# The Romantic Era [Module 8 YouTube Playlist](https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLQY0zQBqYyrWvCGOreoEe25_AYF5hOgpU) ## 19th Century Program Music: Berlioz Goes to Hell - Program Music = Story told in instrumental music - Absolute/Pure Music = Those without pre-existing story - Musical Signifiers - Genres of Program Music - Tone poem (symphonic poem) = one movement for orchestra - Program symphony = multi-movements for orchestra - Dramatic overture = to opera, play or festival, one movement - Hector Berlioz, _Symphonie Fantastique_ - Berlioz could not play piano - Wrote this piece for Harriet Smithson -- his idee fixe - Written in 5 movements -- just as Shakespeare - A Program Note is distributed to the audience for the first time - Cornet and ophicleide (predecessor of tuba) introduced - Rhythmic diminution = note values become shorter - Fugato = Fugue in the middle of another movement - Col legno = Scrape the violin strings with back of the bow, to indicate burning fire - Hector and Harriet did marry, but they were miserable - Some examples - Tchaikovsky, _Romeo and Juliet_ - _Scheherazade_ - _Pictures at Exhibition_ ## The Romantic Piano and Piano Music - Western Music is the only one with _fixed pitch keyed instrument_ - Harpsichord - Only one dynamic range at a time - Cannot "shape" a phrase - Cannot play loud enough - Pianoforte = soft loud - Escape Mechanism = allow the hammer to leave the string so that it sounds freely - Knee levers -> Pedals - Cast iron reinforcement introduced, so that more tighter strings can be placed without collapsing the soundboard. - Soft pedal and Damper pedal - Steinway - over-stringing, bass strings run above middle ones at an angle, unified cast iron frame - Chopin's Piano Music - Nocturnes, Etudes, Preludes, Scherzos, Mazurkas, Polonaises, Concertos - "Big guitar effect" = bass arpeggio - Franz Liszt - "Lisztomania" - First placed the piano in the direction that audience are on the right - First created "recital" - Sonata, Hungarian Rhapsodies, Transcendental Etudes, Concerto Etudes - "Three Hand Trick" ## Romantic Opera - Italian and German tradition of opera - _Bel canto opera_ = focus almost entirely on aria, accompaniment is rather simple - Type of Operatic Voices - Coloratura - Soprano - Lyric, Spinta, Dramatic - Mezzo - Contralto - Tenor - Lyric and Dramatic - Baritone - Bass - Verdi's Opera - "Action Packed Music": a lot happens in the music, banner headlines of emotion - \*Overture to MacBeth - _La Traviata_ - Based on real story of Marie Duplessis, a courtesan. - Conventions of the dying heroine of romantic era. In this opera, Violetta. - Scena = scene = aria + recitative + aria - _Cabaletta_ = following the recitative, a fast concluding "exit" aria - _tempo rubato_ = slowing of the tempo - _Recitativo accompagnato_ = recitative accompanied by orchestra > [!question] What to listen for? > > - Quality (richness of tone) > - Comfort level (does the voice sound strained?) > - Capacity to control the tone > - Capacity to hold pitches (especially the climatic final pitch) > - Tempo of performance (often the greater the vocal control, the slower the > tempo) - Richard Wagner - Self-taught musician - Wagner's new Bayreuth Theater - First theater to use gaslight instead of candles - First to not allow late comers - First to use pit, so that audience do not see the players. - _Ring Cycle_ - _Rheingold_, _Die Walküre_, _Siegfried_, _Götternämmerung_ - _Leitmotif_ = light motif, a signifier - "Music Dramas", "Endless Melody" ## The Romantic Orchestra > [!summary] The Classical Paradigm > > - Symmetrical phrasing (antecedent & consequent) > - Monophonic and then Homophonic texture > - Thin texture > - Strings predominate, woodwinds punctuate, brasses play almost no role > - New ideas (melodies) come in rapid succession > [!summary] The Romantic Paradigm > > - Long sweeping melody with much string vibrato > - Rhythm much freer (syncopations over bar lines) > - Tempo can be unstable (tempo rubato) > - Wild swings of dynamics (_pppp_ to _ffff_) > - Larger orchestra with prominence of brass - Beethoven introduced: - Piccolo - Trombone - Contrabassoon - Hector Berlioz added: - Harp - Cornet - Ophicleide (early tuba) - English horn (low oboe) - Violin - The bow is larger - The fingerboard is now at an angle with the strings - Strings are no longer made of cat gut - Romantic music becomes slower, in that the sound of the orchestra is richer, there is no need for a lot of motifs to feel in the time - A fingerprint: Triad -> Surprise chord -> Minor chord -> Dissonance -> resolving to Consonance Tonic - Musikverein in Vienna: the first concert hall only for music - Gustav Mahler - Compose in summer, conduct in winter - Orchestral Lieder and 9 Symphonies - A Path through Mahler's Symphonies - No. 1 - No. 4 - No. 5 - No. 8 - No. 2 - No. 7 - No. 9 - No. 3 - No. 6 - _Ich bin der Welt abhanden gekommen_