Preludes, Op. 23 (Rachmaninoff)
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Preludes, Op. 23 (Rachmaninoff)
Ten Preludes, Op. 23, is a set of ten preludes for solo piano, composed by Sergei Rachmaninoff in 1901 and 1903. This set includes the famous Prelude in G minor. Together with the Prelude in C minor, Op. 3/2 and the 13 Preludes, Op. 32, this set is part of a full suite of 24 preludes in all the major and minor keys. Composition Op. 23 is composed of ten preludes, ranging from two to five minutes in length. Combined, the pieces take around thirty minutes to perform. They are: * No. 1 in F minor (Largo) * No. 2 in B major (Maestoso) * No. 3 in D minor (Tempo di minuetto) * No. 4 in D major (Andante cantabile) * No. 5 in G minor (Alla marcia) * No. 6 in E major (Andante) * No. 7 in C minor (Allegro) * No. 8 in A major (Allegro vivace) * No. 9 in E minor (Presto) * No. 10 in G major (Largo) Rachmaninoff completed Prelude No. 5 in 1901. The remaining preludes were completed after Rachmaninoff's marriage to his cousin Natalia Satina: Nos. 1, 4, and 10 premier ...
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Prelude In E-flat Minor (Rachmaninoff)
The Prelude in E-Flat Minor, Op. 23 No. 9 is a 1903 composition by Sergei Rachmaninoff Sergei Vasilyevich Rachmaninoff; in Russian pre-revolutionary script. (28 March 1943) was a Russian composer, virtuoso pianist, and conductor. Rachmaninoff is widely considered one of the finest pianists of his day and, as a composer, one o .... It is part of Rachmaninoff's Ten Preludes, Op. 23, and is one of the most difficult of the set. Structure A double note theme is announced in measures 1–4. The piece then modulates rapidly from bar to bar, passing through: G flat (measure 5); C flat (measure 6); A flat minor (measure 7); and B flat (measure 9). The primary melody returns at measure 11. Measures 5 and 6 Measure 7 Measure 9 In measures 5–10 a number of thirds, sixths, seconds, and fourths make up the right hand melody. The left hand is an arpeggiated figure sporadically interrupted with minor seconds. A reiteration of A occurs at measure 23. Measures 22 and 23 T ...
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Largo (music)
In musical terminology, tempo (Italian, 'time'; plural ''tempos'', or ''tempi'' from the Italian plural) is the speed or pace of a given piece. In classical music, tempo is typically indicated with an instruction at the start of a piece (often using conventional Italian terms) and is usually measured in beats per minute (or bpm). In modern classical compositions, a "metronome mark" in beats per minute may supplement or replace the normal tempo marking, while in modern genres like electronic dance music, tempo will typically simply be stated in BPM. Tempo may be separated from articulation and meter, or these aspects may be indicated along with tempo, all contributing to the overall texture. While the ability to hold a steady tempo is a vital skill for a musical performer, tempo is changeable. Depending on the genre of a piece of music and the performers' interpretation, a piece may be played with slight tempo rubato or drastic variances. In ensembles, the tempo is often indic ...
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Common Chord (music)
A common chord, in the theory of harmony, is a chord that is diatonic to more than one key or, in other words, is ''common'' to (shared by) two keys. A "common chord" may also be defined simply as a triadic chord (e.g., C–E–G), as one of the most commonly used chords in a key (I–IV–V–vi–ii), more narrowly as a triad in which the fifth is perfect (i.e., a major or minor triad), in which sense it is alternatively referred to as a "perfect chord" or, more narrowly still (in American practice), as a major triad only.Don Michael Randel, "Common Chord", ''Harvard Dictionary of Music'', fourth edition, Harvard University Press Reference Library 16 (Cambridge: Harvard University Press 2003): 193. . "Common chord: Major triad." Common chords are frequently used in modulations, in a type of modulation known as common chord modulation or diatonic pivot chord modulation. It moves from the original key to the destination key (usually a closely related key) by way of a chord bo ...
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Stepwise Motion
In music, a step, or conjunct motion,Bonds, Mark Evan (2006). ''A History of Music in Western Culture'', p.123. 2nd ed. . is the difference in pitch between two consecutive notes of a musical scale. In other words, it is the interval between two consecutive scale degrees. Any larger interval is called a skip (also called a leap), or disjunct motion. In the diatonic scale, a step is either a minor second (sometimes also called ''half step'') or a major second (sometimes also called ''whole step''), with all intervals of a minor third or larger being skips. For example, C to D (major second) is a step, whereas C to E (major third) is a skip. More generally, a step is a smaller or narrower interval in a musical line, and a skip is a wider or larger interval with the categorization of intervals into steps and skips is determined by the tuning system and the pitch space used. Melodic motion in which the interval between any two consecutive pitches is no more than a step, or, less ...
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Virtuoso
A virtuoso (from Italian ''virtuoso'' or , "virtuous", Late Latin ''virtuosus'', Latin ''virtus'', "virtue", "excellence" or "skill") is an individual who possesses outstanding talent and technical ability in a particular art or field such as fine arts, music, singing, playing a musical instrument, or composition. Meaning This word also refers to a person who has cultivated appreciation of artistic excellence, either as a connoisseur or collector. The plural form of ''virtuoso'' is either ''virtuosi'' or the Anglicisation ''virtuosos'', and the feminine forms are ''virtuosa'' and ''virtuose''. According to ''Music in the Western civilization'' by Piero Weiss and Richard Taruskin: ...a virtuoso was, originally, a highly accomplished musician, but by the nineteenth century the term had become restricted to performers, both vocal and instrumental, whose technical accomplishments were so pronounced as to dazzle the public. The defining element of virtuosity is the performance ab ...
