Music History and Eras Musicians Divide Music Into Time Periods Or Eras
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Music History and Eras Musicians divide music into time periods or Eras. Each Era is distinguished by how the music sounds, new instruments that were invented, and the difficulty and talent required from the TEKS: 117.12, 15, 18 5A musician. When you attend the ensemble performance at your school, we will focus on only a few eras, but let’s look at the eras of music history together! Early Medieval Renaissance Baroque Classical Romantic Modern Romantic C. 1150 C. C. 1400 C. C. 1750 C. C. 1600 C. C. 1830 C. 1860 C. C. 1920 C. Though there are many periods of music, and many periods can be further divided, we will focus on the four periods that modern musicians often have the opportunity to play: Baroque Classical Exercise 1: Romantic Modern Click on each of the periods listed on the left to hear a sample of music from this period. Music has been selected from the 2014-2015 Music Memory list when possible, and is as follows: Baroque: Telemann—Viola Concerto in G Major (Allegro) Classical: Beethoven—Minuet in G Romantic: Berlioz—Symphonie Fantastique (March to the Scaffold) Program Produced in Modern: Stravinsky—Petrushka (Russian Dance) Partnership with: Exercise 2: What defines each music period? Discuss with students what differentiates each of the music periods that they will hear with Conversations with Music. Combining this exercise with Exercise 1 may help students begin to achieve auditory recognition of music genres, styles, and composers! Baroque: During this period, you would have heard classical musicians playing outdoors at large parties or at balls! Only the rich and famous had the opportunity to hear classical music performed as they were the only people who could afford to pay for the musicians and their instruments to perform at parties. The Baroque period helped establish opera, concerto, and sonata as a musical genre. During this period, performers and composers began to use more elaborate musical ornamentation; made changes in musical notation; and developed new instrument playing techniques. During this period, the piano had not been invented yet, but its early relative the harpsichord was utilized often! Famous composers from this period include Johann Sebastian Bach, Antonio Vivaldi, and Johann Pachelbel. Classical: During the Classical Period, composers began to experiment for the first time with dynamics! “Dynamics” is the term musicians use to describe playing both soft and loud in one piece of music. To enhance this new experiment, the harpsichord transitioned into an instrument known as the pianoforte which is Italian and translates to “soft/loud.” In this period, the woodwind section became self-contained; this means that the woodwind section had instruments that were soprano, alto, tenor, and bass in tone. Just like a choir, instrument sections need a variety of voices to make a compete sound. Popular composers from this period include Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Ludwig van Beethoven, and Franz Schubert. Teachers: Interested in teaching more of the key music vocabulary? Look for the vocabulary curriculum online! Romantic: The Romantic period does not mean the same thing as a romantic movie! Romantic composers were not focusing their music on love; romantic composers focused on dynamic, exciting, and expressive forms of music. During this period, the size of the orchestra grew as we saw the invention of the modern day woodwind instrument the flute. We also saw the invention of brass instruments including the trumpet and trombone. As the size of the orchestra grew, composers increased the number of instruments that they could place in their music and were able to create the exciting and dramatic music from the romantic period. Some famous composers from the Romantic period include Hector Berlioz, Frederic Chopin, and Richard Wagner. Modern: The Modern period can be divided into many styles because composers in the modern period look at new ways to approach harmony! Critics say that composers are “being pulled in carious and contradictory directions” since few modern composers share any similarity. What modern composers have done is challenge the musician and the musician’s skill with their instrument. The environment and advances in technology have also effected the sound of modern music compared to other periods. Compared to previous periods of music, modern composers live in a world that has tons of noise all day long! We have cars, trains, airplanes, telephones, radios, and many other technological advances that we hear all day long. Modern music reflects the increase in noise around us daily by using more instruments and utilizing conflicting, non harmonious, tones. Some Modern composers include Dmitri Shostakovich, Leonard Bernstein, and Aaron Copland. TEKS: 110.14, 26A, 29 110.15, 24A, 26 110.16, 26, 27, 28 Exercise 3: Introduction to famous composers! Many of the famous composers that you hear of today can be easily recognized by “fun facts” about their life. Learning a fun fact about a composer may help intrigue your students into learning more about their music and the time period they wrote in! Some of these composers may be performed at your Conversations with Music Performance! Using the worksheet below, create name tags for your students identifying each of them as one of the below composers. Then, give your students the worksheet without the Composers names and have them introduce themselves to each other in the classroom. By “Meeting and Greeting” with other composers, students will have the opportunity to learn about composers! As students meet other composers, have them fill in the name of the composer next to the fun fact that was shared. Additional information on directions for this activity are provided on the teacher worksheet included. Variation 2: Concerned about having all your students “running wild” in the classroom with this activity? Have each Variation 1: Worried about having enough time to student take turns coming to the front complete the entire worksheet? Have students of the classroom to introduce play “MUSIC” ! Using the rules of BINGO, have themselves (just like if they were a new students yell “MUSIC” when they meet enough student!) You can ask students to use composers to gain five composers names either library resources or computers to find across, down, or diagonally in their worksheet! during which period of music history their assigned composer wrote music, where they were born, or other interesting facts! This will allow your students to research and present their composer! Name Class Date I lived and composed in Russia through both World War 1 + II. I lived and composed in Russia through both World War 1 + II. .