of RS’s lieder)
• connects to second song by ending on V7 (whole song tonally ambiguous)

7th lied:

• Ich grolle Nicht (I won’t complain)
• textual image: repeated complaint = repeated chords
• exaggerated ironically by RS’s extra repetitions of refrain, “I won’t complain”
• through composed form with traces of varied strophic form

• G: oratorio* C: JB N: German D: 1857-68**
• *Not liturgical (esp. not a Latin mass), but is a large work for
• chorus, orchestra, vocal soloists on a biblical subject
• **1st thought JB wrote EdR after mother died in 1865, but most written before
• SF: JB chose texts from Lutheran Bible, freely arranged them in 7 movements
• 4th mvmt., How Lovely is Thy Dwelling Place

• Psalm 84
• Shows Brahms preferred clear forms
• Rondo ABACA’
• A’ could be considered a coda, as in some rondos by WAM and Schubert

• G: OratorioC: MendelssohnN: GermanD: 1846 (England)
• SF: final chorus (“And then shall your light break forth”)
• bilingual libretto (English & German)
• Homophony & fugal sections alternate as in Handel & Haydn (Baroque – Classical)
• But tonal plan is based on thirds
• D major – F# minor (romantic)
• Choral parts suited to amateur church choirs & choral societies, common in 1800’s

• C, N, G @ above D=1814 (!) : He was 17 years old
• Significant Features:
• - through-composed form: =

poem’s stanzaic division do not determine musical repetition (as in strophic forms)

• - enables composer to adapt music to words;
• - tonality moves further from tonic in “waves”,
• - tonic returns when Gretchen repeats “My peace is gone”
• - Extremely mimetic accompaniment (3 layers) mimics spinning wheel

Sops only once (Faust’s kiss)

• D: 1853
• G: Italian Serious Opera
• C: Verdi
• N: Italian
• SF:

1st 4 events of Act III occur without pauses and share common motives

1. Maid notifies Violetta (herione) that Alfredo (hero) has returned

• Hero enters (dotted rhythms related to 1)
• Duet in cavatina style (dotted rhythms)
• Duet chits to cabaletta style (scale from 1)

• G: French Grand Opera
• C: Meyerbeer
• N: German (ironic)
• D: 1836
• SF:

• Historical setting: 24 August 1572: St. Bartholomew’s Day Massacre (3000+ killed)
• Catholics vs. Protestants
• “Nights of 7 Stars” - 7 important, virtuosic roles
• all 7 heard in Act 2 Oath Scene
• uses Protestant chorale “A mighty Fortress is our God” to depict Huguenots
• Illustrates new social order, aristocrats try, but fail to control historical events

• G; Symphonic Poem
• C: Liszt
• N: Hungarian
• D: pub. 1856
• SF: Program related to poem by Lamartine; “double function form” resembles both sonata form and sonata cycle

• Introduction
• T1 and T2 = 1st mvmt
• Development 1; (storm in sonata) (scherzo in sonata)
• Development 2; (pastoral in sonata) (slow mvmt in sonata)
• Recap. ; (march in sonata) ( finale in sonata)
• Coda = return of introduction

• G: Italian serious opera
• C: Verdi
• N: Italian
• D: 1842
• SF:

Captures sentiments of the Risorgimento =

political movement (1814-70) that soght to free Italian city-states from oppressive foreign rule and unify them under on Italian king

• Famouis chorus “Va pensiero” interpreted as protest song
• “oom-pah-pah” texture typical of Italian opera, focus is on melody
• in the decades after Nabucco’s success, Italians chanted Verdi’s name as a code
• V = VIva Long Live
• E = Emmanuel Emmanuel, King of Sardinia
• R = Re King
• D = Di of
• I = Italia Italy

Verdi grew dissatisfied with “numbers” as a way of presenting a “realistic” drams

• G: lied
• C: Franz Schubert
• N: Austrian*EC
• D: 1815
• Significant Features:

• strophic form
• off tonic beginning (related to textual image)

