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Strophic Form

Strophic form

Strophic form, or chorus form, is a sectional and/or additive way of structuring a piece of music based on the repetition of one formal section or block played repeatedly. It is the musical analogue of repeated stanzas in poetry or lyrics: where the text repeats the same rhyme scheme from one stanza to the next, the accompanying music for each stanza is either the same or very similar from one stanza to the next. It may be considered AAA... or AA'A".... Most folk and popular songs are strophic in form, including the twelve bar blues, all of which may be in simple verse or simple verse-chorus form. The "verse-chorus-verse" (verse-chorus form) of most popular music songs may be interpreted as parts of a larger a strophic verse-refrain form. In addition, many songs from the classical music tradition are in strophic form, from the 14th century French rondeau of the ars nova, to the 17th century French air de cour, to the 19th century German lieder; indeed strophic form has been one of the must durable of all musical forms, probably because it is intuitively most obvious to have similar music accompanying repeated stanzas of verse. A very similar form is theme and variations form. In this form, there is a musical melody (the theme), followed by many altered versions of it (the variations). The variations are all altered forms of the theme; the theme is always present, in some form however disguised, in each of the variations. The theme may be either original or previously written by another composer.

Section

Section can be:
- A cross section (in the common sense or the physics sense)
- In mathematics:
- A conic section
- A section of a fiber bundle or sheaf
- A Caesarean section
- In UK law:
- Section 28 of the Local Government Act 1988 stated that a local authority "shall not intentionally promote homosexuality"
- Sectioning is the informal name for involuntary medial treatment ordered using the Mental Health Act 1983.
- In the fictional Star Trek universe, Section 31
- A military unit
- A Section is an age grouping of Scouts in order to provide suitable Scouting activities and training for designated age group.
- A section (U.S. land surveying) is a one square mile subdivision of a survey township
- A section of musical form, including introduction or intro, exposition, recapitulation, verse, chorus or refrain, conclusion, coda or outro, fadeout, bridge or interlude; or a sectional form such as binary form.
- A section of a musical ensemble, usually of like instruments, such as the string section in an orchestra.
- The section sign (§)
- A section in archaeology is a method of interpreting and recording features.
- A section in botany is a rank between genus and species. ----

Musical form

The term musical form is used in two related ways:
- a generic type of composition such as the symphony or concerto
- the structure of a particular piece, how its parts are put together to make the whole; this too can be generic, such as binary form or sonata form Musical form (the whole or structure) is contrasted with content (the parts) or with surface (the detail), but there is no clear line between the two. In most cases, the form of a piece should produce a balance between statement and restatement, unity and variety, contrast and connection. There is some overlap between musical form and musical genre. The latter term is more likely to be used when referring to particular styles of music (such as classical music or rock music) as determined by things such as harmonic language, typical rhythms, types of musical instrument used and geographical origin. The phrase musical form is typically used when talking about a particular type or structure within those genres. For example, the twelve bar blues is a specific form often found in the genres of blues and rock and roll music.

Descriptions of musical form

Forms and formal detail may be described as sectional or developmental, developmental or variational, syntactical or processual (Keil 1966), embodied or engendered, extensional or intensional (Chester 1970), and associational or hierarchical (Lerdahl 1983). Form may also be described according to symmetries or lack thereof and repetition. A common idea is formal "depth", necessary for complexity, in which foregrounded "detail" events occur against a more structural background. For example: Schenkerian analysis. Fred Lerdahl (1992), among others, claims that popular music lacks the structural complexity for multiple structural layers, and thus much depth. However, Lerdahl's theories explicitly exclude "associational" details which are used to help articulate form in popular music. Allen Forte's book The American Popular Ballad of the Golden Era 1924-1950 analyses popular music with traditional Schenkerian techniques, but this is only possible because pre-rock popular ballads are the genre most accessible similar to the Romantic music that those theories were designed to analyse. (Middleton 1999, p.144) Extensional music is, "produced by starting with small components - rhythmic or melodic motifs, perhaps - and then 'developing' these through techniques of modification and combination." Intensional music "starts with a framework - a chord sequence, a melodic outline, a rhythmic pattern - and then extends itself by repeating the framework with perpetually varied inflections to the details filling it in." (Middleton, p.142) :Western classical music is the apodigm of the extensional form of musical construction. Theme and variations, counterpoint, tonality (as used in classical composition) are all devices that build diachronically and synchronically outwards from basic musical atoms. The complex is created by combination of the simple, which remains discrete and unchanged in the complex unity...If those critics who maintain the greater complexity of classical music specified that they had in mind this extensional development, they would be quite correct...Rock however follows, like many non-European musics, the path of intensional development. In this mode of construction the basic musical units (played/sung notes) are not combined through space and time as simple elements into complex structures. The simple entity is that constituted by the parameters of melody, harmony, and beat, while the complex is built up by modulation of the basic notes, and by inflexion of the basic beat. All existing genres and sub-types of the Afro-American tradition show various forms of combined intensional and extensional development (Chester 1970, p.78-9). Syntactic music is "centred" on notation and "the hierarchic organization of quasilinguistic elements and their putting together (com-position) in line with systems of norms, expectations, surprises, tensions and resolutions. The resulting aesthetic is one of 'embodied meaning.'" Non-notated music and performance "foreground process. They are much more concerned with gesture, physical feel, the immediate moment, improvisation; the resulting aesthetic is one of 'engendered feeling' and is unsuited to the application of 'syntactice' criteria" (Middleton 1990, p.115). Middleton (p.145) also describes form, presumably after Gilles Deleuze’s Difference and Repetition (1968, translated 1994), through repetition and difference. Difference is the distance moved from a repeat and a repeat being the smallest difference. Difference is qualitative and quantitative, how far different and what type of difference.

Formal structures

In classical and popular music, there are many labels applied to forms, abstract formal designs, as contrasted with the principals and procedures of combining materials: form.

Single-movement forms

In a sectional form, the larger unit (form) is built from various smaller clear-cut units (sections) in combination, sort of like stacking legos (DeLone, 1975):
- Strophic form (AA...)
- Binary form (AB)
- Ternary form, less often tertiary (ABA)
- Arch form, (ABCBA) Sections include:
- Introduction or Intro
- Exposition
- Verse
- Chorus or refrain
- Bridge or interlude
- Conclusion
- Coda or outro, and Fadeout Developmental forms, larger unit (form) is built from small bits of material given different presentations and combinations, usually progressive (DeLone, 1975):
- Sonata form, also called sonata-allegro Variational forms, larger unit (form) is built from sections treated to one type of presentation at a time, but varying successively (DeLone, 1975):
- Rondo (ABACADA...)
- Variation form, sometimes theme and variation (AA'A"A"'...)
- Passacaglia and Chaconne These structures are defined by the distribution of different thematic material, melodies, key centres, and other materials used. While many of the above forms are partly defined by their tonal schemes these forms may be applied to music which has a differing or no tonal scheme (DeLone et. al. (Eds.), 1975, chap. 1). More than one formal method may be used, including in-between types, and music which is not composed with the above or any other model is called through composed. Especially recently, more segmented approaches have been taken through the use of stratification, superimposition, juxtaposition, interpolation, and other interruptions and simultaneities. Examples include the postmodern "block" technique used by composers such as John Zorn, where rather than organic development one follows separate units in various combinations. These techniques may be used to create contrast to the point of disjointed chaotic textures, or, through repetition and return and transitional procedures such as dissolution, amalgamation, and gradation, may create connectedness and unity. Composers have also made more use of open forms such as produced by aleatoric devices and other chance procedures, improvisation, and some processes. (ibid)

Multi-movement forms

Types of piece which may or may not incorporate one or more of the above structures as part of their overall makeup include:
- Ballet, larger musical composition intended for Ballet dance form
- Cantata
- Chorale
- Concerto
- Dance, smaller musical composition intended for presentation of a dance, either as accompaniment for dancing or as music as such
- Duet
- Etude or study
- Fantasia
- Fugue
- Mass
- Opera
- Oratorio
- Prelude
- Requiem
- Rhapsody
- Sonata
- Suite
- Symphonic poem
- Symphony Forms of chamber music are defined by instrumentation (string quartet, piano quintet and so on). The structure of a chamber work is typically similar to a sonata.

