Opera And Classical-Modern Music

Front 1

Which composer studied with George Frideric Handel and composed the Beggar's Opera?

Back 1

John Gay

Front 2

What was the Beggar's Opera?

Back 2

A famous ballad opera composed by John Gay.

Front 3

Which composer was somewhat shy and reserved and composed works that span the transition from the Classical period to the Romantic era?

Back 3

Franz Schubert

Front 4

Schubert's Lieder were written in what formal structures?

Back 4

strophic, modified strophic, and through-composed

Front 5

What is a romantic poem set to music for solo voice with piano accompaniment?

Back 5

Lied

Front 6

Who is credited with the resurgence in the popularity of J.S. Bach and his music and, at the age of 26, was appointed conductor of the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra?

Back 6

Felix Mendelssohn

Front 7

Who was the violinist who revolutionized the world of the solo musician?

Back 7

Niccolo Paganini

Front 8

Who was the composer who also worked as a music critic for the New Journal for Music?

Back 8

Robert Schumann

Front 9

Which female pianist/composer enjoyed more public proclaim as a soloist than her husband during their life together?

Back 9

Clara Schumann

Front 10

What are important characteristics of character pieces?

Back 10

composed for a number of solo instruments with piano accompaniment; absolute, though some carried programatic titles; highly evocative works that conveyed one or two clear emotions; many were through-composed, though some followed simple ABA or rondo schemes; some were influenced by popular dance schemes, while others carried more generic titles; frequently published in a set.

Front 11

Who is often referred to as the "poet of the piano" and was a pioneer in the use of tempo rubato?

Back 11

Frederic Chopin

Front 12

Who is often referred to as the "Paganini of the piano," wrote programmatic symphonies he called symphonic poems, or tone poems, and conceived the idea of thematic transformation?

Back 12

Franz Liszt

Front 13

What were symphonic poems or tone poems?

Back 13

Programmatic, single-movement orchestral works.

Front 14

What was thematic transformation?

Back 14

Liszt wrote music that focused on one major thematic idea, which he would constantly develop throughout the course of a given piece.

Front 15

Berlioz's Symphonie Fantastique was what type of symphony?

Back 15

Five-movement program symphony.

Front 16

What recurring theme did Berlioz introduce in his Symphonie Fantastique?

Back 16

Idee Fixe, or fixed idea.

Front 17

What two gifted artists played a crucial role in Brahms's life?

Back 17

Robert and Clara Schumann

Front 18

Which composer, compared with other composers of the day, was more conservative and focused most of his attention on absolute music?

Back 18

Johannes Brahms

Front 19

Which single-movement orchestral format tended to carry programs about new topic or to in some way concern nature?

Back 19

Tone poems.

Front 20

Which single-movement orchestral formats frequently drew their inspiration from earlier literary works?

Back 20

Concert overtures and overture-fantasias.

Front 21

Composers in the Romantic era and 20th century wrote multi-movement compositions with programmatic themes. What are the most common of these multi-movement orchestral schemes?

Back 21

The program symphony and the orchestral suite.

Front 22

What composer created several works that are excellent examples of the nationalistic movement of the 19th century?

Back 22

Bedrich Smetana

Front 23

Smetana's composition titled ______ is one of the most picturesque tone poems ever composed.

Back 23

The Moldau

Front 24

In whose operas is there a great sense of Italian nationalism?

Back 24

Giuseppe Verdi

Front 25

What terms is said to have been created to describe Richard Wagner's practice of the systematic use of recurring thematic material?

Back 25

Leitmotiv

Front 26

What separates Wagner's music drama from traditional opera formats?

Back 26

He does away with the aria/recitative format and instead uses leitmotivs to unify his opera.

Front 27

Wagner's operas did not work well in opera houses of the day. To solve his staging problem, he built a new festival hall in the town of ______ with the support of King Ludwig II.

Back 27

Bayreuth

Front 28

What is Wagner's 18-hour masterpiece that is actually made up of four individual operas and is still performed every summer at Bayreuth?

Back 28

Der Ring des nibelungen, or Ring cycle

Front 29

What four operas make up Wagner's Ring cycle?

