Composers

Question 1

Johann Sebastian Bach

Answer 1

1685-1750 German composer y musician of the Baroque period - Brandenburg Concertos (1721); Goldberg Variations (1741); Mass in B minor (1749) - His music is revered for its technical command, artistic beauty, and intellectual depth - Born in Eisenach to a musical family - Served as royal Kapellmeister in Leipzig, y later Royal Court Composer

Question 2

Gioachino Rossini

Answer 2

1792-1868 Italian opera composer - The Barber of Seville (1816); William Tell (1829); The Thieving Magpie (1817); Cinderella (1817-La Cenerentola); Moses and Pharaoh; Otello; The Lady of the Lake - Known for ability to write music quickly, y nicknamed “The Italian Mozart”

Question 3

Camille Saint-Saens

Answer 3

1835-1921 French composer y organist - Danse Macabre (1874); The Carnival of the Animals (1886-but not performed til 1922); Rondo Capriccioso (1863); Samson and Delilah (1877-opera)

Question 4

Robert Schumann

Answer 4

1810-1856 German composer y music critic of the Romantic period - Kinderszenen (1838-“Scenes from Childhood”); Kreisleriana (1838); Album für die Jugend; Carnaval (1834); Blumenstück - Married his piano teacher’s daughter Clara, who worked as a concert pianist - Suffered lifelong mental illness y died in an asylum

Question 5

Modest (Petrovich) Mussorgsky

Answer 5

1839-1881 Russian composer - An innovator of Russian music in the romantic period, y part of the group known as The Five - Night on Bald Mountain (1867); Boris Godunov (1874 - Opera); Pictures at an Exhibition (1874) - Strove to achieve a uniquely Russian musical identity, often in deliberate defiance of the established conventions of Western music

Question 6

Bela Bartok

Answer 6

1881-1945 Hungarian composer - Collected folk music, founded ethnomusicology- Reluctantly emigrated to NYC during WWII and died there - Mikrokosmos, Duke Bluebeard’s Castle (opera), The Wooden Prince

Question 7

Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky

Answer 7

1840-93 Russian composer - Late Romantic period - 1812 Overture (1882-aka The Year 1812-celebrating Russia’s victory over Napoleon); Romeo and Juliet (1870); Manfred Symphony - Ballets: Swan Lake (1876); The Nutcracker (1892); The Sleeping Beauty (1890)

Question 8

Franz Schubert

Answer 8

1797-1828 Austrian composer - Late Classical, early Romantic period - Winterreise (Winter Journey), “Unfinished Symphony” (Symph. No. 8), Rosamunde, Death and the Maiden - One of the most prolific of the era - Died of syphillis at age 31

Question 9

Dmitri Shostakovich

Answer 9

1906-75 Russian composer - Jazz Suite, Leningrad, Lady Macbeth of the Mtsensk District (opera-1934-censored by USSR y re-released as Katerina Izmailova) - Member of Supreme Soviet - Made much film music

Question 10

Benjamin Britten

Answer 10

1913-76 English composer y conductor - Peter Grimes (1945-opera); The Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra (45); War Requiem (62); The Turn of the Screw (54); Billy Budd (opera) - Awarded a life peerage

Question 11

Alexander Borodin

Answer 11

1833-1887 Russian composer and chemist - Romantic period - In the Steppes of Central Asia, Prince Igor (inspiration for the musical Kismet) - Advocate of women’s rights

Question 12

Claudio Monteverdi

Answer 12

1567-1643 Italian composer - His revolutionary works marked the change from Renaissance style to Baroque period - Wrote one of earliest operas, L’Orfeo, which is still performed - Wrote many madrigals

Question 13

Aram Khachaturian

Answer 13

1903-1978 Armenian-Soviet composer - Ballets: Gayane (1942-incl the lively piece Sabre Dance); Spartacus (1954) - Masquerade Suite; Anthem of Armenian SSR - Secretary of Union of Soviet Composers (1957-78)

Question 14

George Frideric Handel

Answer 14

1685-1759 - German-born, British Baroque composer who spent the bulk of his career in London - Water Music, Music for the Royal Fireworks, Messiah (1742) - Coronation anthem Zadok the Priest performed at every British monarch coronation since 1727- Buried at Westminster Abbey

