Final Exam Flashcards
Impressionism
A late-nineteenth-century movement that arose in France; the Impressionists were the first to reject photographic realism in painting, instead trying to re-create the impression that an object produces upon the senses in a single, fleeting moment.
Claude Debussy
(1862-1918) -Born into a modest family outside of Paris. -Neither parent was musical. -Gifted at the keyboard. -Age 10 entered the Paris Conservatory. -Won the Prix de Rome. -Wrote: "Prelude to The Afternoon of a Faun" "Préludes for Piano" "Voiles"
What does the author mean by “Stealth Modernism”?
It sneaks up on the listener. Undulating lines and consonant harmonies are so pleasing that we scarcely notice the novelty: a radically new approach to line and color.
Maurice Ravel
(1875-1937) -Spent almost all of his life in Paris. -Music teacher and composer. -Conjured far off lands with his exotic music. -Wrote: "Bolero"
Bolero
A sultry Spanish dance in a slow tempo and triple meter
Glissando
An effect of sliding up or down the scale very rapidly.
Whole Tone Scale
A scale in which each note is a whole step away from the next step. An example of this might be A, B, C#, D#, F, G, A. The author gives the example of a whole tone scale that starts on C. It can start on any pitch, but just needs to have a whole step between each note.
What piece was the Whole Tone Scale used?
“Voiles” (Sails) by Claude Debussy
Exoticism - What artists were associated with this movement?
The use of sounds drawn from outside the traditional Western European musical experience, popular among composers in late-nineteenth-century Europe.
-Maurice Ravel.
Modernism
A bracing, progressive style that dominated classical music and the arts generally from the beginning to the end of the twentieth century.
Expressionism - What artists were associated with this movement? What regions of Europe were associated with this movement?
A powerful movement in the early-twentieth-century arts, initially a German-Austrian development that arose in Berlin, Munich, and Vienna; its aim was not to depict objects as they are seen but to express the strong emotions that the object generates in the artist.
- Arnold Schoenberg
- Igor Stravinsky
Cubism
Early-twentieth-century artistic style in which the artist fractures and dislocates formal reality into geometrical blocks and planes.
What is the “Emancipation of Dissonance”?
Schoenberg meant that dissonance was now liberated from the requirement that it resolve into a consonant triad.
Igor Stravinsky
(1882-1971)
-Born in Russia, later lived in Paris, Venice, Lausanne, New York, and Hollywood.
-Famous for composing ballet music.
-Developed Neo-classicism.
Wrote:
“Le Sacre du Printemps” (The Rite of Spring)
Sergei Diaghilev
- Legendary impresario (producer) of Russian opera and ballet.
- Formed a dance company called the Ballets Russes (Russian Ballets).
Ballets Russes
(Russian Ballets) Formed by Sergei Diaghilev.
Neo-classicism
A movement in twentieth0century music that sought to return to the musical forms and aesthetics of the Baroque and Classical periods.
Polytonality
The simultaneous sounding of two keys or tonalities.
Polymeter - Which song exemplifies this technique?
Two or more meters sounding simultaneously.
-Used in “The Rite of Spring”.
Polychord
The stacking of one triad or seventh chord on another so they sound simultaneously.
Arnold Schoenberg
(1874-1951) -Early Modernism in Vienna. -Leader of the Second Viennese School -Came from a Jewish family. -Created atonal music. Wrote: "Pierrot Lunaire" "Trio" from Suite for Piano
Second Viennese School
A group of progressive modernist composers that revolved around Arnold Schoenberg in Vienna in the early twentieth century.
Atonal Music
Music without tonality; music without a key center; most often associated with the twentieth-century avant-garde style of Arnold Schoenberg.
Sprechstimme
(German for “speech-voice”) A vocal technique in which a singer declaims, rather than sings, a text at only approximate pitch levels.
Twelve Tone Composition
A method of composing music, devised by Arnold Schoenberg, that has each of the twelve notes of the chromatic scale sound in a fixed, regularly recurring order.