Back 29

Das Rheingold, Die Walkure, Siegfried, and Gotterdammerung

Front 30

Debussy began to incorporate ____, in which he would move long, extended-harmony chords up and down in direct parallel motion.

Back 30

Parallelism

Front 31

Beyond his harmonic techniques, which in and of themselves lead to a break down of tonality, Debussy also...

Back 31

Made use of chromaticism, using more notes that do not "belong" to a given key center, again helping to weaken the ear's ability to clearly identify a particular chord as tonic.

Front 32

Debussy's first composition to bring him any major attention was the tone poem ___.

Back 32

Prelude a l'apres-midi d'un faune

Front 33

Debussy's famous tone poem was based off a poem by the same name by _____.

Back 33

Stephane Mallarme

Front 34

What are the characteristics of verismo opera?

Back 34

Set in modern times and avoided focusing on "known" characters.

Front 35

What composer wrote most of the important works in verismo opera and, after Verdi, is Italy's most famous composer of opera?

Back 35

Giacomo Puccini

Front 36

What is one of Puccini's most famous works that tells the story of an American soldier that marries a young geisha?

Back 36

Madama Buttterfly

Front 37

Who wrote a number of vivid programmatic tone poems and symponies that tell specific musical stories or draw on deep philosophical points of view?

Back 37

Richard Strauss

Front 38

What is Strauss' most famous musical gesture?

Back 38

Also sprach Zarathustra

Front 39

The opening sequence to Strauss' Also sprach Zarathustra is used in the opening of which film?

Back 39

2001: A Space Odyssey

Front 40

Whose first three ballets either inspired other composers with their techincal innovation or repulsed them?

Back 40

Igor Stravinsky

Front 41

How did Stravinsky further bring about the breakdown of tonality?

Back 41

Using extreme dissonance, complex rhythms; at times writing for different parts of the orchestra in totally different key centers (polytonality), and superimposing completely different rhythmic patterns on top of one another.

Front 42

What famous work by Stravinsky caused a riot at its first performance and why?

Back 42

Le Sacre du Printemps (The Rite of Spring); he asks the orchestra to use polytonality, keeps changing the basic beat of the work, and coupled this with the ballet portrayal of a young girl who is forced to dance herself to death.

Front 43

Which composer moved away from Post-Romanticism to Expressionism, using musical techniques such as Klangfarbenmelodie and Sprechstimme?

Back 43

Arnold Schoenberg

Front 44

What is the technique of assigning certain tone colors to certain notes in an effort to create identifiable melodic patterns through timbre changes?

Back 44

Klangfarbenmelodie

Front 45

What is a dramatic form of vocal delivery that is half-spoken, half-sung on specific, notated musical pitches?

Back 45

Sprechstimme

Front 46

Who developed serialism?

Back 46

Shoenberg

Front 47

In what mathematical system of musical organization can the octave be divided into 12 equal half-steps?

Back 47

serialism

Front 48

Who were two students of Shoenberg?

Back 48

Anton Webern and Alban Berg

Front 49

Which of Shoenberg's students made exremely strict use of the system of serialism?

Back 49

Anton Webern

Front 50

Which of Shoenberg's students brought more of a Post-Romantic sensibility to his new techniques?

Back 50

Alban Berg

Front 51

___ is considered to be Berg's masterpiece, an opera based on an Expressionist play.

Back 51

Wozzeck

Front 52

In John Cage's musical language, ____, elements of pieces, or even the preparation of entire compositions and performances, are left up to chance operations.

Back 52

Aleatory music

Front 53

Which composer mixes together chance elements with meticulously controlled music?

Back 53

George Crumb

Front 54

What is highly tonal, repetitive music that shares many of the extended meditative qualities of Eastern music?

Back 54

Minimalism

Front 55

What three composers were interested in Minimalism?

Back 55

Glass, Reich, and Adams

Front 56

What two composers created multiple operas that made use of Minimalism?

Back 56

Adams and Glass

Front 57

Which composer was the first woman to recieve a doctorate in composition from Juilliard and the first woman to win a Pulitzer Prize for music?

Back 57

Ellen Zwilich

Front 58

What potential future did "rock and roll" musician, composer, and cultural iconoclast Frank Zappa seem to understand?

Back 58

For classical music to broaden its horizons and embrace more of contemporary society.