- •Music in the Modern World western music of the twentieth century (general survey)
- •Discussion Activities Questions on the Text
- •Discussion Points
- •Additional Assignments
- •Some twentieth-century composers arnold schoenberg (1874-1951)
- •The composer speaks: arnold schoenberg
- •Discussion Activities Questions on the Text
- •Discussion Points
- •Bela bartok (1881-1945)
- •Discussion Activities Questions on the Text
- •Questions about Bartok
- •Discussion Points
- •Paul hindemith: his life and work (1895-1963)
- •The composer speaks: paul hindemith
- •Discussion Activities Questions on the Text
- •Discussion Points
- •Electronic music
- •Discussion Activities Questions on the Text
- •Questions about Stravinsky
- •Additional Assignments
- •Britten's operas
- •The composer speaks: benjamin broten
- •Discussion Activities Questions on the Text
- •Questions about Britten
- •Additional Assignments
- •Menotti. The opera composer
- •The composer speaks: gian carlo menotti
- •Discussion Activities Comprehension Questions and Points for Discussion
- •Additional Assignments
- •Michael tippett: a child of our time
- •30 Questions on the Text
- •Experimental (avant-garde) music
- •Olivier messiaen
- •Discussion Activities Questions on the Text
- •Discussion Points
- •Additional Assignments
- •George ligeti (b. 1923)
- •Karlheinz stockhausen
- •35 Discussion Activities Questions on the Text about Ligeti
- •About Stockhausen and Experimental Composers
- •Questions about Western Music of the 20th Century
- •Points for Discussion and Written Compositions
- •Popular music rock
- •Points about rock
- •Discussion Activities Comprehension Questions and Points for Discussion
- •Additional Assignments
- •Elvis presley - story of a superstar
- •Discussion Activities Comprehension Questions and Points for Discussion
- •The beatles
- •Comprehension Questions and Points for Discussion
- •English and American Musical History english music (general survey)
- •1. Opera.
- •2. Performing groups.
- •3. Festivals.
- •4. Education.
- •Discussion Activities Questions on the Text
- •The golden age in england
- •The english virginal school
- •Virginal music composers. William Byrd (1542-1623)
- •Byrd in his time and ours
- •English madrigalists
- •"The british orpheus"
- •Comprehension Questions and Points for Discussion
- •56 American music (general survey)
- •61 Charles ives, the first truly american composer (1874-1954)
- •Charles ives and american folk music
- •Comprehension Questions and Points for Discussion
- •The relation of jazz to american music
- •Louis armstrong
- •The swing era (duke ellington)
- •Spirituals
- •Comprehension Questions and Points for Discussion
- •The Art of Musical Interpretation the problem of interpretation
- •Discussion Activities Questions on the Text
- •Questions for Discussion
- •Additional Assignments
- •Conducting
- •The art of conducting
- •Questions on the Text
- •Some musical encounters
- •Questions on the Text
- •86 Leonard bernstein
- •Comprehension Questions and Points for Discussion
- •Herbert von karajan
- •Interview with herbert von karajan
- •The art of piano playing: glenn gould
- •Interview with glenn gould
- •Comprehension Questions and Points for Discussion
- •The art of violin playing: eugene ysaye
- •Comprehension Questions and Points for Discussion
- •The world of opera handel in performance
- •Franco zeffirelli: the romantic realist
- •La divina: maria callas
- •Callas remembered
- •Comprehension Questions and Points for Discussion
- •Peter pears: ronald crichton speaks
- •Discussion Activities Comprehension Questions and Points for Discussion
- •Notes Page 5
- •Page 21
- •Page 31
- •Page 32
- •Page 34
- •Page 35
- •Page 37
- •Page 39
- •Page 46
- •Page 47
- •Page 48
- •Page 49
- •Page 52
- •Page 53
- •Page 54
- •Page 57
- •Page 58
- •Page 59
- •Page 60
- •Page 61
- •Page 62
- •Page 63
- •Page 65
- •Page 66
- •Page 111
- •Page 112
- •Sources
- •Contents
35 Discussion Activities Questions on the Text about Ligeti
1. In what areas is Ligeti's music especially inventive?
2. What effect does it have on the receptive listener?
3. How does Ligeti use the traditional technique of composition? Give examples.
4. To what school does Ligeti belong, in your opinion?
About Stockhausen and Experimental Composers
1. Briefly outline Stockhausen's career as a composer and teacher. Name his main works. Why is he regarded as the leader of the electronic avant-garde? What innovations did he bring into music?
2. Speak about his work Momente. What does the word Moment imply for Stockhausen?
3. What is the "open form" in Stockhausen's concept? How does he use it? What is the role of improvisation in the performance of his works?
4. Which composers contributed to the development of the techniques of new music after World War II? Comment on the most daring experiments in music.
5. What new information have you found in this part of the book? Will it be useful to you in your work?
Questions about Western Music of the 20th Century
1. Since 1900 we have seen more drastic changes in our way of life than man has yet known. But somehow we have expected our musicians to continue as they did in previous times, producing a music of romantic feeling and sentiment while we live in a mechanical world. Music of the 20th century held no future if it was only to become more nationalistic, more romantic, or more realistic - it must in some way reflect the age in which it is created. How far, in your opinion, is this a true statement?
2. Can it be that some day the instruments familiar to us will be banished to museums and our orchestras abolished? Or perhaps a wonderful and undiscovered world of sound lies ahead of us? What is your opinion?
3. How do you understand Varese's statement that "the electronic medium has added an unbelievable variety of new timbres to our musical store and has freed music from tempered system, which has prevented music from keeping pace with other arts and science"?
4. Would Mozart have composed The Magic Flute in a machine age? Would Felix Mendelssohn have composed the Overture
36
to a Midsummer Nights Dream in 1826 if a railroad had run near his family's private estate in Berlin? How would Stockhausen's Momente sound in Mendelssohn's garden? Give your opinion on the influence of industrialization on the listener.
5. How would you interpret the following statement by Robert Schumann: "If Mozart were alive today he would write piano concertos not of the type Mozart wrote but of the type Chopin wrote"?
6. Did you go to any of the concerts at The Third International
Festival of Contemporary Music held in Leningrad in 1988? What compositions made the strongest impression on you? Why?
7. Do you agree that modern music, as we have come to know it, appears less unique and strange, that today's musical audience is coming to know this music with increasing sympathy? Give arguments to support your view.
Points for Discussion and Written Compositions
1. Make a written summary of the principal features of the styles we have discussed in this chapter in terms of quality of sound, expressive values, and technical resources.
2. Write a composition or give a short talk describing and illustrating the changes in musical language since 1900. Note the following basic trends:
- growing stylistic diversity.
- exploration and decline of the major-minor tonal system.
- growth of complex rhythms.
- exploration and rejection of large-scale forms.
- development of the large orchestra and new timbres.
- growing importance of texture and timbre in composition.
- innovations of genre and form.