Music of the Romantic Period
(1820-1900)
Romantic Historical Highlights

Industrial Revolution occurs
– Marx and Engels, The Communist Manifesto (1848)
Increase in size and income of middle class
 Most Romantic composers write primarily for middleclass audience
 More revolutions and revolts

– Revolutions in France, Belgium, & Poland (1830)
– Revolutions in Europe (1848)
– American Civil War (1861-65); Spanish-American War (1898)
Romantic Musical & Artistic Highlights
• Emphasis on INDIVIDUALITY of style
• Emphasis on self-expression
Friedrich’s
Wanderer
Above the
Sea of Fog
(c. 1818)
JOHANNES BRAHMS

“How Lovely Is Thy Dwelling Place”
(Mvt. 4) from Ein Deutches Requiem (A
German Requiem)
– Rejects traditional Latin text
– Uses texts he personally selects from
Luther’s German translation of the Bible
– Requiem becomes his own personal
expression of heaven (God’s “Dwelling
Place)
Romantic Musical & Artistic Highlights
• Artists strive to transcend ordinary
existence through free expression
• Everyday life seems dull and meaningless,
artists seek escape through
imagination
Romantic Musical & Artistic Highlights
•
Expressive aims and subjects include...
– Flamboyance and intimacy
– Unpredictability and melancholy
– Rapture and longing
– Songs and operas glorify romantic love
Fuseli’s The Nightmare (c. 1781)
HECTOR BERLIOZ

“The March to the Scaffold” (Mvt. 4) from
Fantastic Symphony (Episodes in the
Life of an Artist)
– Takes ordinary life experience (rejection of
romantic interest in famous actress) and
creates sensationally autobiographical
program for a symphony using imagination
– Depiction of weird and diabolical; grotesque
and macabre
– Program “transcends” ordinary life
experience
Romantic Musical & Artistic Highlights
• Emphasis on the fantastic, the macabre,
the grotesque, and the supernatural
• Emphasis on “night” and things “of the
night”
Fuseli’s The Night-Hag Visiting the Lapland Witches (c. 1796)
Delacroix’s Dante and Virgil in Hell (1822)
Friedrich’s Cloister Cemetery in the Snow (1817-19)
FRANZ SCHUBERT

Erlköing (The Elfking)
– Depiction of weird and diabolical; grotesque
and macabre
– Man struggling against nature (individual
against the world)
• Father struggling to get sick child home and
explain child’s hallucinations away
• Child struggling against mortal seduction of the
Elfking
– “Night” scene and emphasis on supernatural
Romantic Musical & Artistic Highlights
• Reaction against balance and symmetry
of Classical period
• Themes of revolt and rebellion
Delacroix’s Liberty Leading the People (1830)
FREDERIC CHOPIN

Etude in C Minor, Op. 10, No. 2 (“The
Revolutionary”)
– Written as self-exile in Paris
– Protest against Russian invasions and
mistreatments of homeland Poland
– Musical Elements
• Form: A A’ coda
• Uses dotted rhythms (military reference)
• Depiction of struggle and/or anger
– Dissonant harmonies
– Accented Chords
– Passionate main melody
Romantic Musical & Artistic Highlights
• Emphasis on EXAGGERATION leads to
very small (minature) and very large
(monumental) musical compositions
Monumental vs. Minature

RICHARD WAGNER
– Prelude to Act 3 from Lohengrin (orchestra
only)
– Act 1, end of Love Scene from Die Walkure
(The Valkyrie)

FREDERIC CHOPIN
– Etude in C Minor, Op. 10, No. 2 (“The
Revolutionary”)
– Nocturne in Eb Major, Op. 9, No. 2
Romantic Musical & Artistic Highlights
• New emphasis on nostalgia and
history leads to NATIONALISM
Examples of NATIONLISM

ANTONIN DVORAK (Czech)
– Symphony No. 9 in E Minor, Mvt. 1
(Adagio; Allegro molto)
• Nickname = “From the New World”

