DAngelo Milford

April 27, 2015

Music History 3A

Music History Unit 5 Timeline

Franz Schubert (1797-1828)
Schubert was the first great master of the Romantic Lied and a prolific composer in all
genres. He wrote over six hundred Lieder, many of which were first performed for friends in
home concerts known as Schubertiads. Schuberts ability to capture the mood and character of
a poem and make the music its equal in emotive and descriptive power, along with the sheer
beauty of his music and the pleasure it gives to those who perform it, have endeared Schuberts
songs both to his contemporaries and to generations of singers, pianists, and listeners. His
songs set the standard that later song composers strove to match.
1814 C.E. Franz Schubert, Gretchen am Spinnrade (Gretchen at the Spinning Wheel)
1815 C.E. Heidenrslein (Little Heath-Rose)
1815 C.E. Erlknig (The Erl-King)
1816 C.E. Das Wandern (The Wanderer)
1819 C.E. Trout Quintet
1822 C.E. Franz Schubert, Unfinished Symphony
1823 C.E. Die schne Mllerin (The Pretty Miller-Maid)
1823-1828 C.E. Moments musicaux (Musical Moments)
1824 C.E. String Quartet in A Minor
1824 C.E. String Quartet in D Minor (Death and the Maiden)
1825 C.E. Great Symphony No. 9 in C Major
1826 C.E. String Quartet in G Major
1827 C.E. Schubert, Winterreise (Winters Journey)
1827 C.E. Impromptus
1828 C.E. Schwanengesang (Swan Song)
1828 C.E. Fantasy in F Minor
1828 C.E. Schubert, String Quintet in C Major

1828 C.E. String Quintet in C Major

Robert Schumann (1810-1856)
Robert Schumann was an influential music critic and outstanding composer, especially
of piano music, songs, chamber music, and symphonies. He studied piano from age seven and
soon began to compose. After university studies in law, Schumann devoted himself to becoming
a concert pianist, studying in Leipzig with Friedrich Wieck, his future father-in-law. When an
injury to Schumann's right hand cut short his performing career, he turned to composition and
criticism. In his career as a composer, he ofter focused on one medium at a time; piano music
until 1840, then songs that year, symphonies in 1841, chamber music in 1842-43, oratorio in
1843, dramatic music in 1847-48, and church music in 1852.
1834-1835 C.E. Robert Schumann, Carnaval
1834-1844 C.E. Leipzig Neue Zeitschrift fr Musik (New Journal of Music)
1840 C.E. Schumann, Dichterliebe (A Poets Love)
1851 C.E. Robert Schumann completes Symphony No. 4
Felix Mendelssohn (1809-1847)
One of the leading German Romantic composers was Felix Mendelssohn. He blended
influences from Bach, Handel, Mozart, Beethoven, and his own contemporaries in music that
combined contrapuntal skill and formal clarity with Romantic expression, beautiful melodies, and
interesting, often unpredictable rhythms. A virtuoso performer on both piano and organ,
Mendelssohn emphasized fluent technique over bravura display, preferring the older style of
virtuosity typical of Mozart and Clementi to the new virtuosity of his own day, which he viewed
as a kind of acrobatics without substance.
1825 C.E. Octet for Strings, Op. 20
1827 C.E. String Quartet in A Minor, Op. 13
1827 C.E. Seven Character Pieces
1828-1832 C.E. Meeresstille und glckliche Fahrt (Becalmed at Sea and Prosperous
Voyage)
1829 C.E. String Quartet in Eb Major, Op. 12
1830 C.E. Felix Mendelssohn, Songs without Words, Book I
1830 C.E. Symphony No. 5 (Reformation)
1831 C.E. No. 1 in G Minor
1832 C.E. The Hebrides (Fingals Cave)
1833 C.E. Felix Mendelssohn , Symphony No. 4 (Italian)

