Bryce Shutt
Mu History II
Dr. Reuter
12-12-17
Final essay
The Opera
During the 19th century, many different forms of music such as instrumental gained prestige and elite. However, Opera continued to be a central part of music life especially in Italy, France, and Germany. During this time period Opera served as elite entertainment and also as the as a source of music that was extremely popular with people of all classes and professions. Italian bel conto opera was the most popular but new types of opera were developed in France and Germany and while some elements were borrowed from one another they each present interesting, independent and defining elements that made each style very unique and individualistic. The first half of the 19th century
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Italian opera was made to be sung by the singer as was the focused of the opera at this time. Many works by native Italian composers of the 19th and early 20th centuries, such as Rossini, Bellini, Donizetti, Verdi, and Puccini, are amongst the most famous operas ever written and today are performed in opera houses across the world. In the early 19th century composer Gioacchino Rossini modified the dramatic excesses which typified the theater of his era to initiate opera's Romantic period. His career started when he wrote six operas. His first success was an opera buffa, La Cambiale di Matrimonio, followed by The Barber of Seville, La Cenerentola, and Italian Women in Algiers. By 1825 Rossini was the beast known composer even more popular than Beethoven at the time due to Beethoven’s political …show more content…
In German Romantic opera, many pieces were often based on German legends and folklore, with the mystery of nature and supernatural forces serving to intensify dramatic expression as well as human verues other powers. Melodrama or instrumentally accompanied speech, sometimes an independent form, was used for special effects. Two other traits of the music drama were exhibited to some degree in the German romantic opera. The orchestra became more important and an instrument in creating atmosphere, moods, and even bits of realism though
Porgy and Bess, America’s first opera opened on the 10th of October in 1936. Porgy and Bess chronicles the unlikely romance between Porgy and Bess and takes place in the fictitious town of “Catfish Row” in Charleston South Carolina. The opera is based on “Porgy”, a novel written by Dubose Heyward and the play also written by Heyward and his wife Dorothy Heyward.
Eastern Washington University Department of Music presented a program of Opera works by Giacomo Puccini, Aron Copland, W.A. Mozart, John Dowland, Franz Shubert, Maurice Ravel, and Robert Schumann on Friday, March 7, 6:30 p.m., in the Music Building, Recital Hall. These Opera works were sung by Senior Recitalist, Alexandra Rannow.
Christmas and Opera did not merely seem to correlate, but understanding where the two events derived from can help one to understand the similarities and differences between them. The development of Christmas was different from the creation of opera because the working class was controlling the other social classes for profit. Whereas for opera, the different social classes unified to keep opera as entertainment and not a social event. Another difference came within the writing and context throughout the article and the presentation of information conveyed by the author. Yet the events share the similarity of both being refined and reinvented.
Italian Baroque was a period through the late sixteenth century to the mid eighteenth century that included motion in paintings that created drama and tension. One of the most influential artists of Italian Baroque was known as Michelangelo Marisi da Caravaggio, most known as simply Caravaggio. Caravaggio went against the norm of popular baroque art, which before the time focused more on the religious experience in a painting. Instead, Caravaggio mostly focused on the realism of the specific scene of the paintings. His style of Baroque painting influenced many artists during the baroque period but also modern artists. Caravaggio used very dramatic uses of lighting and was very talented when it came to capturing physical aspects of his subjects as well as emotional well-beings.
I can say with absolute certainty that I have always been intrigued by and totally enamored with cultures that were different from my own. I believe this is because I fancy myself to be an imaginative dreamer that has always wished for changes to take place in the world so that it may one day become the way it was supposed to be when the creator of the universe imagined it all those centuries ago.
Baroque era covers the period between 1600 and 1750 beginning with Monte Verdi (birth of opera) and ended with deaths of Bach and Handel. The term baroque music is borrowed from the art history. It follows the Renaissance era (1400-1600). It was initially considered to be a corrupt way of Renaissance by conservatives. The dominant trends in Baroque music correspond to those in Baroque art and literature. Some features of Baroque art included a sense of movement, energy, and tension (whether real or implied). Strong contrasts of light and shadow enhance the effects of paintings and sculptures. Opera is one of the types of music in the Baroque era. It represented melodic freedom. Baroque era was usually referred to as the thorough-bass period. In early Baroque era no tonal direction existed, but experiments in pre-tonal harmony led to the creation of tonality. [1] Baroque genre included instrumental suite, ritornello, Concerto grosso and chant. There were important composers of the Baroque period such as Johann Sebastian Bach, George Frideric Handel, Antonio Vivaldi William Byrd Henry Purcell and George Phillip Telemann. Starting in northern Italy, the hierarchical state -- led by either the urban bourgeoisie or despotic nobles -- replaced the fluid and chaotic feudal system of the middle Ages. [2] For this reason, some historians refer to the Renaissance as the Early Modern Era. Sculptors, building on the techniques of artists such as Giovanni Bernini (1598-1680), found ways to create the illusion of energetic and even violent movement in their works. Painters created larger and more crowded canvases. Virtuosity was used in all the arts. The arts became an important measure of learning and culture. Music moved from the science of number to an expressive art viewed as an equal to rhetoric.
