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1736-1809. A contemporary of Haydn, possibly the greatest organist of his day while at Melk and Vienna and much sought-after as a composition teacher.
Haydn sent Beethoven to him, and Beethoven spent a year learning cpt. with him.
He was known best for his theoretical writings, including a famous treatise on composition and figured bass.
His perpuation of the polyphonic music into the 2nd half of the 18th C, helped ensure the fusion of Baroque polyphony with mid-century homophony into the mature Classical form.
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A fad in 18th c Austria to write compositions in a stylized Turkish flavor.
This stems from the presence of Turkish military (Janissary) bands not long before, when the Turks advanced across Eastern Europe, and laid siege to Vienna.
Janissary bands typically used clarinets, trumpet, triangle, piccolo, large drum, and two cymbals, in addition to the oboes, horns and bassoons of the "ordinary field music."
Mozart uses this Turkish style in his A major Sonata, K 331. Janissary elements in this piece include static harmonies, alternation between major and minor, and heavy, jangling bass chords |
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1714-88. Composed in the Empfindsamer Stil, a singing expressive style well suited to the clavichord, with its light, gentle tone.
In addition to keyboard sonatas, CPE also composed songs, concertos, chamber music, symphonies, and choral works.
He worked for many years at the court of Frederick the Great, after which he succeeded Telemann in Hamburg
Eassy on the True Art of Playing Keyboard Instruments (Versuch uber die wahre Art das Clavier zu spielen, 1753 and 1762) is one of the most important 18th c treatises on music-making. In addition to information on overall musicianship, it lends us insight into issues of improvisation and specific rules for ornamentation, all of which were in flux during the early-mid 18th c
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1735-82. Nicknamed the "Milan Bach", JC Bach spent several years trianing in Italy, after which he went to England (he is also called the "London Bach"), where he became music master to the Queen.
He was an early influence to Mozart, who arranged some of his piano sonatas as concerti.
His style is marked by small design, elegance, and graceful melodies.
His music had popular appeal, especially to amateurs, who found the sonatas easily playable |
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1710-84. Eldest son of JS Bach
Friedemann was also an accomplished organist, well-trained in the strong tradition of organ improvisation.
His composition employ a more contrapuntal style than his brother but with an individual and improvisatory edge.
The most outstanding features of his music are freedom in details of harmony, melody, and rhythm, contrasts of mood, and occasionally an intensely personal, almost Romantic emotion, which endeared his works to 19th c musicians, when there was something of a revival of his reputation.
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rose to prominence in England after the success of Gay's The Beggar's Opera in London in 1728.
Ballad opera, with its use of popular tunes, was a satirical drama based on low-life characters that frequently burst into song.
There was some satire at the expense of opera seria, but the popular belief that it had a hand in the demise of It. opera and Royal Academy of Music is not ture.
The Threepenny Opera of Brecht and Weill is a reworking of the Beggar's Opera, setting a similar story with the same characters and same satirical bite, though only adopting one song from the original.
Thomas Augustine Arne was the only other notable composer of opera in England in the 18th century, though many comic operas were produced by him and by lesser composers throughout the century |
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an instrument like a large viola da gamba with an extra set of resonating metal strings.
Haydn wrote nearly 200 baryton pieces for his employer, Prince Nicholas Esterhazy, who played the instrument.
Most of these pieces were in a trio combination with viola and cello |
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1770-1827. Composer born in Bonn; later lived in Vienna.
He took some composition lessons with Haydn and Albrechtsberger, and perhaps a few with Mozart.
He was known for his talent in improvising on the piano.
His patrons included Viennese aristocrats such as Prince Karl Lichnowsky and Prince Franz Joseph Lobkowitz.
He started to lose his hearing in 1801, which led him to write the Heiligenstadt Testament.
Traditionally, his works have been divided into three periods: Early (-1801), including op 18 string quartets, the Pathetique sonata (op.13), and First and Second Symphonies; Middle or "Heroic" (1802-1811), characterized by larger scope and scale, including the "Eroica" Symphony (No.3), the Fourth through Sixth Symphonies, the Waldstein sonata (Op.53), the triple concerto, and his only opera, Fidelio (text by Sonnleithner); and Late, "transcendental" or "spiritual" (1812-1827), including the Eighth and Ninth Symphonies, the Diabelli Variations, the Hammerklavier sonata (op.106), string quartets opp. 127-135, and Missa Solemnis.
