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Toccatas
Toccata (from Italian ''toccare'', literally, "to touch", with "toccata" being the action of touching) is a virtuoso piece of music typically for a keyboard or plucked string instrument featuring fast-moving, lightly fingered or otherwise virtuosic passages or sections, with or without imitative or fugal interludes, generally emphasizing the dexterity of the performer's fingers. Less frequently, the name is applied to works for multiple instruments (the opening of Claudio Monteverdi's opera ''L'Orfeo'' being a notable example). History Renaissance The form first appeared in the late Renaissance period. It originated in northern Italy. Several publications of the 1590s include toccatas, by composers such as Claudio Merulo, Andrea and Giovanni Gabrieli, Adriano Banchieri, and Luzzasco Luzzaschi. These are keyboard compositions in which one hand, and then the other, performs virtuosic runs and brilliant cascading passages against a chordal accompaniment in the other hand. Amon ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Toccata And Fugue In D Minor, BWV 565
The Toccata and Fugue in D minor, Bach-Werke-Verzeichnis, BWV 565, is a piece of organ repertoire, organ music written, according to its oldest extant sources, by Johann Sebastian Bach (1685–1750). The piece opens with a toccata section, followed by a fugue that ends in a coda (music), coda. Scholars differ as to when it was composed. It could have been as early as . Alternatively, a date as late as the 1750s has been suggested. To a large extent, the piece conforms to the characteristics deemed typical of the north German organ school of the baroque music, Baroque era with divergent stylistic influences, such as south German characteristics. Despite a profusion of educated guesswork, there is not much that can be said with certainty about the first century of the composition's existence other than that it survived that period in a manuscript written by Johannes Ringk. The first publication of the piece, in the Bach Revival era, was in 1833, through the efforts of Felix Mendelss ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Johann Jakob Froberger
Johann Jakob Froberger ( baptized 19 May 1616 – 7 May 1667) was a German Baroque composer, keyboard virtuoso, and organist. Among the most famous composers of the era, he was influential in developing the musical form of the suite of dances in his keyboard works. His harpsichord pieces are highly idiomatic and programmatic. Only two of Froberger's many compositions were published during his lifetime. Froberger forbade publication of his manuscripts, restricting access to his noble patrons and friends, particularly the Württembergs and Habsburgs who had the power to enforce these restrictions. After his death the manuscripts went to his patroness Sibylla, Duchess of Württemberg (1620–1707) and the music library of the Württemberg family estate. Life 1616–1634: Early years in Stuttgart Johann Jakob Froberger was baptized on 19 May 1616 in Stuttgart. The exact date of his birth is unknown. His family came from Halle, where his grandfather Simon livedSchott, Grove and ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Michelangelo Rossi
Michelangelo Rossi (Michel Angelo del Violino) (ca. 1601/1602 – 1656) was an important Italian composer, violinist and organist of the Baroque era. Rossi was born in Genoa, where he studied with his uncle, Lelio Rossi organist (from 1601 to 1638), at the Cathedral of San Lorenzo. Around the year 1624 he moved to Rome to enter the service of Cardinal Maurizio of Savoy. It was there that he met the madrigal composer Sigismondo d'India as well as the keyboard composer Girolamo Frescobaldi. Rossi's two books of madrigals, which have only comparatively recently come to scholarly attention, were likely written during this period. Rossi's madrigal output from this period is remarkably chromatic, to a level matched only by the music of such experimental composers as Carlo Gesualdo. The circumstances of Rossi's dismissal from the Cardinal's service in 1629, after a short stay in Turin, are unclear. From 1629 to 1632 Rossi was organist in the church of San Luigi dei Francesi. Rossi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Johann Pachelbel
Johann Pachelbel (baptised – buried 9 March 1706; also Bachelbel) was a German composer, organist, and teacher who brought the south German organ schools to their peak. He composed a large body of sacred and secularity, secular music, and his contributions to the development of the chorale prelude and fugue have earned him a place among the most important composers of the middle Baroque music, Baroque era. List of compositions by Johann Pachelbel, Pachelbel's music enjoyed enormous popularity during his lifetime; he had many pupils and his music became a model for the composers of south and central Germany. Today, Pachelbel is best known for the Pachelbel's Canon, Canon in D; other well known works include the Chaconne in F minor (Pachelbel), Chaconne in F minor, the Toccata in E minor for organ, and the ''Hexachordum Apollinis'', a set of keyboard Variation (music), variations. He was influenced by southern German composers, such as Johann Jakob Froberger and Johann Caspar ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Randolph Hokanson
