Reminders
• Exam postponed until 4/8
• Activity 2 due next Thursday (3/20)
Review
• What are some main tenets of
Romanticism?
• In what ways was the piano a
significant instrument in the 19th
century
• Who were some virtuoso pianistcomposers?
Review
• Chopin
• What country was he from?
• What types of pieces did he write?
Clara Schumann
• Concert artist and composer
• Wife of Robert Schumann
• Composed pieces for herself to play
C. Schumann, Scherzo
• Listening guide 43
• What does Scherzo mean?
• Form: scherzo section alternates with
trio…
• Trio section contrasting in character.
Usually calmer and smoother
C. Schumann, Scherzo
• Here there are two trios
• Form:
• Scherzo
• Trio 1
• Scherzo
• trio 2
• Scherzo
• Or: ABACA
C. Schumann, Scherzo
• What is jesting about the scherzo?
• In 3/4 time, third beat is emphasized
(rather than first)
More Romantic traits
•
•
•
•
Romantic melody...
Lyrical-song-like
More expressive
Romantic vs Classic
• Romantic melodies tend to be less
balanced
• Romantic melodies tend to have a wider
range
Romantic Harmony
• more dissonance:
• So harmony in Romantic era is more
expressive too
• chromatic harmony
• -chords not built from the diatonic scale
of the "home-base" (tonic) key)
• So harmony is more complex and less
predictable
Romantic Form
• Basic tendencies
• A) Classic forms are expanded
• B) new ideas of cyclic unification
are developed
• However, these are
• C) based more on sectional
contrast (A vs B) instead of
development (like Beet. 5th)
Debate in Romantic
Era
• Between ABSOLUTE MUSIC-- music
•
•
•
•
that refers only to itself and
Program Music, where the music
depicts a story, has an “Extramusical” subject…
2 genres or program music
Program Symphony- multiple
movements
Symphonic Poem- 1 movement
Berlioz’s Symphonie
fantastique
• Listening guide 44
• Story of obsessive lover
• the narrator takes opium and has a
series of hallucinations
• each becomes a musical movement
of the symphony
Berlioz’s Symphonie
fantastique
• may have been based on Berlioz’s
actual obsession and affair with
Harriet Smithson, an actress
• the lover is portrayed musically by
an “idèe fixe” -- a melody associated
with her that recurs obsessively
• the “idèe fixe” occurs in each
movement
Berlioz’s Symphonie
fantastique
• Movements=hallucinations
• I: Reveries, pasions - introduces
idèe fixe = “she”
• II: A Ball-- she appears at a dance
• III: Scene in the Fields-- she brings a
storm
Berlioz’s Symphonie fantastique
• IV: March to the Scaffold- he kills her
• V: Dream of the Witches Sabbath- in
hell he is taunted by her still
Berlioz’s Symphonie
fantastique
• Fourth movement: March to the
•
•
•
•
Scaffold
March rhythm
Two main themes, A and B, that are
developed in the middle
The idée fixe comes at the end (when
is thinking of the Beloved.
Interrupted by the axe that chops his
head off
Berlioz’s Symphonie
fantastique
• Fifth movement: Witches’ Sabbath...
• Spooky opening
• Then distorted version of idée fixe
• Then funeral bell tolling
• Then Berlioz quotes Dies irae, a
Gregorian chant melody that was
used at funeral Masses.