Along with nine symphonies, five piano concertos, one violin concertos, 15 string quartets, 32 piano sonatas, 10 violin sonatas, and 5 cello sonatas, he wrote vocal music, music for wind band, a wind octet, and a "Battle Symphony" Wellington's Victory. |
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1722-1795, Bohemian composer.
Worked as Kapellmeister at the court of Frederick II and later the Duke of Gotha.
He wrote sacred music and theater music, including singspiel such as Der Dorfjahrmarket (1775) and Romeo and Julie (1776) and had particular success with melodramas such as Ariadne auf Naxos (1775) and Medea (1776). The latter two works influenced Mozart.
His works included 15 stage works, many sacred cantatas and oratorios, songs, ca. 30 symphonies, concertos and solo keyboard works
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1743-1805. A distinguished virtuoso cellist and composer of chamber music, who worked chiefly at Madrid.
His output includes about 140 string quintets, 100 string quartets, 65 trios, about 30 symphonies and some sonatas, besides other chamber and orchestral music.
His style displays graceful melodies and variety in the formal design.
His cello parts are often rhythmically complex and highly ornamented |
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1714-95. The Italian poet who collaborated with Gluck to produce at Vienna Orfeo ed Euridice (1762) and Alceste (1767).
Both composer and poet sought to reform opera by bringing out the essential dramatic qualities of the subject, avoiding the complications and subplots common in opera seria.
Calzabigi did decide to give the story a happy ending (lieto fine), brought about by the interference of Amor, a deus ex machina who once more returns Euridice to the living. |
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1752-1832. A composer and virtuoso keyboardist who once performed in a piano competition against Mozart and who briefly taught composition to Beethoven.
Of the Classic era keyboard composers he comes closest to Haydn, Mozart, and Beethoven in stature and, during his lifetime, was extremely successful not only as a performer and composer but also as a conductor and publisher.
He lived in England for his entire adult life.
His piano music (sonatas, sonatinas, four-hand music etc.) demonstrates many of the traits of mature classicism including brilliant passagework, alberti bass, left-hand octaves, and Sturm und Drang Styles |
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An improvised comic genre popular in Italy from the sixteenth century onward.
This theatric genre featured a number of stereotyped stock characters such as the vain lady, pompous military, commander, deceitful servant, and bumbling physician.
Such characters and the convoluted plots they participated in were later commandeered by 18th century Italian comic opera librettists |
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A series of French concerts in Paris, founded by the distinguished musician A.D. Philidor in 1725.
Originally designed to provide music of a properly devotional nature during Lent and other holy days when opera was prohibited, the Concerts Spirituels soon offered a variety of vocal and instrumental music, both French and foreign, and continued as a standard of excellence in musical performance until the Revolution |
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a theatric device used since antiquity in which the main character or the main plot was rescued by some sort of divine power or circumstance.
This technique was often used to wrap up the plots of 18th century comic operas |
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1739-1799. A Viennese violinist and composer remembered for his Singspiels (Doktor und Apothekar) and instrumental works.
He was a friend of Haydn's and wrote a number of programmatic works (among them one based on Ovid's Metamorphosis) |
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a special kind of variation form, often found in late Haydn, in which two themes, often in different keys, and their variations alternate (A,B,A1,B1,A2,B2, etc).
Restatements of either of the themes in between the variations is a possibility |
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Around the middle of the 18th century, a refinement of the comic opera libretto took place largely owing to the Italian dramatist Carlo Goldoni.
Plots of a serious, sentimental, or pathetic character began to appear, as well as the traditional comic ones.
Consequently, the term opera buffa was replaced by dramma giocoso, i.e. a pleasant, cheerful, and non-tragic drama.
