Download The Baroque Period - The Music World of The Linda Rohmund

Lavish Decoration
Pageantry
Majesty
Sumptuous Ornamentation
Extravagance
Grandeur
 1600 to 1750
 Very fancy, decorated style of music, painting and
building being developed in Europe
 ITALY: The movement began around 1600
 ENGLAND: The royal families patronized the fine
arts, and kings and queens were usually very
competent musicians as well.
 FRANCE: The most extravagantly ornamented rococo
or “gallant” music was composed during the reign of
the “Sun King,” Louis XIV.
 GERMANY: The final flowering of the baroque was
culminated by one of the greatest of all musical
geniuses, Johann Sebastian Bach.
 Many musical forms and instruments that are part of
modern concert life were new or in their infancy during the
17th to mid-18th centuries.
 Marked the birth of opera and oratorio
 Opera: A drama or play in which most talking by actors is replaced
by singing. There are choruses, duets, and long solos (arias). The
orchestra accompanies most of the singing.
 Oratorio: A story is told by singing like an opera. The story most
often has a theme from religious text. Costumes and scenery are
not usually used.
 Firmly established instrumental music as instruments
improved and idiomatic writing developed.
 Most Baroque keyboard music was written for and
performed on an organ or a harpsichord.
 Organ: Dozens of sets of pipes through which air is blown to produce
sound. Has several keyboard registers played with the hands and one with
the feet. There are stops—small ivory levers raised or lowered by a finger—
that control the various sounds which the organ can produce.
 Harpsichord: A keyboard instrument with a plucking mechanism and
several sets of strings. One can play notes at standard pitch (like the piano)
or use a hand-stop or pedal to engage another set of strings an octave
higher at the same time.
 Used only for practice and amusement in the home
 A small brass tongue (tangent) strikes the string and
remains in contact with it as long as the key is held
down.
 The piano, a keyboard with a hammer mechanism
was invented around 1700 but was not in
widespread use until the 1770s when it superseded
the harpsichord.
 Born in Germany in 1685 into a large musical family,
J.S. Bach developed a love for music at an early age.
 Played many different instruments.
 Learned to sing and was very happy.
 After Bach’s father died, he lived with his brother.
 J. S. Bach married twice and had twenty-one children.
 Most were musicians. Many were composers
 Johann Christian Bach
 Carl Philip Emmanuel Bach
 Wilhelm Friedemann Bach
 Much of Bach’s music, written for voices and pipe
organ, was used in church services.
 Fugue
 Toccata
 A follow-the-leader
 A piece written for an
piece
 A melody is played and
is followed by itself
again and again.
 For organ or other
instruments.
instrument to let the
performer “show off.”
 From the Italian word
for “touch,” it is full of
action.
 Born in 1685, like Bach he was born Germany.
 From a small family, he loved children, especially poor little orphans.
He had lots of “pretend” nieces and nephews.
 Handel’s father wanted him to become a lawyer but he was very
unhappy about it because he wanted to be a musician.
 His aunt secretly brought him a clavichord.
 Later he became a great organist and a composer.
 He spent many years in London, England. He made friends
with kings and noblemen and became famous, composing
most of his operas.
 When he died in 1759, he was buried in a famous church in
London called Westminster Abbey.
 He wrote more than 40 operas.
 The Royal Fireworks Music was composed to celebrate a
peace treaty signed by England and France.