RENAISSANCE
1450 - 1600
Renaissance means Rebirth.
If you ever visited the Renaissance Faire, you would have a good idea of the lifestyle, clothing, and music of that time.
Most of Renaissance music was Polyphonic. An example of polyphonic music is a Round, such as “Row, row your boat”. The people were still not very educated. They started to write music on paper, but it was very primitive and unorganized. They did not use time signatures nor bar lines.
Some composers of this time are composers that you probably have not heard of before. They include: Thomas Morley, Palestrina, William Byrd, and Gabrieli.
There was no structure of an orchestra during this time.
No Bands; No Orchestras. The largest group of musicians would be app. 3-4 performers together. Also, there were no concert halls to hear the performances. The music had a very thin texture due to the fact that there were only a few musicians. Listen to an example of a choral song written my Thomas Morley, called “Sing We and Chant it”. Listen for the Chorus which repeats the words “Fa-la-la”. (This will be played during your presentation).
Since there were no concert halls and no electricity to hear music like we have today, the people were limited to hearing music, unless they were from a musical family. Troubadours and Bards (found on page 36, * Blue Book), traveled throughout Europe. They were very important during the Renaissance Period. They were a one-man show, telling jokes, singing songs, telling stories through song and dance. If a troubadour showed up in Linglestown Square, everyone in the village will attend the show. The troubadour was the means of communication between the villages of that time, providing them with information about people in other villages. Today, we rely on means such as telephones, newspapers, TV, computers, etc. for information. In the Renaissance times, troubadours provided the news. Someone in the village would provide lodging and food for the troubadour during their stay. Then in a few days, the troubadour would travel to another village, providing them with news from our village.
Instruments of the Renaissance Period consisted largely of string instruments. However, this did not include the string instruments of the orchestra (violin, viola, cello, string bass), because they were not yet invented. These string instruments had names such as lutes, dulcimer, cittern, psaltery, lyres, and rebecs and celtic harps. (There are some examples of different types of string instruments on top of the tall cabinet in the music room.)
There were also clavichord (keyboard instrument) and harpsichords. However, only the wealthy could afford a harpsichord.
Recorders were used during the Renaissance times.
The same recorder is still played today, hundreds of years later.
Baroque Period
1600 – 1750
The Baroque Period (pronounced like “broke”, like broke a vase), was a period with ornamentation. Ornamentation means that the music was very decorated with trills and different kinds of mordents. The rhythm of a lot of the music consisted of many 16th notes and had a driving tempo. The music was also mostly polyphonic in texture (mostly in round form). The fugue was a complex type of round during this time. Composers like Bach wrote many prelude and fugues.
During the Baroque Period, the violin was invented. Today, the violin still has the scroll look at the end of the peg board, which represents that it was designed during the baroque period. Recorders were still highly used. One of the most popular instruments of this time was the Pipe Organ (Red book pg. 133)
Musical Forms include Prelude and Fugue, Invention, Toccata, Concerto, and several different kinds of Dances such as Minuet, Gavotte, Bourree, Gigue, and Sarabande.
The orchestra began during the Baroque Period with only a few players (app. 15).
Some composers of this time include:
Bach (Bahkh) Couperin (KOO-peh-ren)
Handel (HAHN-del) Monteverdi (mon-the-VAIR-dee)
Pachelbel (PAHK-ell-bell) Purcell (PURR-cell)
Scarlatti (skar-LAH-tee) Vivaldi (vee-VAHL-dee)
Classical Period
1750 – 1820
The Classical Period brought a sense of Balance to music. The pivotal changes were (1) Change from Polyphonic Music to Homophonic Music and (2) Clarity of the Melody and Repetition of the Melody. These were major changes and consequently directed music towards what we now listen to.
Up to this time, much of the music was polyphonic, in a round form. Homophonic music (or Homophony), translates into the use of Chords. When we listen to music on the radio, what does our music sound like? Is it composed mostly of rounds or chords? Last year in music, we learned chords on the keyboards. These primary chords are I, IV, and V. Do you remember learning them?
Before the classical period, music kept going and going with many repeats. In the classical period, the melody was more defined and was repeated. If you hear a song on the radio for the first time, you can probably hum the melody by the end of the song. This is due to all the repetition in today’s music.