External links

- [http://www-student.furman.edu/users/r/rkelley/form.htm Study Guide for Musical Form A Complete Outline of Standardized Formal Categories and Concepts by Robert T. Kelley]

References

- DeLone et. al. (Eds.) (1975). Aspects of Twentieth-Century Music. Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey: Prentice-Hall. ISBN 0130493465.
- Lerdahl, Fred (1992). "Cognitive Constraints on Compositional Systems", Contemporary Music Review 6 (2), pp. 97-121.
- Richard Middleton. "Form", in Horner, Bruce and Swiss, Thomas, eds. (1999) Key Terms in Popular Music and Culture. Malden, Massachusetts. ISBN 0631212639. ja:楽式

Stanza

In poetry, a stanza is a unit within a larger poem. The term means "room" in Italian. A stanza may have a self-contained rhyme scheme or be made up of a fixed number of lines (see distich/couplet, tercet, quatrain, cinquain/quintain, sestet) or, as in much modern poetry, may be an arbitrary unit defined by publishing conventions such as white space or punctuation. Shakespeare's Sonnet 116 can be broken into stanzas: Let me not to the marriage of true minds |\ Admit impediments. Love is not love | \ Which alters when it alteration finds, | / All one stanza Or bends with the remover to remove. |/ O no, it is an ever fixed mark |\ That looks on tempests and is never shaken; | \ It is the star to every wand'ring barque, | / All one stanza Whose worth's unknown although his height be taken. |/ Love's not time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks |\ Within his bending sickle's compass come; | \ Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks, | / All one stanza But bears it out even to the edge of doom. |/ If this be error and upon me proved,|\ I never writ, nor no man ever loved.|/ All one stanza Category:Poetic form

Folk music

Folk music, in the original sense of the term, is music by and of the people. Folk music arose, and best survives, in societies not yet affected by mass communication and the commercialization of culture. It normally was shared and performed by the entire community (not by a special class of expert performers), and was transmitted by word of mouth. During the 20th and 21st century, the term folk music took on a second meaning: it describes a particular kind of popular music which is culturally descended from or otherwise influenced by traditional folk music. Like other popular music, this kind of folk music is most often performed by experts and is transmitted in organized performances and commercially distributed recordings. However, popular music has filled some of the roles and purposes of the folk music it has replaced. Folk music is more or less synonymous with traditional music. Some would use either term with a more specific meaning, restricted to just popularized-folk/traditional music or just not-popularized; however, both terms are used interchangeably among the general population and are not strictly defined. See also: World music.

Defining folk music

World music "Folk music is usually seen as the authentic expression of a way of life now, past or about to disappear (or in some cases, to be preserved or somehow revived). Unfortunately, despite the assembly of an enormous body of work over some two centuries, there is still no unanimity on what folk music (or folklore, or the folk) is." (Middleton 1990, p.127) Gene Shay, co-founder and host of the Philadelphia Folk Festival, defined folk music in an April 2003 interview by saying: "In the strictest sense, it's music that is rarely written for profit. It's music that has endured and been passed down by oral tradition. [...] And folk music is participatory—you don't have to be a great musician to be a folk singer. [...] And finally, it brings a sense of community. It's the people's music." The English term folk, which gained usage in the 18th century (during the Romantic period) to refer to peasants or non-literate peoples, is related to the German word Volk (meaning people or nation). The term is used to emphasize that folk music emerges spontaneously from communities of ordinary people. "As the complexity of social stratification and interaction became clearer and increased, various conditioning criteria, such as 'continuity', 'tradition', 'oral transmission', 'anonymity' and uncommercial origins, became more important than simple social categories themselves." Charles Seeger (1980) describes three contemporary defining criteria of folk music (Middleton 1990, p.127-8): # A "schema comprising four musical types: 'primitive' or 'tribal'; 'elite' or 'art'; 'folk'; and 'popular'. Usually...folk music is associated with a lower class in societies which are culturally and socially stratified, that is, which have developed an elite, and possibly also a popular, musical culture." Cecil Sharp (1972), A.L. Lloyd (). # "Cultural processes rather than abstract musical types...continuity and oral transmission...seen as characterizing one side of a cultural dichotomy, the other side of which is found not only in the lower layers of feudal, capitalist and some oriental societies but also in 'primitive' societies and in parts of 'popular cultures'." Redfield (1947) and Dundes (1965). # Less prominent, "a rejection of rigid boundaries, preferring a conception, simply of varying practice within one field, that of 'music'." David Harker (1985) argues that "folk music" is, in Peter van der Merwe's words, "a meaningless term invented by 'bourgeois' commentators". Jazz musician Louis Armstrong and blues musician Big Bill Broonzy have both been attributed the remark "All music is folk music. I ain't never heard a horse sing a song."

Subjects of folk music

Apart from instrumental music that forms a part of folk music, especially dance music traditions, much folk music is vocal music, since the instrument that makes such music is usually handy. As such, most folk music has lyrics, and is about something. Narrative verse looms large in the folk music of many cultures. This encompasses such forms as traditional epic poetry, much of which was meant originally for oral performance, sometimes accompanied by instruments. Many epic poems of various cultures were pieced together from shorter pieces of traditional narrative verse, which explains their episodic structure and often their in medias res plot developments. Other forms of traditional narrative verse relate the outcomes of battles and other tragedies or natural disasters. Sometimes, as in the triumphant Song of Deborah found in the Biblical Book of Judges, these songs celebrate victory. Laments for lost battles and wars, and the lives lost in them, are equally prominent in many folk traditions; these laments keep alive the cause for which the battle was fought. The narratives of folk songs often also remember folk heroes such as John Henry to Robin Hood. Some folk song narratives recall supernatural events or mysterious deaths. Hymns and other forms of religious music are often of traditional and unknown origin. Western musical notation was originally created to preserve the lines of Gregorian chant, which before its invention was taught as an oral tradition in monastic communities. Folk songs such as Green grow the rushes, O present religious lore in a mnemonic form. In the Western world, Christmas carols and other traditional songs preserve religious lore in song form. Other sorts of folk songs are less exalted. Work songs are composed; they frequently feature call and response structures, and are designed to enable the labourers who sing them to coordinate their efforts in accordance with the rhythms of the songs. In the armed forces, a lively tradition of jody calls are sung while soldiers are on the march. Professional sailors made use of a large body of sea shanties. Love poetry, often of a tragic or regretful nature, prominently figures in many folk traditions. Nursery rhymes and nonsense verse also are frequent subjects of folk songs.

Variation in folk music

Music transmitted by word of mouth though a community will, in time, develop many variants, because this kind of transmission cannot produce word-for-word and note-for-note accuracy. Indeed, many traditional folk singers are quite creative and deliberately modify the material they learn. Because variants proliferate naturally, it is naïve to believe that there is such a thing as the "authentic" version of a ballad such as "Barbara Allen." Field researchers in folk song (see below) have encountered countless versions of this ballad throughout the English-speaking world, and these versions often differ greatly from each other. None can reliably claim to be the original, and it is quite possible that whatever the "original" was, it ceased to be sung centuries ago. Any version can lay an equal claim to authenticity, so long as it is truly from a traditional folksinging community and not the work of an outside editor. Cecil Sharp had an influential idea about the process of folk variation: he felt that the competing variants of a folk song would undergo a process akin to biological natural selection: only those new variants that were the most appealing to ordinary singers would be picked up by others and transmitted onward in time. Thus, over time we would expect each folksong to become esthetically ever more appealing — it would be collectively composed to perfection, as it were, by the community. On the other hand, there is also evidence to support the view that transmission of folk songs can be rather sloppy. Occasionally, collected folk song versions include material or verses incorporated from different songs that makes little sense in its context. A perfect process of natural selection would not have permitted these incoherent versions to survive.