Question 15

Aaron Copland

Answer 15

1900-1990 American - Appalachian Spring, Rodeo, Billy the Kid, Fanfare for the Common Man - Film scores for The Heiress and Grapes of Wrath - Commissioned by Benny Goodman

Question 16

Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov

Answer 16

1844-1908 Russian composer - Flight of the Bumblebee (1900-from opera The Tale of Tsar Saltan); Capriccio Espagnol (1887); Russian Easter Festival Overture (1888); Scheherazade (1888) - Known for used Russian folk styles y the musical orientalism style - Member of the composer group known as The Mighty Handful, or the Group of Five (with Mussorgsky, Borodin, etc) - Became professor at the St. Petersburg Conservatory in 1871 - Served in the Russian navy

Question 17

Alexander Scriabin

Answer 17

1872-1915 Russian composer y pianist - Known for his piano sonatas y etudes - Developed an atonal y dissonant sound influenced by synesthesia y theosophic mysticism - Influential to later Russian y Soviet composers

Question 18

Igor Stravinsky

Answer 18

1882-1971 Russian composer - The Rite of Spring (ballet-1913-caused riot at premiere in Paris); The Firebird (ballet-1910); Petrushka (ballet-1911); The Nightingale (opera-1914) - Later became French then American citizen

Question 19

Franz Liszt

Answer 19

1811-1886 Hungarian composer - Piano virtuoso - “New German School” of music, invented the symphonic poem - Consolations, Hungarian Rhapsodies, Mephisto Waltzes, Faust, Dante

Question 20

Frederic Chopin

Answer 20

1810-1849 Polish composer y pianist of the Romantic Era - Famous for nocturnes y etudes - Moved to Paris at age 21 y died there - Relationship with French female novelist George Sand

Question 21

Giacomo Puccini

Answer 21

1858-1924 Italian opera composer - La Boheme (1896); Tosca (1900); Madama Butterfly (1904); Gianni Schicchi (1918-part of Il Tritico series); Turandot (1926-unfinished)

Question 22

Felix Mendelssohn

Answer 22

1809-1847 German composer - Romantic period - Songs Without Words, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, the Italian Symphony, the Scottish Symphony, The Hebrides - Died from stroke at age 38

Question 23

Hector Berlioz

Answer 23

1803-1869 French composer - Romantic period - Symphonie Fantastique, Grande messe des morts - Wrote Treatise on Instrumentation, which greatly influenced Romantic era orchestras

Question 24

Arcangelo Corelli

Answer 24

1653-1713 Italian composer y violinist of the Baroque era - Key figure in the development of the modern genres of sonata y concerto, y in establishing the preeminence of the violin - Composed 48 trio sonatas, 12 violin and continuo sonatas, y 12 concerti grossi

Question 25

Sergei Prokofiev

Answer 25

1891-1953 Russian composer - Peter and the Wolf, ballet Romeo and Juliet, The Love for Three Oranges, Lieutenant Kijé - Lived in USA then back to USSR

Question 26

Gaetano Donizetti

Answer 26

1797-1848 Italian opera composer - Lucia di Lammermoor (1835); Zoraida di Granata (1844); Don Pasquale (1843) - Spent later life in mental hospital

Question 27

Johannes Brahms

Answer 27

1833-1897 German composer and pianist - spent much of his professional life in Vienna - Academic Festival Overture, Tragic Overture, German Requiem - an uncompromising perfectionist, he destroyed some of his works and left others unpublished

Question 28

W(illiam) S(chwenk) Gilbert and Arthur Seymour Sullivan

Answer 28

Victorian-era theatrical partnership of librettist Gilbert (1836–1911) y composer Sullivan (1842–1900) - Collaborated on 14 comic operas (called Savoy Operas) - HMS Pinafore (1878); The Pirates of Penzance (1879); The Mikado (1885); Princess Ida (1884); Ruddigore (1887)

Question 29

Antonín Dvořák

Answer 29

1841-1904 Czech composer - Slavonic Dances (1878); From the New World (1893); Cello Concerto (1895); Dumky Trio (1891); Songs My Mother Taught Me (1880-song from the cycle Gypsy Songs) - Composed 8 operas in Czech, incl Rusalka (1901) - Director of the National Conservatory of Music of America in NYC 1892-95

