R O S S I N I , S C H U B E R T ,
B E R L I O Z , M E N D E L S S O H N
&
R E V I E W F O R T E S T # 2

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Enormous orchestral scoring
Bel Canto vocal lines
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Florid, ornamental
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Success!
Fame!
Money!
Early retirement!

 39 operas
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The Barber of Seville
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Cinderella
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Ceclia Bartoli “Non piu mesta”
William Tell
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Overture
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Sacred Music
Salon music

 Stabat Mater (1827)
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“The Sorrowful Mother Stood”
 Quis est homo qui non fleret
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“Is there one who would not weep, whelmed in miseries so deep, Christ's dear Mother to behold?”
 Listen for…
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Close harmonies, crescendo

 Upper case definition
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Reaction against “reason”
Aesthetics
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Heightened emotion
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Nature
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Children
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Struggle with nature
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Death

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 fantasy grotesque whimsy
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 imaginative playful reaching for eternity
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 longing for the unrequited artist and art

 Image
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Poverty
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Health
Suffering
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Eccentric
Exotic

 Romantic ideal
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Love/death
 Sturm und Drang
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Storm and stress/urge/longing

 Purpose
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“Beauty for Beauty’s Sake”
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Robert Lewis Stevenson
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Must beauty be “beautiful?”
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Emotion
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Emotionalism?

 No more patronage
 Middle-class
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Educated
Musical

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Artist*
Genius
Inspiration
Dilettante
Professional
Amateur

 Beethoven
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Salieri
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Mozart

 Over 1,000 completed pieces
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Nine symphonies
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Chamber music
600 Lieder

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Piano
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Story-teller
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Subconscious
Song “cycle”*
 Text
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Prose
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Poetry
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Heine, Schiller, Goethe

 Piano
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Horse
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Dissonance
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Melody

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Narrator
Son
Father
Erl King

 Marco Rima
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VERY politically incorrect!

 Meeting place
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Artists
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Writers
Poets
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Musicians
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Political radicals

 Schubert Abend*
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Informal
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Fun
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Fame
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Food

Marian Anderson
 “Ave Maria”
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Listen for…
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Long, extended melodic line
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Simple, harmonically-complex accompaniment
Latin text?
Original source: “The Lady Of The Lake”

 “An Episode in the Life of an Artist “
…a young vibrant musician, afflicted by a wave of passions, sees for the first time a woman who unites all the charms of the ideal person his imagination was dreaming of, and falls desperately in love with her. By a strange anomaly, the beloved image never presents itself to the artist’s mind without being associated with idée fixe.

The artist finds himself in the most diverse situations in life, in the tumult of a festive party, in the peaceful contemplation of the beautiful sights of nature, yet everywhere, whether in town or in the countryside, the beloved image keeps haunting him and throws his spirit into confusion.

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Mysterious opening with harps and strings
Festive waltz music
Two interruptions by the idée fixe*
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2:10
5:25

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Elegant
Sensitive
“Miniature”s
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Songs Without Words: “Spring”
 Incidental Music*
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A Midsummer Night’s Dream
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Wedding march

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Wealthy
Musical prodigy*
Handsome
 Intelligent
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Languages
Artist
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Jewish

 CPE Bach’s widow
 St. Matthew’s Passion
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1750-1829
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Devotee
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Contrapuntal influence

Fanny Mendelssohn (Hensel)* 1805-1847)

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Same education
More talent and creativity?
Pseudonym
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Handwriting
Correspondence
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Style

“Madame Hensel was an unforgettable musician, an excellent pianist, an intellectually superior woman.
She was small, almost slight, but the fire that burned in her eyes revealed extraordinary energy.
As a composer, she was exceptionally gifted ...”