The decline of folk traditions in modern societies

Folk music seems to reflect a universal impulse of humanity. No fieldwork expedition by cultural anthropologists has yet discovered a preindustrial people that did not have its own folk music. It seems safe to infer that folk music was a property of all people starting from the dawn of the species. However, the development of modern society--first literacy, then the conversion of culture into a salable commodity--created a new form of transmission of music that first influenced, then in some societies essentially eliminated the original folk tradition. The decline of folk music in a culture can be followed through three stages.

Stage I: Urban influence

One of the first folk traditions impacted by modern society was the folksong of rural England. Starting in Elizabethan times, urban poets wrote broadsheet ballads that (thanks to printing) could be sold widely. The ballads probably didn't need musical notation, since they would have been sung to tunes that everybody knew, the folk tradition being very much alive at the time. These ballads heavily influenced the folk tradition, but did not override it. In fact, the folk tradition showed great resilience. Through the process of folk transmission, the urban ballads were modified, keeping the more vivid content and ironing out the less "citified" material. The resulting body of folk lyrics is widely considered to be a very appealing blend. Thus, the printing press and widespread literacy did not suffice to destroy the English folk tradition, but in some ways enriched it. The English folk song legacy was probably affected by urban melodies as well as words. The clue here is that folk music in remote rural areas of the English-speaking world, such as Highland Scotland or the Appalachian mountains, abounds in tunes that employ the pentatonic scale, a scale widely used for folk music around the world. However, pentatonic music was rare among the rural English villagers who first volunteered their tunes to researchers in the late 19th century. A plausible explanation is that life in rural England was far more closely affected by the proximity to the urban centers. Music in the standard major and minor scales evidently penetrated to the nearby rural areas, where it was converted to folk idiom, but nevertheless succeeded in displacing the old pentatonic music.

Stage II: Replacement of folk music by popular music

The pattern of urban influence on folk music was intensified to outright destruction as soon as the capitalist economic system had developed to the point that music could be packaged and distributed for the purpose of earning a profit--in other words, when popular music was born. It was around Victorian times that ordinary people of the Western world were first offered music as a mass commodity, for example, in the phenomenon of Music Hall. The introduction of popular music was simultaneous with the latter part of the Industrial Revolution. This was a time of great change in lifestyle for the great body of the people, notably the migration of the old agrarian communities to the new industrial ones. It is likely that the resulting social disruption helped cut people's emotional bonds to their old folk music, and thereby helped the shift in taste toward popular music. As technology advanced, succeeding generations became enticed with popular music in ever more accessible and desirable forms. Gramophone records became LPs and then CDs; the Music Hall gave way to radio, followed by television. With the ever-increasing success of popular music, the musical life of many individuals eventually ceased to include any folk music at all. Moreover, since popular music for most people is passive music (that is, listened to, but not created or performed), the overwhelming success of popular music also entailed a sharp decline of music as an active, participatory activity.

Stage III: Loss of musical ability in the community

The terminal state of the loss of folk music can be seen in the United States and a few similar societies, where except in isolated areas and among hobbyists, traditional folk music no longer survives. In the absence of folk music, many individuals do not sing. It is possible that non-singers feel intimidated by widespread exposure in recordings and broadcasting to the singing of skilled experts. Another possibility is that they simply cannot sing, because they did not sing when they were small children, when learning of skills takes place most naturally. Certainly it is very common for contemporary Americans to claim that they cannot sing. There is anecdotal evidence that the loss of singing ability is continuing rapidly at the present time. As recently as the 1960s, audiences at American sporting events collectively sang the American national anthem before a game; the anthem is now generally assigned to a recording or to a soloist. Inability to sing is apparently unusual in a traditional society, where the habit of singing folk song since early childhood gives everyone the practice needed to able to sing at least reasonably well.

Regional variation

The loss of folk music is occurring at different rates in different regions of the world. Naturally, where industrialization and commercialization of culture are most advanced, so tends to be the loss of folk music. Yet in nations or regions where folk music is a badge of cultural or national identity, the loss of folk music can be slowed; this is held to be true, for instance in the case of Hungary, Ireland, Brittany, and Galicia, Greece and Crete all of which retain their traditional music to some degree.

Fieldwork and scholarship on folk music

Starting in the 19th century, interested people - academics and amateur scholars - started to take note of what was being lost, and there grew various efforts aimed at preserving the music of the people. One such effort was the collection by Francis James Child in the late 19th century of the texts of over three hundred ballads in the English and Scots traditions (called the Child Ballads). Contemporaneously came the Reverend Sabine Baring-Gould, and later and more significantly Cecil Sharp who worked in the early 20th century to preserve a great body of English rural folk song, music and dance, under the aegis of what became and remains the English Folk Dance and Song Society (EFDSS). Sharp also worked in America, recording the folk songs of the Appalachian Mountains in 1916-1918 in collaboration with Maud Karpeles and Olive Dame Campbell. Around this time, composers of classical music developed a strong interest in folk song collecting, and a number of outstanding composers carried out their own field work on folk song. These included Ralph Vaughan Williams in England and Béla Bartók in Hungary. These composers, like many of their predecessors, incorporated folk material into their classical compositions. In America, during the 1930s and 1940s, the Library of Congress worked through the offices of musicologist Alan Lomax and others to capture as much American field material as possible. Often, fieldworkers in folk song hoped that their work would restore folk music to the people. For instance, Cecil Sharp campaigned, with some success, to have English folk songs (in his own heavily edited and expurgated versions) to be taught to schoolchildren. One theme that runs through the great period of scholarly folk song collection is the tendency of certain members of the "folk", who were supposed to be the object of study, to become scholars and advocates themselves. For example, Jean Ritchie was the youngest child of a large family from Viper, Kentucky that had preserved many of the old Appalachian folk songs. Ritchie, living in a time when the Appalachians had opened up to outside influence, was university educated and ultimately moved to New York City, where she made a number of classic recordings of the family repertoire and published an important compilation of these songs.

Folk revivals

As folk traditions decline, there is often a conscious effort to resuscitate them. Such efforts are often exerted by bridge figures such as Jean Ritchie, described above. Folk revivals also involve collaboration between traditional folk musicians and other participants (often of urban background) who come to the tradition as adults. The folk revival of the 1950's in Britain and America had something of this character. In 1950 Alan Lomax came to Britain, where at a Working Men's Club in the remote Northumberland mining village of Tow Law he met two other seminal figures: A.L.'Bert' Lloyd and Ewan MacColl, who were performing folk music to the locals there. Lloyd was a colourful figure who had travelled the world and worked at such varied occupations as sheep-shearer in Australia and shanty-man on a whaling ship. MacColl, born in Salford of Scottish parents, was a brilliant playwright and songwriter who had been strongly politicised by his earlier life. MacColl had also learned a large body of Scottish traditional songs from his mother. The meeting of MacColl and Lloyd with Lomax is credited with being the point at which the British roots revival began. The two colleagues went back to London where they formed the Ballads and Blues Club which eventually became renamed the Singers' Club and was the first, as well as the most enduring, of what became known as folk clubs. As the 1950s progressed into the 1960s, the folk revival movement built up in both Britain and America. Another example is the Hungarian model, the tanchaz movement. This model involves strong cooperation between musicology experts and enthusiastic amateurs, resulting in a strong vocational foundation and a very high professional level. They also had the advantage that rich, living traditions of Hungarian folk music and folk culture still survived in rural areas, especially in Transylvania. The involvement of experts meant an effort to understand and revive folk traditions in their full complexity. Music, dance, and costumes remained together as they once had been in the rural communities: rather than merely reviving folk music, the movement revived broader folk traditions. Started in the 1970s, tanchaz soon became a massive movement creating an alternative leisure activity for youths apart from discos and music clubs—or one could say that it created a new kind of music club. The tanchaz movement spread to ethnic Hungarian communities around the world. Today, almost every major city in the U.S. and Australia has its own Hungarian folk music and folk dance group; there are also groups in Japan, Hong Kong, Argentina and Western Europe. See also: blues, Harry Everett Smith.

