Music of the romantic period

• Vocal music


  One of the best tools for expressing one's feelings
• Romantic period


  • Emotional subjectivity
  • Composers explore feelings of grandiosity, intimacy, unpredictability, sad, rapture and longing
• Romantic vocal forms


  • Art song
  • Operas
• Romantic vocal forms


  About fantasy, supernatural, romance and the nature as mirror of the human heart
• Virtuoso performers


  • Not only instrumentalists but also singers
  • One singer sometimes sounds like several characters by use of different vocal register
• Music and literature


  Parallelisms were clearly evident in almost all forms of vocal music during the Romantic period
• Composers


  Interpret poems, mood, atmosphere and imagery into music
• Art song


  • Written for solo voice and piano
  • Inspiration from poetry in this period
  • Mood is often set at the beginning with piano introduction and concluded with a piano postlude
• Vocal music in the Romantic period

  • Requires singers to perform a greater range of tone color, dynamics and pitch
• Opera


  • Became an important source of musical expressions
  • The birth of the opera houses came
  • Place where all the arts converged: not only music, but poetry, painting, architecture and the dance as well
• Lieder


  German word for songs, developed by Schubert to have a powerful dramatic impact on the listeners
• Schubert tapped the poetry of writers like Johann Goethe
• Schubert is considered the last of the Classical composers and one of the first romantic ones
• Schubert's famous vocal music works/ Lieder

  • "Gretchen am Spinnrade"
  • "Erlkonig"
  • "EllensGesang III" ("Ave Maria")
  • "Schwanenge sang" ("Swan Song")
  • Symphony No.8 in B minor ("Unfinished Symphony")
• Verdi


  • Famous in making Romantic opera
  • His characters are ordinary people and not those of the royal family like those found in German operas
  • Insisted on a good libretto and wrote operas with political overtones and for middle-class audience
• Verdi born in Parma, Italy


  October 9, 1813
• Verdi studied in Busseto and later went to Milan where his first opera "Oberto" was performed in La Scala, the most important opera house at the time
• Verdi's operas


  • Almost all are serious love story with unhappy ending
  • Expressive vocal melody is the soul of his opera
• Verdi completed 25 operas throughout his career
• Verdi's final opera ends with "All the world‟s a joke"
• Verdi's famous operas


  • La Traviata
  • Rigoletto
  • Falstaff
  • Otello
  • Aida
• Verdi died in Milan, Italy


  January 27, 1901
• Puccini


  • Born in a poor family on December 22, 1858 in Lucca, Italy
  • Studied at the Milan Conservatory
  • Belonged to a group of composers who stressed realism, therefore, he drew material from everyday life, rejecting heroic themes from mythology and history
• Puccini's famous operas


  • La Boheme
  • Tosca
  • Madame Butterfly
  • Turandot
• Wagner


  • Born in Leipzig, Germany on May 22, 1813
  • Attended Leipzig University and very much inspired by Ludwig van Beethoven
  • Introduced new ideas in harmony and in form, including extremes of chromaticism
  • Explored the limits of the traditional tonal system that gave keys and chords itsown identity which paved the way for the rise of atonality in the 20th century
  • Advocate of a new form of opera which he called "music drama" where musical and dramatic elements were fused together
  • Developed a compositional style in which the orchestra has of equal importance in dramatic roles as the singers themselves
  • Used "leitmotifs" or musical sequences standing for a particular character/plot element
• Wagner's famous works


  • Tristan and Isolde
  • Die Walkyrie
  • Die Meistersinger
  • Tannhäuser
  • Parsifal
  • Wedding March
• Wagner's work would later influence modern film scores, including those of the Harry Potter and Lord of the Rings film series
• Wagner died of a heart attack at age of 69


  February 13, 1883
• Bizet


  • Registered with the legal name Alexandre-Cesar-Leopold Bizet, but was baptized Georges Bizet and was always known by the latter name
  • Born October 25, 1838 in Paris, France
  • Entered the Paris Conservatory of music at a very young age
  • Famous for his operas, most famous being "Carmen"
  • When "Carmen" first opened in Paris, the reviews were terrible and resulted in poor audience attendance
  • Bizet died (June 3, 1875) during the first round of "Carmen" performances, but four months later "Carmen" opened in Vienna, Austria and was a smash hit
• Romantic opera


  • Musical composition having all or most of its text set to music with arias, recitative, choruses, duets, trios, etc. sung to orchestral accompaniment
  • Usually characterized by elaborate costumes, scenery and choreography
• Components of an opera

  • Libretto - the text of an opera
  • Score - the book that the composer and librettist put together
  • Recitative - Declamatory singing, used in the prose parts and dialogue of opera
  • Aria - an air or solo singing part sung by a principal character
• Different roles in operas are created taking into account different types of voices, each requiring a different type of singer, not only able to sing a given vocal range but also with certain voice characteristics, color and power
• Male voice types


  • Tenor - highest male voice
  • Baritone - Middle male voice, lies between Bass and Tenor voices
  • Bass - lowest male voice
• Female voice types


  • Soprano - highest female voice (Coloratura - highest soprano voice, Lyric - bright and full sound, Dramatic - darker full sound)
  • Mezzo-Soprano - most common female voice; strong middle voice, tone is darker or deeper than the soprano
  • Contralto - lowest female voice and most unique among female
• Other vocal ensemble types

  • Duet - a piece of music performed by two singers or musician
  • Trio - performed by three
  • Chorus - a large group of singers
  • Orchestra - a group of musicians
• Other opera components


  • Acts - main divisions of an opera
  • Scene - setting or place
• Vocal techniques and musical terms

  • Dynamics and vocal embellishments
  • A Capella - one or more singers performing without instrumental accompaniment
  • Cantabile - In a singing style
  • Capo - Head, the beginning
  • Coda - closing section appended to a movement or song
  • Dolce - sweetly
  • Falsetto - a weaker and more airy voice usually in the higher pitch ranges
  • Glissando - sliding quickly between 2 notes
  • Passagio - parts of a singing voice where register transitions occur
  • Rubato - slight speeding up or slowing down of the tempo of a piece at the discretion of the soloist
  • Tessitura - the most comfortable singing range of a singer
  • Vibrato - rapidly repeated slight pitch variation during a sustained note, to give a richer & more varied sound
• Sarswela


  • Known as drama simbolico, a traditional theatre genre introduced by Dario Cespedes
  • Storyline based on domestic issues like nationalism fight against foreign imperialist
• Famous Sarswela writers


  • Benigno Zamora
  • Severino Reyes
  • ClodualdodelMundo
• Dalagang Bukid


  1919, most popular sarswela in tagalog