|
Te Deum (Pärt)
''Te Deum'' is a setting of the Latin Te Deum text, also known as the Ambrosian Hymn attributed to Saints Ambrose, Augustine, and Hilary, by Estonian-born composer Arvo Pärt, commissioned by the Westdeutscher Rundfunk in Cologne, Germany, in 1984. Dedicated to the late Alfred Schlee of Universal Edition, the WDR Broadcast Choir premiered the Te Deum under the direction of conductor Dennis Russell Davies on January 19, 1985. The Te Deum plays an important role in the services of many Christian denominations, including the Paraklesis (Moleben) of Thanksgiving in the Eastern Orthodox Church. Because of the unusual instrumentation Pärt employs, his Te Deum is not suited for use within the Orthodox Church. It was recorded on the ECM New Series label in 1993 by the Estonian Philharmonic Chamber Choir and Tallinn Chamber Orchestra under the direction of Tõnu Kaljuste. The piece is approximately thirty minutes long. Te Deum employs Pärt's signature tintinnabuli compositional style. T ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Arvo Pärt
Arvo Pärt (; born 11 September 1935) is an Estonian composer of contemporary classical music. Since the late 1970s, Pärt has worked in a minimalist style that employs tintinnabuli, a compositional technique he invented. Pärt's music is in part inspired by Gregorian chant. His most performed works include ''Fratres'' (1977), ''Spiegel im Spiegel'' (1978), and ''Für Alina'' (1976). From 2011 to 2018, Pärt was the most performed living composer in the world, and the second most performed in 2019—after John Williams. The Arvo Pärt Centre, in Laulasmaa, was opened to the public in 2018. Early life, family and education Pärt was born in Paide, Järva County, Estonia, and was raised by his mother and stepfather in Rakvere in northern Estonia. He began to experiment with the top and bottom notes of the family's piano as the middle register was damaged. Pärt's musical education began at the age of seven when he began attending music school in Rakvere. By his early teenage ye ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Choir
A choir ( ; also known as a chorale or chorus) is a musical ensemble of singers. Choral music, in turn, is the music written specifically for such an ensemble to perform. Choirs may perform music from the classical music repertoire, which spans from the medieval era to the present, or popular music repertoire. Most choirs are led by a conductor, who leads the performances with arm, hand, and facial gestures. The term ''choir'' is very often applied to groups affiliated with a church (whether or not they actually occupy the quire), whereas a ''chorus'' performs in theatres or concert halls, but this distinction is not rigid. Choirs may sing without instruments, or accompanied by a piano, pipe organ, a small ensemble, or an orchestra. A choir can be a subset of an ensemble; thus one speaks of the "woodwind choir" of an orchestra, or different "choirs" of voices or instruments in a polychoral composition. In typical 18th century to 21st century oratorios and masses, 'choru ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Renaissance Music
Renaissance music is traditionally understood to cover European music of the 15th and 16th centuries, later than the Renaissance era as it is understood in other disciplines. Rather than starting from the early 14th-century '' ars nova'', the Trecento music was treated by musicology as a coda to Medieval music and the new era dated from the rise of triadic harmony and the spread of the ' ''contenance angloise'' ' style from Britain to the Burgundian School. A convenient watershed for its end is the adoption of basso continuo at the beginning of the Baroque period. The period may be roughly subdivided, with an early period corresponding to the career of Guillaume Du Fay (c. 1397–1474) and the cultivation of cantilena style, a middle dominated by Franco-Flemish School and the four-part textures favored by Johannes Ockeghem (1410's or 20's – 1497) and Josquin des Prez (late 1450's – 1521), and culminating during the Counter-Reformation in the florid counterpoint of Palest ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Tintinnabuli
Tintinnabuli (singular. ''tintinnabulum''; from the Latin ''tintinnabulum'', "a bell") is a compositional style created by the Estonian composer Arvo Pärt, introduced in his ''Für Alina'' (1976), and used again in ''Spiegel im Spiegel'' (1978). This simple style was influenced by the composer's mystical experiences with chant music. Musically, Pärt's tintinnabular music is characterized by two types of voice, the first of which (dubbed the "tintinnabular voice") arpeggiates the tonic triad, and the second of which moves diatonically in mostly stepwise motion. The works often have a slow and meditative tempo, and a minimalist approach to both notation and performance. Pärt's compositional approach has expanded somewhat in the years since 1970, but the overall effect remains largely the same. An early example can be heard in ''Cantus in Memoriam Benjamin Britten''. Pärt's own comments on his style *"Tintinnabulation is an area I sometimes wander into when I am searching for ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Melisma
Melisma ( grc-gre, μέλισμα, , ; from grc, , melos, song, melody, label=none, plural: ''melismata'') is the singing of a single syllable of text while moving between several different notes in succession. Music sung in this style is referred to as ''melismatic'', as opposed to ''syllabic'', in which each syllable of text is matched to a single note. An informal term for melisma is a vocal run. The term roulade is also sometimes used interchangeably with melisma. History General The term melisma may be used to describe music of any genre, including baroque singing, opera, and later gospel. Within the tradition of Religious Jewish music, melisma is still commonly used in the chanting of Torah, readings from the Prophets, and in the body of a service. Today, melisma is commonly used in Middle Eastern, African, and African American music, Irish sean nós singing, and flamenco. Melisma is also commonly featured in Western popular music. Prevalence in western popular music ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Paul Hillier