The emergence of popular folk artists

During the twentieth century, a crucial change in the history of folk music began. Folk material came to be adopted by talented performers, performed by them in concerts, and disseminated by recordings and broadcasting. In other words, a new genre of popular music had arisen. This genre was linked by nostalgia and imitation to the original traditions of folk music as it was sung by ordinary people. However, as a popular genre it quickly evolved to be quite different from its original roots. Confusingly, popular (i.e., commercially-disseminated) music based on a folk tradition is called "folk music", no matter how different it may be from a folk music rooted in the community. As a result, some individuals in a modern society are unaware that folk music of the original variety ever existed. The rise of folk music as a popular genre began with performers whose own lives were rooted in the authentic folk tradition. Thus, for example, Woody Guthrie began by singing songs he remembered his mother singing to him as a child. Later, in the 1930s and 1940s, Guthrie both collected folk music and also composed his own songs, as did Pete Seeger, who was the son of a professional musicologist. Through dissemination on commercial recordings, this vein of music became popular in the United States during the 1950s, through singers like the Weavers (Seeger's group), Burl Ives, Harry Belafonte and the Kingston Trio, who tried to reproduce and honor the work that had been collected in preceding decades. The commercial popularity of such performers probably peaked in the U.S. with the ABC Hootenanny [http://www.tvtome.com/Hootenanny/] television series in 1963, which was cancelled after the arrival of the Beatles, the "British invasion" and the rise of folk-rock. The itinerant folksinger lifestyle was exemplified by Ramblin' Jack Elliott, a disciple of Woody Guthrie who in turn influenced Bob Dylan. Sometimes these performers would locate scholarly work in libraries and revive the songs in their recordings, for example in Joan Baez's rendition of "Henry Martin," which adds a guitar accompaniment to a version collected and edited by Cecil Sharp. Publications like Sing Out! [http://singout.org/] magazine helped spread both traditional and composed songs, as did folk-revival-oriented record companies. Many of this group of popular folk singers maintained an idealistic, leftist/progressive political orientation. This is perhaps not surprising. Folk music is easily identified with the ordinary working people who created it, and preserving treasured things against the claimed relentless encroachments of capitalism is likewise a goal of many politically progressive people. Thus, in the 1960s such singers as Joan Baez, Phil Ochs and Bob Dylan followed in Guthrie's footsteps and to begin writing "protest music" and topical songs, particularly against the Vietnam War, and likewise expressed in song their support for the civil rights movement. Such songs were newly written, but took their instrumentation and stanza forms from folk tradition. In Ireland, The Clancy Brothers & Tommy Makem (although the members were all Irish born, the group became famous while based in New York's Greenwich Village, it must be noted), The Dubliners, Clannad, Planxty, The Chieftains, The Pogues and a variety of other folk bands have done much over recent years to revitalise and repopularise Irish traditional music. These bands were rooted, to a greater or lesser extent, in a living tradition of Irish music, and they benefitted from collection efforts on the part of the likes of Seamus Ennis and Peter Kennedy, among others. In Hungary, the group Muzsikás and the singer Márta Sebestyén became known throughout the world due to their numerous American tours and their participation in the Hollywood movie The English Patient and Sebestyén's work with the Deep Forest band.

The blending of folk and popular genres

The experience of the last century suggests that as soon as a folk tradition comes to be marketed as popular music, its musical content will quickly be modified to become more like popular music. Such modified folk music often incorporates electric guitars, drum kit, or forms of rhythmic syncopation that are characteristic of popular music but were absent in the original. One example of this sort is contemporary country music, which descends ultimately from a rural American folk tradition, but has evolved to become vastly different from its original model. Rap music evolved from an African-American inner-city folk tradition, but is likewise very different nowadays from its folk original. A third example is contemporary bluegrass, which is a modified development of American old time music. As less traditional forms of folk music gain popularity, one often observes tension between so-called "purists" or "traditionalists" and the innovators. For example, traditionalists were indignant when Bob Dylan began to use an electric guitar. His electrified performance at the 1965 Newport Folk Festival was to prove to be an early focal point for this controversy. Sometimes, however, the exponents of amplified music were bands such as Fairport Convention, Pentangle, Mr. Fox and Steeleye Span who saw the electrification of traditional musical forms as a means to reach a far wider audience, and their efforts have been largely recognised for what they were by even some of the most die-hard of purists. Traditional folk music forms also merged with rock and roll to form the hybrid generally known as folk rock which evolved through performers such as The Byrds, Simon and Garfunkel, The Mamas and the Papas, and many others. Since the 1970s a genre of "contemporary folk", fuelled by new singer-songwriters, has continued to make the coffee-house circuit and keep the tradition of acoustic non-classical music alive in the United States. Such artists include Steve Goodman, John Prine, Cheryl Wheeler, Bill Morrisey, Christine Lavin and Gundula Krause. Lavin in particular has become prominent as a leading promoter of this musical genre in recent years. Some, such as Lavin and Wheeler, inject a great deal of humor in their songs and performances, although much of their music is also deeply personal and sometimes satirical. In the 1980s a group of artists like Phranc and The Knitters propagated a form of folk music also called country punk or folk punk, which eventually evolved into Alt country. More recently the same spirit has been embraced and expanded on by performers such as Dave Alvin, Ani DiFranco, and Steve Earle. At the same time, a line of singers from Baez to Phil Ochs have continued to use traditional forms for original material. The appropriation of folk has even continued into hard rock and heavy metal, with bands such as Skyclad, Waylander and Finntroll melding distinctive elements of folk styles from a wide variety of traditions, including in many cases traditional instruments such as fiddles, tin whistles and bagpipes as an element of their sound. Unlike other folk-related genres, folk metal shies away from organized religion in favour of more ancient pagan inspired themes. A similar stylistic shift, without using the "folk music" name, has occurred with the phenomenon of Celtic music, which in many cases is based on an amalgamation of Irish traditional music, Scottish traditional music, and other traditional musics associated with lands in which Celtic languages are or were spoken (regardless of any significant research showing that the musics have any genuine genetic relationship; so Breton music and Galician music are often included in the genre). One of the more unusual offshoots of modern folk music is the genre now known as filk, a form of music defined primarily by who its audience is. Folk music is still extremely popular among some audiences today, with folk music clubs meeting to share traditional-style songs, and there are major folk music festivals in many countries, eg the Port Fairy Folk Festival is a major annual event in Australia attracting top international folk performers as well as many local artists. The Cambridge Folk Festival in Cambridge, England is always sold out within days, and is noted for having a very wide definition of who can be invited as folk musicians. The "club tents" allow attendees to discover large numbers of unknown artists, who, for ten or fifteen minutes each, present their work to the festival audience.

