Silly Symphonies

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, born January 27, 1756 in Salzburg, Austria is one of the most well known and prolific composers of the classical era. As a child prodigy Mozart learned to play the piano at the age of three by watching his father teach his is older sister. By the age of six Mozart was composing his own music and with his sister, Nannerl, traveling Europe to preform concerts. During these travels young Wolfgang met Johann Christian Bach (youngest son of…

On September 8, 1841, Antonin Dvorak was the first born of nine children. Being born in Nelahozeves, he became adapted to music very early in his life. He knew the violin really well as a young child. He moved to Zlonice when he was just twelve years old to live with his aunt and uncle. There, he studied piano, harmony, and organ. While here, he wrote one of his most valuable pieces called the Polka. Dvorak worked hard from the 1850's to the 1860's. During the 1860's, he tutored many students.…

In this essay, I will be taking an in depth study into a musical idea or possibly referred to as a musical movement or genre. This process will then further consist of looking at a single composer and a chosen piece of work. The musical idea I chose to be electronic music, as I feel in this current musical era, its is incredibly popular and so wanted to have a look into its roots and someone who impacted the growth and style - Pierre Schaeffer. This composer had his very own particular outlook…

his wife Alma Schindler, a fellow composer. During his time at his Maiernigg villa, Mahler composed his Fifth Symphony between 1901 and 1902. Like his First Symphony, Mahler’s Fifth Symphony received mixed reactions, with Mahler himself supposedly saying “Nobody understood it. I wish I could conduct the first performance fifty years after my death.” Also like his First Symphony, Symphony No. 5 follows an unconventional layout in terms of switching around the traditional order of the movements;…

The composer i am writing about is Richard Wagner. Richard was a German composer and he was born in Leipzig, Saxony and on May 22, 1813. He died February 13, 1883 and his cause of death was heart failure. The genre of his music was classical. He began in the 1830s to write his music. He was the ninth child in the family of Carl Wagner, a police clerk. Richard was only six months when his father died. Wagner studied piano from the age of 7 and soon developed ability to…

Beethoven vs. Mozart As a growing musician, I look up to the great composer. Some of these composers are more recent and some of them are in the past. The composers from the past had a lot of variation. Some of the past periods of music are classical and romantic. Two of the composers that lived during this period are Ludwig van Beethoven and Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. These men are very influential in the area of classical music. Some different features of Mozart and Beethoven are their…

First Selection: -Symphony No. 1 (“ Classical”), first movement- Sergei Prokofiev (1891-1953) First Hearing: Happy, Calm Second Hearing: Prokofiev wanted to create a kind of the homage for the composers of the Classical era. I really like the sound of this song. It put me in a happy, calm mood. Third Hearing: The pitch starts off low. The melody is disjunct. The rhythm is duple meter. The tempo is a steadfast. The dynamic is widely varying levels at the beginning of the song. It increases…

Beethoven Center The Beethoven Center, located on the fifth floor of the MLK library, holds many historical artifacts and background on Beethoven and his time period. The center was much smaller than what I had originally anticipated. However, I was able to learn a lot of new facts that fascinated me about Beethoven during the visit. The person conducting the presentation for the class seems to be highly educated about Beethoven’s entire life. It was nice to hear her play different pieces by…

attended the Austin symphony’s showing of Schubert’s Unfinished symphony “The Sounds of Hope”. The Symphony was filled with incredible pieces by Verdi, Schubert, and contemporary composers Nigel Westlake and Lior Attar. The evening began with Verdi’s Nabucco from his opera that follows the plight of the Jews as they were subsequently exiles from their homeland by the Babylonian King Nabucco. The next piece was Franz Schubert’s Unfinished Symphony, Schubert started this piece in 1822 but wasn’t…

“On n’est jamais content là ou l’on est.” These words from Antoine de Saint-Exupéry’s novel Le Petit Prince relays in my head while I stare blankly out of the train’s frosted window. The world outside seems like an infinite hole of darkness, everything seems barren and monotonous. I crave to feel the vivacity of what the world had been. My enduring travel through the night causes me to grow famished. But alas, I only have a stale cereal bar. The blandness of my snack sits on my tongue while I…