Examples of dramma giocoso include Piccini's La buona figliuola of 1760, serveral of Haydn's operas, and Mozart's Don Giovani |
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A term referring to the mid-18th century style of "sentimentality" or "sensibility"
A refined passionateness and melancholy that characterizes some slow movements and obbligato recitatives in particular.
Expressed through surprising turns of harmony, chromaticism, nervous rhythmic figures, and rhapsodically free, speechlike melody.
It is found in late concertos of Vivaldi and in symbiosis with the galant idiom in CPE Bach's keyboard sonatas |
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A beautiful castle in Neusiedel Lake which became the ancestral home of the Esterhazy family. Today it lies in Hungary, not far from the Austrian city of Eisenstadt. The palace was built by Nicolas I who was a great patron of the arts and attempted to emulate court life in Vienna and Versailles at Esterhaza. The palace soon became known as a cultural center and attracted many distinguished guests, including the empress herself in 1773. In terms of music history, Esterhaza is important because it served as Haydn's residence for many years while he bore the title of Kappelmeister at Esterhaza. Many of his middle-period works were composerd for this court. Though Haydn was well-paid, he did feel isolated at Esterhaza and later in his employ there, took frequent leaves to visit Vienna and England |
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A moment in sonata form in which the principal thematic materials returns, either too early, in the wrong key, or both.
This "false" recapitulation is followed by the "real" recapitulation, thus placing the false recap in the development (usually near the end).
Examples of false recaps occur in the first movement of Beethoven's A minor string quartet and his Eroica Symphony |
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This group valued the virtues of tolerance and brotherly love, the belief in dignity of the individual regardless of birth.
The Freemasons were a fraternal order, or secret soceity, that attracted many of the leading figures in politics, philosophy and the arts.
The first Masonic lodge was established in the anticlerical attitude of London in 1717.
Among memebrs of the Masons were: Frederick the Great, Goethe, Haydn, and Mozart.
The latter composed some music with decidedly Masonic ideals or motivations behind it, including the opera, The Magic Flute, and the Masonic Funeral Music (both off which feature the key Eb, the perfection of the mystical number 3) |
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An elegan, courtly style associated with pre-Classical and Classic Era music.
It is characterized by an emphasis on melody made up of short-breathed, often repeated motives organized in 2, 3, and 4-measures phrases combining into larger periods, lightly accompanied with simple harmony that stops for frequent cadences but freely admits seventh and dimished seventh chords |
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| Gluck, Christoph Willibald |
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1714-87. Synthesized in his opera Italian melodic grace, German seriousness, and the stately magnificence of French tragedie lyrique.
Collaborated with poet Raniero Calzabigi (1714-75) to produce at Vienna Orfeo ed Euridice (1762) and Alceste (1767).
Gluck attempted to remove the abuses of Italian opera of the time, such as the conventions of the da capo aria, and excessive ornamental variation which show off the singer's technical viruosity.
Instead, Gluch strove to make the music serve the poetry, to make the overture an integral part of the opera, to adapt the orchestra to the dramatic requirements, and the lessen the contrast between aria and recitative.
After the War of the Buffoon, Lully and Rameau gradually lost favor, and Gluck was the first big composer since them to succeed with French opera in France. |
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1734-1824. A French composer who studied under Stamitz when the latter was in Paris (1754-55).
His music often features large wind sections.
He composed a number of Patriotic songs after the Revolution, including the Marseillaise.
He became directeur de la musique des fetes nationales.
His music is often noisy and constructed for the enjoyment of the masses, rather than the elite upper classes.
His ideal of musical expression (patriotism or despair in the Funeral March) was a precursor to the emerging Romantic style |
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A bitter dispute via pamphlets over the "vitues" of Italian opera.
This debate took place in Paris and was sparked by a late-run performance of Pergolesi's La serva pardrona.
Followers of Lully detested the foreign Italian style and attacked it whereas composers such as Rameau and Rousseau supported the growth of Italian style opera in France |
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a French word used to designate the wind band (often an octet) which many 18th c monarchs kept at their disposal.
Harmonies comprised instruments such as oboes, English Horns, clarinets, bassoon, horns, basset horns, and occasionally flutes.
They were typically used for intertainment and often played divertimenti, cassations, serenades, nocturnes, etc. as dinner or socializing music.