1836 C.E. St. Paul

1837 C.E. No. 2 in D Minor
1840 C.E. Lobgesang Symphony No. 2 (Song of Praise)
1842 C.E. Symphony No. 3 (Scottish)
1843 C.E. Felix Mendelssohn founds Leipzig Conservatory
1844 C.E. Mendelssohn, Violin Concerto
1846 C.E. Elijah
Fryderyk Chopin (1810-1849)
Fryderyk Chopin composed almost exclusively for piano. His entire output comprises
about two hundred solo piano pieces, six works for piano and orchestra composed for his
concert appearances as a young virtuoso, some twenty songs, and four chamber works. He is
revered for idiomatic writing that opened new possibilities for the piano and appealed to
amateurs and connoisseurs alike. The genres he cultivated range from the tude and prelude,
associated with teaching , and types suitable for amateurs, such as dances and nocturnes, to
longer, more challenging works, including ballades, scherzos, and sonatas, for his own
performances and for other advanced players.
1829-1832 C.E. Opp. 10
1831 C.E. Fryderyk Chopin settles in Paris
1831 C.E. Mazurka in Bb Major, Op. 7, No. 1
1832-1837 C.E. Opp. 25
1835 C.E. Nocturne in Db Major, Op. 27, No. 2
1836-1839 C.E. Chopin, Preludes
Franz Liszt (1811-1886)
Franz Liszt was the most astounding piano virtuoso of his era and one of its most
important composers. He had an enormous impact on music, in a variety of roles. As the
foremost piano virtuoso of his time, Liszt devised new playing techniques and textres for piano
music. As a composer, he introduced innovations in form and harmony and invented the
symphonic poem. As a conductor, he championed Bach, Beethoven, and other composers from
the past, alongside Berlioz, Wagner, and other contemporaries. As a teacher, he invented the
masterclass, in which students play for each other as well as for the teacher, and bother
approaches that remain standard practice today.
1822 C.E. Franz Liszt begins career as virtuoso pianist
1837-1838 C.E. Album dun voyageur (Album of a Traveler

1838-1861 C.E. Liszt, Annes de plerinage (Years of Pilgrimage), Books 1-2

1845-1849 C.E. Un sospiro (A Sigh)
1848 C.E. Liszt appointed court music director at Weimar
1850-1855 C.E. Prometheus
1852-1854 C.E. Mazeppa
1853 C.E. Sonata in B Minor
1853-1854 C.E. Orpheus
1854 C.E. Faust Symphony
1854 C.E. Franz Liszt, Les Prludes (The Preludes)
1855 C.E. Piano Concerto No. 1 in Eb Major
1856 C.E. Dante Symphony
1857-1872 C.E. St. Elisabeth
1866-1872 C.E. Christus
Hector Berlioz (1803-1869)
Hector Berlioz, who created more than a dozen works that have gained the status of
musical classics and who wrote the nineteenth-century bible on orchestration, played flute and
guitar but never learned how to play piano. Berliozs Symphonie fantastique and other
symphonic works made him the leader of the Romantic movements radical wing. All
subsequent composers of program music would be indebted to him. He enriched orchestral
music with new resources of harmony, color, expression, and form. His orchestration initiated a
new era in which instrumental color rivaled harmony and melody as an expressive tool for
composers.
1830 C.E. Hector Berlioz, Symphonie fantastique
1834 C.E. Harold en Italie (Harold in Italy)
1837 C.E. Berlioz, Requiem (Grande Messe des Morts)
1839, revised ca. 1847 C.E. Romo et Juliette
1840 C.E. Grande symphonie funbre et triomphale (Grand Funeral and Triumphant
Symphony)
1843 C.E. Treatise on Instrumentation and Orchestration
1855 C.E. Te Deum
1856-1858 C.E. Hector Berlioz composes Les Troyens
Gioachino Rossini (1792-1868)

