Romantic Era Music

1. Romantic Era Music

2. Musical Overview • Dramatic, both light and dark • Three composers: • Beethoven • Tchikovsky • Wagner

3. Beethoven • First composer to earn his living directly from his own work without being subsidized • Benefited from the emergence of the new upper middle class audience who bought tickets for Beethoven's concerts. • First “Rock Star” • Received money from • lessons • the sale of his compositions • public performances, Beethoven was able to survive if not to prosper. Allowed him to express his extreme individualism, rejecting the role of artistic servant

4. Tchaikovsky • Wrote operas, piano compositions and various chamber works, but he is chiefly remembered today for his 1812 Overture, Symphonies 4-6 and his popular ballet scores: • Swan Lake • Sleeping Beauty • The Nutcracker • Much of his music reflects a sunny, celebratory mood • Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairies, from the Nutcracker’ • The cannon from 1812 Overture • Russians (and Tchikovsky) were first to transform ballet into a truly exalted art

5. Richard Wagner • Revolutionized opera in the mid-19th century • One of the most important and influential figures in the history of opera. • Masterwork– "The Ring of the Nibelung" or "The Ring Cycle," • Strove to establish Germanic mythology as an equal of Greco-Roman mythology by using its stories as the basis of his works • "Ride of the Valkyries,“– memorably used to accompany a U.S. helicopter attack during the Vietnam War in Francis Ford Coppola's Apocalypse Now. • In the opera it is performed during the flight of the female warrior spirits known as "Valkyries.“ • Basis for Bugs Bunny’s What’s Opera, Doc? • Elmer Fudd’s Killed the Wabbit