Mozart wrote a number of divertimenti for harmonies of varying instrumentations (including his Gran Partita).
Mozart also arranged some numbers from his operas for harmonies (The Marriage of Figaro) and Beethoven arranged two of his symphonies (7 and 8) for this ensemble as well. |
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1747-1822. A prolific composer of sonata forms in the Classic period.
These wroks include pieces in the galant style as well as the more ambitous Deux sonates instructives featuring tightly knit motive material and frequent modulations.
Engaged in a piano competition with Mozart in Dresden |
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Music for leisure time at home.
This became popular in the four-hand piano music, "table music," and songs for solo voice and piano which a number of classic-era composers produced for the enjoyment of their friends and family.
Mozart, in particular, wrote a great deal of Hausmusik |
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1778-1737. A student of Mozart's and Haydn's successor at the palace of the Esterhazy family. He was a virtuoso pianist and wrote a number of brilliant piano sonatas and concertos. These works tend more towards the pianism of the 19th century than the Classical style. He also wrote a number of chamber works and orchestrally-accompanied sacred music. His music remains in the canon in Germany and Austria even today |
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In the 18th century, a comic work performed between the acts of a serious opera.
Its origins lie in the intermedio and comic scenes of 17th century Italian opera.
The reform of opera seria around 1700 seperated these scenes into separate works.
An example is La serva Padrona which was intended to be performed with Il Prigioner superbo.
The use of the bass voice is an important feature |
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The Turkish military band which became in vogue in Europe during the last part of the 18th century.
The janissary band often featured wind instruments along with cymbals, the piccolo, triangle, drums.
the music was heavily accented, shifted quickly between major and minor, and often featured jarring, accented dissonances which found their way stylistically into the Turkish music of the later 18th and early 19th century.
Mozart Rondo Alla Turka and Beethoven 9, fourth movement Turkish march, for example |
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1749-1816. His Versuch einer Anleitung zur Composition (Introductory Essay on composition, 1787) described the form of the first movement of a classical sonata, now known as sonata form or sonata allegro |
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Associated with the court of Mannheim, it was regarded as the finest orchestra in Europe during the 18th century.
Important contributions include the extended crescendo passage, the "Mannheim sigh" (melodic appogiatura), the "Mannheim rocket" (an arpeggio theme rising through several octaves), adapting and extending the Italian overture style to the concert symphony, earliest consistent use of four movements in the symphony, and the idiomatic treatment of the orchestra.
Composers of the Mannheim school are students of Stamitz like Anton Fils, christian Cannabich, and Carl Joseph Toeschi |
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Poet and Librettist.
Important figure in early 18th century opera reform.
Extracted the humorous portions of opera and standardized the form that came to be known as "Metastasian".
Some of the features: three acts, six characters, historical subject matter, and exit da capo arias that end each scene.
His predecessor was Apostolo Zeno. They were both disturbed by the corruption of the literary aspect of opera and wanted to purify it |
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| missa longs /soleminis vs. brevis |
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the Missa solemnis is the High Mass in its full form with all items sung as opposed to the Missa Lecta (or read Mass) and the Missa Brevis in which an abbreciated musical setting is provided (usually just the Kyrie and Gloria)
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Father of Wolfgang, he was known for his air of superiority and though he never attained the higher court positions he sought, he was nevertheless a well-known and respected violin pedagogue and all-around musician in his day.
Besides running Wolfgang's early career as a piano prodigy, he is famous today for his treatise Versuch einer Grundlichen Violinschule. This treaties attends to the details of technique and artistry of violin playing, in detail and in general, and thus lends insight into performance practice of his time.
In addition music of what he mentions is also applicable today. |
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A musical dramatic form that flourished in France starting in the late 17th century.
Composers were Campra, Mourat, and Monteclair.
The genre mixes elements of ballet (instrumental pieces, dances) and opera (recitatives, arias, chorus).
It was an expansion by the followers of Lully |
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(Comic opera) The opera reforms of the early 18th century removed the comic scenes from operas and made them independent works.
The intermezzi became opera buffa, a genre separate from opera seria.