• G: CP
• C: Chopin
• N: Polish
• D: 1835
• Significant Features:
• nocturne = night piece; cantabile melody in right hand supported by rocking widely spaced arpeggios in left; Chopin admired John Field’s nocturnes, but also imitated Italian operatic style of 1830s;

• two melodies alternate (ABA’B’A”B”+Coda)
• 1st harmonically stable, 2nd unstable minor
• both increasingly ornate with each repetition
• exploits rubato, flexible tempo modification for which Chopin was greatly admired
• Impeccable control of dissonance
• 1st melody includes long appoggiatura
• climax = “best suspension ever”

• G: Italian serious opera
• C: Bellini
• N: Italian
• D: 1831
• SF:

• Casta diva (Chaste goddess) still divided into cavatina-cabaletta (standard by 1830s)
• but cavatina had evolved into slow, sustained, melodious section, sometimes with choral interjections
• this bel canto cavatina style influenced Chopin’s nocturnes
• Recording with Maria Callas, controversial soprano who helped revive bel canto opera during 1950’s-60s, after long period of neglect

• C: Mendelssohn
• N: German
• D: 1826!
• G: concert overture = independent 1-mvmt. orchestral work; not prelude to opera, oratorio, or play; essentially Mendelssohn’s invention
• Significant Features:
• - Clear sonata form with conventional keys, but with EMA’s (extra musical associations) as in “Eroica”;
• Short motto (as in Schubert’s “Unfinished”) = eyelids close (Liszt)
• T1= Fairies scurry
• T2=melody countermelody
• CT=Bottom(character) as groom-donkey
• (1843: FM wrote more music for stage production and AMND = incidental music)

• G: piano quintet (piano + string 4tet)
• C: Brahms N: German D: 1862-4*
• * 1st written as string 5tet, then revised for 2 pianos; C. Schumann
• recommended piano + 4tet

• Ambiguous opening harmonies (C or Ab?)
• Changes of meter (6/8 vs. 2/4)
• Ambiguous bar lines, typical of JB’s music
• Abrupt dynamic changes (as in LvB)
• Form is still ABA, but A&B are both irregularly multisectional (i.e. NOT rounded binary form)

• In 1863 Brahms was not hired as the Hamburg Symphony’s conductor: he
• moved to Vienna to conduct a Singakademie (choral society)
• He the wrote many choral works including

• G: Piano Quintet
• normal scoring = piano + SQ
• Schubert’s = piano + violin, viola, cello, bass (bass not normally used)
• C: Schubert
• N: Austrian
• D: 1819
• 4th of 5 movements
• (! not sonata cycle)
• is theme & variations based on Schubert’s song
• Die Forelle [The Trout] in romantic version of medieval bar from AABA.

• G: piano trio
• C: Clara Schumann
• N: German
• D: 1846
• Significant Features:

slow mvmt in ABA’ form (I-vi-I)

• A = nocturne texture (see Chopin later)
• B = agitated
• A & B each instrument takes turn with theme

• G: CP
• C: Chopin
• N: Polish
• D: 1842
• Significant Features:

polonaise = aristocratic Polish dance in triple meter

choreographic accents on beats 1 & 3

• Form = intro, A B transition A, Coda
• B section features virtuosic octaves in left hand

G: program symphony = a type of

• Program music = **Instrumental** music is endowed with literary or pictorial associations (something "outside" music)
• Composers typically provide a text (a program) to explain extra musical associations

• C: Berlioz
• N: French
• D: 1830

Background of Symphonie fantastique

1827 British Shakespeare troupe performs in Paris

• + HB falls in love & becomes obsessed with lead actress, Harriett Smithson
• - 1833 HB & HS marry, one child, then separate
• - Heard music when he thought of his wife, melody that is present throughout SF

• Significant Features:
• - Uses Idée fixe, fixed idea, melody that represents the "beloved"
• - Uses cyclical form, same theme = multiple movements

The idée fixe appears in all 5 mvmts. (precedent = LvB's 6), but varied each time = thematic transformation

