Final Testing Center Flashcards
1
Q
Franz Schubert
A
- Romantic
- wrote over 600 lieder
- Elkronig- tells a story, difficult to perform making it more of a high art rather than just pop parlor music
- sometimes used poems by goethe and some by his friends
- piano parts are pictorially derived
- wrote about all kinds of topics
- wrote primarily for small groups of instruments
2
Q
Robert Schumann
A
- Romantic
- lieder
- more romantic because he wrote a lot about romantic topics like one and death
- started out as a pianist
- makes piano equal to singer
3
Q
Chopin
A
- amazing Romantic pianist
- hardly performed publicly
- very popular with aristocracy
- mainly wrote works for solo piano
- wrote character pieces ( solo piano work usually composed in a group with a somewhat evocative title)
- Polish
- moved to Vienna in his late teens
- rubato
- new musical form of nocturne (short piano piece with an expressive and often melancholy medley over a murmuring accompaniment)
- he wrote what he played
- had a relationship with George Sand (author and woman)
4
Q
Liszt
A
- romantic
- followed footsteps of Paganini
- took advantage of advancements in piano technology (metal frame, extra octaves, felt hammers, quick release)
- rock star of his day
- pieces that are infused with folk tunes of Hungary
- had groupies
- born in Hungary but moved to Paris early in life
5
Q
Berlioz
A
- Romantic
- program music (instrumental music that follows a story line)
- symphonie fantastique
- idee fixe (recurring motif that represents something)
- imitation of sound
- plays with color to tell the story
- unusual use of woodwinds
6
Q
Brahms
A
- Romantic
- more conservative and traditional
- lyrical melodies, harmonic variety and color make him Romantic
- symphonies in classical format
- absolute music
- successor of Beethoven
- possible scandal with Clara Schumann
7
Q
Dvorak
A
- Romantic
- wrote symphony no 9 after arriving in America
8
Q
Italian Opera
A
- bel canot (beautiful singing)
- virtuosic singing that focused more on arias
- sacrifices drama to a certain degree
9
Q
Verdi
A
- romantic italian opera
- all sopranos die at the end
- matches musical style to the emotions
- convincing expression to human relationships
- became associated with nationalist movement n Italy
10
Q
Puccini
A
- romantic italian
- verismo- realism
- realistic depictions of everyday life, especially from the middle class
- BIG TUNE (hear it softly and then again louder)
- parallel motion in the harmonies, despair, foreshadowing of doom, recurring motifs
- part traditional italian opera part impressionism
- flow of drama is important so it just flows from one to the next to prevent applause
- someone always dies at the end
- shows end of century despair
11
Q
Wagner
A
- romantic opera
- gesamtkunstwerk (total artwork, combines all of the arts into one epic opera)
- leitmotif (musical phrases linked to character, plot elements or operas)
- starts as conductor not composer
- can’t get opera produced in France to he goes to Dresden
- wrote opera und drama- outings theory of what opera should be (best place for all arts to be unified)
- based operas on Nordic mythology
- he thought He was got, anti-Semitic
- new emphasis on the orchestra
12
Q
Debussy
A
- impressionism
- avoids putting meaning to music
- focus is on the sound
- use of instrumental textures and colors
- fluid harmony
- symbolist poetry
- anti-Germanic style of music
- Prelude is based on a poem
- greater WW sound than brass (French)
13
Q
Ravel
A
- impressionism
- avoids putting meaning to music
- focus is on the sound
- use of instrumental textures and colors
- more likely to write in regular meter
- understood other culture’s music
- bolero
- evoke a scene for untrained listeners
- liked spnaish culture music
14
Q
Mahler
A
- 20th century
- epic and enormous symphonies
- 8th symphony was symphony of a thousand because of how many performers are on stage
- converted to Christianity from Judaism for social status
- often programmatic and classical concept of symphony
- fascination with death
- musical effects that come from a distance
- used popular ballad tunes and abrupt changes of mood in his music
- dealt with big cosmic ideas (view of heaven, purpose of death etc)
15
Q
Strauss
A
- 20th century
- uses tone poems/symphonic poems in his works (single orchestra movement that illustrates a particular poem story or novel
- Don Juan, Zarathustra
- programmatic
- single movement symphonies
- deeply passionate and personal
- out Wagner Wagner
- pushes extremes of German Romantic style
- wrote music about himself
- first job was a court composer
- wasn’t a nazi but supported them
- last four songs are a song cycle- softer perspective of death
- wrote tons of tone poems and programmatic music
- Opera Salome- John the Baptist head- put it on the edge of tonality
- wrote symphonic music, not waltzes
16
Q
Stravinsky
A
- 20th century
- from Russia
- worked for the Ballet Russe
- Firebird, Petrushka, Rite of Spring
- quasi-tonal- sounds like wrong notes but still tonal
- heavy emphasis on rhythm
- becomes more neoclassical after WWI
- write serial music after Schoenberg died
- mentored by Rimsky-Korsakov
- made ballet more orchestral and symphonic
- wrote in a variety of styles with influences from Bach, Tchaikovsky and jazz
- short, expressive melodies
17
Q
Schoenberg
A
- atonality/serialism
- part of 2nd Viennese school
- pioneer in atonality
- developed 12 tone technique
- Pierrot lunaire (setting of 21 poems from Hartleben)- freely atonal
- sprechstimme (vocal technique between singing and speaking)