Pastiche and parody

Popular culture sometimes creates pastiches of folk music for its own ends. One famous example is the pseudo-ballad sung about brave Sir Robin in the film Monty Python and the Holy Grail. Enthusiasts for folk music might properly consider this song to be pastiche and not parody, because the tune is pleasant and far from inept, and the topic being lampooned is not balladry but the medieval heroic tradition. The arch-shaped melodic form of this song (first and last lines low in pitch, middle lines high) is characteristic of traditional English folk music. A more recent similarly incisive send-up of folk music, this time American in origin, is the film A Mighty Wind by Christopher Guest and Eugene Levy. Another instance of pastiche is the notoriously well-known theme song for the television show Gilligan's Island (music by George Wyle, lyrics by Sherwood Schwartz). This tune is also folk-like in character, and in fact is written in a traditional folk mode (modes are a type of musical scale); the mode of "Gilligan's Island" is ambiguous between Dorian and Aeolian. The lyrics begin with the traditional folk device in which the singer invites his hearers to listen to the tale that follows. Moreover, two of the stanzas repeat the final short line, a common device in English folk stanzas. However, the raising of the key by a semitone with each new verse is an unmistakable trait of commercial music and never occurred in the original folk tradition. Folk music is easy to parody because it is, at present, a popular music genre that relies on a traditional music genre. As such, it is likely to lack the sophistication and glamour that attach to other forms of popular music. Folk music satire ranges from the worst excesses of Rambling Syd Rumpo and Bill Oddie to the deft and subtle artistry of Sid Kipper, Eric Idle and Tom Lehrer. Even "serious" folk musicians are not averse to poking fun at the form from time to time, for example Martin Carthy's devastating rendition of "All the Hard Cheese of Old England" (written by Les Barker), to the tune of "All the Hard Times of Old England", Robb Johnson's "Lack of Jolly Ploughboy," and more recently "I'm Sending an E-mail to Santa" by the Yorkshire-based harmony group Artisan. Other musicians have been known to take the tune of a traditional folk song and add their own words, often humourous, or on a similar-sounding yet different subject; these include The Wurzels and The Incredible Dr. Busker. Filk music is a closely related musical genre which originated as parodies of folk songs, and parody remains a dominant theme of the style. It is evolving into a true folk tradition, however, with songs learned orally that are undergoing the "folk process" of change in melody and text.

Media

External links

Folksong material:
- [http://www.mudcat.org/ mudcat.org], the home of the Digital Traditions (DIGITRAD) folksong database. The latest (2002) edition of DIGITRAD contains lyrics, and in some cases tunes or chords, for around 9000 folk rock, folk revival, and authentic American, English, and Irish folk songs, as well as some parodies. The database may be searched online, or downloaded as a standalone application. Another portal to DIGITRAD with file formats converted to emerging standards (e.g. ABC) is available at http://sniff.numachi.com/~rickheit/dtrad/.
- [http://www.csufresno.edu/folklore/BalladSearch.html The Traditional Ballad Index] search page. Provides bibliographic information and some theoretical genealogical information for many ballads in English.
- [http://www.travel-impressions.de/music/dichosa.htm Photos of Regional and Cultural Genres of Music and Dance]
- http://www.smsu.edu/folksong/maxhunter/. The Max Hunter Folk Song Collection is a set of about 1600 field recordings made by Max Hunter between 1956 and 1976 in the Ozark Mountain region of Missouri. The recordings are downloadable.
- [http://www.birchmore.clara.net/ Northumbrian Traditional Music] The folk music of Northumbria in North-East England.
- The [http://mtcn.free.fr folk music in the county of Nice] (France) : hundreds of MIDI files, lyrics, music sheets.
- http://ingeb.org. A list of folksongs from all over the world
- http://www.volksmusiknet.ch/. Swiss Folkmusic
- Musipedia contains several thousand folk music tunes. [http://www.musipedia.org musipedia.org]
- http://www.tritonus.ch/. Swiss Folkmusic and -instruments
- [http://www.geocities.com/krofnic/index1.htm Pticice] - a free MP3 album of native Serbian music
- http://folktunes.org/. The Folktunes Wiki, with streaming and downloadable songs, lyrics, and all things folk. In its infancy.
- [http://www.folkalley.com FolkAlley.com] - 24-hour streaming folk music
- [http://www.folkandroots.co.uk Folk and Roots]- A guide to the folk scene in the UK
- [http://www.floridamemory.com/Collections/folklife/folklife_cd.cfm Music from the Florida Folklife Collection] - From Shove It Over, a WPA recording of a work song performed by Zora Neale Hurston, to Orange Blossom Special, performed by Gamble Rogers and Will McLean, this CD spans fifty years of Florida folk music. The recordings are downloadable.
- [http://digital.library.wisc.edu/1711.dl/WiscFolkSong Wisconsin Folksong Collection, 1937-1946]. Presented by the [http://uwdc.library.wisc.edu/ University of Wisconsin Digital Collections Center] and [http://music.library.wisc.edu/ Mills Music Library Special Collections]. The Wisconsin Folksong Collection, 1937-1946 contains Wisconsin field recordings, notes, and photographs made by UW-Madison faculty member Helene Stratman-Thomas as part of the Wisconsin Folk Music Recording Project, co-sponsored by the University of Wisconsin and the Library of Congress during the summers of 1940, 1941, and 1946; and recordings collected by song catcher Sidney Robertson Cowell during the summer of 1937 for the Special Skills Division of the Resettlement Administration. Folk Festivals:
- [http://www.folkdranouter.be Folkfestival Dranouter:] An annual folk festival in Belgium, attracting over 70 000 visitors, which combines traditional with contemporary music. History:
- [http://libcom.org/history/articles/revolutionary-song-france People's history: Political folk song in France, 1789-1989]
- [http://libcom.org/history/articles/revolutionary-song-italy People's history: Political song in Italy, 1862-1999] Pastiche and parody:
- [http://arago4.tn.utwente.nl/stonedead/movies/holy-grail/scene-10.html A web page on "The Ballad of Sir Robin", with lyrics and sound file]
- Gilligan's Island theme:
- [http://www.gilligansisle.com/wave.html Sound files]
- [http://www.geocities.com/rickanddarvagossip/gilliganthemesong.html Lyrics: one of many sites ]

References

- English Folk Songs from the Southern Appalachians. Collected by Cecil J. Sharp. Ed. Maud Karpeles. 1932. London. Oxford University Press.
- Carson, Ciaran (1997). Last Night's Fun: In and Out of Time with Irish Music. North Point Press.
- Harker, David (1985). Fakesong: The Manufacture of British 'Folksong', 1700 to the Present Day. Cited in van der Merwe (1989).
- Karpeles, Maud. An Introduction to English Folk Song. 1973. Oxford. Oxford University Press.
- Middleton, Richard (1990/2002). Studying Popular Music. Philadelphia: Open University Press. ISBN 0335152759.
- Seeger, Charles (1980). Cited in Middleton (2002)
- Sharp, Cecil. Folk Song: Some Conclusions. 1907. Charles River Books
- van der Merwe, Peter (1989). Origins of the Popular Style: The Antecedents of Twentieth-Century Popular Music. Oxford: Clarendon Press. ISBN 0193161214. Category:Folk music Category:Folklore ja:フォークソング

Simple verse form

Verse-chorus form is a musical form common in popular music and predominant in rock since the 1960s. In contrast to AABA form, which is focused on the verse (contrasted and prepared by the bridge), in verse-chorus form the chorus is highlighted (prepared and contrasted with the verse). (Covach 2005, p.71) The chorus often sharply contrasts the verse melodically, rhythmically, and harmonically, and assumes a higher level of dynamics and activity, often with added instrumentation. See: arrangement.

Contrasting verse-chorus form

Songs which use different music for the verse and chorus are in contrasting verse-chorus form. Examples include:
- "Be My Baby" by The Ronettes' (1963)
- "Penny Lane" by The Beatles' (1967)
- "Smoke on the Water" by Deep Purple's (1973)
- "That'll Be the Day" by Buddy Holly's (1957)
- "California Girls" by The Beach Boys (1965)
- "All You Need Is Love" by The Beatles (1967)
- "Foxy Lady" by Jimi Hendrix (1967)
- "Can't Get Enough" by Bad Company (1974)

Simple verse-chorus form

Songs that use the same music for the verse and chorus, such as the twelve bar blues, though the lyrics feature different verses and a repeated chorus, are in simple verse-chorus form. Examples include:
- "Shake, Rattle, and Roll" by Big Joe Turner (1954)
- "Louie, Louie" by The Kingsmen (1963 cover), example not using blues form
- "La Bamba" by Ritchie Valens (1959)

Simple verse form

Songs which feature only a repeated verse are in simple verse form (verse-chorus form without the chorus). Examples include:
- "Evil Ways" by Santana (1969)
- twelve or other bar blues which are not simple verse-chorus form (above), such as "Heartbreak Hotel", "Jailhouse Rock", "Hound Dog", and "Lucille" and with a contrasting bridge:
- "Eight Miles High" by The Byrds (1966)
- "Tomorrow Never Knows" by The Beatles (1966)
- "Purple Haze" by Jimi Hendrix (1967). (ibid, p.71-72) Both simple verse-chorus form and simple verse form are strophic forms.