I imagine in the future a new wave of opera will surface. We will see more use of robots, computers, social network, and virtual reality. We might see breakthroughs in stage design, such as a circular stage. We will see opera performed under different settings. Shows will become even more interactive, adaptable, personal, and modular. All in all, we are seeing a transformation in opera. The challenge lies in keeping the essence of the art of opera and striking a balance between modernization and preservation, so that it can continue to engage its audience yet distinguishes itself from all other types of musical performances.
...n shaping the music and a lot of the music expressed emotions in many different and new ways. Their music had experiments with harmonies and textures, more forms, and new treatments of melodies. There were many new compositions that were aimed towards amateurs. There were also a lot of new genres that came about during this time. Because a lot of the composers during this time were so great, they influenced composers in the twentieth century and so on.
When approaching a performance, accomplished musicians often consider the historical context from which a piece originates. They most often think of such considerations in the application of that context as it pertains to early music that is, the Baroque era or earlier. For any era, such historical considerations are called performance practice, and may include the use of vibrato, ornamentation, dynamic levels, tempi, instrumental timbres, performance setting, and balance. Vibrato and ornamentation are two important areas of consideration that vocalists must explore when aiming to give an authentically Baroque performance.
Opera, a popular art from Italy, was popular with the immigrants as well, and unlike the music halls, it generated an appeal far beyond the Italian community. From the 1880's, when the Metropolitan Opera House opened in New York with Cleofante Capanini as it's first conductor and director, until today, the Italians have been prominent in opera in the United States and else where in the world.
John Warrack, author of 6 Great Composers, stated, “Any study of a composer, however brief, must have as its only purpose encouragement of the reader to greater enjoyment of the music” (Warrack, p.2). The composers and musicians of the Renaissance period need to be discussed and studied so that listeners, performers, and readers can appreciate and understand the beginnings of music theory and form. The reader can also understand the driving force of the composer, whether sacred or secular, popularity or religious growth. To begin understanding music composition one must begin at the birth, or rebirth of music and the composers who created the great change.
One of the characteristics of the Italian Baroque is the realistic depiction of human figures, vivid use of color and foreshadowing techniques, especially in the paintings. In addition, the figures of the paintings seem to emerge from the background, giving huge differences between light and dark. The Italian baroque structure has a sense of movement and that of energy when in static form. The sculptures make the observers to have multiple viewpoints. The Baroque architecture has characteristic domes, colonnades, giving an impression of volume and void.
With more than four and half million Italian immigrants arriving to American between the years of 1876-1924, traditions, food, literature and an immense amount of Italian culture was slowly spread nationwide. With that, Italian music was also brought across seas. Music in New York City began developing rapidly during the nineteenth century as the number of immigrants and residents steadily increased. Italian music has become popular genre with many subdivisions. Italian music has also become an influential genre of music on other types of popular music.
Opera is a unique genre of spoken word and song accompanied by music. The music takes one through ascending and descending ranges of emotions. Mozart's Don Giovanni is a perfect example of how this genre emits a wide variety of feelings and attitudes. This "dark comedy seems to convey Mozart's feeling that events have both comical and serious dimensions…" (Kerman, 205). The opera, as a whole, is neither exclusively comedic nor entirely tragic.
Other societal practice during romanticism is the Romantic Opera. In comparison to the classical and baroque opera, romantic opera has a continuous flow of music in each scene and soon, people pay less attention to tenors and pays equal attention to choruses. To name a few of many composers for romantic operas, Wagner and Bizet are known for their works for romantic opera during the romantic era. Romantic music is also influenced by folk music, tunes, rhythms and themes as many romantic composers wrote nationalist music, which is inspired from folk dances and songs, during the romantic period (http://absoluteastronomy.com). Another factor that contributed to romantic music in defining its traits is the instrumentation.