The Five, The Mighty Handful, and The New Russian School all depict the five Russian composers who came together in 1856-57 in St Petersburg. Their ultimate goal was to portray and produce a Russian style of music , and this is exactly what they would accomplish. Though one of "The Five" goes farther than this with his works, this being Modest Mussorgsky. Mussorgsky was a composer born march 21st 1839, with one of the most controversial names and spellings of a name. He was born to wealthy land owners and was raised for the military life. Studying piano at a young age in St. Petersburg, then later arriving at a cadet school. Mussorgsky’s importance to and influence on later composers are quite out of proportion to his relatively small output. The 65 songs he composed, many to his own texts, describe scenes of Russian life with great vividness and insight and realistically reproduce the inflections of the spoken Russian language. "Mussorgsky was recognized by both the Kuchka and Tchaikovsky as a powerful musical force." Rimsky-Korsakoff, for example, regarded some of his friend's boldest strokes as "mistakes, particularly in his harmonies." Mussorgsky was too knowledgeable about contemporary aesthetic philosophy and was too self-conscious, to the extent that his mental wrestling cut down on further composing. However, he knew what he wanted and felt it his job to flesh out his artistic intuitions. Mussorgsky's music challenged the music in the Nineteenth Century, and laid outside the standard Brahms-vs.-Wagner fight. He opened up a new musical path and a new aesthetic attitude. Even with being a patronized composer in the Nineteenth Century, he escalated to become a hero in the Twentieth. Mussorgsky’s 1874 suite Pi...
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...se forms. The performances of the piece by both the Philharmonia Orchestra and the Chicago Symphony are superb, maintaining a similar characteristic to both performances. The most obvious and deliberate difference are the tempos, the Philharmonic takes the "Promenade" at a stately and slower tempo. To which you can say they really exemplified the overall sound Mussorgsky was going for. There is a shared feel of phrasing and overall musicality between both performances, yet you will be driven back to the Philharmonia's rendition with their stately texturing and sound. The Philharmonia also explores the realm of the tenor tuba with their playing, to help the burden placed on the bass tuba player. Chicago's Symphony was able to utilize a broader range of dynamic contrast and coloring between their sections timbre, while maintaining the context of the pieces.
Felsenfeld described his “passion for this ‘other’ kind of music felt like the height of rebellion: I was the lone Bolshevik in my army” (pg. 626). He further defined his description by stating how “[r]ebels sought to break the mold, to do something that was exclusively ‘theirs,’ to be weird by way of self-expression,” and compared this idea of a rebel to himself: “... since I [he] was the only one I knew listening to symphonies and concerti, operas and string quartets, I felt I was the weirdest of them all; …,” signifying that he feels much like a rebel in his own musical vibe (pg. 626). Taking this feeling of rebellious passion and amazement of classical music, Felsenfeld “... decided, with little prior experience or interest, to become a composer,” ultimately changing his way and mood of life for the better by working in a career with music that he most irresistibly loves and people who share similar feelings to his own in contrast to the work he took up in piano bars and community theater orchestra pits where the music he felt were utterly dull and lifeless (pg.
Classical music can be best summed by Mr. Dan Romano who said, “Music is the hardest kind of art. It doesn't hang up on a wall and wait to be stared at and enjoyed by passersby. It's communication. Its hours and hours being put into a work of art that may only last, in reality, for a few moments...but if done well and truly appreciated, it lasts in our hearts forever. That's art, speaking with your heart to the hearts of others.” Starting at a young age Johann Sebastian Bach and Ludwig van Beethoven have done just that with their musical compositions. Both musical composers changed the world of music and captivated the hearts of many. Their love of composing shared many similar traits, though their musical styles were much different.
While Tchaikovsky is known for his compositions of classical ballet, he was overall great as a pianist. Like most composers of music, his compositions reflected that of his feelings greatly, which helped him connect to the public and spread his music quite well. As a child, he became better than his teacher in one year, and at the age of ten went to the School of Jurisprudence and quickly completed the upper division classes. After graduating, he did four years at the Ministry of Justice, which didn’t really suite him well. Once out of the Ministry of Justice in the 1860s, he joined the Music Conservatory at the age of 22. Shortly after joining, he composed his first orchestral score in 1864. Two years later, he settled down in Moscow and started to increase his fame as a composer. In the following years he would tour around Europe and even into the United States. In 1893, six days after the premiere of his last piece he
“Carmina Burana” and “Pictures At An Exhibition” are two wonderfully composed pieces of music, but the actual composers were very different. Carl Orff was born on July 10, 1895 in Munich, Germany. Orff began learning to play the piano at the age of five and soon realized he wanted to become a composer more than he wanted to perform. Orff is most widely known for the composition of “Carmina Burana” which was very popular within Nazi parties and camps. In contrast, the composer of “Pictures At An Exhibition” is Modeste Moussorgsky who was born just south of St. Petersburg on March 21, 1839. When Moussorgsky was introduced to Alexander Dargomyzhsky, a very important Russian composer, Moussorgsky began his professional music career. “Pictures At An Exhibition” is one of Moussorgsky’s most imaginative and creative pieces. The backgrounds of Carl Orff and Modeste Moussorgsky is useful knowledge when comparing some of their most popular works of music. Both composers are similar when it comes to structure and imagination, but different when you explore their early life and influences in the music world.
