20th Century and Beyond Flashcards
List all of the 20th Century isms.
1) Post-Romanticism
2) Neo-Romanticism
3) Primitivism
4) Impressionism
5) Expressionism
6) Avant Garde
7) Soviet Music
8) Post-Impressionism
9) Neo-Classicism
10) Minimalism/Spiritual Minimalism
11) New Virtuosity
12) Electronic Music
13) Realism
What are the three categories of Romantics in the 20th Century?
1) “Born too late Romantics” - Rachmaninoff, Barber, Holst. All Romantics in the Early 20th Century.
2) Neo-Romantics - Late 20th Into Early 21st Century. Keep Using Techniques and Tonalities to Make “Good Music”. Believe the Height of Music was the Romantic Era
3) Post-Romanticism - Still loosely followed the tenants of the Romantic Era but carried only into Italian Opera really.
Briefly describe the plot of Madame Butterfly.
Butterfly (Japanese) likes pinkerton (US Soldier), they have a kid, pinkerton leaves, comes back with Kate his American wife, wants to take his kid back, but then Butterfly kills herself on stage so it all solves.
What is the historical context of 20th century music?
1) World Wars I and II - A rejection of the old way of doing things as a failure.
2) Industrialization and Its Effects - Electronic Music is important here. The theremin et al.
3) Progressivism - Affects Ideals as expressed in music and its later failure prompts.
4) Great Depression - Generates certain genres in America.
5) Russian Revolution and Communism - Created a highly regulated and nationalistic composition style in the Soviet Union.
6) Modernism - Intellectual movement that emphasized a turn from Romantic and Classical Thought. New is better is basically the line here. Ditch the old forms, cause they don’t do nothing.
Describe Musical Impressionism.
1) Based on art theory of impressionism. Not just trying to capture an object but a specific moment in time and everything associated with it.
2) Involves new scales, such as the pentatonic and whole tone scales. Non-resolved phrases and non-resolved harmonies/chords.
3) Claude Debussy is the Center of Impressionism. Rejects climaxes etc.
4) Characterized by Modal and Exotic Scales, Unresolved dissonances, tone combinations like 9th chords, rich orchestral color, and red rhythm.
5) All cast in small-scale programmatic forms.
Describe Musical Primitivism.
1) Unpredictable rhythm with interesting in being visceral in expression.
2) Dissonance goes beyond simply being contained and resolved. This style of music causes a riot after it gets produced.
3) Main composer is Stravinsky. But he leaves it after the Rite of Spring debuts and gets smashed.
Describe Russian Music Pre-Soviets.
1) Igor Stravinsky
- Goes Modernist. Rejects old European forms. Experiments with Primitivism, Polytonality (More than one Key at a Time.)
2) Ballet
- Becomes its own separate art form. Diagahlev produces some good ones like Firebird and The Soldiers Tale.
Describe Expressionism.
1) German Musical Movement that Goes Dormant Relatively Early After It Starts.
2) Mainly Reacts against resolving dissonance to consonance. Free Music to Allow it to be Fully Expressive.
3) These guys think they are a part of the Second Viennese school.
Describe the Change in Tonality/Progression of Tonality in the 20th Century.
1) Chromaticism - Romantic Era dabbles
2) More Chromaticism - Goes Outside the Normal Tonal Scales Entirely. Pentatonic Scale etc. New chords and combining Chords (@Stravinsky)
3) Atonality - No Rules. Free music. Let dissonance be free and not have to resolve into anything. (@ Schoenberg)
4) 12-Tone System - Schoenberg realizes atonality is a little too much and opts for a non-resolving tonal system. All notes are equal, use each note once before repeating, make a specific order called a tone row, manipulate it by going anyway through it, Matricies are a thing.
Describe Pre-Modernism.
1) Really one guy in America called Charles Ives. Technically falls under the Avant-Garde. He’s an insurance salesman who writes music on the side.
2) Does a bunch of cool avant-garde stuff. Like playing a wood block on the piano. Only popular later though. Experiments in multiple keys.
What are the two musical associations that govern music in the Soviet Union? What do each stand for?
1) Association of Contemporary Music - More open to modernism. Accepted experimentation with atonality, dissonance, etc. More Open to American and European Influence.
2) Russian Association of Proletarian Music - No modernism. Traditional style of music that is tonal, consonant, and resolves. RAPM eats the ACM in the mid 1920s.
When is it incredibly dangerous to compose music in the Soviet Union?
1928-1960ish.
Define the formalism the Soviet Union objects in music.
- Modernist
- Dissonant/Ugly Sounding
- Atonal
- Too European
- Not Optimistic or Patriotic Enough
Who are the four big Soviet Era Composers? Which Get along with the government and which do not?
1) Kabalevsky - Gets along with the government well but isn’t well known. More of an academic composer.
2) Khachaturian - Gets along with the government because he is largely traditional and tonal.
3) Prokofiev - Experiments a little with formalism and gets put on trial and his wife put in a work camp. He defects but then comes back cause he misses it.
4) Shostakovich - Complicated relationship with the Soviets. He didn’t openly reject them like Prokofiev but also wasn’t entirely pro-Western.
Describe the early work of Shostakovich and how he interacts with the Soviets.
1) Popular early composer that experiments with modernism and is pretty popular.
2) Then he publishes Lady MacBeth of mtensk District and Stalin probably sees it and publishes a scathing review in Pravda that accuses it of formalism.
3) Shostakovich pulls his Fourth Symphony and Replaces it with a Fifth Symphony “An Artists Just Response to Criticism”
4) After Shos dies, a fake memoir saying he hates the soviets is published. Son confirms it is how he felt though. Could be sarcasm in the 5th Symphony.