Distinct musical procedures emerged that point the way from Baroque to Classical, like basing a piece on short motives that could be easily repeated or interrupted.
Unlike opera seria, opera buffa uses duets, trios, quartets, and larger ensembles.
National variety of comic opera are Italian opera buffa, French Opera comique, and German Singspiel.
Examples of opera buffa are Mozart's Le nozze di Figaro, Don Giovanni, and Cosi fan tutte |
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French form of comic opera.
Musical numbers separated by spoken dialogue |
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An operatic genre, arising in the second half of the 18th century, in which both comic and serious elements are present.
Ornate arias of opera seria are present, as well as ensemble finales of opera buffa. Often they can be distinguished by the presence of the basso buffo.
One such example is Rossini's LA Gazza Ladra, but Bellini's La Sonaambula has all the characteristics but no bass buffo, hence it does not qualify |
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The product of early 18th c opera reform.
The main librettists were Zeno and Metastasio.
A Metastasio libretto is in three acts with each act having many scenes. Usually six characters and the subject matter is classical history or legend.
Opera seria is dominated by the da capo aria, and thus the virtuosic singer.
Regular alternation between recit and aria.
The role of instruments is accompanimental.
The idea was to purify opera as a literary genre. The libretto was much more important than the music.
Composers: A. Scarlatti, Vivaldi, Handel.
Ex. Handel's Giulio Cesare |
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A series of harposichord or instrumental ensemble pieces in the same key.
F. Couperin coined the term in his four harpsichord books.
Most of the pieces are in dance rhythms. Highly decorated, published between 1713-1730 |
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| Pergolesi, Giovanni Battista |
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1710-1736. One of the most important composers of opera buffa.
His important work was La serva Padrona.
It was written to be performed with Il prigioner superbo, which set off the guerre des bouffons, between serious Fr. opera composers like Lully and Rameau, and supporters of new It. Opera
It represents comic opera and the new galant style, characterized by short regular phrases (antecedent/ consequent), simple melodies, with a clear distinction from the accomp. |
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1757-1831. Austrian composer, music publisher ("Maison Pleyel") and piano maker.
Student of Vanhal in Vienna and Haydn in Eisenstadt.
His brilliant, and virtuosic sinfonia concertante in F was first performed in London for the Professional Concert, which resulted in a rivalry between him and Haydn.
Today he is mostly remembered for his violin duets. He also wrote ca. 45 symphonies, chamber music fro strings, and a number of concertos |
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1749-1838. Italian poet and librettist.
His librettos for Mozart included Le nozze di Figaro (1786), Don Giovanni (1787), and Cosi fan tutte (1790).
He wrote about 50 librettos in all.
He died in New York, where he taught Italian language and literature at Columbia College.
He brought Don Giovanni to NY in 1825 |
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| Reichart, Johann Friedrich |
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1752-1814. German composer and writer whose close contact with Goethe resulted in many songs.
His songs tend to be strictly strophic, particularly the earlier ones. Variety is attained only through the singer's interpretation of the text's changing emotional content.
His later songs have some variety between the stanzas.
Keyboard parts are of the older Klavierlied style: a spare bass that outlines the simple harmonies and a right hand that doubles the melody.
This simple, strophic song style is typical of the "Second Berline School" of song-writing. |
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1709-89. Composer and singer who composed symphonies in the "Mannheim style" (He was associated with the Mannheim orchestra from 1747-69).
His symphonies are in three movements, occasionally with a minuet as a last movement, and with cantabile themes and orchestral textures typical of the Mannheim style |
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A category of opera-comique in which the hero or heroine, threatened by a natural catastrophe, outlaw or tyrant, is rescued at the last minute by a person of great courage.
It was first popular in France at the end of the 18th century, and later taken up in Italy and Germany.
The most famous example is Beethoven's Fidelio |
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A term that derived the Fr. "Rocaile" meaning "shell".
Originally an architectural term, it is now applied to floried musical style that straddles the High baroque and early Classical periods.
As a reaction against the formal and grandiose structures of the baroque, it values ornamental delicay and graceful elegance over profundity.
