Programmatic Music Flashcards
Franz Liszt
1811 - 1886
Hungarian composer, pianist, and teacher
Tone Poem
A piece of orchestral music, usually in a single continuous movement, which illustrates or evokes the content of an extra-musical work
Term invented by Liszt in 1853
Franz Liszt: Les Preludes
Third of Liszt’s thirteen symphonic poems
1845 - 1854
Began as overture to a choral cycle then revised later as a stand-alone concert overture.
Title referring to Larmartine’s poem added after revision, poetic reference not original intention.
Romanticism Characteristics
Free expression of feelings
Rejection of classical traditions
Imagination and originality
Interest in the importance of nature
Nostalgia / yearning
Individualism
Hector Berlioz
1803 - 1869
French romantic composer and conductor
Hector Berlioz: Symphonie Fantastique
Op, 14
1830
Programmatic symphony
Introduces the ‘idee fixe’ (fixed idea)
Richard Strauss
1864 - 1949
German composer, conductor, pianist, and violinist
Richard Strauss: Death and Transfiguration
Op. 24
1888 - 1889
Tone poem for orchestra
Dedicated to his friend Friedrich Rosch
Depicts the death of an artist
Described in a poem by Alexander Ritter after composed
Richard Strauss: An Alpine Symphony
Op. 64
Written 1915
Tone poem for orchestra
One of his largest non-operatic works
Depicts the experiences from before dawn to the following nightfall climbing an alpine mountain.
Eduard Hanslick
Conservative music critic
Championed absolute music over programmatic music
Sided with Schumann and Brahms in the “War of the Romantics”
Best remembered for critical advocacy of Brahms as against the school of Wagner
He thought the nature of music as expressive solely by virtue of its form, and not through any extra-musical associations
New German School
Introduced in 1859 by Franz Brendel
Describe certain trends in German music
Replace the term “music of the future”
Wagner, Berlioz, Liszt