Question 30

Edvard Grieg

Answer 30

1843-1907 Norwegian composer from Bergen - Romantic Era - Peer Gynt Suite (written for Ibsen’s play, includes the piece “In the Hall of the Mountain King”); Lyric Pieces - Subject of the musical The Song of Norway

Question 31

(Wilhelm) Richard Wagner

Answer 31

1813-1883 German composer - Four-opera cycle Der Ring des Nibelungen (1876): Das Rheingold; Die Walkurie; Siegfried; Götterdämmerung (Twilight of the Gods) - Tristan und Isolde (1865); The Mastersingers of Nuremberg; Parsifal - Founded Bayreuth Festival

Question 32

Niccolò Paganini

Answer 32

1782-1840 Italian violinist, violist, guitarist, y composer - The most celebrated violin virtuoso of his time - Composed 24 Caprices for Solo Violin (1817)

Question 33

Edgard Varèse

Answer 33

1883-1965 French-American composer - Ameriques; Ionization; Arcana; Hyperprism - Emphasizes timbre y rhythm - Coined the term “organized sound” in reference to his own musical aesthetic - Used new instruments y resources - Known as the “father of electronic music”

Question 34

Classical Music Periods

Answer 34

Baroque 1600-1760
Classical 1730-1820
Romantic 1780-1910

Question 35

Antonio Vivaldi

Answer 35

1678-1741 Italian Baroque composer, virtuoso violinist, teacher and cleric from Venice - The Four Seasons

Question 36

Richard Strauss

Answer 36

1864-1949 German composer of the Romantic y Modern eras - Der Rosenkavalier (1911-opera-The Knight of the Rose); Salome (1905-opera); Also Sprach Zarathustra (1896-tone poem); An Alpine Symphony (1915-tone poem); Four Last Songs (1948)

Question 37

Johann Strauss II

Answer 37

1825-1899 Austrian composer - Known as the Waltz King - The Blue Danube (1866); Kaiser-Walzer (1889-Emperor Waltz); Tales from the Vienna Woods (1868); Vienna Blood (1873); Tritsch-Tratsch-Polka - Operas: Die Fledermaus (1874-The Bat); Der Zigeunerbaron (1885-The Gypsy Baron)

Question 38

Henry Purcell

Answer 38

1659-1695 English Baroque composer - Considered to be one of the greatest English composers - English opera Dido and Aeneas, Come Ye Sons of Art, Hear My Prayer O Lord - Very influential in English music

Question 39

Maurice Ravel

Answer 39

1875-1937 French composer - Bolero (1928); Gaspard de la Nuit (08); Daphnis et Chloé (12) - One of the 1st composers to make extensive use of recordings

Question 40

(Franz) Joseph Haydn

Answer 40

1732-1809 Austrian composer of the Classical period - Instrumental in the development of chamber music such as the piano trio - Called “Father of the Symphony” y “Father of the String Quartet” - Worked most of career as court musician for the wealthy Esterházy family in remote Hungary - Friend y mentor of Mozart, y tutor of Beethoven

Question 41

Guiseppe Verdi

Answer 41

1813-1901 Italian opera composer - Aida (1871); Otello (1887); Falstaff (1893); Rigoletto (51); Il Trovatore (53); La Traviata (53); Nabucco; Macbeth - Operas performed at La Scala theater

Question 42

Philip Glass

Answer 42

1937- American composer from MD - Known for his influential, minimalist, repetitive music - Strung Out (1967); Music In 12 Parts; Another Look at Harmony (1975); The Portrait Trilogy - Film scores for Koyaanisqatsi (1982); The Truman Show (1998); The Hours (2002)

Question 43

Frederick (Theodore Albert) Delius

Answer 43

1862-1934 English composer - The Florida Suite (1887); 3 Small Tone Poems; A Village Romeo and Juliet (1907); A Mass of Life (1909) - Sent to Florida by his wealthy family to manage an orange plantation, where he was influenced by African-American music - Spent most of career in Paris

Question 44

Jaques Offenbach

Answer 44

1819-80 German-French composer y cellist from Cologne - Known for his operettas - Orpheus in the Underworld (1858 - includes a scene called the Infernal Galop, often erroneously called the Can-Can); La Périchole (1868); The Tales of Hoffmann (1880) - Personally granted French citizenship by Napoleon III