Periods in Music History

Question 1

Baroque period dates

Answer 1

1600-1750

Question 2

Classical period dates

Answer 2

1750-1830

Question 3

Romantic period dates

Answer 3

1830-1900

Question 4

Contemporary period dates

Answer 4

1900-present

Question 5

characteristics of the Baroque period

Answer 5

• polyphonic texture - use of ornamentation - improvisation - use of figured bass - dance suite - terraced dynamics

Question 6

characteristics of the Classical period

Answer 6

• homophonic texture - obvious cadence points - Alberti bass - Sonata form

Question 7

characteristics of the Romantic period

Answer 7

• programme music - colorful harmonies - lyric melodies - complex rhythmic patterns

Question 8

characteristics of the Contemporary period

Answer 8

• less use of major and minor tonalities - quartal harmony - bitonality - polytonality - atonality - irregular and changing meters - polyphonic texture - Neo-Classic writing (return to Classical forms, i.e. Sonata form) - serial music - twelve-tone music

Question 9

what is a dance suite mainly consist of?

Answer 9

includes many different dances performed together - allemande - courante/corrente - sarabande - gigue

Question 10

what are the optional dances in the dance suite?

Answer 10

• bouree - gavotte - passapeid - polonaise - anglaise - loure - air

Question 11

what is an allemande?

Answer 11

dance in moderate 4/4 time with a short upbeat often using short running figures that are passed through a semi-contrapuntal texture

Question 12

what is a courante?

Answer 12

a French dance in moderate 3/2 or 6/4 time which shifts from one of these meters to the other with free counterpoint and a shifting melody

Question 13

what is a corrente?

Answer 13

an Italian dance with in quick triple meter with continuous running figures and homophonic texture

Question 14

what is a sarabande?

Answer 14

dance in slow triple meter and dignified style; often accented with an accented or long tone in the second beat

Question 15

what is a minuet?

Answer 15

a French country dance in 3/4 meter

Question 16

what is a bouree?

Answer 16

a French dance usually in quick duple meter with a single upbeat

Question 17

what is a gavotte?

Answer 17

a French dance in moderate 4/4 time with an upbeat of two quarter notes and with phrases usually beginning and ending in the middle of the measure

Question 18

what is a passapeid?

Answer 18

a spirited dance in quick 3/8 or 6/8 meter

Question 19

what is a polonaise?

Answer 19

a Polish dance of stately and festive character in moderate triple meter usually containing measure with a repeated rhythmic motive

Question 20

what is an anglaise?

Answer 20

a dance in fast duple meter

Question 21

what is a loure?

Answer 21

dance in moderate 6/4 time with dotted rhythms and heavy downbeats from the 16th and 17th century bagpipe term

Question 22

what is an air?

Answer 22

a song/dance with melodic characteristics

Question 23

what is a French gigue?

Answer 23

compound duple meter (6/8); contains dotted rhythms and large intervals, and has fugal texture

Question 24

what is an Italian giga?

Answer 24

quicker, non-fugal, has running passages over a harmonic bass (less frequently found in Baroque)

Question 25

what are terraced dynamics?

Answer 25

dynamics that increase or decrease by sections of music, as opposed to making crescendos and decrescendos

Question 26

composers of the Baroque Period

Answer 26

• J.S. Bach
• Corelli
• Handel
• Rameau
• Scarlatti
• Telemann
• Vivaldi

Question 27

composers of the Classical Period

Answer 27

• Beethoven
• Clementi
• Czerny
• Diabelli
• Haydn
• Mozart
• Kuhlau

Question 28

composers of the Romantic period

Answer 28

• Brahms
• Chopin
• Grieg
• Liszt
• Schubert
• Schumann
• Tchaikovsky

Question 29

composers of the Contemporary Period

Answer 29

• Bartok
• Britten
• Copland
• Dello Joio
• Kabalevsky
• Poulenc
• Prokofiev
• Shostakovich