If asked who was the most famous and important living composer, most people in
Europe around 1825 would have answered not Beethoven but rather Gioachino Rossini. He
was the most popular and influential opera composer of his generation, in part because he
blended aspects of opera buffs and opera seria into both his comic and his serious operas,
making them all more varied, more appealing, and more true to human character. The new
conventions he established for Italian opera would endure for over half a century.
1813 C.E. LItaliana in Algeri (The Italian Woman in Algiers)
1816 C.E. Gioachino Rossini, Il Barbiere di Siviglia (The Barber of Seville)
1816 C.E. Otello
1818 C.E. Mos in Egitto (Moses in Egypt)
1823 C.E. Semiramide
1829 C.E. Rossini, Guillaume Tell (William Tell)
Vincenzo Bellini (1801-1835)
Vincenzo Bellini was a younger contemporary of Rossinis who came to prominence
after Rossini had retired from opera composition. Bellini preferred dramas of passion, with fast,
gripping action. His favorite librettist, Felice Romani, did not limit action to recitative passages
but built it into the arias and provided opportunities for lyrical moments within the recitatives. He
is best known for long, sweeping, highly embellished, intensely emotional melodies.
1831 C.E. La Sonnambula (The Sleepwalker)
1831 C.E. Vincenzo Bellini, Norma
1835 C.E. I Puritani (The Puritans)
Gaetano Donizetti (1797-1848)
One of the most prolific Italian composers during the second quarter of the century was
Gaetano Donizetti, who was compared oratorios, cantatas, chamber and church music, about
one hundred songs, and several symphonies in addition to some seventy operas. Donizetti, like
Rossini, had an instinct for the theater and for melody that effectively captures a character,
situation, or feeling. His comic operas often mix sentimentality with comedy. In his serious
operas, Donizetti constantly moves the drama forward, occasionally averting cadences that
would entice applause and thus sustaining dramatic tension until a major scene is finished.
1830 C.E. Anna Bolena
1832 C.E. Lelisir damore (The Elixir of Love)
1835 C.E. Gaetano Donzetti, Lucia di Lammermoor
1840 C.E. La Fille du regiment (The Daughter of the Regiment)

1843 C.E. Don Pasquale

Carl Maria von Weber (1786-1826)
The work that established German Romantic opera was Der Freischtz by Carl Maria
von Weber. What made Der Freischtz so daring for its time was not only Webers unusual
orchestration and harmonies, but also his idea of putting ordinary people center stage, talking
and singing about their concerns, their loves, and their fears. Webers association of motives
and keys with particular characters or events exercised an enormous influence on later
composers of opera. Webers use of tritone-related and third-related harmonies, diminished
seventh chords, and strings tremolos to evoke mystery, danger, and the supernatural
contributed to the establishment of these associations as conventions followed by countless
Romantic composers and still used by composers for film and television.
1821 C.E. Carl Maria von Weber, Der Freischtz (The Magic Rifleman), in Berlin
1823 C.E. Euryanthe
1826 C.E. Oberon
Richard Wagner (1813-1883)
The outstanding composer of German opera, and one of the crucial figures in
nineteenth-century culture, was Richard Wagner. Several of his ideas had an enormous impact
on all of the arts, notably his belief in the interrelationships between the arts and his view of the
art as a kind of religion. All of his important compositions are for the stage. After bringing
German Romantic opera to a new height, he reconceived the very nature of opera as a drama
based in music but incorporating all the other arts. In his later works, he developed a rich
chromatic idiom and a system of conveying meanings through motivic associations which
influenced composers for generations.
1842 C.E. Rienzi
1843 C.E. Richard Wagner, Der fliegende Hollnder (The Flying Dutchman)
1845 C.E. Tannhuser
1850 C.E. Lohengrin
1850 C.E. The Artwork of the Future
1851, revised 1868 C.E. Opera and Drama
1857-1859 C.E. Wagner composes Tristan und Isolde
1862-1867 C.E. Die Meistersinger von Nrnburg (The Meistersingers of Nuremberg)
1876 C.E. Wagner, premiere of complete Ring cycle
1882 C.E. Parsifal

Giuseppe Verdi (1813-1901)