The term is best used in relation to the music of Fr. small scale lute and harpsichord works (e.g. descriptive pieces of Francois Couperin) and French-influenced composers such as Telemann.
Rococo style represented a shift in aesthetic from the lofty, serious style of Lully's tragedie lyrique to a lighter approach, favoring entertainment and embellishment rather than strong emotions.
The opera-ballets tended to lack a continuous plot, sacrificing drama for display.
An example of this was Campra's L'Europe galante (1697).
The Italian development of opera buffa is parallel to this trend.
Rococo is often used to refer to the Pre-classical period in general, with it's lighter, galant aesthetic. |
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1749-1815. German violinist, impresario, and composer.
He went to London as a virtuoso performer, and then turned to conducting and promoting concerts.
He secured Haydn's trips to London in 1790-91 and 1794-95, for which the "London symphonies were written.
His works include operas, other vocal music, several violin concertos, and chamber music |
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1685-1757. Italian Pre-classical composer and son of Alessandro Scarlatti.
He is mostly remembered for his 555 harpsichord sonatas. These sonatas are short, one movement works, mostly binary in form, with two repeated parts (tonal scheme: 1-V, V-I).
Thus, they are similar to the Baroque suite movement; however, unlike a Baroque suite movement, Scarlatti's sonatas often employ more than one "theme," a kind of predecessor to the thematic dualism in the Classical sonata form |
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A setting of a portion of a libretto for concert performance by a solo singer plus orchestra may be called scena ed aria.
Ex. Beethoven's "Ah! Perfido" or Mozart's "Misera, dove son." |
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Literally "joke".
Having evolved from the minuet, it retains the minuet standard 3/4 time, and usual light-heartedness, but is often quite a bit faster than minuets.
It also assumes the place of the minuet as the 3rd mvt in symphonies and string quartets.
It is itself normally a rounded binary form, but since it combines usually with a trio, like the minuet, it is a ternary form in reality.
Haydn used the term scherzo for the dance mvts of his op.3 quartets, and these do not differ much from minuets.
Beethoven and Schubert both widely used scherzo movements.
Under the Beethoven, the scherzo assumed an intense even savage quality.
In his 7th symphony, he expands the form by adding an additional trio and scherzo statement; thus S-T-S-T-S |
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librettist for Mozart's The Magic Flute.
Like Mozart, he was a Freemason |
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d.1767. A German composer well established in Paris when the Mozarts journeyed there in 1763.
Mozart was influenced by his sonatas for violin and piano, of which the violin parts are often dispensable, providing little more than a doubling of the upper line of the keyboard part and occasional rhythmic accents.
In other words, the violin part was accompanimental, if not altogether unnecessary.
Schobert's sonatas consist of three movements of various types and sequence, normally beginning with an allegro.
Mozart's early violin sonatas show some influence from Schobert, but later works involve the violin substantially |
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| serenade (divertimento, Cassation, and nocturno) |
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Originally interchangeable designations for chamber pieces, (even among Haydn's early chamber music). (note that here, "chamber music" does not always mean one player per part).
Graudally, a distinction was made between light and purely entertaining music (with the above titles) and more "serious" works, which were normally called trio, quartet, etc.
The serenade was usually based on the standard Classical three movement instrumental piece, with added marches, minuets, and movements with featured soloists.
They were often commissioned for a special occasion.
Mozart's six Salzburg serenades are festive, large-scale pieces for orchestra, and his three Viennese serenades are for six to thirteen winds; some serenades are for small groups.
Cassation are informal pieces usually intended for performance outdoors, and were most common in Austria |
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a musico-dramatic work with German text, especially a work written in the 18th or 19th century in which spoken dialogue interspersed with ballads, popular songs, arias, and ensemble.
The setting is frequently rural, sometimes fantastic or exotic.
The characters are often artisans or from the lower class and exhibit simpler or humbler virtues than characters from opera seria.
The first singspiele were probably translation of English ballad operas and opera comiques.
Mozart's Singspiel include Entfuhrung aus dem Serail (1782), and Die Zauberflote (1791).
There were two main schools of Singspiel: the Viennese (which included Mozart), and the North German, which was influenced by English and French comic opera.
