Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756 – 1791) is known to the world as the child piano prodigy who was exploited by his father at age 5, entertaining royalty throughout Europe. He is also said to have been prodigious on violin and composing at the age of five.
Although he was to compose for only the next 30 years, his output is also prodigious. Despite his popularity, he died a pauper. The circumstances surrounding his death are mysterious in that he was commissioned by a an unknown person to write a Requiem Mass for the dead. He had not finished before he died, but he was able to instruct a student to complete the task after his death. Leaving no fund even for burial, he was buried in a common grave with other “un-notable commoners,” at an unidentified site. There is little evidence to justify the notion of his rivalry with Salieri, a contemporary composer, but the movie in the latter part of the 20th century, Amadeus, suggests the rivalry as part of the mystery surrounding Mozart’s death.
Besides his numerous symphonies, operas, piano concerto’s and piano sonatas, he also wrote a number of masses. He was well-known, for “Ave Verum Corpus.” a favorite of church choirs at least in the mid-20th century.
Ave Verum Corpus
Laudamus te – Renée Fleming
Et incarnatus est – Sandrine Piau
Magnificat
Great Mass in C Minor
Misa brevis en Do Mayor KV 220 – Kyrie y Gloria
Exsultate Jubilate
Kathleen Battle:
Alleluja from Exsultate Jubilate –
Cecilia Bartoli:
Franz Joseph Haydn was born before the deaths of Bach and Handel. The Baroque era, generally reflected the manner and tastes of monarchical and aristocratic society. It was highly embellished, harmonically organized and progressive with its characteristic circle of fifths, stately, formal, harmonically driven and its dynamics were terraced. In the rococo period, embellishment lost its formality and stateliness and became mere frills. It did, however make a significant contribution at Mannheim. There, rather than dynamics in terraces, the “Mannheim crescendo” was introduced.
Franz Joseph Haydn (1732 – 1809) was born to a wheelwright and his wife in the small Austrian town of Rohrau. His family was financially poor but musically rich in heritage and environment. His parents recognized his musical talents by age 6. Rohrau offered few opportunities to develop that talent, so they made arrangements with a relative, Johann Matthias Frankh, who was a choirmaster in nearby Hainburg, to take Franz Joseph as an apprentice for musical training. Franz Joseph lived with him and sang in his choir. There, Karl Georg Reutter, a choirmaster in Vienna, discovered him and his extraordinary voice. Reutter took him to Vienna, where Franz Joseph sang in his choir. As Franz Joseph’s voice was about to change, Reutter made plans that he be castrated to preserve his voiceas a castrati. However, his father learned of, and foiled, the plan.
When at age 15 his voice did change, he could no longer sing in the choir. He then began to compose music. Soon, he became well known as a composer and was employed by the Eszterhazy Palace. He was one of the last composers to be employed in the patronage system. He wrote an opera, Orlando Palladino, for which he was best known during his lifetime. At Eszterhazy he developed the musical form called the sonata allegro form, in which a theme is stated, followed by a secondary theme, usually contrasting with the primary theme; there is a middle developmental section in which the themes are broken apart into primary pieces, which are repeated and varied; and a final section as a recapitulation. For an excellent graphic representation of the form, see https://www.google.com/search?q=sonata+allegro+form+chart&hl=en&tbo=u&tbm=isch&source=univ&sa=X&ei=w_erUODrEMfyyAGn3IDYCw&ved=0CDQQsAQ&biw=1103&bih=593 .
The sonata allegro form permitted the development of new extended sections of music, and Haydn used and developed that form to become known as “Papa Haydn,” composer of both the string quartet and the symphony. One of his more popular symphonies is the “Surprise Symphony.”
He married, but, given the instability of his childhood as he was moved from place to place, and not surprisingly with what we now know of bonding and attachment disorders, that marriage failed and they separated. It did not help that he married the sister of the woman that he really loved.
Haydn also wrote sacred music, including oratorio (e.g. The Creation), and the mass (e.g. the Nelson Mass). He was a close friend Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, who was 24 years his junior, and who died 19 years before his own death. He made two visits to London in the 1790s which influenced his “London period.”
Oratorios:
The Seven Last Words of Christ – in three parts:
The seven last words of Christ – instrumental version
As Handel began his study of law, he was appointed as organist at a German Cathedral. He traveled to Italy, where, for a time, he composed sacred music. There, he wrote a number of operas, cantatas and oratorios, gaining some significant fame as a composer. In 1710 he moved to London to become Kapelmeister to King George I of Great Britain and Ireland. There he wrote operas in the Italian style, which was then en vogue, for audiences of aristocrats and royalty. He established three opera companies, but it seemed that his music was secondary in audience appeal to the popularity of the vocalists.
When he was nearly blind, yet within 23 days, he wrote Messiah for the benefit of the Foundling Hospital.