During the classical period, the orchestra grew in size. It almost doubled in size from the baroque period to app. 30 people.
Some composers were Haydn, Mozart, and Clementi. Can you find any of their pictures on the wall? Please show these during your presentation.
One instrumental form which was created during the classical period was the Sonata Form. This is an advanced form structure.
Romantic Period
1820 – 1899
During the Romantic Period the amount of music composed exploded. Composers also grew in number. The orchestra grew and basically peaked to the size that it is today. There were some significant changes with the music. This was the first time that composers realized that they could express themselves through music. The music of this time demonstrates the sharp contrasts between loud and soft and fast and slow. Before this time, music had very little or no expression. Composers experimented with the emotion, mood, and tension in their compositions. The complete name of the piano (pianoforte) also represents this change.
Following is a list of some of the composers, but there are many more:
Beethoven (BAY-toe-ven) Brahms
Chopin (SHOW-pan) Liszt (LIST)
Mendelssohn (MEN-dell-sohn) Moussorgsky (mah-SORG-skee)
Schubert (SHOO-burt) Saint-Saens (sann-SAWN)
Tchaikowsky (chy-CUFF-skee)
Can you find any of their pictures on the wall?
Can you name any music by Beethoven?
5th Symphony, Fur Elise, Moonlight Sonata
Program Music is music that describes something or tells a story without words. Can you think of an example of program music?
Peter and the Wolf by Prokovief (pro-KOH-fee-eff)
Carnival of the Animals by Saint-Saens
Pictures at an Exhibition by Moussorgsky
Impressionism
Late 1800’s to Early 1900’s
This period is very short lived, but it is unique in its style. Impressionism took its name from a painting called Impression: Sunrise, by the French painter Claude Monet.
Please look at page 68 in blue book at this painting. Describe the techniques that Monet used to illustrate this style.
The first musician to introduce impressionism in music was Claude Debussy (day-byou-SEE), a French composer (1862 – 1918).
Some of Debussy’s music is:
Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun
Clair de lune (moonlight)
Reverie
Arabesques
Almost all the music of the impressionists was based on program music. Program music is music that is based on a story or a descriptive idea.
The whole-tone scale is used in Impressionism. This scale creates an unusual, mystical sound.
Modern, Contemporary, or 20th Century
1900 – Present
During the romantic period, many composers wrote a wealth of music.
Since the orchestra peaked and volumes of music were composed, composers did not know how to improve at what was already done. Throughout history, man’s basic instinct has been to search for new ideas, inventions, and better ways to do things. We see evidence of that today, especially in technology.
How many people roller blade or skate board? Do you try to jump something higher or go faster than you did before? How many people ski or snow board? Do you try to go down more difficult slopes, jump higher moguls, or do different jumps and turns? At the turn of the century (1900), composers looked for new creative ways to improve musically.
Composers of this period came up with unusual ways to create new music. This music is not the music you listen to on the radio. It is music that you probably have never heard before. This is also the time before computers were in existence. Composers took existing instruments and played them in different, unusual ways.
Example: What would happen if you played a violin by bowing on the other side of the bridge?
What would happen if you took the mouthpiece off of the trumpet and played the mouthpiece through the bell of the instrument?
What would happen if you tried to play notes higher on the clarinet than what exists?
These are some examples of how composers were creating a new sound and creating new music. Again, these sounds were not made with computers. Today with computers, we can create almost an indefinite number of sounds.
Composers also used Dissonance which means sounds that clashed. The rhythms were very complex with frequent changes in meter and irregular accents. Terms such as chance music and avante-garde music described how musicians would “make-up” music as they performed. Composers also made up their own notation (written music) using clusters, new ways to write rhythms to describe the complicated rhythms, complex notes and sounds.
Musical Styles Activities via internet
Go in this Order:
Home Page http://www.dsokids.com/2001/dso.asp?PageID=460
1. Information about Composers (briefly look at)
http://www.dsokids.com/2001/composerperiods.htm
2. Timeline - Put composers into their correct time period
http://www.dsokids.com/games/timeline/
3. Play Beethoven Baseball
http://www.dsokids.com/games/baseball/
4. If need additional activity, play hangman with composers
http://www.dsokids.com/games/hangman/hanginst.asp