• o Recurrent material is transformed
• + Usually found in programmatic, cyclical works

• * Mvmt. 1 , Reveries & Passions
• o i.f. is beloved's beauty

• * Mvmt. 2, At a ball,
• o i.f. interrupts waltz (dance movement, LvB's 9th has a scherzo in 2nd)

• * Mvmt. 3, Scene in the Country: shepards' piping, (adagio)
• o i.f.returns when artist becomes jealous

• * Mvmt. 4, March to Scaffold,
• o i.f. interrupted to represent artist's execution

• * Mvmt. 5, Dream of Witches' Sabbath
• o Grotesque version of i.f. combined with dies irae (day of wrath)

Plainchant from requiem mass

• C: Bruckner
• G: Symphony
• N: Austrian
• D: 1874-80
• SF of Bruckner Symphonies:

• 9 numbered + “00” and “0”
• most in several versions, reflecting Bruckner’s insecurity (accepted advice regarding revisions)
• still observes sonata cycle
• 4 mvmts, no overt programs
• reflect LvB’s influence

• 1st mvmts begin like LvB’s 9th (nebulous haze = tremolos, motivic fragments)
• 3rd mvmts = scherzos

Bruckner’s own traits:

• expansive forms, “theme groups” in separate parts of exposition
• prominent brasses
• solos, section, chorales in finales
• organ-like orchestration (choirs of instruments)
• characteristic rhythm (duple-triple)

• G: symphony
• C: Shumann
• N: German
• D: 1841, revised 1851
• SF: combines tradition and innovation; 4 mvmts but no pauses between them; 1st mvmt in conventional sonata form, but all its themes are related to one motive (p. 525 in anthology); unusual recapitulation: tonic arrives but not T1-T2-CT, instead development’s “new” themes appear; T1-T2 “reserved” for return in 4th mvmt

• G: Symphony
• C: Brahms
• N: German
• D: 1883

• Opening motto contains cross relation (Ab-A-Ab) that resonates in 1st mvmt’s “progressive” (but Schubertian) tonal plan
• Exposition Recapitulation
• T1 F minor (Ab) F minor (Ab)
• T2 A Major (A) D Major (A)
• CT A minor D minor

Coda restores f/F (Ab/A)

note balanced 3rds above and below tonic

• G: Symphony
• C: Tchaikovsky
• N: Russian
• D: 1893
• SF:

• 1st performance puzzled audience, since untitled symphony’s finale was funeral slow movement
• 2nd performance, 5 days after PT’s death, title revealed, interpreted as farewell or suicide note
• 3rd movement = triumphant scherzo before tragedy

• combines scherzo figuration with march
• roughly a “sonata form without development”
• AB = exposition A’B’ = recap Coda
• I, IV = expo I, I = recap

• G: Symphony
• C: Schubert
• N: Austrian
• D: 1822
• Significant Features:
• - 4 “new” romantic traits

Begins with “motto” – a short preface in same tempo as main sonata form; returns at important points in form

• - T1 new style o orchestration, oboe & clarinet blend in “haunting”, unison melody
• - short transition, modulation not dramatized (not “chugga-chugga”)

T2 in VI (3rd relations gradually replace I-V)

• G: Italian Comic Opera
• C: Rossini
• N: Italian
• D: 1816
• SF:

• Una voce poco fa (A voice just now)
• illustrates typical bel canto traits
• division of arias into cavatina and cabaletta
• Cavatina = “drawn” from recitative, but voice not speech-like (melodic even virtuosic); still punctuated by orchestral chords
• Cabaletta = faster, more rhythmic, bravura; uses “Rossini crescendo”= same figure repeated with increasing volume

• G: CP
• C: Liszt
• N: Hungarian
• D: rev. 1848
• 19th century etudes often infused with “poetic” EMA’s
• Un Sospiro develops 4 techinques:

• Cross-hands melody
• Harp-like accompaniment
• Black keys (pentatonic)
• Famous “three hand” texture