For a BBC documentary in five parts of his life and contributions, see
Johann Sebastian Bach (1685 – 1750) was a German composer who wrote in the old polyphonic style, perfecting it. In an age when there was greater travel throughout Europe, and printed music was available, he was greatly influenced by the music of several regions from Italy to Great Britain. I, personally, love his music because, to my ear, it is as a riveting dialogue between individual voices: declaring, asserting, responding, imitating, inverting, countering, and ultimately resolving in solidarity and repose. He was a numerologist. Many experts see significance of certain numbers in his compositions. Some find significant musical moments at numerically significant points in his music.
Bach wrote during a time when keyboard tuning became “well tempered:” if the division of an octave into separate steps and half steps is strictly mathematical, there are some keys that will sound good and others that will sound out of tune or conflicting. It was discovered that if the keyboard was tuned slightly out of tune, then all keys would sound “the same.” Piano tuners know that they have tuned the notes “perfectly,” or sufficiently out of tune, when they can play two differently pitched notes which create “beats,” much as interference pattern of waves created by casting two stones in water. Bach demonstrated this new value of this method of tuning in his Well Tempered Clavier, which systematically explored each of the keys for various numbers of “voices,” or parts.
He is known for a common inscription on his music manuscripts, roughly meaning “to the glory of God and edification of the soul.” To my mind, Bach’s music has a strong spiritual component reflecting that dedication of all his music, both sacred and secular.
He was also an organist and served a Lutheran church, St. Thomas, writing one cantata each week for church services. In his “spare time” he wrote secular music, one of the most popular sets being the Brandenburg Concertos. Whatever he composed had a contextual relationship with a set, such as Preludes and Fugues in each key, Inventions for keyboard in each key, a set of unaccompanied sonatas for violin and another set for cello. I suspect that thoroughness was another expression of his fascination with numerology.
Among his most impressive works is the oratorio, St. Matthew Passion. I understand that it was not so much intended for performance as to demonstrate his skills, in hopes of obtaining a better position than that which he enjoyed at St Thomas. It is immense in scope and its demands for resources and for audience endurance. The following YouTube post is exemplary of Bach’s beauty, skill and power’ his sensitivity, even intimacy:
Organ Toccata e Fuga BWV 565-Karl Richter
David Garrett – popular interpretation of Air on the G string
Wachet auf – Strathmere Festival Orchestra – Blanche Moyse Chorale
organ: Wachet auf, ruft uns die Stimme
J.S. Bach Magnificat Ton Koopman BWV 243
Motet BWV 227 ‘Jesu, meine Freude’ – Vocalconsort Berlin
Motet BWV 229 ‘Komm, Jesu, komm’ – Vocalconsort Berlin
Jean Philippe Rameau (1683 –1764) was one of the most important French composers and theorists of the Baroque era. He wrote Treatise on Harmony, which was revolutionary for that day. In it, he explores the philosophical underpinnings of music, and its mathematical and scientific foundations, giving musical criticism and pedagogy some objective foci. He gained notoriety for his departure from what had become conventional harmonies of John-Baptiste Lully for much more adventurous harmonies, which, in their turn, soon became accepted as convention. He was forgotten until rediscovered in the 20th century.
His harmonies are much more familiar to the modern ear, and to my mind, he makes a quantum leap from the past which he inherited. Having written that, I note that the early 20th century was, itself, a reaction against such harmonies. Composers were then criticized for living in an ivory tower and being inaccessible to the common person. Nonetheless, as modern “serious music” explored new tonalities or none at all, tone clusters or minimalistic sonorities, some composers turned to the past through primitivism and neoclassicism. Concertizing relied upon audience appeal, so that it tended to turn to music of the past which most related to that which was familiar in our churches and on the airways. One well-known example of such criticism was The Agony of Modern Music by Henry Pleasants. The listening public of his time, on the other hand, related to Rameau.
Rameau – Motet, In convertendo / Part 1 ( William Christie )
Rameau – Motet, In convertendo / Part compositions 2
George Philip Telemann (1681 –1767) left study of the law to become the most prolific German composer of his time, largely self-taught. He was an acquaintance of both George Friedrich Handel and Johan Sebastian Bach. By age 12, he had composed his first opera. He also composed poetry, wrote his own libretti, and engraved covers and published his own compositions. His married life was marred by spousal death and debt. His compositional style brought together a number of international musical styles.
Last movement of Du aber, Daniel, gehe hin
St. Matthew Passion Aria: “Lass mich mein Teil bei deinem Sterben”
Antonio Vivaldi (1678 – 1741), known as “the red priest” for his red hair, was an Italian composer and violinist, is recognized by some as one of the greatest of the Baroque composers, and criticized by others who consider that because of his characteristic style, he had little originality, and that each major composition tended to be a variation on the patterns of others. Perhaps each position could be analogized to Elton John.
Certainly, Vivaldi has become one of the most popular and recorded of the Baroque composers in the 20th century. He is most known for his violin concerto, The Four Seasons, in which he dedicates a movement to each of the seasons – more descriptive music, which was in vogue in the latter Baroque, Classical and Romantic eras. His red hair was sufficiently remarkable that he became known as “the Red Priest.”
