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Slide 2 20th Century Music (1900-2000) Slide 3 Movements in 20th-Century Music Modernism Neo-Classicism Minimalism Popular Music-inspired, Folk-music inspired, Jazz Music-inspired Pieces Slide 4 Modernism Assumptions of music are challenged and/or taken to extremes Can involve complex rhythms, melodies, and harmonies The wierder, the better Composers: Arnold Schoenberg Igor Stravinsky Slide 5 ARNOLD SCHOENBERG Mondestrunken (Moondrunk) from Pierrot Lunaire (Moonstruck Pierrot) (1912) Genre: Song Cycle Super-complex harmonies with lots of dissonance called atonality Example of weird instrumental effects and scary-sounding half-sung/half-spoken vocal sound called sprechstimme (song-speech) Example of Expressionism - movement in arts seeking to express innermost extreme feelings (Freud) Slide 6 Moonstruck The wine that with eyes is drunk, at night the moon pours down in waves, and a spring- flook overflows the slient horizon. Desires shuddering and sweet swim countless through the floods! The poet, whom devotion inspires made drunk by the sacred drink, toward heaven he turns his entranced head and,reeling, sucks and slurps the wine that with eyes is drunk. Slide 7 Slide 8 IGOR STRAVINSKY Part 1 from Le Sacre du printemps (The Rite of Spring) (1913) Genre: Ballet Example of Primitivism - recalling the prehistoric power of rhythm and form (Darwin) From ballet based on story of ancient ritual sacrifice of a maiden Lots of rhythmic complexity - including SYNCOPATION Complex tone colors (unusual combinations of instruments) Slide 9 Slide 10 Slide 11 NEO-CLASSICISM (includes neo-romanticism, neo- baroquism, neo-renaissancism, and neo-medievalism) A reaction against the wierdness of Modernism A return to the past in thematic material and formal structures Composers: Bela Bartok Benjamin Britten Ellen Taffe Zwilich Slide 12 BELA BARTOK Second Movement: Game of Pairs from Concerto for Orchestra (1943) Genre: Concerto A B A form - used Classical forms such as sonata and rondo in an established form such as Concerto Use traditional melodic shapes Slide 13 BENJAMIN BRITTEN Young Persons Guide to the Orchestra (1946) Genre: (like a ) Concerto (for orchestra) Theme and Variations Form Theme is borrowed from a 17th-century Baroque composer Henry Purcell Slide 14 MINIMALISM A movement in music also against the complexities of Modernism Composers use simple melodic and harmonic ideas and repeat them over and over with very gradual changes Composer: Philip Glass Slide 15 Slide 16 Slide 17 Slide 18 PHILIP GLASS Knee Play 1 from Einstein on the Beach (1976) Genre: Opera Simple melodic, harmonic and rhythmic patterns These patterns are repeated over and over again with subtle changes Slide 19 POPULAR MUSIC-INSPIRED, FOLK-MUSIC INSPIRED, JAZZ MUSIC-INSPIRED PIECES Composers look to popular, folk, and jazz music for inspiration and musical material Composers: William Grant Still Aaron Copland Slide 20 WILLIAM GRANT STILL Third Movement from Afro-American Symphony (1931) Genre: Symphony Inspired by African-American spirituals and Jazz music Featured lots of syncopation Slide 21 AARON COPLAND Section 7 from Appalachian Spring: Theme and Variations on Simple Gifts (1943-44) Genre: Ballet Theme is based on early American Shaker folk hymn called Simple Gifts Theme and Variaitons form Slide 22 Slide 23 ELLEN TAFFE ZWILICH First Movement from Concerto Grosso 1985 (1985) Genre: Concerto Uses instruments from the past - (harpsichord) Modelled after concerto grosso of Handel and Bach Example of Neo-Classicism (although it goes back to Baroque music models)