Giuseppe Verdi was the dominant figure in Italian music for the fifty years after Donizetti,
as central to Italian opera as Wagner was to German opera. The first of his twenty-six operas
was produced in 1839 when he was twenty-six, the last in 1893 when he was eighty. His music
has been called the epitome of Romantic drama and passion. He worked within the traditions of
his predecessors but during his long life continually refined his techniques. The secret to Verdis
popularity was his ability to capture character,feelings, and situation in memorable melodies that
sound both fresh and familiar.
1842 C.E. Nabucco
1849 C.E. Luisa Miller
1851 C.E. Rigoletto
1853 C.E. Giuseppe Verdi, Il trovatore and La traviata
1855 C.E. Les vpres siciliennes (The Sicilian Vespers)
1859 C.E. Un ballo in maschera (A Masked Ball)
1862, revised 1869 C.E. La forza del destino (The Future of Destiny)
1871 C.E. Aida
1887 C.E. Verdis Otello premieres
1893 C.E. Falstaff
Giacomo Puccini (1858-1924)
The most successful Italian opera composer after Verdi was Giacomo Puccini. Puccini
created a highly individual personal style by blending Verdis focus on vocal melody with
elements of Wagners approach, notably the use of recurring melodies or leitmotives, less
reliance on conventional operatic forms, and a greater role for the orchestra in creating musical
continuity. In Puccinis operas, arias, choruses, and ensembles are usually part of a continuous
flow rather than set off as independent numbers.
1884 C.E. Le villi
1893 C.E. Manon Lescaut
1896 C.E. Giacomo Puccini, La bohme
1900 C.E. Tosca
1904 C.E. Puccini, Madama Butterfly
1926 C.E. Turandot
Piotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky (1840-1893)

The leading Russian composer of the nineteenth century was Piotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky.
Tchaikovsky sought to reconcile the nationalist and internationalist tendencies in Russian music,
drawing models from Beethoven, Schubert, Schumann, and other Western composers as well
as from Russian folk and popular music. He wrote a great deal of music for the stage, including
incidental music, ballets, and operas. He was the most prominent Russian composer of the
nineteenth century, both in his country and in the West. He combined his Russian heritage with
influences from Italian opera, French ballet, and German symphony and song.
1876 C.E. Swan Lake
1877-1878 C.E. Symphony No. 4 in F Minor
1878 C.E. Violin Concerto
1879 C.E. Piotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky, Eugene Onegin
1888 C.E. Symphony No. 5 in E Minor
1889 C.E. The Sleeping Beauty
1890 C.E. The Queen of Spades
1892 C.E. The Nutcracker
1893 C.E. Piotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky, Sixth Symphony (Pathtique)
Modest Musorgsky (1839-1881)
Widely considered the most original of the Mighty Five, Musorgsky earned a living as a
clerk in the civil service and received most of his musical training from Balakirev. The realism so
prominent in nineteenth-century Russian literature echoes especially in Boris Godunov, in the
way Musorgsky imitated Russian speech, in his lifelike musical depiction of gestures, and, in the
choral scenes, the sound and stir of the crowds. Musorgskys harmony is essential tonal,
projecting a clear sense of key, but in many respects it is highly original, even revolutionary.
Some passages seem more modal than tonal, and dissonances may be left hanging or resolve
in unconventional ways.
1867 C.E. Night on Bald Mountain
1872 C.E. The Nursery
1872-1880 C.E. Khovanshchina (The Khovansky Affair)
1874 C.E. Premiere of Modest Musorgskys Boris Godunov
1874 C.E. Modest Musorgsky, Pictures at an Exhibition
1874 C.E. Sunless
1875 C.E. Songs and Dances of Death
Johannes Brahms (1833-1897)

Johannes Brahms was the leading German composer of his time in every field except
opera and an important influence on twentieth-century music. Brahms matured as a composer
just as the classical repertoire came to dominate concert life. By the time he was twenty, threefifths of the music played in orchestral concerts was by dead composers, and by the time he
was forty, that proportion had risen beyond three-quarters. Brahms fully understood what it
meant to compose for audiences whose taste were formed by the classical masterpieces of the
last two centuries: one had to create pieces that were like those already enshrined in the
repertoire in function and aesthetic yet were different enough to offer something new and
attractive.
1861 C.E. Piano Concerto No. 1 in D Minor
1861 C.E. Variations and Fugue on a Theme of Handel, Op. 24
1863 C.E. Variations on a Theme of Paganini, Op. 35
1864 C.E. Johannes Brahms, Piano Quintet, Op. 34
1868 C.E. Wiegenlied (Lullaby)
1868 C.E. Ein deutsches Requiem (A German Requiem)
1873 C.E. Variations on a Theme of Haydn, Op. 56a
1876 C.E. Symphony No. 1 in C Minor, Op. 68
1877 C.E. Symphony No. 2 in D Major, Op. 73
1878 C.E. Violin Concerto in D Major, Op. 77
1881 C.E. Piano Concerto No. 2 in Bb Major, Op. 83
1883 C.E. Symphony No. 3 in F Major, Op. 90
1885 C.E. Brahms, Fourth Symphony
Richard Strauss (1864-1949)
Richard Strauss was a dominant figure in German musical life for most of his career. He
was celebrated as a conductor, holding positions in the opera houses of Munich, Weimar, Berlin,
and Vienna, and conducting most of the worlds great orchestras during numerous tours. As a
composer, he is remembered especially for his tone poems (his preferred term for symphonic
poems), most written before 1900; his operas, all but one of which came later; and his Lieder.
1888-1889 C.E. Don Juan
1888-1889 C.E. Tod und Verklrung (Death and Transfiguration)
1888, revised 1891 C.E. Macbeth
1894-1895 C.E. Till Eulenspiegel
1896 C.E. Also sprach Zarathustra (Thus Spoke Zoroaster)

