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Chapter
Listening to Music
It is perhaps in music that the dignity of art is most eminently apparent, for it
elevates and ennobles everything that it expresses.
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (17491832)
F I G U R E 11
A medieval representation of how music
was transmitted. Pope Gregory the Great
(590604) receives what is now called
Gregorian chant from the Holy Spirit
(a dove on his shoulder) and communicates
it orally to a scribe who writes down the
music on either parchment or a wax tablet.
2
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Listening to Music
C H A P T E R
Nir Elias/Reuters/Corbis
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P A R T
PictureNet/Corbis
F I G U R E 12
A student listening to an MP3 file on
an iPod.
Music is heard everywhere in the world. Numerous forms of art music, rooted
in centuries of tradition, thrive in China, India, Indonesia, and elsewhere. Musical practices associated with religious ceremonies, coming-of-age rituals, and
other social occasions flourish across Africa and Latin America. Dance music
serves a central function for youth culture in nightclubs and discotheques
across the globe. In the West, classical music still holds sway in concert halls
and opera houses, while numerous idioms of Western popular musicrock,
hip-hop, and country, for exampledominate the commercial landscape.
Jazz, a particularly American form of vernacular music, shares traits with both
Western classical and popular music.
What is more, the increasing frequency of fusions among musical styles
illustrates the trend of musical globalization in recent years. Afro-Cuban
genres draw upon musical traditions ranging from Caribbean styles, to jazz,
to the music of old Spain. Classical cellist Yo-Yo Ma performs with traditional
Chinese musicians on the Silk Road Project, while British pop singer Sting has
collaborated with musicians ranging from jazz virtuoso Branford Marsalis to
Algerian singer Cheb Mami. To be sure, there are plenty of styles, and fusions
of styles, from which to choose. We might on occasion choose a certain kind
of musicclassical, traditional, or popularaccording to its association with
our own heritage, while at other times we might base our decision on our
mood or activity at a particular moment.
What is a classic?
Most of the music that will be discussed in this book is what we generally refer
to as classical music. We might also call it high art music or learned music,
because a particular set of skills is needed to perform and appreciate it. Classical
music is often regarded as old music, written by dead white men. But this is
not entirely accurate: no small amount of it has been written by women, and
many high art composers, of both sexes, are very much alive and well today.
In truth, however, much of what we hear by way of classical musicthe music
of Bach, Beethoven, and Brahms, for exampleis old. That is why, in part, it
is called classical. We refer to clothes, furniture, and automobiles as classics
because they have timeless qualities of expression, proportion, and balance.
So, too, we give the name classical to music with these same qualities, music
that has endured the test of time.
Popular music, as its name suggests, appeals to a much larger segment of
the population. Pop and rock CDs outsell classical music recordings by more
than ten to one. Popular music can be just as artful and just as serious as classical music, and often the musicians who perform it are just as skilled as classical
musicians. Some musicians are equally at home in both idioms (Fig. 13). But
how do classical and popular music differ?
Classical music relies on acoustic instruments (the sounds of which are
not electronically altered), such as the trumpet, violin, and piano; popular
music often uses technological innovations such as electrically amplified
guitars and basses, electronic synthesizers, and computers.
Classical music relies greatly on preset musical notation, and therefore the
work (a symphony, for example) is to some extent a fixed entity; popular
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music relies mostly on oral and aural transmission, and the work can change
greatly from one performance to the next. Rarely do we see performers reading from written music at a pop concert.
Classical music is primarily, but by no means exclusively, instrumental, with
meaning communicated through a language of musical sounds and gestures;
most popular music makes use of a text or lyric to convey its meaning.
Classical compositions can be lengthy and involve a variety of moods, and
the listener must concentrate over a long period of time; most popular pieces
are relatively short, averaging from three to four minutes in length, and possess a single mood from beginning to end.
In classical music the rhythmic beat often rests beneath the surface of the
music; popular music relies greatly on an immediately audible, recurrent
beat.
Classical music suggests to the listener a chance to escape from the everyday world into a realm of abstract sound patterning; popular music has a
more immediate impact, and its lyrics often embrace issues of contemporary life.
C H A P T E R
Lynn Goldsmith/Corbis
Listening to Music
F I G U R E 13
Trumpeter Wynton Marsalis can record a
Baroque trumpet concerto one week and
an album of New Orleansstyle jazz the
next. He has won nine Grammy awards,
seven for various jazz categories and two
for classical discs.
Classical listeners were given the chance to elaborate on why they prefer
this kind of music. Here is just one typical response for each category:
1. My work is pretty stressful, and when it gets really stressful, I turn to classical. It calms me down. It soothes the savage beast.
2. Its very good for the brain.
3. Enjoying a symphony takes me back to great childhood memories.
4. Im not educated in music. Im like really stupid about it, but this is one way
[listening on the radio] that I can educate myself, in my own stumbling,
bumbling musical way.
From mental and emotional well-being, to increased concentration and enriched imagination, to deeper understanding of human culture and history, it
would seem that classical music has something to offer virtually everyone.