Source

- Covach, John. "Form in Rock Music: A Primer", in Stein, Deborah (2005). Engaging Music: Essays in Music Analysis. New York: Oxford University Press. ISBN 0195170105. Category:Musical forms

Verse

Most verse writing uses meter as its primary organisational mode, as opposed to prose, which uses grammatical and discoursal units like sentences and paragraphs. Verse may also use rhyme and other technical devices that are often associated with poetry. Not all verse is poetry. Generally speaking, what separates the two is that in poetry language achieves the highest possible level of condensation. In popular music a verse roughly corresponds with a poetic stanza. It is often sharply contrasted with the chorus or refrain melodically, rhythmically, and harmonically, and assumes a higher level of dynamics and activity, often with added instrumentation. See: strophic form, verse-chorus form and Thirty-two-bar form. Holy books such as the Bible or Qur'an are divided into small verses. See Chapters and verses of the Bible and ayah.

Verse-chorus form

Contrasting verse-chorus form

Simple verse-chorus form

Simple verse form

Source

- Covach, John. "Form in Rock Music: A Primer", in Stein, Deborah (2005). Engaging Music: Essays in Music Analysis. New York: Oxford University Press. ISBN 0195170105. Category:Musical forms

European classical music

:This article is about the genre of classical music or art music in the Western musical tradition. For articles on classical music of non-Western cultures, see: Classical music, For the period of music in the late 18th century see Classical music era, Classical music is a broad, somewhat imprecise term, referring to music produced in, or rooted in the traditions of, European art, ecclesiastical and concert music, encompassing a broad period from roughly 1000 to the present day. The central norms of this tradition, according to one school of thought, developed between 1550 and 1825, focusing on what is known as the common practice period.

Timeline

According to one school of thought, musical works are best understood in the context of their place in musical history; for adherents to this approach, this is essential to full enjoyment of these works. There is a widely accepted system of dividing the history of classical music composition into stylistic periods. According to this system, the major time divisions are:
- Medieval, generally before 1450. Chant, also called plainsong or Gregorian Chant, was the dominant form until about 1100.
- Renaissance, about 1450–1600, characterized by greater use of instrumentation, multiple melodic lines and by the use of the first bass instruments.
- Baroque, about 1600–1750, characterized by the use of complex counterpoint and growing popularity of keyboard music (harpsichord and pipe organ, since pianos didn't exist until the early 1700s, and didn't become popular until the classical music era) and orchestral music (it must be noted that orchestras, by that time, were of a much smaller constituition- see Chamber Music).
- Classical, about 1730–1820, an important era which established many of the norms of composition, presentation and style. Also, the classical era is marked by the disappearance of the harpsichord in favour of the piano, which from then on would become the central source for keyboard performance and composition.
- Romantic, 1815–1910 a period which codified practice, expanded the role of music in cultural life and created institutions for the teaching, performance and preservation of works of music.
- Modern, 1905–1975 a period which represented a crisis in the values of classical music and its role within intellectual life, and the extension of theory and technique. Some theorists, such as Arnold Schoenberg in his essay "Brahms the Progressive," insist that Modernism represents a logical progression from 19th century trends in composition; others hold the opposing point of view, that Modernism represents the rejection or negation of the method of Classical composition.
- 20th century, usually used to describe the wide variety of post-Romantic styles composed through 2000, which includes late Romantic, Modern and Post-Modern styles of composition.
- The term contemporary music is sometimes used to describe music composed in the late 20th century through present day
- The prefix neo is usually used to describe a 20th Century or Contemporary composition written in the style of an earlier period, such as classical, romantic, or modern. So for example, Prokofiev's Classical Symphony is considered a Neo-Classical composition. The dates are generalizations, since the periods overlapped. Some authorities subdivide the periods further by date or style. However, it should be noted that these categories are to an extent arbitrary; the use of counterpoint and fugue, which is considered characteristic of the Baroque era, was continued by Mozart, who is generally classified as typical of the Classical period, by Beethoven who is often described as straddling the Classical and Romantic periods, and Brahms, who is often classified as Romantic. This chart shows a selection of the most famous classical composers. For a more complete overview see Graphical timeline for classical composers

Classical music as "music of the classical era"

Main article: Classical music era In music history, a different meaning of the term classical music is occasionally used: it designates music from a period in musical history covering approximately Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach to Beethoven – roughly, 1730–1820. When used in this sense, the initial C of Classical music is sometimes capitalized to avoid confusion.

The nature of classical music

Classical music is primarily a written musical tradition, preserved in music notation, as opposed to being transmitted orally, by rote, or in recordings. While differences between particular performances of a classical work are recognized, a work of classical music is generally held to transcend any particular performance of it. Works that are centuries old often are performed far more often than works recently composed. The use of notation is an effective vehicle for transmitting classical music because all active participants in the classical music tradition are able to read music and are schooled in both historical and contemporary performance practices. Normally, this ability comes from formal training, which usually begins with learning to play an instrument, and sometimes continues with instruction in music theory and composition. However, there are many passive participants in classical music who enjoy it without being able to read it or perform it. Classical music is meant to be experienced for its own sake. It is unlike other forms of music that serve merely as an adjunct to other forms of entertainment. Performances of classical music often take place in a relatively solemn atmosphere, with the audience expected to maintain silence and remain immobile during the performance, so that everyone can hear each note and nuance. The performers usually dress formally, a practice which is often taken as a gesture of respect for the music, and performers normally do not engage in casual banter or other direct involvement with the audience. Amateur private readings of chamber music are more informal home occasions. Written transmission, along with the veneration bestowed on classical works, has important implications for the performance of classical music. To a fair degree, performers are expected to perform a work in a way that realizes the original intentions of the composer, which during the 19th century became stated ever more explicitly (down to the level of small, note-by-note details) in the score. Indeed, deviations from the composer's intentions are sometimes condemned as outright ethical lapses. Yet the opposite trend--admiration of performers for new "interpretations" of the composer's work, can be seen, and it is not unknown for a composer to praise a performer for achieving a better realization of the composer's original intent than the composer was able to imagine. Thus, classical music performers often achieve very high reputations for their musicianship, even if they do not compose themselves. Classical composition often aspires to a very complex relationship between the affective (emotional) content of the music, and the idea content. There is, in the most esteemed works of Classical music, an intensive use of Musical development, the process by which a musical germ idea or motif is repeated in different contexts, or in altered form, so that the mind of the listener consciously or unconsciously compares the different versions. The classical genres of sonata form and fugue employ particularly rigorous forms of musical development. (See also History of sonata form) Another consequence of the primacy of the composer's written score is that improvisation plays a relatively minor role in classical music--in sharp contrast to traditions like jazz, where improvisation is central. Improvisation in classical music performance was far more common during the Baroque era, and recently the performance of such music by modern classical musicians has been enriched by a revival of the old improvisational practices. During the Classical period, Mozart and Beethoven sometimes improvised the cadenzas to their piano concertos--but tended to write out the cadenzas when other soloists were to perform them. Art music, concert music, and orchestral music are terms sometimes used as synonyms of classical music.

Complexity

Classical works are generally considered to display great musical complexity through heavy use of development, modulation (changing of keys), little outright repetition, a wide use of musical phrases that are not default length--that is, four or eight bars long- counterpoint, polyphony and sophisticated harmony. Also, in classical music very long works (30 minutes to three hours) may be built up hierarchically from smaller units (phrases, periods, sections, and movements). Structural levels are distinguished by Schenkerian analysis.