1897 C.E. Don Quixote

1897-1898 C.E. Ein Heldenleben (A Heros Life)
Gustav Mahler (1860-1911)
Gustav Mahler was the leading Austro-German composer of symphonies after Brahms
and Bruckner and one of the great masters of the song for voice and orchestra. Mahler made
his living as a conductor, renowned for his dynamism, precision, expressivity, and tyrannical
perfectionism. Composing mainly in the summers between busy seasons of conducting, Mahler
completed nine symphonies, leaving a tenth unfinished, and five multimovement works for voice
with orchestra (for which he also prepared versions with piano). He revised most of his works
repeatedly, including the first seven symphonies, retouching the orchestration but not changing
the substance of the music.
1884-85, revised 1891-96 C.E. Lieder eines fahrenden Gesellen (Songs of a
Wayfarer)
1884-88, revised 1893-96, 1906, and 1910 C.E. First Symphony
1888-94, revised 1906 C.E. Second Symphony
1892-1901 C.E. Des Knaben Wunderhorn (The Boys Magic Horn)
1895-96, revised 1906 C.E. Third Symphony
1899-1900, revised 1906 and 1910 C.E. Fourth Symphony
1901-1904 C.E. Gustav Mahler, Kindertotenlieder (Songs on the Death of Children)
1901-1905 C.E. Fifth, Sixth, and Seventh Symphonies
1906 C.E. Eighth Symphony
1908 C.E. Das Lied von der Erde (The Song of the Earth)
1909 C.E. Ninth Symphony
Bedrich Smetana (1824-1884)
Like the Russians, Bedrich Smetana is better known outside of his native land for his
instrumental music than for his operas, no doubt because instrumental music can leap over the
language barrier. He was influenced by the innovations of the New German School, particularly
by Liszt. He sought to create a national music in his String Quartet No. 1 and in his cycle of six
symphonic poems collectively titled M vlast.
1872-1879 C.E. Bedrich Smetana, M vlast (My Country)
1876 C.E. String Quartet No. 1, From My Life
Antonn Dvork (1841-1904)

Like the Russians, Antonn Dvork is better known outside of his native land for his
instrumental music than for his operas, no doubt because instrumental music can leap over the
language barrier. He was influenced by the innovations of the New German School, particularly
by Wagner. He wrote nine symphonies, four concertos, numerous dances and other works for
orchestra, and many chamber works, piano pieces, songs, and choral works. Many of his pieces
are in an international style.
1878 C.E. Antonn Dvork, Slavonic Dances, Op. 46
1880 C.E. Symphony No. 6 in D Major
1883 C.E. Husitsk
1884-1885 C.E. Symphony No. 7 in D Minor
1889 C.E. Symphony No. 8 in G Major
1890-1891 C.E. Dumky Piano Trio
1893 C.E. Antonn Dvork, New World Symphony
1893 C.E. String Quartet No. 12 in F Major (American)
1894-1895 C.E. Cello Concerto in B Minor
Edvard Grieg (1843-1907)
At the same time that the Mighty Five were forging a distinct Russian idiom, Edvard
Grieg was writing a series of songs, short piano pieces, and orchestral suites that emulated the
model melodies and harmonies as well as the dance rhythms of his native Norway. His piano
style, with its delicate grace notes and mordents, owes something to Chopin, but the allpervading influence in his music is that of Norwegian folk songs and dances, reflected in his
modal turns of melody and harmony; frequent drones in the bass or middle register; and the
fascinating combination of 3/4 and 6/8 rhythm in the Sltter.
1867-1901 C.E. Lyric Pieces
1868, revised 1907 C.E. Piano Concerto in A Minor
1875 C.E. Peer Gynt Suite