Randolph Henning Hokanson (June 22, 1915 – October 18, 2018) was an American pianist and professor emeritus at the University of Washington in Seattle. He was noted for his recordings of Bach, Schubert, Beethoven, Chopin, Liszt and Mendelssohn, and gave over 100 performances, including the complete cycle of Beethoven sonatas. Hokanson was born in the state of Washington in June 1915 as the fifth of eleven children of a family of Swedish immigrants in Bellingham. He began playing the piano at the age of eight, and by the age of fifteen, he had begun giving recitals regularly in Seattle and Victoria, British Columbia. After high school, he studied in London on a scholarship with Harold Samuel, Myra Hess and Carl Friedberg and later performed as soloist under Thomas Beecham, Pierre Monteux, Arthur Fiedler, Walter Susskind, Milton Katims, and others. He toured the United States and Canada for eight years. He was part of the University of Washington music faculty from 1949 to 19 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Dieterich Buxtehude
Dieterich Buxtehude (; ; born Diderik Hansen Buxtehude; c. 1637 – 9 May 1707) was a Danish organist and composer of the Baroque period, whose works are typical of the North German organ school. As a composer who worked in various vocal and instrumental idioms, Buxtehude's style greatly influenced other composers, such as Johann Sebastian Bach. Buxtehude is considered one of the most important composers of the 17th century. Life Early years in Denmark He is thought to have been born with the name Diderich Buxtehude.Snyder, Kerala J. Dieterich Buxtehude: Organist in Lübeck. New York: Schirmer Books, 1987. His parents were Johannes (Hans Jensen) Buxtehude and Helle Jespersdatter. His father originated from Oldesloe in the Duchy of Holstein, which at that time was a part of the Danish realms in Northern Germany. Scholars dispute both the year and country of Dieterich's birth, although most now accept that he was born in 1637 in Helsingborg, Skåne at the time part of De ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Jan Pieterszoon Sweelinck
Jan Pieterszoon Sweelinck ( ; April or May, 1562 – 16 October 1621) was a Dutch composer, organist, and pedagogue whose work straddled the end of the Renaissance and beginning of the Baroque eras. He was among the first major keyboard composers of Europe, and his work as a teacher helped establish the north German organ tradition. Life Sweelinck was born in Deventer, Netherlands, in April or May 1562. He was the eldest son of organist Peter (or Pieter) Swybbertszoon and Elske Jansdochter Sweeling, daughter of a surgeon. Soon after Sweelinck's birth, the family moved to Amsterdam, where from about 1564, Pieter Swybbertszoon served as organist of the Oude Kerk (Sweelinck's paternal grandfather and uncle also were organists).Sadie, Stanley. 1980.Sweelinck [Swelinck, Zwelinck, Sweeling, Sweelingh, Sweling, Swelingh], Jan Pieterszoon ''The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians''. Vol.8. Macmillan Publishers Limited, London. Pg. 406–407 Jan Pieterszoon must have ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Improvisation
Improvisation is the activity of making or doing something not planned beforehand, using whatever can be found. Improvisation in the performing arts is a very spontaneous performance without specific or scripted preparation. The skills of improvisation can apply to many different faculties, across all artistic, scientific, physical, cognitive, academic, and non-academic disciplines; see Applied improvisation. Improvisation also exists outside the arts. Improvisation in engineering is to solve a problem with the tools and materials immediately at hand. Improvised weapons are often used by guerrillas, insurgents and criminals. Engineering Improvisation in engineering is to solve a problem with the tools and materials immediately at hand. Examples of such improvisation was the re-engineering of carbon dioxide scrubbers with the materials on hand during the Apollo 13 space mission, or the use of a knife in place of a screwdriver to turn a screw. Engineering improvisations ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Arpeggio
A broken chord is a chord broken into a sequence of notes. A broken chord may repeat some of the notes from the chord and span one or more octaves. An arpeggio () is a type of broken chord, in which the notes that compose a chord are played or sung in a rising or descending order. An arpeggio may also span more than one octave. Being an Italian noun, its plural is ''arpeggi''. The word ''arpeggio'' comes from the Italian word ''arpeggiare'', which means ''to play on a harp''. Even though the notes of an arpeggio are not played or sung all together at the same time, listeners hear the sequence of notes as forming a chord. When an arpeggio also contains passing tones that are not part of the chord, different music theorists may analyze the same musical excerpt differently. Arpeggios enable composers writing for monophonic instruments that play one note at a time (e.g., flute, saxophone, trumpet), to voice chords and chord progressions in musical pieces. Arpeggios and brok ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Baroque Music
Baroque music ( or ) refers to the period or dominant style of Western classical music composed from about 1600 to 1750. The Baroque style followed the Renaissance period, and was followed in turn by the Classical period after a short transition, the galant style. The Baroque period is divided into three major phases: early, middle, and late. Overlapping in time, they are conventionally dated from 1580 to 1650, from 1630 to 1700, and from 1680 to 1750. Baroque music forms a major portion of the "classical music" canon, and is now widely studied, performed, and listened to. The term "baroque" comes from the Portuguese word ''barroco'', meaning " misshapen pearl". The works of George Frideric Handel and Johann Sebastian Bach are considered the pinnacle of the Baroque period. Other key composers of the Baroque era include Claudio Monteverdi, Domenico Scarlatti, Alessandro Scarlatti, Antonio Vivaldi, Henry Purcell, Georg Philipp Telemann, Jean-Baptiste Lully, Jean-Philippe R ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
