Ernst Ludwig Kirchner

On Sunday, October 30th, I attended a live performance by the Warsaw Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Jacek Kaspszyk as a part of their 2016 U.S. tour. When I walked into the concert hall, there was an electric atmosphere as a crowd of people was waiting in anticipation to find their seats and settle down to enjoy the show. In order to have a better idea of what I was about to experience, I read the playbill that explained how the Warsaw Philharmonic Orchestra is the premiere musical…

written by Beethoven in 1802, while he was resting in Heiligenstadt (Ludwig van Beethoven 's Biography: Heiligenstadt Testament, n.d.). It was in part his will, the first of three that he wrote during his lifetime (Ludwig van Beethoven 's Biography: Heiligenstadt Testament, n.d.). The document was also a letter to his brothers, in it Beethoven revealed to them that he was deaf and told of the despair he felt because of this (Ludwig van Beethoven 's Biography: Heiligenstadt Testament, n.d.).…

Introduction to Opera Compare the characters of Carmen and Micaëla in Carmen. What are the differences between them, how is this expressed in the music, and do you think the outcome is inevitable? Introduction Bizet's Carmen is an Opera in four acts, first performed at the Opéra-Comique in Paris on 3 March with a plot based on the 1845 novella by Mérimée. Today it stands as one of the most popular french operas of all time.The Opera explores the relationship between the enchanting Carmen and…

“To send light into the darkness of men’s hearts – such is the duty of the artist” a quote by a composer, Robert Schumann. Musicians are skillful, patient, and creative people. They play or perform for audiences, which takes a lot of time and effort to be able to play. There’s lots of practice involved, musicians don’t become musicians with a push of a button. There’s been studies that show that musicians practice from one to eight hours a day, which is a mass amount of time used for playing.…

The 20th century was a major turning point in the history of classical music. Tonal harmony of the Romance era have been replaced with the dissonant sounding atonality of many composers of the 20th century. The 20th century of classical music was led by Arnold Schoenberg, Igor Stravinsky, and Claude Debussy. These composers have created techniques that were unlike any other in the history of classical music. Arnold Schoenberg is known for a technique called the Twelve Tone Technique. This…

Introduction Statement of the problem Western classical singing is aim at producing a good quality, clear, natural, relax, and overall loud enough sound in singing. Vibrato is an important technique in good western classical and operatic singing. The pitch of the notes quickly changing up and down makes vibrato. It is one of the important means of musical performance. Like violin, Chinese erhu and other string instruments playing with rubbing strings. Italian vocal school more likely to say:…

The Baroque period is commonly referred to as the period containing the oldest examples of music still played today. The most popular choral work to arise from this period was written by Hanel- one of the most prominent composers at the time. Regarded as the greatest classical work ever, Handel’s Messiah is one of the most performed pieces- both in part and in whole- by professionals and amateurs alike. Its popularity nearly 300 years after its creation demonstrates its music power. Despite the…

John Cage was an American composer that experimented with the very nature of sound and developed new ways of notating music. Cage’s ideas on composition influenced many artists such as painters, musicians, and chorographers. Cage questioned the musical preconceptions that was left from the 19th century. Arnold Schoenberg, a teacher of John Cage, called Cage “not a composer, but an inventor of genius” (Hicks, 1990). Many musicians, and to much of the public, thought Cage’s compositions…

The Infant Prodigy, written by Thomas Mann, is a story of Bibi Saccellaphylaccas, a young prodigal artist. He plays piano for an audience of ridiculers. Through this story, readers are given a real look at the art of music, also the thoughts from the audience when observing Bibi’s performance. Thomas Mann describes a complete picture of Bibi, the audience and the relationship between them and culture through the all-knowing point of view. When we get into the story firstly, it is the time also…

In my third concert, I decided to oppose Opus 15 with other Lieder that were composed in 1908 and 1909 and performed works by Pfitzner, Reger and Berg. While the first two contextualisations appeared to be logical points of departure in my exploration of Opus 15, as they were related to aspects that seemed more or less directly accessible through the score and offered the opportunity to potentially discover internal similarities between Opus 15 and the other repertoire in the form of a certain…