BEDRICH SMETANA (Czech)
– The Moldau
ANTONIN DVORAK - Mvt. 1,
Symphony No. 9 in E Minor (From the
New World)
Mvt. gets a slow intro tacked on to the
beginning
 Exposition features:

– an expanded 2nd theme group (3 themes
in all)
– Constant variation/development
Exposition - Allegro

1st theme in home key of e minor (HORNS &
WOODWINDS)
– Heroic, bold, motivic

BRIDGE (BRASSES, arpeggio motive)

2nd theme in different key of g minor (FLUTE &
OBOE)
– Softer, dance-like tune, more phrase-based

3rd theme (actually part of 2nd theme group)
(FLUTE) In different key of G major
– Soft, phrase-based, “Swing Low” spiritual melody
Development

Thematic material is ‘developed’ or
‘varied’
– Fragmentation
– Recombination
– Reorchestration
– Melodic extenision
– Unstable harmonies (moves through
many keys) - frequent modulations
– Chromaticism
– Counterpoint (often imitative polyphony)
Recapitulation

1st theme in home key of e minor (HORNS &
WOODWINDS)
– Heroic, bold, motivic

BRIDGE (BRASSES, arpeggio motive)

2nd theme in home key (FLUTE & OBOE)
– Softer, dance-like tune, more phrase-based

3rd theme (actually part of 2nd theme group) (FLUTE)
in home key, but MAJOR
– Soft, phrase-based, “Swing Low” spiritual melody
Coda follows
Romantic Musical & Artistic Highlights
• PROGRAM MUSIC
Examples of PROGRAM MUSIC

BEDRICH SMETANA (Czech)
– The Moldau

HECTOR BERLIOZ
– “The March to the Scaffold” (Mvt. 4) from
Fantastic Symphony (Episodes in the Life
of an Artist)
Romantic Music Genres

Vocal Music Genres
– Lieder (German Art
Song)
– Opera
– Choral Music

Instrumental Music Genres
– Chamber Music
• Piano Minatures
– Orchestral Music
•
•
•
•
•
Symphony
Program Symphony
Tone Poem/Symphonic Poem
Ballet (for a dance)
Incidental Music (for a play)
Romantic Music Style Characteristics
Mood
Emphasis on great variety and contrast of mood
Mood
Rhythm
Emphasis on
g reatof
variety
and (faster
contrastallegros,
of moodslower adagios), use of
Expanded
range
tempos
RUBATO
Rhythm
Dynamics
Expand ed range o f tempos (fa ster all egros, slower adagios), us e of
RUBATO
Longer,
with wider range, building to more sustained climaxes,
Longe r, with
wider range,
bui lding tostructures
more sus tained clim axes, irre gul ar
irregular
phrasing,
and sequential
phrasing, and sequential structures
Use
of thematic
thematictransforma
transformation
-(idee
in Berlioz,
leitmotives
in ra,
Use of
tion -(idee
fi xefixe
in Berlioz,
leitmotives
in ope
cycli c themes
in sy mphonies
that recur that
in o ther
mov
li ke "shortopera,
cyclic themes
in symphonies
recur
inements
other movements
th
short-short-long"
theme in B eethov
enin
5 Beethoven
symphony ) 5th symphony)
like
"short-short-short-long"
theme
Expand ed range - pppp to ffff
Harmony
Colorful, more chroma ticis m, b lurring o f ma jor and mino r modes
Tone
Harmony
Expand edmore
"p alette"
of instrume nts
and expressive
tone minor
colors;modes
instruments
Colorful,
chromaticism,
blurring
of major and
Color
used in ne w ways to ge t new tone colors
Tone
Color
Expanded "palette" of instruments and expressive tone colors;
instruments used in new ways to get new tone colors
Melody
Melody
Themes
Themes
Dynamics Expanded range - pppp to ffff