Music for Voices

A Pop Ballad

• An slow emotional love song
• Usually a standard set up
• Normally accompanied by guitar or keyboard

Enrique Iglesias

Whitney Houston

Folk Song

• A song traditionally sung by the people of a region and usually forms part of their culture
• Mainly british isles and America
• Usually just a simple strummed accompaniment usually on guitar
• Sometimes sung A Cappella
• In verse structure
• Dont always have a chorus
• The lyrics tend to tell a story
• Sometimes the story they are telling is political

Bob Dylan

The Dubliners

Madrigal

• A song for two or a three unaccompanied
• Developed in Italy in the late 13th century
• Not really written now
• Most popular in the 1300-1400's
• No more than 6 singers
• Pieces about everyday life
• Not religious (secular)

April is my Mistress' Face

Concerto

Concerto
A musical piece which is usually composed in three parts or movements
Usually one solo instrument, such as a piano or a violin, is accompanied by an orchestra




Concerto Grosso
A form of Baroque Music where musical material is passed between a small group of soloists and a full orchestra

Concerto Grosso

Classical Violin Concerto-Mozart

Romantic Cello Concerto-Elgar

20th century music

Minimalism Serialism-1920-1930

• The technique is a means of ensuring that all 12 notes of the chromatic scale are sounded as often as one another in a piece of music while preventing the emphasis of any through the use of tone rows, an ordering of the 12 pitches.
• All 12 notes are thus given more or less equal importance, and the music avoids being in a key.
• Play all 12 notes in a random order and then you play it inverted(backwards)
• Then play in a retrograde(same amount of semitones between notes) may sound really random but is the most organised piece of music ever
• Not in a particular key
• Odd and clashy sounds

3 composers:
Berg

Schoenberg-inventor of twelve tone technique

Webern

Electronic music
Music that uses electronic musical instruments and electronic music technology in it
Can be made between sound produced using electromechanical means and that produced using electronic technology

Atonal music
Where a hierarchy of pitches focusing on a single, central tone is not used, and the notes of the chromatic scale work independently of one another

Aleatoric music
Music of chance
No rules
Composers were really random

Romantic Period

Dissonance
Clashy sounding-notes from outside of the key-composers used this to make it sound emotive, breaking the rules of music

Virtuoso- Liszt (best composer)
A performer that excels in technical ability-fanciest, most complicated music known

Programme Music
a piece of music for instruments that describes a story or a picture

Tone Poems
A composer who writes a piece of music for instruments only to describe a storyline

Impressionism
Creates an atmosphere instead of just telling a story
Stylistic origins
Reaction to 19th century
Romanticism Cultural origins
Late 19th century in Paris, France
Typical instruments
Woodwind, strings, harp, piano, small chamber ensembles
Mainstream popularity ca. 1875 to 1925

Romantic Symphony
Lasted 20-45 mins, didn't follow any strict rules unlike classical symphony, used large orchestras (70-80 people on stage), composer could do whatever they liked, much more expressive using harmonisation, rhythmic patterns and dynamics, used a lot more instruments

Change in Opera
Told myths and stories, composers used folk music to identify where they came from, very very very long, extremes in emotion (every form of emotion, death, murder) lots and lots of brass instruments, all about the gods

Schumann

Liszt

Wagner

Mahler

Classical Music

1750-1810

Diatonic music:
Music that only uses notes of the key-no clashy sounds

Concerto:
A concerto is a musical work usually composed in three parts or movements, in which (usually) one solo instrument, for instance, a piano, violin, cello or flute, is accompanied by an orchestra.

Symphony:
A symphony is an extended musical piece in Western classical music, written almost always for orchestra. Split int chunks called movements
1st movement: Sonata form
2nd movement: contrasting key to first movement & slower, stronger melody line
3rd movement: more light hearted, livelier and in rondo form

Even phrases:
Regular chunks of music as if separated by commas

Baroque music continued

Ground bass:
A Ground Bass is a short bass line that is repeated constantly throughout the piece of music. Below is an example of a Ground Bass.

Continuo:
Part that is played by the harpsichord, usually a bass line and a harmony together on one instrument.

Figured bass:
The numbers underneath a piece of music, the numbers mean that the you go up however number of notes the numbers above the bass note say and play them to make a chord

Concerto grosso:
A piece of music for a group of soloists that is part of the orchestra. Below is an example of a Concerto Grosso

String quartet:
Two violins, viola, cello

This is a musical piece by Antonio Vivaldi

This is a musical piece by Henry Purcell

This is a musical piece by Johann Sebastian Bach

Baroque Music continued

Baroque music describes a style of Western Classical music approximately extending from 1600 to 1760.

Ornamentation
frilly (lots of additional notes for no reason other than to make it sound better)

Smaller groupings
not a set tuning, so one instrument might be playing one A but it would sound very different to an A on another instrument as they aren't the same tuning

Chamber Music
a small group of players that play in an average sized room e.g. After dinner entertainment

Baroque Period is the first time that the style of music that is opera existed.

Opera is a mixture of singing and instrumental music and drama (a play that is sung)

Instruments
Strings- viola, violin, violoncello, viol, contrabass, harp, lute
Winds- flute, oboe, bassoon, recorder
Brass- trumpet, trombone, horn, sackbut
Keyboards- harpsichord, organ

Harpsichord is the most important instrument, it looks like a grand piano but it sounds different, instead of being hit the strings inside are plucked which give it a twanging sound

Baroque Music Website