Paul Douglas Hillier OBE (born 9 February 1949) is an English conductor, music director and baritone. He specializes in both early and contemporary classical music, especially that by composers Steve Reich and Arvo Pärt. He was a co-founder of the Hilliard Ensemble and directed the Estonian Philharmonic Chamber Choir for numerous years. He has been Chief Conductor of Ars Nova (Copenhagen) since 2003, and Artistic Director and Chief Conductor of the National Chamber Choir of Ireland since 2008. Ensembles Hillier was born in Dorchester, England in 1949, where he attended Hardye's Grammar School. In 1967 he became a music student at the Guildhall School of Music & Drama, studying voice. In 1974 he co-founded the Hilliard Ensemble along with fellow vicar-choral Paul Elliott, tenor, and counter-tenor David James. His concert debut was in 1974 in London's Purcell Room. Hillier remained the director of the ensemble until 1990, when he founded Theatre of Voices. In addition ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Plainsong
Plainsong or plainchant (calque from the French ''plain-chant''; la, cantus planus) is a body of chants used in the liturgy, liturgies of the Western Church. When referring to the term plainsong, it is those sacred pieces that are composed in Latin text. Plainsong was the exclusive form of Christian church music until the ninth century, and the introduction of polyphony. The Monophony, monophonic chants of plainsong have a non-metric rhythm. Their rhythms are generally freer than the metered rhythm of later Western music, and they are sung A cappella, without musical accompaniment. There are three types of chant melodies that plainsongs fall into, Syllabic verse, syllabic, Neume, neumatic, and melismatic. The free flowing melismatic melody form of plainsong is still heard in Middle Eastern music being performed today. Although the Catholic Church (both its Eastern and Western halves) and the Eastern Orthodoxy, Eastern Orthodox churches did not East–West Schism, split until lo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ison (music)
Ison is a drone note, or a slow-moving lower vocal part, used in Byzantine chant and some related musical traditions to accompany the melody, thus enriching the singing. It was not considered to transform it into a harmonized or polyphonic piece. History It is widely believed that ison was first introduced in Byzantine practice in the 16th century.Kyiv's Znamenny chant). The drone practice may have been borrowed from the West, namely from Italy">Znamenny_chant.html" ;"title="Kyiv's Znamenny chant">Kyiv's Znamenny chant). The drone practice may have been borrowed from the West, namely from Italy. Traditionally the ison was not notated (see below). The first example of notated ison was not documented until 1847, and the practice of notating the ison did not become widespread for 100 years, or only in the second half of the 20th century. There is some evidence for a use of a 2nd "auxiliary" ison in Patriarchate of Constantinople">Patriarchal chanting practice, that would be pitched o ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Drone (music)
In music, a drone is a harmonic or monophonic effect or accompaniment where a note or chord is continuously sounded throughout most or all of a piece. A drone may also be any part of a musical instrument used to produce this effect; an archaic term for this is ''burden'' (''bourdon'' or ''burdon'') such as a "drone ipeof a bagpipe", the pedal point in an organ, or the lowest course of a lute. Α ''burden'' is also part of a song that is repeated at the end of each stanza, such as the chorus or refrain.Brabner, John H F., ed. (1884). The national encyclopædia', Vol. V, p.99. Libr. ed. William McKenzie. . Musical effect "Of all harmonic devices, it droneis not only the simplest, but probably also the most fertile." A drone effect can be achieved through a sustained sound or through repetition of a note. It most often establishes a tonality upon which the rest of the piece is built. A drone can be instrumental, vocal or both. Drone (both instrumental and vocal) can be place ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Manfred Eicher
Manfred Eicher (born 9 July 1943) is a German record producer and the founder of ECM Records. Life and career Eicher was born in Lindau, Germany. He studied music at the Academy of Music in Berlin. He started as a double-bass player of classical music and later became a record producer. In 1969, he founded ECM Records (Edition of Contemporary Music) in Munich. Some of the jazz artists he has recorded over more than 50 years of his career include Paul Bley, Keith Jarrett, John Abercrombie, Jan Garbarek, Egberto Gismonti, Chick Corea, Gary Burton, Jack DeJohnette, Anouar Brahem, Dave Holland, Pat Metheny, Ralph Towner, Terje Rypdal, Steve Kuhn, Eberhard Weber, Jon Hassell, and the Art Ensemble of Chicago. ''The Köln Concert'', a solo piano performance by Keith Jarrett, recorded and released by ECM in 1975, became the all-time best-selling jazz solo piano album. In 1984, Eicher started a sublabel, ECM New Series, for classical music. Some of the artists, whose work was release ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Aeolian Harp
An Aeolian harp (also wind harp) is a musical instrument that is played by the wind. Named for Aeolus, the ancient Greek god of the wind, the traditional Aeolian harp is essentially a wooden box including a sounding board, with strings stretched lengthwise across two bridges. It is often placed in a slightly opened window where the wind can blow across the strings to produce sounds. The strings can be made of different materials (or thicknesses) and all be tuned to the same pitch, or identical strings can be tuned to different pitches. Besides being the only string instrument played solely by the wind, the Aeolian harp is also the only string instrument that plays solely harmonic frequencies. They are recognizable by the sound which is a result of this property, which has been described as eerie and ethereal. The Aeolian harp – already known in the ancient world – was first described by Athanasius Kircher (1602–1680) in his books ''Musurgia Universalis'' (1650) and ''Phonu ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