Serial Music
Music in which some important component - pitch, dynamics, rhythm - comes in a continually repeating series; see also twelve-tone composition.
Tone Row
In a twelve-tone composition, the composer arranges the twelve notes of the chromatic scale in a sequence in his or her own choosing.
Charles Ives
(1874-1954) -Born in Danbury Connecticut. -Son of George Ives, a bandleader in the Union army. -Used polytonality. -Went to Yale. -Formed and insurance company. Wrote: "Variations on America"
Polytonality
The simultaneous sounding of two keys or tonalities.
Collage Art
Art made up of disparate materials taken from very different places.
Samuel Barber
(1910-1981) -Born in West Chester Pennsylvania. -Musical Prodigy. -Went to Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia. -Suffered from depression because he was gay. -Sad music. Wrote: "Adagio for Strings"
Neo-Romanticism
A style that starts with the musical elements of Romantic music but reimagines them with an awareness of Modernist musical processes.
Aaron Copland
(1900-1990) -Born in Brooklyn, New York to Jewish immigrant parents. -Rudimentary musical training in New York. -Continues education in Paris. -Composed distinctly American style. -Orchestrated Open Scoring. Wrote: "Appalachian Spring" "Lincoln Portrait" "Fanfare for the Common Man"
Open Scoring
Music with a solid bass, thin middle texture, and penetrating high sound of a flute, clarinet, or trumpet.
Martha Graham
American choreographer.
Ellen Taaffe Zwilich
(1939-?) -Born in Miami, Florida. -Educated at Florida State University. -Studied composition at the Juilliard School. -First woman to win the Pulitzer Prize in Music. -Neo-classicism Wrote: "Concerto Grosso"
Postmodernism
Cultural movement that leaves artistic traditions behind in favor of an inclusive, “anything goes” approach to art and music.
Edgard Vaese
(1883-1965) -Born in France. Immigrated to the US in 1915. -Originated Postmodernism. -Used new percussion instruments (sirens & sleighbells) -Used a synthesizer. -Musique concrète. Wrote: "Poème Électronique"
Musique Concrète
Music in which the composer works directly with sounds recorded on magnetic tape, not with musical notation and performers.
John Cage
(1912-1992) -Born in Los Angeles, California. -Prepared Piano. -Chance Music. -Critics called him a joker and charlatan. Wrote: "4'33""
Chance Music
Music that involves an element of chance (rolling dice, choosing cards, and so on) or whimsy on the part of the performers; especially popular with avant-garde composers.
Prepared Piano
A piano outfitted with screws, bolts, washers, erasers, and bits of felt and plastic to transform the instrument from a melodic one to a percussive one.
John Adams
(1947-?) -Born in Worcester, Massachusetts. -Minimalism. -Trance Music. Wrote: "Short Ride in a Fast Machine"
Minimalism
A style of modern music that takes a very small amount of musical material and repeats it over and over to form a composition.
Caroline Shaw
(1982-?) -Music training at Rice and Yale. -Violinist, stinger and composer. -Youngest Pulitzer Prize for music winner. -Had no intention of being a composer. Wrote: "Passacaglia" from Partita for 8 Voices
From “The Story of Jazz”
Stride Piano
A style of jazz piano playing in which the right hand plays the melody while the left hand plays a single bass note or octave on the strong beat and a chord on the weak beat, developed in Harlem during the 1920s, partly from ragtime piano playing.
From “The Story of Jazz”
Louis Armstrong
One of New Orleans’ trumpet kings, who became the personification of Jazz.
Father of the organized solo.
From “The Story of Jazz”
Jazz
- Spontaneous, instant swing.
- A lot of times is on the up-beat.
- A sin.
- The first World Music.
- Roots in West Africa. Draws from many cultures.
From “The Story of Jazz”
Up-beat
An unaccented beat preceding an accented beat.
From “The Story of Jazz”
Scott Joplin
African American Composer. Was inspired by Gottschalk. Was the undisputed master of Ragtime Music.
From “The Story of Jazz”
Where Jazz originated
New Orleans
