Classical Music Era

• Music History includes the Medieval-Renaissance-Baroque, Classical (1750-1825), Romantic (1825-1900), and Modern (1900-Present) eras.
• Form refers to structure, genre to type, and style to characteristics in music.
• Rondo form involves the frequent return of a theme in a piece.

Classical Era

• The late 1700s are known as the Age of the Enlightenment.
• The French Enclopedie, a set of 24 volumes with terms and references, was published between 1751 and 1772.
• Music is distinguished by balance, proportion, and clarity.
• Carl Phillip Emanuel Bach developed the "sensitive style," utilizing the clavichord's expressive potential to compose sonatas and fantasias, showcased dramatic rhythm contrasts, chromatic designs, and key changes.
• Johann Christian Bach led a more adventurous life than CPE.
• The symphony developed in the mid-1700s.
• The classical era symphony evolved from the 3-movement Italian overture, which established the fast/slow/fast movement sequence.
• Giovanni Battista Sammartini (1701-1775) composed 3-part symphonies with a straightforward structure.
• The Mannheim School defined the sonata form and symphony and introduced the clarinet and elimination of basso continuo.
• The Mannheim school developed the Mannheim rocket, which would inspire future composers like Haydn.
• Opera Buffa is a comedic opera style that depicts the everyday lives of ordinary people and features arias, recitatives, and choral singing.
• Beethoven and Schubert introduced Romantic elements into Classical styles during the transition period of 1800-1825.
• Haydn, Mozart, and Beethoven are known as the First Viennese School up to about age 30.
• Tonality, which is the art of using keys or key changes, is a major energizing factor.
• Movements 1 and 4 of a sonata or symphony are typically in sonata form, movement 2 may be a theme and variations, movement 3 is a minuet and trio, and movement 4 may be in rondo form.
• Sonata form is the most important.
• Franz Josef Haydn (1732-1809) lived from the late Baroque to the birth of Romanticism.
• Haydn developed his musical talent at the choir school at St. Stephen's Cathedral in Vienna and composed over 40 keyboard sonatas.
• His early works are structured and simple, while his mature works display structure, organized themes, and harmonic twists.
• Haydn's artistic development is apparent in his 68 string quartets and over 100 symphonies.
• Mozart composed over 600 pieces catalogued by Ludwig von Kochel, which are accompanied by their "K" number.
• Mozart's 17 piano sonatas are intended for students, while his 27 piano concertos were intended for his use.
• The Classical Concerto is often a 3-movement work featuring a solo instrument and orchestra.
• Its first movements combine Baroque ritornello form with the tonal drama of sonata allegro form, creating the "classic concerto form".
• In a cadenza, the soloist presents new versions of themes with complex passages and figuration in the last movement.
• Opera Seria is a Baroque genre.
• Christoph Willibald Gluck (1714-1787) was the most prominent opera reformer of the 18th century.
• Gluck developed a style focused on essentials.
• Mozart composed 4 opere serie and 7 buffa operas, using recitative for dialogue.
• Mozart's transformation of opera buffa created dramatic power and sophistication.
• Mozart's first collaboration with Da Ponte was on The Marriage of Figaro.
• Mozart's singspiel, a comic opera written to a German-language libretto, features spoken dialogue, with The Rescue from the Harem (1782) and The Magic Flute (1791) being his best known.
• A famous aria from The Magic Flute is “The Fury of Hell” in D minor.

Beethoven's Importance and Early Life

• Beethoven's career symbolizes individualism, innovation, transformation, and triumph over adversity.
• He overcame a turbulent childhood, health issues, and personal turmoil.
• Beethoven sought greater complexity and emotional depth in his compositions.
• Beethoven was born into a musical family, and his father pushed him to practice extensively.
• He was an assistant court organist at 11 and a harpsichordist at 13 and supported his family financially from a young age.
• His ethical standards and artistic vision were shaped by his exposure to Enlightenment ideals.
• In 1787, he briefly visited and played for Mozart in Vienna, but his plans to study with him were disrupted by his mother's death.

Beethoven's Career and Style

• Beethoven studied with Haydn, then Albrechtsberger and Salieri, gaining fame as a pianist and improviser.
• His early works focused on piano compositions and culminated with his First Symphony (1801) and six string quartets, Op. 18.
• Beethoven combined stylistic elements from Haydn, Mozart, and C.P.E. Bach.
• He expanded musical forms, emotional depth, and used bold ideas, surprises, and rhythmic energy.
• Early piano sonatas (Op. 2) introduced F minor and scherzos, and Symphony No. 1 displayed tonal instability which was revolutionary at the time.
• Beethoven's middle "Heroic" period was inspired by personal struggle, Romantic ideals, the French Revolution, and Napoleon.
• His style featured expanded dimensions, relentless drive, contrasts, and unity across movements.
• In his works, Symphony No. 3 ("Eroica") was revolutionary, Symphony No. 5 reflected struggle, Symphony No. 6 ("Pastoral") explored nature.
• The middle-period also saw the composition of piano sonatas such as "Waldstein" and "Appassionata", the opera Fidelio, and the song cycle An die ferne Geliebte.
• In his late period post-1815, he was deaf and isolated, focusing philosophically with counterpoint, structure, and key relationships.
• It represented his exploration of a “new world of sound,” setting the stage for Romanticism.

Composers and Musical Forms

• Franz Schubert (1797-1828) studied with Antonio Salieri and suffered from syphilis and depression.
• He composed 9 symphonies and elevated the lied, which is a song for solo voice and accompaniment based on German poetry, transforming it into a romantic piece full of emotion.
• Three musical forms found in lieder include strophic, modified strophic, and through-composed forms.
• His popular lied “Gretchen at the Spinning Wheel” was composed when Schubert was 17.
• Felix Mendelssohn (1809-1847) composed quickly in a tonally based style with short songs without words.
• Mendelssohn innovated the concert overture, designing it to open a concert, exemplified by A Midsummer Night’s Dream.
• Robert Schumann (1810-1856), who studied piano with Friedrich Wieck, focused on short piano pieces during the 1830s, and wrote over 200 lieder in 1840, the year he married Clara.
• Carnaval, a piano cycle of 21 pieces unified by a 4-note motive, is one of Schumann's notable pieces.

Comparison of Mozart and Beethoven

• Mozart (1756-1791) was a child prodigy who toured Europe and worked in Salzburg and Vienna.
• Mozart was known for his operas, instrumental works, and balanced melodies and died young at 35.
• Mozart composed 41 symphonies, 27 piano concertos, 17 piano sonatas, and operas like Don Giovanni, The Magic Flute, and The Marriage of Figaro.
• Beethoven (1770-1827) struggled early, supported his family, and studied with Haydn in Vienna.
• Beethoven gained patronage, valued independence, and composed while experiencing progressive hearing loss and died old at 56.
• Beethoven was known for dramatic contrasts, emotional depth, motivic development, unconventional harmonies.
• Beethoven composed 9 symphonies (Eroica, Fifth, Ninth with Ode to Joy), 5 piano concertos, and 32 piano sonatas.
• Beethoven revolutionary late string quartets and for pushing boundaries, while Mozart had mastered classical forms with beauty and balance.
• Pushed boundaries, leading into Romanticism. Known for power, innovation, and emotional depth.