Review from last class
• What are some main features of the
Italian madrigal? Who wrote them
• What is text painting?
• What is an English madrigal?
Announcements
• Quiz Thursday, February 13
• Multiple choice format
• Pick up a review sheet after class if
you don’t have it
INSTRUMENTS
Families of the Orchestra
• STRING (violin, viola, cello, bass)
• WOODWIND (flute, oboe, sax, clarinet,
bassoon)
• BRASS (trumpet, horn, trombone,
tuba)
• PERCUSSION (pitched vs. non-pitched)
• Chamber Ensembles (string quartet, brass
quintet, etc.)
More materials of music
• Machlis textbook 131-43
INSTRUMENTS
• Guitar, Lute, other strings
• Keyboards
• Piano
• Organ
• Harpsichord
• Synthesizer
The Octave
• Produced by one string vibrating twice
as fast as another
• Notes an octave apart have the same
name and sound
• An octave can be DIVIDED in a number of
ways
• In western music, there are 12 notes per
octave (as on the piano)
Major and minor scale
• Series of notes selected from the
twelve notes of the octave
• Difference: the third note
• Chords can be major or minor as well
• Chromaticsm: use of notes that are
not normally in the major or minor
scale
Chords
• Tonic is a rest chord
• Other chords are active (feel like they
have to more somewhere else)
Baroque (1600-1750)
• Rise of Instrumental Music
• Tonality - harmony is regularized,
sounds more modern
• Chords move in regular patterms
• Vigorous (Motoric) Rhythm
Monody
• a homophonic musical texture
• one singer with instrumental
accompaniment
• Figured Bass
• bass instrument + chording instrument
(reads numbers written at bottom-harmonic
blueprint)
Baroque Opera
• Philosophical background
• The Camerata
• Recreate the style of Greek Drama
• drama sung throughout
• INVENTION of Opera
• stile rappresentativo
• led to speechlike style of singing
Opera
• recitative - derivative of monody
• disjunct vocal style
• speech like
• used for places where ACTION occurs
• aria - formal number
• lyrical style
• organized formally
• action stops- emotional REaction
Dido and Aeneas
• Listening guide 15 (not 14, as on the
syllabus)
• By Purcell
• Based on Virgil’s Aeneid
• Tragic story of fate- Aeneas must
leave Dido to found Rome- she
commits suicide
“Dido’s Lament”
• Affect -- a “Lament” (dissonaces
used for expressive means)
• Recitative - “Thy hand” -expressive
• Aria- formal, organized and tuneful
section
• ground bass repeating bass linetypical for lament
Johann Sebastian Bach (16851750)
• 19 children- 2 wives
• held positions in …
• Weimar- court organist and chamber
• Cöthen- chamber music
• Leipzig- extensive church duties
• cycles of cantatas for the entire church year
(200 extant)
Lutheran Cantatas
• Liturgical music for protestant service
• Bach’s works are multimovemented (5-
8)
• with arias, recitatives and choruses
• some based on a single tune that
appears throughout the movements
A Mighty Fortress
• Choral tune “A Mighty Fortress” …
• Created in the time of the Reformation,
by Martin Luther himself
• hymn tune- in German rather than Latin
• originally sung monophonically- then in
homophonic settings
• permeates the entire cantata by Bach
Cantata: A Mighty
Fortress
• Das wort, sie sollen (#8)
• Homophonic setting
• Bach harmonized the original tune in 4-
parts
• He also added a “continuo” part, (like a
figured bass)
• His son Wilhelm added the timpani and
trumpets … for grandeur