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One of Mozart’s most brilliant achievements in his mature operas is the way he harnesses the symphonic energies and key structures of the Classical sonata style to reveal character and propel the action forward. The sextet from Figaro is a famous example: here the sonata design is a perfect musical equivalent of the stage action as the initial situation spawns confusion ...

Source: Definitive Opera Encyclopedia, founding editor Stanley Sadie

Sonata form was the most important principle of musical structure during the classical period, and has remained so up to the present day. It applies most often to a single movement, part of a sonata, symphony or quartet, but an independent movement, such as an overture, may also be in sonata form. Its principles affect ...

Source: Classical Music Encyclopedia, founding editor Stanley Sadie

a tutor for the instrument, and Heinrich August Birnback (1782–1848), who wrote a concerto for it. The main reason for the arpeggione’s continuing fame, however, is a sonata written for Schuster by Schubert in November 1824. This piece is now normally played on either the cello or the viola. Styles & Forms | Early Romantic | Classical Instruments ...

Source: Classical Music Encyclopedia, founding editor Stanley Sadie

ensembles include the viol consort (usually six viols: two trebles, two tenors, two basses), the recorder consort (of four to six recorders of varying sizes) and the trio sonata, in which a continuo group (usually harpsichord plus a bass instrument such as a bass viol or baroque cello) accompanies two melodic instruments such as Baroque violins or flutes. ...

Source: The Illustrated Complete Musical Instruments Handbook, general editor Lucien Jenkins

When the player’s fingers press down its keys, the lever mechanism of the fortepiano (meaning ‘loud-soft’) causes the string to be struck once by a covered hammer, rather than plucked as in a harpsichord. The mechanism allowed it to play variously loudly or softly, and in an age producing music of increasing emotional diversity the dynamic range of ...

Source: Classical Music Encyclopedia, founding editor Stanley Sadie

late-eighteenth century. Rise and Fall of the Harpsichord Its prevalence may be gauged by the fact that the first 14 of Beethoven’s epoch-making piano sonatas, including the famous Moonlight Sonata (1801), were originally published as being ‘For Harpsichord or Pianoforte’. In reality, they were no such thing, but there were clearly enough harpsichords in private ownership to justify the ...

Source: The Illustrated Complete Musical Instruments Handbook, general editor Lucien Jenkins

By the middle of the eighteenth century, hand horn playing was the standard in orchestras across Europe. The horn concerti of Haydn and Mozart, along with Beethoven’s horn sonata all use this technique. In fact, it became so popular that players, conductors and composers were reluctant to leave it behind. All of Johannes Brahms’ (1833–97) orchestral parts ...

Source: The Illustrated Complete Musical Instruments Handbook, general editor Lucien Jenkins

possibilities of the piano are also seen to advantage in George Antheil’s music of the 1920s and later in Boulez’s conventionally played but nevertheless ‘Hammer-klavier’ piece, the Second Piano Sonata (1948). Styles & Forms | Modern Era | Classical Instruments | Additional Percussion | Modern Era | Classical ...

Source: Classical Music Encyclopedia, founding editor Stanley Sadie

Acoustic Guitar Throughout its history, the guitar has – perhaps more than any other instrument – managed to bridge the gap between the often disconnected worlds of classical, folk and popular music. Its roots go back to Babylonian times; by the 1500s it was prevalent in Spain, and is still sometimes called the Spanish guitar. Medieval versions – ...

Source: The Illustrated Encyclopedia of Music, general editor Paul Du Noyer

timpani continued to be used to provide such operatic and programmatic effects as thunder, drum rolls and gunshots (as in Prokofiev’s Peter and the Wolf). However, in his Sonata for Two Pianos and Percussion (1937), Bartók made use of the pedal timpani for a novel effect. Here, the pedal alters the tension in the membrane while it is ...

Source: Classical Music Encyclopedia, founding editor Stanley Sadie

world. On top of uprights or within piano benches throughout the western world, it was common to find leather-clad volumes of collected sheet music. Just occasionally these included a sonata by Mozart or Beethoven, but far more typical of them was the century’s runaway bestseller, composed by Thekla Badarzewska (1834–61), an obscure Polish woman of small talent. The ...

Source: The Illustrated Complete Musical Instruments Handbook, general editor Lucien Jenkins

later years he found new inspiration and challenges in the artistry and personality of the great Russian cellist Mstislav Rostropovich (1927–2007), writing for him his first major solo compositions (a sonata and three suites) and his first orchestral work without voices for many years, the Cello Symphony (1963). A severe heart complaint enfeebled him in his last years, but ...

Source: Classical Music Encyclopedia, founding editor Stanley Sadie

b. 1953 Hungarian-British pianist Schiff studied at the Franz Liszt Academy, Budapest, before winning prizes at both the Moscow Tchaikovsky (1974) and Leeds (1975) piano competitions. Having appeared with most of the world’s major orchestras, he has focused increasingly on chamber and solo repertoire, recording the keyboard works of Bach (on the piano), the Mozart and Schubert ...

Source: Classical Music Encyclopedia, founding editor Stanley Sadie

composers of the twentieth century. His left-wing politics were to surface many times in his music and were of central importance in his life. His first acknowledged works were Piano Sonata No. 1 (1936–37) and Concerto for Double String Orchestra (1938–39). He has retained a firm belief in the formal principles of Austro-German music, particularly that of Beethoven. Alongside this ...

Source: Classical Music Encyclopedia, founding editor Stanley Sadie

b. 1934 English composer Early use of serialism (Trumpet Sonata, 1955) led Davies to a less systematic method of composing with smaller sets of pitches (Prolation, 1958). Alongside this grew a fascination for the pre-Baroque. Davies makes particular use of plainsong themes, which he then subjects to quasi-serial transformations. A peculiar leaning towards parody was central to Davies’s ...

Source: Classical Music Encyclopedia, founding editor Stanley Sadie
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