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Symphony No. 1 (Schnittke)
The Symphony No. 1 by Alfred Schnittke was composed between 1969 and 1974. It is scored for a large orchestra. The symphony is recognised as one of Schnittke's most extreme essays in aleatoric music. From the outset the piece is loud, brash, and chaotic, and it quotes motifs from all parts of the Western classical tradition. Schnittke includes a choreography for the musicians themselves, and in a manner similar to Haydn's ''Farewell Symphony'', they leave and re-enter the stage at points marked in the score. Music The symphony is in four movements: The second movement opens with a faux-Baroque rondo which is soon usurped by a Mahlerian intervention on clarinet. This too is soon eclipsed by a sleazy percussive theme. There are also direct quotations from Tchaikovsky's B-minor Piano Concerto, Johann Strauss Jr's 'Vienna Woods' waltz, Chopin's Second Piano Sonata amongst many others. Often the material collides in a manner similar to Charles Ives' music, but as the critic A ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Alfred Schnittke
Alfred Garrievich Schnittke (russian: Альфре́д Га́рриевич Шни́тке, link=no, Alfred Garriyevich Shnitke; 24 November 1934 – 3 August 1998) was a Russian composer of Jewish-German descent. Among the most performed and recorded composers of late 20th-century classical music, he is described by musicologist Ivan Moody as a "composer who was concerned in his music to depict the moral and spiritual struggles of contemporary man in ..depth and detail." Schnittke's early music shows the strong influence of Dmitri Shostakovich. He developed a polystylistic technique in works such as the epic Symphony No. 1 (1969–1972) and his first concerto grosso (1977). In the 1980s, Schnittke's music began to become more widely known abroad with the publication of his second (1980) and third (1983) string quartets and the String Trio (1985); the ballet ''Peer Gynt'' (1985–1987); the third (1981), fourth (1984), and fifth (1988) symphonies; and the viola concerto ( ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Clarinet
The clarinet is a musical instrument in the woodwind family. The instrument has a nearly cylindrical bore and a flared bell, and uses a single reed to produce sound. Clarinets comprise a family of instruments of differing sizes and pitches. The clarinet family is the largest such woodwind family, with more than a dozen types, ranging from the BB♭ contrabass to the E♭ soprano. The most common clarinet is the B soprano clarinet. German instrument maker Johann Christoph Denner is generally credited with inventing the clarinet sometime after 1698 by adding a register key to the chalumeau, an earlier single-reed instrument. Over time, additional keywork and the development of airtight pads were added to improve the tone and playability. Today the clarinet is used in classical music, military bands, klezmer, jazz, and other styles. It is a standard fixture of the orchestra and concert band. Etymology The word ''clarinet'' may have entered the English language via the Fr ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen national republics; in practice, both its government and its economy were highly centralized until its final years. It was a one-party state governed by the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, with the city of Moscow serving as its capital as well as that of its largest and most populous republic: the Russian SFSR. Other major cities included Leningrad (Russian SFSR), Kiev (Ukrainian SSR), Minsk ( Byelorussian SSR), Tashkent (Uzbek SSR), Alma-Ata (Kazakh SSR), and Novosibirsk (Russian SFSR). It was the largest country in the world, covering over and spanning eleven time zones. The country's roots lay in the October Revolution of 1917, when the Bolsheviks, under the leadership of Vladimir Lenin, overthrew the Russian Provisional Government ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Piano
The piano is a stringed keyboard instrument in which the strings are struck by wooden hammers that are coated with a softer material (modern hammers are covered with dense wool felt; some early pianos used leather). It is played using a keyboard, which is a row of keys (small levers) that the performer presses down or strikes with the fingers and thumbs of both hands to cause the hammers to strike the strings. It was invented in Italy by Bartolomeo Cristofori around the year 1700. Description The word "piano" is a shortened form of ''pianoforte'', the Italian term for the early 1700s versions of the instrument, which in turn derives from ''clavicembalo col piano e forte'' (key cimbalom with quiet and loud)Pollens (1995, 238) and ''fortepiano''. The Italian musical terms ''piano'' and ''forte'' indicate "soft" and "loud" respectively, in this context referring to the variations in volume (i.e., loudness) produced in response to a pianist's touch or pressure on the keys: the grea ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Violin
The violin, sometimes known as a ''fiddle'', is a wooden chordophone (string instrument) in the violin family. Most violins have a hollow wooden body. It is the smallest and thus highest-pitched instrument (soprano) in the family in regular use. The violin typically has four strings (music), strings (some can have five-string violin, five), usually tuned in perfect fifths with notes G3, D4, A4, E5, and is most commonly played by drawing a bow (music), bow across its strings. It can also be played by plucking the strings with the fingers (pizzicato) and, in specialized cases, by striking the strings with the wooden side of the bow (col legno). Violins are important instruments in a wide variety of musical genres. They are most prominent in the Western classical music, Western classical tradition, both in ensembles (from chamber music to orchestras) and as solo instruments. Violins are also important in many varieties of folk music, including country music, bluegrass music, and ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Jazz Improvisation
