Tuesday, February 16, 2010

Mozart's Piano Concerto no. 17 in G Major, K 453

This fine three-movement concerto features a gorgeous piano cadenza in the second movement as well as Mozart's addition of a finale at the end of five variations in the third movement. Normally, a slow ornamental variation would be expected after the five variations, but Mozart rather chooses to compose a presto finale to conclude the movement.

Monday, February 15, 2010

Mozart's Symphony no. 40 in g minor

The harmonic style employed in this popular symphony seems to project forward to the following centuries, especially to Beethoven's compositions. Drama and elegance are joined together in this creative classical work.

1st movement:
In sonata-allegro form, this movement in g minor has its foundation on certain motif, i.e. two descending eighth notes preceding a single quarter note.

2nd movement:
The character of this slow Andante movement, in modified sonata-allegro form, is held together by Mozart's handling of both emotion and texture in a holistic manner.

3rd movement:
This dramatic Minuet and Trio in g minor presents the two-measure syncopation in the minuet. The boisterous trio shifts the downbeat, thus also changing the meter.

4th movement:
Though the texture is light, this finale moves forward with a dramatic push, beginning with a rocket theme in the violin section. The aspect of Mozart looking towards the future in his music is featured in the development section as its material seems close to modern music.

Listen to this piece at:

Schubert's Trout Quintet

Piano Quintet in A Major "Trout" (4th movement)
This delightful quintet portrays word painting as the music depicts a trout caught by a fisherman in addition to exquisitely conveying the babbling stream. Schubert also adds the rare use of a double bass, an effective instrument to point to the lower range.

Listen to this piece at:

Saturday, February 13, 2010

Mozart's Prague Symphony

Symphony No. 38 in D Major, K 504
Although this symphony has much in common to Mozart's other symphonies, it includes a few unique attributes, such as a slow-moving, subtle opening in the first movement. The harmony in the second movement is generally unstable and turns to a minor key, featuring different moods.

Listen to this symphony at:

Mozart's Marriage of Figaro

Having quite a crazy plot featuring a clever and passionate love story, this opera buffa demonstrates Mozart's musical style known for its numerous melodies. The text and orchestration fit together elegantly and provide an intriguing piece of music for the audience.

Listen to this opera at:

Wednesday, February 10, 2010

Mozart's "Magic Flute"

Mozart's dramatic singspiel opera portrays the journey of two lovers by skillfully dramatizing the realistic emotions and circumstances they faced, in addition to adding humor to the composition. This work of art also demonstrates Mozart's superb abililty to model the vocal parts after the human voice.

Listen to this opera at:

Tuesday, February 9, 2010

Haydn's Surprise Symphony

Haydn often employed humor in his compositions, such as in the Surprise Symphony. In the second movement in variation-form, he shocked the audience by an abrupt fortissimo chord following a piano theme with the intention of providing something new in competition with a performing student of his.

Listen to this symphony at:

Quote from Beethoven

Beethoven highly valued a strong internal ear for music, as is evident by a remark he told his pupil,
"Never use the piano while composing."

Haydn's Creation Oratorio

The engaging Creation Oratorio is full of richness especially with regard to "tone-painting" (similar or identical to word painting) where the music either complements and describes the text or even imitates it. Haydn also meant much (if not all) of this oratorio to be a proclamation of his optimism and praise to God, which can clearly be deciphered through the joyous music it contains.

Listen to this oratorio at:

Music History sites

1) http://www2.cpdl.org/wiki/index.php/Main_Page

2) It is called Werner Icking. This link is the one to the composer pages.

http://icking-music-archive.org/ByComposer.php
m40.pdf, sheet music