North German Singspiel composers included Johann Adam Hiller and Georg Benda.
Tragedy is a less frequent motif, but those that are still part of the canon are somewhat more serious, like Weber's Der Freischutz, and Beethoven's Fidelio.
The singspiel is considered a predecessor to the Gr. Romantic opera |
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In the 18th c., the rise of the middle class caused an increased demand for accessible music, and the solo song was suited to this niche.
The rise of the piano, with its new, expressive possiblities, made in the favored accompaniment instrument.
The "Second Berlin School" of song composers favored simple diatonic melodies, strophic form, and light, often minimal accompaniment.
This ideal was also favored by Goethe, who did not want his poems obscured by complex music. He preferred Zelter's settings of his poems to those of Schubert because Zelter's were less distracting from the poetry.
Goethe did approve of melodic variants that would reflect changing moods and word meaning.
Other early composers of solo songs include Zumsteeg and Reichardt |
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1717-57. He was the founder of the Mannheim school.
With Holzbauer and Richter, they form the first generation of Mannheimists.
He is responsible for the creation of the greatest orch of his day, and for specific orch effects like the Mannheim rocket (a spiralling upwards from bass to sop or arpeggiated triads).
He is also responsible for heling to standardize the symphony to 4 movts, adding a minuet and trio as a 3rd movt, before the 4th movt Presto.
His son Carl Phillip was a violin virtuoso, violist and a viola d'amore player, and composer, and the last generation of Mannheim symphonists, active in the late 18th C.
He played in the court orchestra in Mannheim then left to tour as a violinist.
He was the most prolific composer of the family, writing symphonies and large amounts of chamber music |
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("Storm and Stress") A term from German literature which is applied to music of the 1770's and 1780s.
A sort of outgrowth or late phase of Empfindsamkeit.
Literature in this style stresses great emotional intensity and passionate, violent outburst (e.g. Goethe's The Sorrows of young Werther, 1774).
Several of Haydn's symphonies (and his string quartets from the same period) represent the musical version of this style, including No. 44 in E minor (the Mourning) and no. 49 (La Passione) in F minor.
Characteristic of these works are: minor keys, stormy, restless, or agitated moods; abrupt dynamic changes; use of canon and other contrapuntal devices; and the element of surprise, harmonic and other.
German opera and other stage music of the 1770's, notably the melodrama, were influenced by the Sturm und Drang trend |
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1766-1803. A pupil of Mozart who completed Mozart's Requiem Mass K. 626 |
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a type of concerto for two or more solo instruments (normally strings or winds) and orchestra.
Though called symphonies, these works belong, with few exceptions, to the history of the concerto.
They are in two or three movements, the first in Classical ritornello or ritornello-sonata form, the last typically in rondo form.
The style tends generally toward the light and popular rather than the heroic or grand.
The earliest examples date from the late 1760's.
The genre is not connceted with the Baroque concerto grosso.
The form was popular between 1770 and the early 1800's, especially in Paris.
Mozart's Sinfonia Concertante for violin and viola K.364 (Salzburg, 1779) is one important example |
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A prolific and successful composer in Vienna who was acquainted with both Mozart and Haydn.
Burney calls his symphonies "masterworks of their kind" |
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popular tunes which were the basis of the first French version of light opera, opera comique, from around 1710 until the middle of the century.
When vaudevilles were graudally replaced by ariettes or original airs in a mixed French-Italian style |
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| Versuch einer Grundlichen Violinschule |
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Leopold Mozart's treatise on violin playing and technique of 1756, one of a number of such treatises published around this time. |
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| Versuch uber die wahre Art das Clavier zu spielen |
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Eassy on the true art of playing keyboard instruments, parts I and II published in 1753 and 1762.
CPE Bach's treatise on keyboard technique and musicianship in general.
Along with Quantz's treatise for the flute and Leopold Mozart's treatise for the violin, it is among our best sources of information about musical practices of the mid-18th century |
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Composers such as Schubert and Mozart wrote sonatas for piano with violin obbligato, or an accompanimental violin part which tended to double the right hand of the piano, provide rhythmic accents, or serve merely as accompaniment.
