Classical period (music)
When Haydn and Mozart began composing, symphonies were played as single movements—before, between, or as interludes within other works—and many of them lasted only ten or twelve minutes; instrumental groups had varying standards of playing, and the continuo was a central part of music-making. In the intervening years, the social world of music had seen dramatic changes: international publication and touring had grown explosively, concert societies were beginning to be formed, notation had been made more specific, more descriptive, and schematics for works had been simplified (yet became more varied in their exact working out). In 1790, just before Mozart's death, with his reputation spreading rapidly, Haydn was poised for a series of successes, notably his late oratorios and "London" symphonies. Composers in Paris, Rome, and all over Germany turned to Haydn and Mozart for their ideas on form.
The moment was again ripe for a dramatic shift. During the 1790s, there emerged of a new generation of composers, born around 1770, who, while they had grown up with the earlier styles, found in the recent works of Haydn and Mozart a vehicle for greater expression. In 1788 Luigi Cherubini settled in Paris and in 1791 composed Lodoiska, an opera that rose him to fame. Its style is clearly reflective of the mature Haydn and Mozart, and its instrumentation gave it a weight that had not yet been felt in the grand opera. His contemporary Étienne Méhul extended instrumental effects with his 1790 opera Euphrosine et Coradin, from which followed a series of successes.
The most fateful of the new generation was Ludwig van Beethoven, who launched his numbered works in 1794 with a set of three piano trios, which remain in the repertoire. Somewhat younger than the others, though equally accomplished because of his youthful study under Mozart and his native virtuosity, was Johann Nepomuk Hummel. Hummel studied under Haydn as well; he was a friend to Beethoven and Schubert and a teacher to Franz Liszt. He concentrated more on the piano than any other instrument, and his time in London in 1791 and 1792 generated the composition and publication in 1793 of three piano sonatas, opus 2, which idiomatically used Mozart's techniques of avoiding the expected cadence, and Clementi's sometimes modally uncertain virtuoso figuration. Taken together, these composers can be seen as the vanguard of a broad change in style and the center of music. They studied one another's works, copied one another's gestures in music, and on occasion behaved like quarrelsome rivals.
The crucial differences with the previous wave can be seen in the downward shift in melodies, increasing durations of movements, the acceptance of Mozart and Haydn as paradigmatic, the greater use of keyboard resources, the shift from "vocal" writing to "pianistic" writing, the growing pull of the minor and of modal ambiguity, and the increasing importance of varying accompanying figures to bring "texture" forward as an element in music. In short, the late Classical was seeking a music that was internally more complex. The growth of concert societies and amateur orchestras, marking the importance of music as part of middle-class life, contributed to a booming market for pianos, piano music, and virtuosi to serve as examplars. Hummel, Beethoven, and Clementi were all renowned for their improvising.
Direct influence of the Baroque continued to fade: the figured bass grew less prominent as a means of holding performance together, the performance practices of the mid 18th century continued to die out. However, at the same time, complete editions of Baroque masters began to become available, and the influence of Baroque style continued to grow, particularly in the ever more expansive use of brass. Another feature of the period is the growing number of performances where the composer was not present. This led to increased detail and specificity in notation; for example, there were fewer "optional" parts that stood separately from the main score.
The force of these shifts became apparent with Beethoven's 3rd Symphony, given the name Eroica, which is Italian for "heroic", by the composer. As with Stravinsky's Rite of Spring, it may not have been the first in all of its innovations, but its aggressive use of every part of the Classical style set it apart from its contemporary works: in length, ambition, and harmonic resources.
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Classical influence on later composers
- See also: Tonality
Musical eras seldom disappear at once; instead, features are replaced over time, until the old is simply felt as "old-fashioned". The Classical style did not "die" so much as transform under the weight of changes.
One crucial change was the shift towards harmonies centering around "flatward" keys: shifts in the subdominant direction. In the Classical style, major key was far more common than minor, chromaticism being moderated through the use of "sharpward" modulation, and sections in the minor mode were often merely for contrast. Beginning with Mozart and Clementi, there began a creeping colonization of the subdominant region. With Schubert, subdominant moves flourished after being introduced in contexts in which earlier composers would have confined themselves to dominant shifts. This introduced darker colors to music, strengthened the minor mode, and made structure harder to maintain. Beethoven contributed to this by his increasing use of the fourth as a consonance, and modal ambiguity — for example, the opening of the D Minor Symphony.
Franz Schubert, Carl Maria von Weber, and John Field are among the most prominent in this generation of "Classical Romantics", along with the young Felix Mendelssohn. Their sense of form was strongly influenced by the Classical style, and they were not yet "learned" (imitating rules which were codified by others), but they directly responded to works by Beethoven, Mozart, Clementi, and others, as they encountered them. The instrumental forces at their disposal were also quite "Classical" in number and variety, permitting similarity with Classical works.
However, the forces destined to end the hold of the Classical style gathered strength in the works of each of these composers. The most commonly cited one is harmonic innovation. However, also important is the increasing focus on having a continuous and rhythmically uniform accompanying figuration: Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata was the model for hundreds of later pieces — where the shifting movement of a rhythmic figure provides much of the drama and interest of the work, while a melody drifts above it. Greater knowledge of works, greater instrumental expertise, increasing variety of instruments, the growth of concert societies, and the unstoppable domination of the piano — which created a huge audience for sophisticated music — all contributed to the shift to the "Romantic" style.
Drawing the line exactly is impossible: there are sections of Mozart's works which, taken alone, are indistinguishable in harmony and orchestration from music written 80 years later, and composers continue to write in normative Classical styles into the 20th century. Even before Beethoven's death, composers such as Louis Spohr were self-described Romantics, incorporating, for example, more extravagant chromaticism in their works. However, generally the fall of Vienna as the most important musical center for orchestral composition is felt to be the occasion of the Classical style's final eclipse, along with its continuous organic development of one composer learning in close proximity to others. Franz Liszt and Frédéric Chopin visited Vienna when young, but they then moved on to other vistas. Composers such as Carl Czerny, while deeply influenced by Beethoven, also searched for new ideas and new forms to contain the larger world of musical expression and performance in which they lived.
Renewed interest in the formal balance and restraint of 18th century classical music led in the early 20th century to the development of so-called Neoclassical style, which numbered Stravinsky and Prokofiev among its proponents.
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See also
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Further reading
- Roger Kamien Sixth Brief Edition "Music: An Appreciation" ISBN 978-0-07-340134-8
- Charles Rosen, The Classical Style. New York: W.W. Norton, 1972.
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External links
- Classical Net - Classical Music Reference Site
- Free music downloads from classical music era
- Classical Music mp3s - pianist Michael Sayers
- Directories of composers and performers of classical.music
- A daily glance at this day in classical music history
- Classical Forums - Classical Music Forums and Information
- Classical Music Forums
- Classic Cat - A free classical catalogue.
- NMA (Neue Mozart-Ausgabe) Online - Mozart's scores
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