Russian composers of Prokofiev’s time were generally restrained and classical in their approach. (In class) Prokofiev on the other hand was known for his romantic tendencies for which he was scorned. However, his Symphony no.1 is known as his “classical” symphony as it is extremely classical in form and was written according to classical design attempting to emulate the style of Haydn. Similarities between Prokofiev’s Classical Symphony no.1 and Haydn include its orchestrion size and use of the sonata allegro form, of which is classical. Although Prokofiev's symphony is classical in many aspects, elements of Prokofiev's unique voice are clearly heard. (Ferris)
Schwartz, Boris. Music and Musical Life in Soviet Russia, 1917-1981. 2nd edition. Indiana University Press, 1983.
Igor Stravinsky was a Russian composer who reformed 20th-century music, and incited disturbances with The Rite of Spring. Stravinsky composed masterpieces in every genre. Russian-born American composer Igor Stravinsky is widely considered one of the great geniuses of modern music. His innovations in tone, rhythm, and harmony were revolutionary in their day, and his compositions have been universally acclaimed. Stravinsky's was known for his stylistic diversity. He changed the way composers thought about rhythmic structure. Stravinsky pushed the boundaries of musical design.
painting, and I react as such. There is a clear blue middle that he seems to draw attention to.
As a youth, Shostakovich believed that he was to be the successor to Beethoven's throne as the compositional genuis. It is safe to assume that no composer until Shostakovich had been so central to the history of his time, or had so consistently sought to symphonically express the sufferings and aspirations of his contemporaries as had Beethoven. Dmitri S...
Volkov, Solomon, and Antonina W. Bouis. Shostakovich and Stalin: the extraordinary relationship between the great composer and the brutal dictator. New York: Knopf, 2004. Print.
Stravinsky opens the Rite of Spring with a three-measure phrase melody played by a solo bassoon spelling out 024579. The bassoon continues to measures 4 and 5 emphasizing 013 by repetition (A, B-flat, C). The clarinet responds in the next measure with overlapping 0235 pitch classes. In measures 7 to 9, the bassoon returns to the opening material of 024579 and the English horn responds with 0257 in measures 10 and 11. Set class 0257 will play an important role in the movement and will be the basis for its expanded variation in measures 15 to 19. Measure 12 functions as a cadential harmony with pitch class 0157. This harmony is important since it will be recalled later on in the pizzicato of the cello in measures 73 to 75 thereby preparing the
...re was very interesting transitions between the variation, for example, string section plays the variation from low to high, when they reach the highest note, the brass family takes over and continue with the scale and make it more higher. Tremolo style was used in this piece, which is a quick ups and downs stroke mode. The music were very soothing and attracted the audience. Lastly, they end the piece with the same variations that was played at the beginning.
Many of Igor Stravinsky’s finest works were molded by the influence of Russian folk tunes. These melodies were either wholly taken by the composer, or they provided a sketch for him to create his own imitation of peasant music. Although his music, especially his early ballets, was extraordinarily influenced by Russian folk music, he ended up rejecting the immense value that these rustic tunes had in modern music. And because he never cited his sources, he was able to escape the admittance of using folk tunes in his own early music. However, musicologists have identified many of the sources that Stravinsky borrowed, and it was discovered that the composer relied quite heavily on the indelible melodies of Russian folk culture.
He published his first orchestral works, a symphony and an opera, by 1869 (1). Inspired by E. T. A. Hoffmann’s libretto, Tchaikovsky wrote his best-recognized ballet, The Nutcracker (“Peter Ilych Tchaikovsky” 2).The Nutcracker lends an ironic understatement to Tchaikovsky because of the ballet’s cheerfulness and Tchaikovsky’s various forms of mental stress he faced throughout his life (2).... ... middle of paper ... ...
Tchaikovsky is one of the most popular of all composers. The reasons are several and understandable. His music is extremely tuneful, opulently and colourfully scored, and filled with emotional passion. Undoubtedly the emotional temperature of the music reflected the composer's nature. He was afflicted by both repressed homosexuality and by the tendency to extreme fluctuations between ecstasy and depression. Tchaikovsky was neurotic and deeply sensitive, and his life was often painful, but through the agony shone a genius that created some of the most beautiful of all romantic melodies. With his rich gifts for melody and special flair for writing memorable dance tunes, with his ready response to the atmosphere of a theatrical situation and his masterly orchestration, Tchaikovsky was ideally equipped as a ballet composer. His delightful fairy-tale ballets, Swan Lake, The Sleeping Beauty and The Nutcracker are performed more than any other ballets. Swan Lake, Tchaikovsky's first ballet, was commissioned by the Imperial Theatres in Moscow in 1875. He used some music from a little domestic ballet of the same title, composed for his sister Alexandra's children in 1871.