DAngelo Milford
April 27, 2015
Music History 3A

Music History Unit 5 Listening Journal

1814 C.E. Gretchen am Spinnrade (Gretchen at the Spinning Wheel)
The composer is Franz Schubert. The form and genre is Lieder. The piano suggests
the spinning wheel by using a constant rising and falling sixteenth-note figure in the right hand,
and the motion of the treadle by using repeated notes in the left hand. These figures also
convey Gretchens agitation as she thinks of her beloved. Often the piano introduces the songs
mood and central image in a short prelude before the voice enters. The author used this as an
example because it was Schuberts first Lied set to a text by Goethe and it became one of his
most famous, prized for its dramatic and empathetic portrayal of a young womans first feelings
of love.
1816 C.E. Il barbiere di Siviglia (The Barber of Seville), Act II, scene 5: Cavatina, Una
voce poco fa
The composer is Gioachino Rossini. The form and genre is comic opera. The
orchestral introduction presents ideas that will reappear later. There is no opening recitative, but
the first part of her cantabileas she narrates being serenaded by and falling in love with
Lindorois broken into small phrases punctuated by orchestral chords. When she swears to
outwit her guardian, the style briefly changes to a comic patter song, which is preceded and
followed by elaborate embellishments and runs as she vows to marry Lindoro. The author used
this as an example because it conveys Rosinas character through changes of style.
1821 C.E. Der Freischtz, Act II, Finale: Wolfs Glen Scene
The composer is Carl Maria von Weber. The form and genre is opera. The scene
begins with soft tremolos and chromatic harmony laced with diminished seventh chords.
Trombones and clarinets low in their range and a descending chromatic line in cellos and
basses add to the gloom. An unseen ghostly chorus sings, juxtaposing soft recitation on F# with
loud cries of Uhui!, accompanied by the diminished seventh chord. The author used this as an

example because the Wolfs Glen Scene, during which the seven bullets are cast, incorporates
elements of the melodrama.
1830 C.E. Symphonie fantastique, Fifth movement: Dream of a Witches Sabbath
The composer is Hector Berlioz. The form and genre is program symphony. It
begins slowly and mysteriously with muted strings playing a diminished seventh chord tremolo
and tritones in the bass, both associated with the diabolical. Soft flutters in the strings and
louder figures in the winds and brass suggest the convergence of the ghosts, wizards, and
monsters described in the program. As if from a distance, and then gradually approaching, a
clarinet begins a distorted, mocking version of the ide fixe in a fast 6/8, embellished with grace
notes and trills. The author used this as an example because the fifth and final movement
depicts a Dream of a Witches Sabbath, presenting transformations of the ide fixe and two
other themes, first singly, then in combinations.
1831 C.E. Norma, Act I, scene 4, excerpt: Casta diva
The composer is Vincenzo Bellini. The form and genre is opera. When Norma prays
to the moon for peace with the Romans, her vocal line seems to be in constant motion, creating
a deeply expressive and unpredictable melody. The secret of such melodies is that an
underlying simple structure, often stepwise motion, is embellished with ever-changing figuration
that draws our attention and plays with our expectations. The author used this as an example
because Bellini is known for long, sweeping, highly embellished, intensely emotional melodies
and this is among the most famous.
1834-1835 C.E. Carnival, Excerpts
The composer is Robert Schumann. The form and genre is character pieces. The
titles of the set and its twenty short movements evoke a masked ball during carnival time, he
period of parties, parades, masquerades, and feasting before the penitential season of Lent.
The varied images evoked by the titles parallel the strong contrasts between movements, each
of which features distinctive ideas and textures that give it a highly individual character. The
author used this as an example because it was one of Schumann's most popular sets of
character pieces.
Eusebius
His piece is the slowest and least dancelike in the entire set. Over an almost
entirely chromatic bass, moving for the most part in even quarter note, the right hand traces
undulating patterns in odd-numbered divisions of seven, five, and three. The twisting melody