- expands tonality through chromaticism
- atonality matched the growing sense of rejection of traditional values and a violent break with the past that was happening in society
- would put little works together to create a bigger work
18
Q
Berg
A
- atonality/serialism
- 2nd Viennese school
- pupil of Schoenberg
- most romantic of three from school
- writes in standard romantic genres (opera, concerto etc)
- Wozzeck- about a soldier- not freely atonal but atonal (makes serial music sound tonal- which I think kinda defeats the purpose but whatever he wants to do I guess)
- stuck to trains, some elements of romanticism
- deeply emotional work
- Sprechstimme
19
Q
Webern
A
- atonality/serialism
- 2nd Viennese school
- intensely organized (pitch, rhythm, dynamics and developing 12 tone technique)
- brief- like ridiculously brief stuff
- quiet
- similar to pointillism because it’s like pops of sound
- wrote 31 op numbers
- died in ending days of WWII- got shot
- 5 Orchestral Pieces- all incredibly short
20
Q
Charles Ives
A
- American composer of 20th century
- day job was selling insurance & wrote music for fun
- involved with experimental music
- explored polytonality, polyrhythm, tone clusters, quarter tones etc
- Country Band March
- used American sources like circus, band, Protestant churches
- revolutionized American music-uniquely American
- eclectic/melting pot type music- representative of America although he probably didn’t do it with that in mind
- lots of layering
- quoted music
- very experimental because of financial freedom
21
Q
Copland
A
- American composer
- created the “American Sound” (open spaced chords to show vastness)
- Appalachian Spring, Lincoln Portrait, Rodeo
- Fanfare for the Common Man was a fundraiser
- used 4ths and 5ths
- was accused of being a communist but they let him go
- studied with Nadia Boulanger
22
Q
John Cage
A
- contemporary
- leading figure in avant garde
- pioneered indeterminacy (music created by chance)
- not a goo musician
- studied tonal theory
- studied with Schoenberg
- worked with Henry Cowell who was an important experimental composer
- prepared piano (used it to divorce sound from notation)
- 4’33
- influenced by Zen philosophy
- music should reflect random chaos
- songs can be played various ways so its different every time
23
Q
Kafka
A
- born in Prague 1883
- worked for the worker’s accident instate describing instustrial accidents
- wrote strange stuff mostly of himself
- wanted his works burned after his death
- metamorphosis, the trial
- stories often deal with the struggle of a man against a patriarchal or ordered society
- experienced hatred by everyone
- writes very objectively
- kafkaesque- things that don’t seem wright, waking up and finding something isn’t he way it was before, like monday instruction on tuesday
24
Q
Ibsen
A
- norwegian playwright and poet
- rounder of realism, key proponent of modernism in the theatre
- doll’s house
- tragedy of powerlessness of women at the time, about both men and women
- put people’s lives on the stage and made it shocking
- rejection of Victorian ideals
- conflict between husband and wife
25
Q
Chekhov
A
- Russian physician and author, born 1860
- considered among the greatest authors of short stories of all time
- steam of consciousness technique
- The Bet-solitary confinement, end of century despair, life is futile
- sometimes emits detail- kind of impressionist in that way
- not a lot of action in his stories
- skips years
- uses irony and satire to show passivity and emptiness of characters
- short stories
26
Q
Eliot
A
- born in US but moved to England when he was 25
- modernist poet which means he was depressing
- the Hollow Men- references to 4 sources: Heart of Darkness, Julius Cesear, Divine Comedy, Gunpowder Plot
- numbered sections of above poem
- hopelessness, alienation
- desire to go back to the past
- people needed to recover sense of cultural continuity through religious tradition of the past if culture was to survive
27
Q
Joyce
A
- spitirual insight- epiphany
- Ulysses
- blend of myth and personal story
- puns and linguistic allusions
- stream of consciousness
28
Q
Huxley
A
- didn’t like growth of technology
- saw it as an inevitable tool of totalitarian control over individuals and society
- individuality, family relationships, creativity, and unmanageable human qualities are eradicated from society in his story Brave New World
- great humanistic achievements (lit, art, religion) are threatening forces to any totalitarian society and are logical targets for scientifically constructed society
29
Q
Manet
A
- transitions from realism to impressionism: adding light, using thick broad brushstrokes
- artist is the server of his own time
- subjects seemingly aware of the viewer’s presence
- reverses painting method by using a white background and adding darker tones
30
Q
Monet
A
- Impressionism
- outdoors, subjects found in nature, glowing colors and reflections of natural light at a single moment represented
- same subjects in different moments of time: water lilies, haystacks, boats
- dissolution of surfaces and the separation of light into its spectrum
- preoccupied with light and it’s effects
- all about color
31
Q
Renoir
A
- impressionist
- realistic effect of light on the surface
- city and metropolitan subjects
- every day activities
- figure painter of the middle class in leisure activities
- feathery strokes
32
Q
Morisot
A
- impressionist
- managed to suggest the presence of a complete form with loose vigorous brushstrokes
- goes toward post impressionism- think van gogh in way of brushstrokes