Emotional content

As with many fine art forms, classical music often aspires to communicate a quality of emotion which has a transcendent quality, expressing universals of the human condition. They argue that this deeper reserve of expression allows classical music to reach what has been called the "sublime" in art. Examples often cited in this argument are religious works such as the Masses of Bach, Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven or Dvořák, or in works such as Beethoven's setting of Friedrich Schiller's poem, Ode to Joy, in the 9th symphony, which has often been used as a celebratory work at moments of national liberation or celebration, as in the Japanese practice of performing it to observe the New Year.

Instruments

Classical and popular music are distinguished to some extent by their choice of instruments. For the most part, the instruments used in common practice classical music are non-electrical and were invented prior to the mid-19th century (often, much earlier), and codified in the 18th and 19th centuries. They consist of the instruments found in an orchestra, together with a few other solo instruments (such as the piano, harpsichord, organ). The electric guitar plays an extremely prominent role in popular music, but naturally plays no role in classical music, and only appears occasionally in the classical music of the 20th and 21st centuries. Both classical and popular musicians have experimented for the last several decades with electrical or electronic instruments (for instance, the synthesizer or electronic tape), and instruments from other cultures (such as the gamelan). It must be noted that all the bass instruments didn't exist until the Renaissance (in Medieval Music, instruments are divided in two categories: outdoor/church, which sound loud, and indoor instruments). Also, many instruments which are associated today with popular music used to have important roles on early classical music, such as bagpipes, vilhuelas, hurdy-gurdys and some woodwind instruments. On the other hand, the acoustic guitar, for example, which used to be associated with popular music, started to gain proeminence on classical music since the 19th century, what culminated in the 20th century, and today has a prestige it never had before. Finally, it is important to know that the manners that a classical instrument is tuned may vary drastically according to the period from which the instrument is typical and the period in which the piece was composed. See musical tuning.

Permanence

One criterion that might be said to distinguish classical music is staying power. For instance, some of the works of J. S. Bach are now almost 300 years old, yet they continue to be widely performed. In contrast, big band music, for instance, a popular music genre of several decades ago, seems to be proving ephemeral in comparison. Bach had many contemporaries whose music was mediocre at best, and today their music is forgotten, surviving perhaps in libraries. The repertoire of classical music is skewed toward works recognized as excellent by listeners over long periods of time.

Influences between classical and popular music

Classical music has always been influenced or taken material from popular music. Examples include Erik Satie, Kurt Weill's The Threepenny Opera, and postminimalism, as well as much postmodern classical music.

Classical music and folk music

Composers of classical music have often made use of folk music, that is, music created by untutored musicians, spread by word of mouth. Often, they have done so with an explicit nationalist ideology; in other cases they have simply mined folk music for thematic material. See: European Classical Composers Noted for Use of Folk Music

Classical music in education

Throughout history, parents have often made sure that their children receive classical music training from a young age. Early experience with music provides the basis for more serious study later. Some instruments, such as the violin, are almost impossible to learn to play at a professional level if not learned in childhood. Some parents pursue music lessons for their children for social reasons or in an effort to instill a useful sense of self-discipline; lessons have also been shown to increase academic performance. Some consider that a degree of knowledge of important works of classical music is part of a good general education. The 1990s marked the emergence in the United States of research papers and popular books on the so-called Mozart effect: a temporary, small elevation of a Mozart listener's scores on certain tests. The popularized version of the controversial theory was expressed succinctly by a New York Times music columnist: "researchers have determined that listening to Mozart actually makes you smarter." Promoters marketed CDs claimed to induce the effect. Florida passed a law requiring toddlers in state-run schools to listen to classical music every day, and in 1998 the governor of Georgia budgeted $105,000 a year to provide every child born in Georgia with a tape or CD of classical music. One of the original researchers commented "I don't think it can hurt. I'm all for exposing children to wonderful cultural experiences. But I do think the money could be better spent on music education programs." See also:
- Mozart effect
- Orff Schulwerk
- Suzuki method

Composers of classical music

- List of classical music composers

Terms of classical music

For terms relating specifically to the performance of classical music, see the Musical terminology.

Literature

- Norman Lebrecht, When the Music Stops: Managers, Maestros and the Corporate Murder of Classical Music, Simon & Schuster 1996

Sources

- Middleton, Richard (1990/2002). Studying Popular Music. Philadelphia: Open University Press. ISBN 0335152759.
- Becker, Judith (1969). "The Anatomy of a Mode", Ethnomusicology 13(2):267–279.

External links

- [http://www.classiccat.net/ Classic Cat] – A directory of free classical MP3.
- [http://www.classical.net/ Classical.net] – review, database and mailing-list resource
- [http://www.classicalarchives.com/ ClassicalArchives] – music, artists, composers, MIDI files
- [http://www.chopinmusic.net/forum ChopinMusic Forum] – a community of romantic music lovers
- [http://www.download-latest-online-music.com/free-classical-music-downloads.html European Classical Music] – chronology and free downloads
- [http://www.musicweb-international.com MusicWeb International] – CD reviews, composer articles, timelines, concert and book reviews
- [http://thegclef.blogspot.com The G Clef] All about Indian and European classical music. Also fine information on Classical Guitar and Recorder.
- [http://www.violinmp3.com/ ViolinMP3.com - Violin Information website, containing several classical music resources and composer guides] Classical music ko:서양 고전음악 ja:古典派音楽

Rondeau

Rondeau may mean:
- Rondeau (poetry), a form of French poetry
- Rondo, a musical form from the 18th century to the present, also knows as Rondeau
- José Casimiro Rondeau Pereyra, a general and politician in Argentina and Uruguay in the early 19th century.
- Noah John Rondeau, an Adirondack hermit.
- Jim Rondeau, a politician in Manitoba, Canada
- Rondeau Provincial Park, in southwestern Ontario
- Rondeau (dance), a French baroque dance, often incorporated into a suite
- Rondeau (music) is a form of medieval and early Renaissance music

Ars nova

The ars nova was a stylistic period in music of the Late Middle Ages, centered in France, which encompassed the period from the publication of the Roman de Fauvel (1310 and 1314) until the death of Machaut (1377). Sometimes the term is used more loosely and refers to all European music of the 14th century, thereby including such figures as Landini, who was working in Italy. Occasionally the term "Italian ars nova" is used to denote the music of Landini and his compatriots. The term ars nova means "new art" or "new technique", and was first used in a publication by Philippe de Vitry of the same name (c.1322). Ars nova is generally used in conjunction with another term, ars antiqua, which refers to the music of the immediately preceding age, usually extending back to take in the period of Notre Dame polyphony (therefore covering the period from about 1170 to 1320). Roughly, then, the ars antiqua is the music of the thirteenth century, and the ars nova the music of the fourteenth; many music histories use the terms in this more general sense. Stylistically, the music of the ars nova differed from the preceding era in several ways. Rhythm was used much more freely, shunning the straitjacket of the rhythmic modes, which prevailed in the thirteenth century; secular music acquired much of the polyphonic sophistication previously found only in sacred music; and new techniques and forms, such as isorhythm and the isorhythmic motet, became prevalent. The overall aesthetic effect of these changes was to create music of greater expressiveness and variety than had been the case in the thirteenth century. Indeed the sudden historical change which occurred, with its startling new degree of musical expressiveness, can be likened to the introduction of perspective in painting, and it is useful to consider that the changes to the musical art in the period of the ars nova were contemporary with the great early Renaissance revolutions in painting and literature. The greatest practitioner of the new musical style was undoubtedly Guillaume de Machaut, who also had an equally distinguished career as a poet. The ars nova style is nowhere more perfectly displayed than in his considerable body of motets, lais, virelais, rondeaux, and ballades. Towards the end of the fourteenth century a new stylistic school of composers and poets centered around Avignon in southern France developed; the highly mannered style of this period is often called the ars subtilior, though some scholars choose to consider it a late development of the ars nova rather than breaking it out as a separate school. This strange but interesting repertory of music, limited in geographical distribution (southern France, Aragon and later Cyprus), and clearly intended for performance by specialists for an audience of connoisseurs, is like an endnote to the entire Middle Ages.