Jazz improvisation is the spontaneous invention of melodic solo lines or accompaniment parts in a performance of jazz music. It is one of the defining elements of jazz. Improvisation is composing on the spot, when a singer or instrumentalist invents melodies and lines over a chord progression played by rhythm section instruments (piano, guitar, double bass) and accompanied by drums. Although blues, rock, and other genres use improvisation, it is done over relatively simple chord progressions which often remain in one key (or closely related keys using the circle of fifths, such as a song in C Major modulating to G Major). Jazz improvisation is distinguished from this approach by chordal complexity, often with one or more chord changes per bar, altered chords, extended chords, tritone substitution, unusual chords (e.g., augmented chords), and extensive use of ii–V–I progression, all of which typically move through multiple keys within a single song. However, since the release ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Alex Ross (music Critic)
Alex Ross (born January 12, 1968) is an American music critic and author who specializes in classical music. A staff member of ''The New Yorker'' magazine since 1996, his extensive writings include performance and record reviews, industry updates, cultural commentary and historical narratives in the realm of classical music. He has written three well-received books: '' The Rest Is Noise: Listening to the Twentieth Century'' (2007), ''Listen to This'' (2011), and ''Wagnerism: Art and Politics in the Shadow of Music'' (2020). A graduate of Harvard University and student of composer Peter Lieberson, from 1992 to 1996 Ross was a critic for ''The New York Times''. He has received wide acclaim for his publications; ''The Rest Is Noise'' was a finalist for the 2008 Pulitzer Prize for General Nonfiction, and his other awards and honors include a MacArthur Fellowship and the Belmont Prize. He maintains a popular classical music blog, ''The Rest is Noise''. Life and career Alex Ross w ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Charles Ives
Charles Edward Ives (; October 20, 1874May 19, 1954) was an American modernist composer, one of the first American composers of international renown. His music was largely ignored during his early career, and many of his works went unperformed for many years. Later in life, the quality of his music was publicly recognized through the efforts of contemporaries like Henry Cowell and Lou Harrison, and he came to be regarded as an "American original". He was also among the first composers to engage in a systematic program of experimental music, with musical techniques including polytonality, polyrhythm, tone clusters, aleatory elements, and quarter tones. His experimentation foreshadowed many musical innovations that were later more widely adopted during the 20th century. Hence, he is often regarded as the leading American composer of art music of the 20th century. Sources of Ives's tonal imagery included hymn tunes and traditional songs; he also incorporated melodies of the tow ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Piano Sonata No
The piano is a stringed keyboard instrument in which the strings are struck by wooden hammers that are coated with a softer material (modern hammers are covered with dense wool felt; some early pianos used leather). It is played using a keyboard, which is a row of keys (small levers) that the performer presses down or strikes with the fingers and thumbs of both hands to cause the hammers to strike the strings. It was invented in Italy by Bartolomeo Cristofori around the year 1700. Description The word "piano" is a shortened form of ''pianoforte'', the Italian term for the early 1700s versions of the instrument, which in turn derives from ''clavicembalo col piano e forte'' (key cimbalom with quiet and loud)Pollens (1995, 238) and ''fortepiano''. The Italian musical terms ''piano'' and ''forte'' indicate "soft" and "loud" respectively, in this context referring to the variations in volume (i.e., loudness) produced in response to a pianist's touch or pressure on the keys: the grea ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Tales From The Vienna Woods
"Tales from the Vienna Woods" (german: "Geschichten aus dem Wienerwald", links=no, italic=no, occasionally ) is a waltz by Johann Strauss II. Composed in 1868 in music, 1868, , Opus number, Op. 325, was one of six Viennese waltzes by Johann Strauss II which featured a virtuoso part for zither. The title of Strauss' dance recalls the folk music of the inhabitants of the Vienna Woods. Composition notes The waltz's Introduction (music), introduction is one of the longest he ever wrote for a waltz, 119 bars in the musical score. It starts in C major, intertwining with F major before gaining ascendancy in volume and mood, finishing with a Fermata, long pause. The second part is in the key of G major, with a solo violin incorporating material which appears again in successive waltz sections. A short flute cadenza evoking birdsong comes in, and moves on to the zither solo, marked ''moderato''. The zither part involves two sub-sections of its own; the slowish ländler tempo and its mor ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Johann Strauss Jr
Johann Baptist Strauss II (25 October 1825 – 3 June 1899), also known as Johann Strauss Jr., the Younger or the Son (german: links=no, Sohn), was an Austrian composer of light music, particularly dance music and operettas. He composed over 500 waltzes, polkas, quadrilles, and other types of dance music, as well as several operettas and a ballet. In his lifetime, he was known as "The Waltz King", and was largely responsible for the popularity of the waltz in Vienna during the 19th century. Some of Johann Strauss's most famous works include "The Blue Danube", "Kaiser-Walzer" (Emperor Waltz), "Tales from the Vienna Woods", "Frühlingsstimmen", and the "Tritsch-Tratsch-Polka". Among his operettas, ''Die Fledermaus'' and ''Der Zigeunerbaron'' are the best known. Strauss was the son of Johann Strauss I and his first wife Maria Anna Streim. Two younger brothers, Josef and Eduard Strauss, also became composers of light music, although they were never as well known as their brothe ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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