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P A R T
Corbis
F I G U R E 14
Symphony Hall in Boston. The best seats
for hearing the music are not up front, but
at the back in the middle of the balcony.
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Listening to Music
best for hearing. In some concert halls, the sound sails immediately over the
front seats and settles at the back (Fig. 14). Often the optimal seat in terms
of acoustics is at the back of the hall, in the first balcony. Sitting closer, of
course, allows you to watch the performers on stage. If you attend a concert
of a symphony orchestra, follow the gestures that the conductor makes to the
various soloists and sections of the orchestra; like a circus ringmaster, he or
she turns directly to the soloist of a given moment. The conductor conveys
to the players the essential lines and themes of the music, and they in turn communicate these to the audience.
C H A P T E R
where to sit
GETTING STARTED:
THREE MUSICAL BEGINNINGS
In a work of art that unfolds over timea poem, a novel, a symphony, or a
film, for examplethe beginning is critical to the success of the work. The
artist must capture the attention of the reader, listener, or viewer by means of
some kind of new approach as well as convey the essence of the experience
that is to follow. We can learn much about how classical music works by engaging just the beginnings of three strikingly original compositions.
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F I G U R E 15
A portrait of Ludwig van Beethoven painted
in 18181819 by Ferdinand Schimon
(17971852).
seven and almost totally deaf (Fig. 15; see Chapter 21 for a biography of
Beethoven). How could a deaf person write a symphony? Simply said, he could
do so because musicians hear with an inner ear, meaning that their brains can
create and rework melodies without recourse to externally audible sound. In
this way, the nearly-deaf Beethoven fashioned an entire thirty-minute symphony.
A symphony is a genre, or type, of music for orchestra, divided into several
pieces called movements, each possessing its own tempo and mood. A typical classical symphony will have four movements with the respective tempos
of fast, slow, moderate, and fast. A symphony is played by an orchestra, a
large ensemble of acoustic instruments such as violins, trumpets, and flutes.
Although an orchestra might play a concerto, an overture, or a dance suite,
historically it has played more symphonies than anything else, and for that
reason is called a symphony orchestra. The orchestra for which Beethoven
composed his fifth symphony was made up of about sixty players, including
string, wind, and percussion instruments.
Beethoven begins his symphony with the musical equivalent of a punch in
the nose. The four-pitch rhythm short-short-short-long is quick and abrupt.
It is all the more unsettling because the music has no clear-cut beat or grounding harmony to support it. Our reaction is one of surprise, perhaps bewilderment, perhaps even fear. The brevity of the opening rhythm is typical of what
we call a musical motive, a short, distinctive musical figure that can stand by
itself. In the course of this symphony, Beethoven will repeat and reshape this
opening motive, making it serve as the unifying thread of the entire symphony.
Having shaken, even staggered, the listener with this opening blow, Beethoven then begins to bring clarity and direction to his music. The motive
sounds in rapid succession, rising stepwise in pitch, and the volume progressively increases. When the volume of sound increases in musicgets louder
we have a crescendo, and conversely, when it decreases, a diminuendo. Beethoven uses the crescendo here to suggest a continuous progressionhe is
taking us from point A to point B. Suddenly the music stops: we have arrived.
A French horn (a brass instrument; see page 51) then blasts forth, as if to say,
And now for something new. Indeed, new material follows: a beautiful flowing melody played first by the strings and then by the winds. Its lyrical motion serves as a welcome contrast to the almost rude opening motive. Soon
the motive reasserts itself, but is gradually transformed into a melodic pattern
that sounds more heroic than threatening, and with this, Beethoven ends his
opening section.
In sum, in the opening of Symphony No. 5, Beethoven shows us that his
musical world includes many different feelings and states of mind, among
them the fearful, the lyrical, and the heroic. When asked what the opening
motive of the symphony meant, Beethoven is reported to have said, There
fate knocks at the door. In the course of the four movements of this symphony (all of which are included in the six-CD set), Beethoven takes us on a
fateful journey that includes moments of fear, despair, and, ultimately, triumph.
Turn now to this opening section (Intro /1) and to the Listening Guide. Here
you will see musical notation representing the principal musical events. This
notation may seem alien to you, but dont panicthe essentials of musical
notation will be explained fully in Chapters 23. For the moment, simply
play the music and follow along according to the minute and second counter
on your player.
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Listening to Music
Listening Guide
0:00
0:22
0:42
0:45
1:04
1:14
C H A P T E R
Intro
U
b
& b b 24
b
&b b
&
bbb
Peter Tchaikovsky,
Piano Concerto No. 1 (1875)Opening
All of us have heard the charming and often exciting music of Peter Tchaikovsky (18401893), especially his ballet The Nutcracker, a perennial holiday
favorite. Tchaikovsky was a Russian composer who earned his living first as a
teacher of music at the Moscow Conservatory and then, later in life, as an independent composer who traveled widely around Europe and even to the
United States (see Chapter 30 for his biography). All types of classical music
flowed from his pen, including ballets, operas, overtures, symphonies, and
concertos.