avoids the arch shape common to many tunes and instead constantly winds backs on itself. The
music begins soft and thin-textured, builds in dynamics and density, and then recedes again.
Florestan
Florestan is a total contrast: a fast waltz in G minor, marked Passionato, with
sforzandos on offbeats and cascading arpeggios, depicting Florestan as a passionate virtuoso.
It is mercurial, rapidly changing his moods, is suggested by the alternation of the first phrase
with a sudden turn to an Adagio figure, and then the return of the opening phrase.
Coquette
The appearance of Coquette may explain Florestans distraction. Her flirtatious
charm is suggested by a lilting dotted rhythm in a fast waltz tempo, and her effect on Florestan
by the sudden fortissimo figures in octaves on the second beat of the measure, as if his heart
were pounding in his chest. Teasingly, her music starts with a little cadential figure colored by
dissonant augmented fifths.
1835 C.E. Nocturne in D-flat Major, Op. 27, No. 2
The composer is Fryderyk Chopin. The form is nocturne. The genre is character
piece. In this nocturne, the accompanimental figuration aches over two octaves and capitalizes
on the pianos natural resonance by using wide spacing in the bass and closer spacing in the
middle range. The melody also ranges widely, featuring large leaps and florid embellishments
that are inspired by vocal coloratura but beyond the capacity of most voices. The author used
this as an example because Chopin composed this and issued them with a dedication to
Countess Thrse dApponyi, wife of the Austrian ambassador in Paris.
1841 C.E. Symphony No. 4 in D Minor, Op. 120, First movement
The composer is Robert Schumann. The form and genre is symphony. From a bare
opening A in octaves, the melody of the slow introduction emerges and is gradually developed.
Throughout the movement, the first theme is often accompanied by a rhythmic figure of an
eighth and two sixteenth notes. The entire exposition is based on the first theme, as the
transition, second theme, and brief closing theme each present new variants with contrasting
characters and moods. The author used this as an example because the Fourth Symphony
represents Schumanns most radical rethinking of the symphony.
1845-1849 C.E. Trois tudes de concert: No. 3, Un sospiro
The composer is Franz Liszt. The form and genre is tude. It addresses the technical
problem of how to project a slower moving melody outside or within rapid broken-chord
figurations. At the beginning, the pedal sustains harmonies while the two hands brave

treacherous leaps over each other to pick out a pentatonic tune. Later on, the melody appears
in the right hand in the middle of the texture, while the left arpeggiates below and above it. The
author used this as an example because it illustrates Liszts virtuosic technique.
1846 C.E. Elijah, Chorus: And then shall your light break forth
The composer is Felix Mendelssohn. The form and genre is oratorio. In Elijah,
Mendelssohn employed a wide variety of styles and textures for choral movements, as Handel
had done in his oratorios; evoked the style chorales, which Bach had used in his Passions; and
used unifying motives and links between movements to integrate the work into a cohesive
whole, following the practice of his own time. The author used this as an example because the
final chorus of Elijah is Handelian in spirit, with a powerful homorhythmic opening, vigorous
fugue, culminating statement of the fugue theme in chordal harmony, and contrapuntal Amen,
while contrasts of minor and major and touches of chromaticism draw on more recent styles.
1853 C.E. La traviata, Act III, scene and duet
The composer is Giuseppe Verdi. The form and genre is opera. The scene follows
the structure Rossini had standardized for duetsscena (recitative), tempo dattacco (opening
section), slow cantabile, tempo di mezzo (contrasting dramatic section), and fast cabalettayet
each element is in a new style characteristic of Verdi. Instead of recitative punctuated by the
orchestra, the scene presents a complete musical texture in the orchestra, a skipping melody in
four-measure phrases, over which Violetta and her maid engage in recitative-like dialogue. The
author used this as an example because many features of Verdis mature works are embodied
in this.
1857-1859 C.E. Tristan und Isolde Excerpts: Prelude, Conclusion of Act I, scene 5
The composer is Richard Wagner. The form and genre is opera. Desire is evoked in
Tristan und Isolde from the very beginning of the Prelude as Wagner uses chromatic harmony
and delayed resolutions to convey an almost inexpressible yearning. The opening motive, a
rising sixth followed by a chromatic descent, suggests longing. The harmony is constantly
churning, shifting keys, altering chords chromatically, and blurring progressions by means of
nonchord tones. The author used this as an example because it has become a monument of
music as secular religion, a notion Wagner endorsed and one that pervades much musical
activity in the later nineteenth century.
1878 C.E. Slavonic Dance No. 1 in C Major (Furiant), Op. 46, No. 1
The composer is Antonn Dvork. The form and genre is dance for piano four
hands or orchestra. The first dance is a furiant, a couple dance in triple meter and four-

