Unit 4 (Intro to Modern Era)

Question 1

impressionism in music

Answer 1

• late 19th and early 20th-century French style associated most closely with the music of Debussy & Ravel
• often programmatic
• use of non-traditional scales
• parallel harmonies
• blurring of metrical pulse

Question 2

expressionism in music

Answer 2

• early 20th-century German style
• marked by extreme dissonance, angular melodies, irregular rhythmic groupings
• explored deep psychological themes

Question 3

atonality

Answer 3

Music that has no tonal centre, no sense of key

Question 4

serialism

Answer 4

• a compositional approach developed by the second Viennese School
• any number of musical parameters are organized using a specific ordering (set) that undergoes manipulation
• sometimes used as a synonym for dodecaphonic (or 12-tone) music

Question 5

neo-classicism

Answer 5

• a post-WWI style marked by a return to absolute music and traditional formal structures
• cultivated a less emotional sensibility

Question 6

minimalism

Answer 6

• a style of music that evolved in the latter half of the 20th century
• generally characterized by the endless repetition of short melodic patterns, complex cross-rhythms and a return to tonal/modal principles