Sometimes these added strings parts were unnecessary, added perhaps for the convenience of amateur musicians.
Later, Mozart gave more equal prominence to the violin part in his violin and piano sonatas. |
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1749-1814. "Abbe Vogler" was a composer, theorist, teacher,and organ builder who designed his own organ called an Orchestrion, which he played to acclaim and fascination.
He founded 3 separate music schools, but his pedagogical in earliest organum theories produced innumerable enemies.
He also traveled widely in search of different national melodies, even as far as Greenland.
His students included Weber and Meyerbeer |
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The powerful Hungarian family that served as Haydn's long time patron.
They lived in Esterhaza, a palace on the Neusiedel lake in Hungary not far from the Austrian city of Eisenstadt.
It was built with the idea of emulating court life in Vienna and Versailles. It soon became a cultural center and attracted many distinguished guests, including the Empress herself.
Haydn served as Kappelmeister of Esterhazy and resided there for many years, during which he composed many of his middle period works for the court.
He did feel isolated there however, and took long leaves to England and Vienna |
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Used to describe the keyboard of the 18th and early 19th c.
It supplanted the harpsichord and more intimate clavichord, and is the forerunner of the modern piano.
It permitted the layer to vary the dynamics from piano to forte via striking the keys more heavily.
CPE BAch's last 5 sets of keyboard sonatas were very likely written with the fortepiano in mind |
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Originally the finale to Beethoven's Op. 130 quartet in Bb, it is now played independently as a piece.
It goes far beyond any classical fugue.
Its outer architecture a 2 part, very short overture followed by 5 main sections.
A long fugue in 4/4, a developmental section in 2/4, a 2nd developmental section in 6/8, a brief return of the 2/4, and extended return of 6/8, and then a modification of the original fugue but in a 6/8 |
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The best of Mozart's opera seria, despite a clumsy libretto.
It was written for Munich on commission.
It is dramatic and pictorial.
Its numerous accompanied recitatives, conspicuous use of chorus, and inclusion of spectacular scenes shows the influence of Gluck, Traetta, and French tragedie lyrique |
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One of a remarkable number of theorists centered in Berlin that included CPE Bach, Marpurg, and JJ Quanz.
His didactic and theoretical works were regarded by his contemporaries as invaluable, though his compositions were coreect but uninspired.
His most important student was Schulz, and his style was conservative compared to the current galant style;
He worshipped Bach and was vehemently opposed to Rameau.
He asserted like Rameau of the bass as being the most important part of music, but disagreed passionately that the harmony gave rise to melody |
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The term refers to several different aspects of the Mannheim court.
Under the patronage of Duke Karl Theodor of Mannheim and his court director Stamitz in the mid-18th C, the "school" refers to the uniformity of the string technique and the concomitant orchestral discipline.
Under Stamitz a virtuoso violinist and composer, the string playing, esp the violins, were known for their precision and nuance, leading to terms today like the Mannhein crescendo, a disciplined graduated crescendo, and the Mannheim rocket, which was quick and melodic ascending figures, all possible due to the extraordinary talent of the orchestra.
The composers of the Mannheim school included Stamitz, Richter, and Holzbauer. The next generation included Cannabich and Stamit'z sons. |
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A bitter dispute via pamphlets regarding the virtues of Italian opera.
The debate took place in Paris, and was sparked by a late-run performance of Pergolesi's La Serva Padrona.
Followers of Lully and Rameau detested the foreign style and attacked it, whereas It. supporters such as Rousseau supported the growth of Italian style in France.
The decline of Rameau and Lully opera paved the way for the works Gluck |
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A form used primarily in the Classical era.
A blend of the sonata form and the rondo form.
If a sonata form looks like [AB'] expo [c"] dev. [AB] recap with '=V and "= remote keys, then the simplest of sonata rondo form is when the A material starts the development section, thus looking like [AB'] [AC'][AB].
One way to explain this transformation is that occasionally a sonata form includes an "episodic development" which uses new thematic material.
Example of this type of simple sonata rondo is Mozart's Piano Sonata K 330 |
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