Much of his music was written specifically for a young girls’ orchestra at an orphanage, which he served for a number of years. He is best known for his instrumental works, particularly, but he also wrote operas and sacred music, including oratorios, contatas and masses. Although his style, to me, is more homophonic, nonetheless it has energetic rhythmic drive, and had a great influence upon Johan Sebastian Bach, who transcribed some of his works for other instruments or groupings.
Vivaldi is one of the earliest composers that remains en vogue today. When I taught music in the 70s, my students could relate to Vivaldi’s rhythmic and harmonic drive, because of their familiarity with rock and the melodic qualities of the Beatles. The harmonies are much more familiar to modern audiences because of the old rock classics and modern hymnody.
I am amazed at the excellent quality of the videos available on YouTube, generally, and specifically concerning Vivaldi. It reflects his great appeal to performing artists as well as audiences.
Following are four laudable performances of Laudamus Te, from Vivaldi’s Gloria in D Major; it seems appropriate that each is performed by young women, and that causes me to wonder if Vivaldi had in mind two of the young women in the orphanage where he served and taught:
Florilegium with soprano soloist Elin Manahan Thomas perform sacred works for soprano and orchestra, with nice dialogue between the soloist and the director:
From the Gloria in D, Cascade High School Honor Choir in France
Nulla in mundo pax sincera, RV 630
Vivaldi – Gloria: 1. Gloria in excelsis Deo – Trevor Pinnock
Vivaldi’s Gloria in its entirety
Ensemble Caprice “The return of the Angels” with insightful comments upon Vivaldi and this music by the director:
Stabat Mater RV 621
Gaude mater Ecclesia
See Vivaldi and the women of the Pieta – Vivaldi’s Women for an excellent documentary:
Francois Couperin (1668 – 1733), was a composer and organist to Louise XIV. He was also a harpsichordist and published works addressing fingering, ornamentation and other skills of harpsichord performance.
The organ had already developed a rather rich history, which he inherited. It was first developed during the Middle Ages and compositions for it bloomed in the Baroque era. The modern pipe organ is quite similar to that which Couperin played and for which he composed. Most people know that the pipe organ produces sounds with a stream of air which flows into and through a pipe. The harpsichord is less familiar to us both by look and by sound. It is the precursor of the modern piano looking similar to it and similarly strung, tuned and arranged upon a wood or metal frame within a curved cabinet; however, rather than the strings being struck with a felt hammer, it’s tone was produced by the action of the keys drawing a moderately flexible plectrum across the string much as a guitarist plucks the strings of the guitar. Harpsichords could have two different keyboards, much as that of the organ, one of which could play soft and another loud. It was commonly used as a solo keyboard instrument or as an accompaniment for voice or instrument. By the Classical Era (from approximately 1600 – 1750) it was replaced by the pianoforte, which produces sound from its strung strings by a felt hammer-actuating a keyboard, as opposed to plectrum-plucked strings actuated by the harpsichord keyboard. Couperin published much music for the harpsichord, much of it in “ordres,” which might be a collections of dances or descriptive of a mood, a place, or an action, much as a “suite”in the compositions of Bach. His writing is very much indicative of the influence of the Doctrine of Affections, in which different keys were associated with different moods, and different melodic lines, ornaments and tempos associated with different affects. One characteristic of Baroque music in the Doctrine of Affections is a musical device known as a “sigh” which was a melodic and harmonic device in which the end of a phrase consisted of a dissonance on a strong beat of the measure which was then resolve on a weak beat or weak part of the beat. Moreover, Couperin’s music became so descriptive as to be picturesque with specifically associative titles such as “the mysterious barricades” Jordi Savall, an early – music expert, called him the “poet musician par excellence.” His style and technique of compositions for harpsichord would influence J.S. Bach in his compositions both for harpsichord and for orchestra, which were designated as “suites,” rather than “ordres.” His descriptive music would later be developed by Strauss into even more descriptive tone poems.
The Baroque eras a time when musical form developed into richer and more complex forms. Polyphony predominated with its fugues, cannons, and imitative or dialogical interplay of the voices; but composers were also developing more homophonic textures. Much as the liturgical music of the individual parts of the mass developed from individual settings to an artistic grouping of the whole, so, suites, ordres, and other multi-part collections were composed so that not only were the parts were composed with the sense of wholeness standing alone, but they also provided some contrast to maintain the interest while complementing each other. Typically, a three – part form would begin allegro (or fast), followed by a middle section of a slower tempo (such as Largo), and concluded with a final section of a faster tempo. Or, it could begin and end with a slower tempo, with a faster middle section.
Not much of his sacred music is extant, but its expressive qualities in that which is available is rich:
The following YouTube site presents a video of Michel Chapuis playing an improvisation of ”Prelude et Fugue dans le Stylus Phantasticus.” It would be of particular interest to those who play organ, is preceded for 40 seconds by videos of still photos of the organ on which he plays and its setting within the church, and shows not only his own playing, but the mechanics of operating the bellows, as would’ve been typical in the Baroque era when it was composed and performed:
The Bible Through Artists' Eyes 