Classical Period Terms

Question 1

Musical idiom of the mid-to-late 18th Century, generally characterized by an emphasis on melody over relatively light accompaniments; simple, clearly articulated harmonic plans; periodic phrasing; clearly delineated forms based on contrast between themes, between stable and unstable passages, and between sections with different functions; and contrasts of mood, style, and figuration within movements as well as between them.

Answer 1

Classical style

Question 2

The most vibrant intellectual movement of the 18th Century whose central themes were reason, nature, and progress. In general, it was a humanitarian movement whose adherents were interested in promoting the welfare of human kind.

Answer 2

Enlightenment

Question 3

(French, “elegant”) 18th Century musical style that featured songlike melodies, short phrases, frequent cadences, and light accompaniment.

Answer 3

Galant style

Question 4

(German, “sensitive style” or “sentimental style”) close relative of the galant style, featuring surprising turns of harmony, chromaticism, nervous rhythms, and speech like melodies.

Answer 4

Empfindsam style

Question 5

The quality of being periodic, especially when this is emphasized through frequent resting points and articulations between phrases and periods.

Answer 5

Periodicity

Question 6

Wrote volume 2 of the “Versuch Einer Anleitung Zur Composition” (Introductory Essay on Composition, published in 3 volumes in 1782, 1787, and 1793), one of several treatises written for amateurs who wished to learn how to compose.

Answer 6

Heinrich Christoph Koch

Question 7

Broken-chord accompaniment common in the second half of the 18th Century and named after Domenico Alberti, who used the figuration frequently.

Answer 7

Alberti bass

Question 8

(Italian, “comic opera”) 18th Century genre of Italian comic opera, sung throughout.

Answer 8

Opera buffa

Question 9

Composed “Le Zite ‘Ngalera” (The Spinsters in the Galley) which premiered in Naples in 1722.

Answer 9

Leonardo Vinci

Question 10

18th Century genre of Italian comic opera, performed between acts of a serious opera or play.

Answer 10

Intermezzo

Question 11

(1710-1736) was one of the most original composers of his day but died young of tuberculosis. He is best known for his intermezzo “La Serva Padrona” (The Maid as Mistress, 1733), a classic example of opera in miniature, with only 3 characters: Uberto (bass), a rich bachelor; his maid, Serpina (soprano); and his mute valet, Vespone.

Answer 11

Giovanni Battista Pergolesi

Question 12

(Italian, “serious opera”) 18th Century genre of Italian opera, on a serious subject but normally with a happy ending, usually without comic characters and scenes.

Answer 12

Opera seria

Question 13

(1698-1782) An Italian poet where opera seria received its standard form from. His two-stanza aria texts set the standard for the da capo aria of the 1720s through 1740s. His success in Naples, Rome, and Venice led to an appointment in 1729 as court poet in Vienna, where he remained the rest of his life. His operas were intended to promote morality through entertainment and to present models of merciful and enlightened rulers, in tune with Enlightenment thought.

Answer 13

Pietro Metastasio

Question 14

Aria form with two sections. The first section is repeated after the second section’s close, which carries the instruction da capo (Italian, “from the head”), creating an ABA form.

Answer 14

Da capo aria

Question 15

(1699-1783) was one of the most popular and successful opera composers in Europe around the middle of the 18th Century. He was acknowledged by most of his contemporaries as the great master of the opera seria. The great majority of his eighty operas use Metastasio librettos, some of which he set two or three times, and his music in the perfect complement to Metastasio’s poetry.

Answer 15

Johann Adolf Hasse

Question 16

(Quarrel of the comic actors) a long-simmering critical opposition to the old-fashioned, state-subsidized French opera that erupted in Paris in 1752-54.

Answer 16

“Querelle Des Bouffons”

Question 17

(1712-1778) A leader of the Enlightenment in France and a major influence on Romanticism; one of the most vehement voices arguing for the merits of Italian opera who praised Italian composers’ emphasis on melody and their ability to express any emotion through melody.

Answer 17

Jean-Jacques Rousseau

Question 18

(The Village Soothsayer, 1752) a charming little opera by Jean-Jacques Rousseau with airs and recitatives inspired by the new Italian melodic style.

Answer 18

“Le Devin Du Village”

Question 19

(French, “comic opera”) (1) In the 18th Century, light French comic opera, which used spoken dialogue instead of recitatives. (2) In 19th Century France, opera with spoken dialogue, whether comic or tragic.

Answer 19

Opera comique

Question 20

Genre of 18th Century English comic play featuring songs in which new words are set to borrowed tunes.

Answer 20

Ballad opera

Question 21

(German, “singing play”) German genre of opera, featuring spoken dialogue interspersed with songs, choruses, and instrumental music.

Answer 21

Singspiel

Question 22

(1714-1787) achieved a winning synthesis of French, Italian, and German operatic styles. Born of Bohemian parents in what is now Bavaria, he studied under Giovanni Battista Sammartini in Italy, visited London, toured in Germany as conductor of an opera troupe, became court composer to Emperor Charles VI at Vienna, and triumphed in Paris under the patronage of Marie Antoinette. His operas become models for many subsequent works, especially in Paris. His influence on the form and spirit of opera was transmitted to the 19th Century through composers.

Answer 22

Christoph Willibald Gluck

Question 23

In France, a strophic song on a sentimental text with a simple, expressive, melody, almost entirely without ornamentation, over a plain accompaniment.

Answer 23

Romance

Question 24

In Britain, songs printed on single large sheets called broadsides or gathered in printed collections. Usually only the text was printed, typically a new poem about recent events or on a sentimental theme, meant to be sung to a familiar tune.

Answer 24

Ballads

Question 25

(German, “song”) Song with German words, whether monophonic, polyphonic, or for voice with accompaniment; used especially for polyphonic songs in the renaissance and songs for voice and piano in the 18th and 19th Centuries.

Answer 25

Lied

Question 26

A type of piano from the 18th or early 19th Centuries, distinguished from later pianos by a variety of features, notably a smaller range and strings attached to a wooden rather than metal frame.

Answer 26

Fortepiano

Question 27

Binary form in which the two sections are roughly equal in length and feature musical material that is different or only loosely related.

Answer 27

Simple binary form

Question 28

Binary form in which the latter part of the first section returns at the end of the second section, but in the tonic.

Answer 28

Balanced binary form

Question 29

Binary form in which the beginning or all of the first section returns in the tonic in the latter part of the second section.

Answer 29

Rounded binary form

Question 30

(1) Standard chamber ensemble consisting of two violins, viola, and cello. (2) Multi-movement composition for this ensemble.

Answer 30

String quartet

Question 31

Form typically used in first movements of sonatas, instrumental chamber works, and symphonies during the Classic and Romantic Periods. An expansion of rounded binary form, it was described in the 19th Century as consisting of an exposition, development, and recapitulation based on a limited number of themes.

Answer 31

Sonata form

Question 32

(1) In a fugue, a set of entries of the subject. (2) In sonata form, the first part of the movement, in which the main themes are stated, beginning in the tonic and usually closing in the dominant (or relative major).

Answer 32

Exposition

Question 33

(1) The process of reworking, recombining, fragmenting, and varying given themes or other material. (2) In sonata form, the section after the exposition, which modulates through a variety of keys and in which themes from the exposition are presented in new ways.

Answer 33

Development