References and further reading

- Article "ars nova", in The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, ed. Stanley Sadie. 20 vol. London, Macmillan Publishers Ltd., 1980. ISBN 1561591742
- Richard H. Hoppin, Medieval Music. New York, W.W. Norton & Co., 1978. ISBN 0393090906
- Harold Gleason and Warren Becker, Music in the Middle Ages and Renaissance (Music Literature Outlines Series I). Bloomington, Indiana. Frangipani Press, 1986. ISBN 089917034X Category:Medieval music Category:French music history ja:アルス・ノーヴァ

Lieder

Lied (plural Lieder) is a German word, literally meaning "song"; among English speakers, however, it is used primarily as a term for European classical music songs, also known as "art songs". Typically, Lieder are arranged for a single singer and piano. Sometimes Lieder are gathered in a Liederkreis or "song cycle" — a series of songs tied by a single narrative or theme. The composers Franz Schubert and Robert Schumann are most closely associated with this genre of classical music.

History

Amongst German speakers, the term Lied has a much older and longer history, ranging from 12th century troubadour songs (Minnesang) via folk songs (Volkslieder) and church hymns (Kirchenlieder) to 20th-century satirical or protest songs (Kabarettlieder, Protestlieder). In Germany, the great age of song came in the 19th century. German and Austrian composers had written music for voice with accompaniment before then, but it was with the flowering of German literature in the Classical and Romantic eras that composers found high inspiration in poetry that created the genre known as the Lied. The beginnings of this tradition are seen in the songs of Mozart and Beethoven, but it is with Schubert that a new balance is found between words and music, a new absorption into the music of the sense of the words. Schubert wrote over 600 songs, some of them in sequences or song cycles that relate a story - adventure of the soul rather than the body. The tradition was continued by Schumann, Brahms, and Hugo Wolf, and on into the 20th century by Strauss and Mahler. The body of song created in the Lied tradition, like that of the Italian madrigal three centuries before, represents one of the richest products of human sensibility.

Other national traditions

The Lied tradition is closely linked with the actual sound of the German language. But there are parallels elsewhere noticeably in France, with the melodies of such composers as Faure, Debussy and Francis Poulenc, and in Russia, with the songs of Mussorgsky in particular. England too had a flowering of song in the 20th century represented by Vaughan Williams and Benjamin Britten.

External link

- At http://www.lieder.net/ you can find thousands of texts to classical art songs in many languages, with translations to English. Category:German music history Category:Songs Category:Romanticism Category:German loanwords ko:가곡 ja:歌曲

Theme and variations

In music, variation is a formal technique where material is altered during repetition; reiteration with changes. Changes may be harmonic, melodic, contrapuntal, rhythmic, and of timbre or orchestration. Variational sections depend upon one type of presentation of material, while developmental sections use many different presentations and combinations of material. Variation form, or theme and variation, is a musical form where a theme is repeated in altered form or accompanied in a different manner. Passacaglias and chaconnes are forms in with a repeating bass line or ostinato is heard through the entire piece. Fantasia variation is a form which relies on variation but which repeats and incorporates material freely.

History of variations

Works in theme-and-variation form have been written through most of the history of classical music. A favorite form of variations in Renaissance music was divisions, a type in which the basic rhythmic beat is successively divided into faster and faster intervals. The basic principle of beginning with simple variations and moving on to more elaborate ones has always been present in the history of the variation form, since it provides a way of giving an overall shape to a variation set, rather letting it just form an arbitrary sequence. Two famous variation sets from the Baroque era, both for harpsichord, are George Frideric Handel's Harmonious Blacksmith set, and Johann Sebastian Bach's Goldberg Variations, which together with Beethoven's late variations is widely considered to represent the pinnacle of the form. In the Classical era, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart wrote a great number of variations, such as the first movement of his Piano Sonata in A, K. 331, or the finale of his Clarinet Quintet. Mozart favored a particular pattern in his variations: the penultimate variation is in slow tempo, often acting as a kind of extra slow movement in a multi-movement work; and the final variation is fast and in bravura style. Joseph Haydn specialized in sets of double variations, in which two related themes, usually minor and major, are presented and then varied in alternation; one example is the slow movement of his Symphony No. 103, the Drumroll. Ludwig van Beethoven wrote many variation sets in his career. Some were independent sets, of which the most substantial are considered to be the "Diabelli" variations, Op. 120. Others form single movements or parts of movements in larger works, such as first movement of the Piano Sonata Op. 26, or the variations in the final movement of the Third Symphony. Variation sets that listeners often consider to be among Beethoven's most profound musical utterances occur in several of his late works, such as slow movement of his String quartet Op. 127, the second movement of his final Piano sonata, Op. 111, and the slow movement of the Ninth Symphony. Franz Schubert wrote five variation sets using his own lieder as themes. A highlight of these is the slow movement of his string quartet Death and the Maiden (Der Tod und das Mädchen, D. 810), an intense set of variations on his somber lied (D. 531) of the same title. Schubert's Piano Quintet in A (The Trout, D.667) likewise includes variations on The Trout (Die Forelle, D. 550). In the Romantic era, the variation receded somewhat in importance, but many composers nevertheless created variation sets. A standout was Johannes Brahms, whose Classical tendencies perhaps naturally inclined him to writing variations; some of Brahms's variation sets rely on themes by older composers, for example the variations for orchestra on a theme (thought in Brahms's time to be) by Haydn and the variations for piano on a theme by Handel. Edward Elgar's Enigma Variations (1899) is probably his best-known full-length piece. Variation sets were also composed by 20th century composers, including Arnold Schoenberg (the Variations for Orchestra), Anton Webern (the Variations, Opus 27 for piano and Variations, Opus 30 for orchestra), Paul Hindemith, and Benjamin Britten (including the Young Person's Guide to the Orchestra (Variations and Fugue on a Theme by Purcell) and the Variations on a Theme by Frank Bridge).

Improvised variations

Skilled musicians who know a theme well can often improvise variations on it. This was commonplace in the Baroque era, when the da capo aria, particular when in slow tempo, required the performer to be able to improvise a variation during the return of the main material. Musicians of the Classical era also could improvise variations. A minor work by Beethoven, his Fantasia in G Minor Op. 77, is almost certainly a written transcription of an improvised performance, at the core of which is a series of variations on a short theme. The great number and somewhat stereotyped character of Mozart's stand-alone variation sets for piano suggest that these, too, may be written-down improvisations, or at least were composed in haste. Improvisation of elaborate variations on a popular theme is one of the core genres of jazz.

External links

- [http://w3.rz-berlin.mpg.de/cmp/g_variation.html Classical Music Pages: Variation] Category:Musical techniques Category:Musical forms ja:変奏曲

Song structure (popular music)

Songs in

Strophic form

See also

Section

Musical form

Descriptions of musical form

Formal structures

Single-movement forms

Multi-movement forms

See also

External links

References

Stanza

Folk music

Defining folk music

Subjects of folk music

Variation in folk music

The decline of folk traditions in modern societies

Stage I: Urban influence

Stage II: Replacement of folk music by popular music

Stage III: Loss of musical ability in the community

Regional variation

Fieldwork and scholarship on folk music

Folk revivals

The emergence of popular folk artists

The blending of folk and popular genres

Pastiche and parody

Media

See also

External links

References

Simple verse form

Contrasting verse-chorus form

Simple verse-chorus form

Simple verse form

Source

Verse

See also

Verse-chorus form

Contrasting verse-chorus form

Simple verse-chorus form

Simple verse form

Source

European classical music

Timeline

Classical music as "music of the classical era"

The nature of classical music

Complexity

Emotional content

Instruments

Permanence

Influences between classical and popular music

Classical music and folk music

Classical music in education

Related genres

Composers of classical music

Terms of classical music

Literature

Sources

External links

Rondeau

Ars nova

References and further reading

Lieder

History

Other national traditions

External link

Theme and variations

History of variations

Improvised variations

See also

External links

Song structure (popular music)