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Romantic Music
Romantic music is a stylistic movement in Western Classical music associated with the period of the 19th century commonly referred to as the Romantic era (or Romantic period). It is closely related to the broader concept of Romanticism—the intellectual, artistic and literary movement that became prominent in Western culture from approximately 1798 until 1837. Romantic composers sought to create music that was individualistic, emotional, dramatic and often programmatic; reflecting broader trends within the movements of Romantic literature, poetry, art, and philosophy. Romantic music was often ostensibly inspired by (or else sought to evoke) non-musical stimuli, such as nature, literature, poetry, super-natural elements or the fine arts. It included features such as increased chromaticism and moved away from traditional forms. Background The Romantic movement was an artistic, literary, and intellectual movement that originated in the second half of the 18th century in ...
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Polyphony
Polyphony ( ) is a type of musical texture consisting of two or more simultaneous lines of independent melody, as opposed to a musical texture with just one voice, monophony, or a texture with one dominant melodic voice accompanied by chords, homophony. Within the context of the Western musical tradition, the term ''polyphony'' is usually used to refer to music of the late Middle Ages and Renaissance. Baroque forms such as fugue, which might be called polyphonic, are usually described instead as contrapuntal. Also, as opposed to the ''species'' terminology of counterpoint, polyphony was generally either "pitch-against-pitch" / "point-against-point" or "sustained-pitch" in one part with melismas of varying lengths in another. In all cases the conception was probably what Margaret Bent (1999) calls "dyadic counterpoint", with each part being written generally against one other part, with all parts modified if needed in the end. This point-against-point conception is opposed to " ...
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Preludes (Chopin)
Frédéric Chopin wrote a number of preludes for piano solo. His cycle of 24 Preludes, Op. 28, covers all major and minor keys. In addition, Chopin wrote three other preludes: a prelude in C minor, Op. 45; a piece in A major from 1834; and an unfinished piece in E minor. These are sometimes referred to as Nos. 25, 26, and 27, respectively. 24 Preludes, Op. 28 Chopin's 24 Preludes, Op. 28, are a set of short pieces for the piano, one in each of the twenty-four keys, originally published in 1839. Chopin wrote them between 1835 and 1839, partly at Valldemossa, Mallorca, where he spent the winter of 1838–39 and where he had fled with George Sand and her children to escape the damp Paris weather. In Majorca, Chopin had a copy of Bach's ''The Well-Tempered Clavier'', and as in each of Bach's two sets of preludes and fugues, his Op. 28 set comprises a complete cycle of the major and minor keys, albeit with a different ordering. The manuscript, which Chopin carefully prepare ...
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Frédéric Chopin
Frédéric François Chopin (born Fryderyk Franciszek Chopin; 1 March 181017 October 1849) was a Polish composer and virtuoso pianist of the Romantic period, who wrote primarily for solo piano. He has maintained worldwide renown as a leading musician of his era, one whose "poetic genius was based on a professional technique that was without equal in his generation". Chopin was born in Żelazowa Wola in the Duchy of Warsaw and grew up in Warsaw, which in 1815 became part of Congress Poland. A child prodigy, he completed his musical education and composed his earlier works in Warsaw before leaving Poland at the age of 20, less than a month before the outbreak of the November 1830 Uprising. At 21, he settled in Paris. Thereafterin the last 18 years of his lifehe gave only 30 public performances, preferring the more intimate atmosphere of the salon. He supported himself by selling his compositions and by giving piano lessons, for which he was in high demand. Chopin formed a fr ...
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Alexander Scriabin
Alexander Nikolayevich Scriabin (; russian: Александр Николаевич Скрябин ; – ) was a Russian composer and virtuoso pianist. Before 1903, Scriabin was greatly influenced by the music of Frédéric Chopin and composed in a relatively tonal, late Romantic idiom. Later, and independently of his influential contemporary, Arnold Schoenberg, Scriabin developed a much more dissonant musical language that had transcended usual tonality but was not atonal, which accorded with his personal brand of metaphysics. Scriabin found significant appeal in the concept of Gesamtkunstwerk as well as synesthesia, and associated colours with the various harmonic tones of his scale, while his colour-coded circle of fifths was also inspired by theosophy. He is often considered the main Russian Symbolist composer and a major representative of the Russian Silver Age. Scriabin was an innovator as well as one of the most controversial composer-pianists of the early 20th century ...
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Johann Sebastian Bach
Johann Sebastian Bach (28 July 1750) was a German composer and musician of the late Baroque period. He is known for his orchestral music such as the '' Brandenburg Concertos''; instrumental compositions such as the Cello Suites; keyboard works such as the ''Goldberg Variations'' and ''The Well-Tempered Clavier''; organ works such as the '' Schubler Chorales'' and the Toccata and Fugue in D minor; and vocal music such as the ''St Matthew Passion'' and the Mass in B minor. Since the 19th-century Bach revival he has been generally regarded as one of the greatest composers in the history of Western music. The Bach family already counted several composers when Johann Sebastian was born as the last child of a city musician in Eisenach. After being orphaned at the age of 10, he lived for five years with his eldest brother Johann Christoph, after which he continued his musical education in Lüneburg. From 1703 he was back in Thuringia, working as a musician for Protestant c ...
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