measure phrases that typically begins with hemiolas, as if the first two measures of each phrase
were three duple measures instead. Later the dance moves in a steady triple time like the
Austrian lndler. The Czech word furiant means proud, swaggering man, and one midnineteenth century description of the dance suggests that the hemiolas at the beginning were
intended to imitate the swagger of a proud farmer, with his chest puffed up, hands on hips, and
elbows out as he stomps his feet. The author used this as an example because it was one of
the most widely known of Czech dances that Dvork was highlighting his ethnicity on.
1885 C.E. Symphony No. 4 in E Minor, Finale
The composer is Johannes Brahms. The form and genre is symphony. Like
Beethoven, Brahms first presents his bass line as a melody in the upper register and only works
it into the bass after several variations. When the ostinato finally reaches the bass, the melodic
figuration is a sarabande rhythm exactly like Bachs and subsequent variations often parallel
Bachs from dotted rhythms to bariolage (rapidly alternating stopped and open strings). The
author used this as an example because the finale of Brahms Fourth Symphony is a chaconne,
a form that reflects Brahms fascination with Baroque music.
1893 C.E. Symphony No. 6 in B Minor (Pathtique), Third movement
The composer is Piotr Ilich Tchaikovsky. The form and genre is symphony. The
movement opens with twittering staccato triplets that alternate between strings and winds. The
rapid triplet motion, soft dynamic, and light orchestration lend this opening the sound of a
scherzo; the triplets and scherzo character will continue throughout the A section, occasionally
punctuated with louder outbursts and fuller textures. The author used this as an example
because this movement would make a perfect culmination for a symphony.
1897 C.E. Don Quixote, themes and variations 1 and 2
The composer is Richard Strauss. The form and genre is tone poem. Strauss
presents the two principal themesthe first on Don Quixote, the second on Sancho Panza in
two separate sections. In Don Quixote, der Ritter von der traurigen Gestalt, the solo cello states
the knights theme in D minor, echoed and joined by solo violin and English horn. The theme
soars, then gradually sinks, then soars again, in a musical analogy to Don Quixotes everfrustrated but always renewed idealism. Then bass clarinet and tenor tuba present Sancho
Panzas theme in F major, using a turning gesture and wide leaps to suggest the lumbering,
roly-poly servant on his donkey. The author used this as an example because the wry humor
and cleverness in Don Quixote lie not so much in the apt depiction of real things as in the play
with musical ideas.

1904 C.E. Madama Butterfly, from Act I

The composer is Giacomo Puccini. The form and genre is opera. As the excerpt
begins, Pinkerton invites Butterfly into their new home, using Puccinis normative style,
unmarked by any of the special qualities that make the others distinctive. This style is European
in sound, with lyrical melodies and the standard harmonic vocabulary of the late nineteenth
century, tonal yet often chromatic. The orchestra plays the music that accompanied Butterflys
entrance earlier in the act: a simple, sweet, diatonic melody, immediately varied in sequence a
step higher, harmonized with major triads and chromic chords that resolve normally. The author
used this as an example because all of these characteristics such as a highly individual
personal style by blending Verdis focus on vocal melody with elements of Wagners approach,
notably the use of reoccurring melodies or leitmotives, less reliance on conventional operatic
forms, and a greater role for the orchestra in creating musical continuity are evident in the scene
of Butterflys marriage to Pinkerton in Madama Butterfly.