W E E K 1 0 : T H U R S D A Y , N O V E M B E R 1 2 , 2 0 0 8

 Cumulative
 New tracks
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All of CD#1
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CD #2, Tracks 1-3

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What were the most important changes made to the piano during the Classical era?
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What enormous political/social event was celebrated with a performance of the Beethoven 9 th in December 25, 1989?
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At the end of his career, Haydn wrote his first and only oratorio.
It is a highly descriptive telling of Holy Scripture from Genesis and the Psalms. What is the name of this piece?
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Compare Haydn’s years with the Esterházy family vs. Mozart and his employers.
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What was the tradition known as D ROIT DE SEIGNEUR ?

 What are the “Sketch Books”?
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What are “Conversation Books”?
 What city was the musical and cultural center of the Classic period?
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The exposition of Beethoven’s 5th Symphony contains how many notes?
 How does the overture to Mozart's Don
Giovanni end?

 Beethoven violently changed the dedication of the “Emperor” concerto to the “Eroica” concerto in December 1804. Why?
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Thousands of Viennese attended Beethoven’s funeral. Among his pallbearers was what future great composer and Beethoven devotee?
 Why is the Classical Period also known as the “Age of Reason” or the
“Age of Enlightenment”?
 Mozart was unusually proud of the end of Act I in The Marriage Of
Figaro. Why?
 What is Don Giovanni’s fate? Is he dragged to Hell, or does he alone make the decisions which determine that fate? In what way is that revolutionary?

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Who was Lorenzo Da Ponte? Why was he hired to work in Vienna?
Da Ponte promised Emperor Franz Joseph a major change in Beaumarchasis’ radical play The Marriage Of Figaro in order to obtain permission to work with
Mozart on the project. What was Da Ponte’s promise, and did he keep it?
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What is THE HEILIGENSTADT LETTER?
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How did the father of Fanny and Felix Mendelssohn prepare his children for their adult life?
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Who was Antonio Salieri? Facts vs. fiction, please!
How and when did the myths about him and his relationship to Mozart begin?
What Tony and Academy Award winning play and movie tells that story?
 What is “Chamber Music”? What composer is credited with the greatest accomplishments in Chamber Music? How many musicians are required for Chamber Music?

 Did Beethoven write and re-write his music or did he compose seemingly without effort? Compare to Schubert and Mozart.
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The writers, poets and playwrights of the Classic period worked with what cultural and aesthetic goals in mind?
 Did Mozart’s talent require training? What proof was recorded of his talents?
 “Music, of all the arts, has the greatest influence over the
passions....The Marriage of Figaro contains all of the elements of the
French Revolution…” What political figure made this statement?
 When did Beethoven’s hearing begin to fail? Why? Why have the facts recently changed?

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How did the public react to Rossini’s operas?
Define “Crescendo” and explain its relevance to
Rossini.
What are the aesthetic goals of the Romantic period?
What were the new ways in which Schubert used the piano for lieder?
How many characters are presented in “The Erlking”?
 What is Marian Anderson’s place in American history?

 The excavation of what two major cities marks the birth of the Classical Period?
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Why is Haydn considered to be the “Father Of The Symphony”?
“Papa Haydn”?
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How many movements are standard in a Classical concerto?
Which tempo scheme is standard for a Classical concerto?
 Between 1812 and 1817 Beethoven composed almost no music. Three crisis interrupted his musical concentration. What were those three events?
 Mozart once wrote to his father that he was really only interested in writing one genre and that all his other compositions were just to generate income. What is that one genre?
 What is the “surprise” in the “Surprise Symphony” by Haydn? Why did he feel the need to surprise his audiences? How did he accomplish the surprise?

 Explain how Susanna (The Marriage Of Figaro) and Leporello (Don
Giovanni) are radical characters and thereby symbolic of the entire Classical period. Your answer must include a discussion of the musical and social/political implications each character presents.
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What did Ferdinand Hiller do on May 27, 1827? What was the fate of the locket? How has the history of Beethoven’s final years changed as a result?
Where is the largest collection of Beethoven artifacts housed today?
 How did Berlioz use the idée fix in his Symphonie Fantastique?
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Describe Beethoven’s week of May 1-7, 1824 in detail, including the premiere of the 9 th .
 Identify and label each section of the Sonata form in detail.