A concerto is a genre of music in which an instrumental soloist plays with,
and sometimes against, a full orchestra. Thus the concerto suggests both cooperation and competition, one between soloist and orchestra in the spirit of
anything you can do, I can do better. Most concertos consist of three movements, usually with tempos of fast, slow, and fast. Tchaikovskys Piano Concerto No. 1 was composed in 1875 and premiered that year, not in Russia but
in Boston, where it was performed by the Boston Symphony. Since that time,
Tchaikovskys first concerto has gone on to become what The New York Times
called his all-time most popular score.
The popularity of this work stems in large measure from the opening section of the first movement. Tchaikovsky, like Beethoven above, begins with a
four-note motive, but here the pitches move downward in equal durations
and are played by brass instruments, not strings. The opening motive quickly
yields to a succession of block-like sounds called chords. A chord in music is
simply the simultaneous sounding of two or more pitches. Here the chords
are played first by the orchestra and then by the piano. Suddenly the violins
enter with a sweeping melody that builds progressively in length and grandeur,
a melody surely found near the top of every music lovers list of fifty great
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10
P A R T
classical melodies. Tchaikovskys beginning makes clear the difference between a motive and a melody: the former is a short unit, like a musical cell or
building block, while the latter is longer and more tuneful and song-like. As
the violins introduce the melody, the piano plays chords against it. Soon, however, the roles are reversed: the piano plays the melody, embellishing it along
the way, while the strings of the orchestra provide the accompanying chords.
To make the music lighter, Tchaikovsky instructs the strings to play the chords
pizzicato, a technique in which the performers pluck the strings of their instruments with their fingers rather than bowing them. Then, after some technical razzle-dazzle provided by the pianist, the melody sweeps back one last
time. In this glorious, lush final statement of the melody by the strings, we experience the essence of musical romanticism.
Listening Guide
0:00
0:07
0:15
0:56
1:21
2:10
2:26
3:05
Peter Tchaikovsky
Piano Concerto No. 1 (1875)
First movement, Allegro non troppo e molto maestoso (not too fast
and with much majesty)
Intro
There were two important composers named Strauss in the history of music.
One, Johann Strauss, Jr. (18251899), was Austrian and is known as the Waltz
King because he wrote mainly popular waltzes. The other, Richard Strauss
(18641949), was German and composed primarily operas and large-scale
compositions for orchestra called tone poems. A tone poem (also called a
symphonic poem) is a one-movement work for orchestra that tries to capture
in music the emotions and events associated with a story, play, or personal experience. In his tone poem Thus Spoke Zarathustra, Richard Strauss tries to depict
in music the events described in a novel of that title by the German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche (18441900). The hero of Nietzsches story is the
ancient Persian prophet Zarathustra (Zoroaster), who foretells the coming of
a more advanced human, a Superman. (This strain in German Romantic philosophy was later perverted by Adolf Hitler into the cult of a master race.)
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Listening Guide
0:00
0:16
0:30
0:35
0:49
0:55
1:13
1:23
C H A P T E R
11
Cindy Davis
Listening to Music
F I G U R E 16
A fanciful depiction of the opening of Friedrich Nietzsches Thus Spoke Zarathustra
with the rise of the all-powerful sun.
Richard Strauss
Thus Spoke Zarathustra (1896)
Intro
Listening Exercise 1
Intro
13
Musical Beginnings
This first Listening Exercise asks you to review three of the most famous beginnings in the entire repertoire of classical music. The following questions encourage
(continued)
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12
P A R T
you to listen actively, sometimes to just small details in the music. This first
exercise is designed to be user-friendlythe questions are not too difficult.
Beethoven, Symphony No. 5 (1808)Opening
1. (0:000:05) Beethoven opens his Symphony No. 5
1
with the famous short-short-short-long motive and
then immediately repeats. Does the repetition present
the motive at a higher or at a lower level of pitch?
a. higher pitches
b. lower pitches
2. (0:220:44) In this passage, Beethoven constructs a
musical transition that moves us from the opening
motive to a more lyrical second theme. Which is true
about this transition?
a. The music seems to get slower and makes use of a
diminuendo.
b. The music seems to get faster and makes use of a
crescendo.
3. (0:380:44) How does Beethoven add intensity to the
conclusion of the transition?
a. A pounding drum (timpani) is added to the orchestra and then a French horn plays a solo.
b. A French horn plays a solo and then a pounding
drum (timpani) is added to the orchestra.
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Rhythm
a. a crashing cymbal
b. a piano
c. an electric bass guitar
20. Student choice: You have now heard three very different
musical openings, by Beethoven, Tchaikovsky, and
orchestra (8)
symphony
orchestra (8)
motive (8)
crescendo (8)
diminuendo (8)
concerto (9)
C H A P T E R
13
Key Words
classical music (4)
popular music (4)
acoustic
instrument (4)
encore (6)
symphony (8)
movement (8)
chord (9)
melody (10)
pizzicato (10)
tone poem
(symphonic
poem) (10)
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