Music Development during the 20th Century - Essay Example

Music History Name: Lecturer: Course: Date: Music Development during the 20th Century Introduction The Western classical music has gone through acceleration all through the century. A similar trend in African-American music and its European offshoots starting from the 1940s was also evident. Among the remarkable changed in America included the bridging of Jazz and classical music styles during between in 1930s (Gioia 1997). Conversely, several musical styles have largely been statics, specifically the non-Western ones that are mostly used during rituals. Interpretational and compositional musical styles changed significantly during the 20th century (Classic FM 2013). This essay argues that the 20th century music compositions witnessed immense changes and development that exemplify the growth of multiethnic societies, the explosion of the mass media and the deepening of intercultural integration during. In this respect, this paper examines the early European and American 20th Century music compared to pre-war and post-war music (1945 onwards). The comparisons are made in tandem, starting with the Early 20thh century, Pre-War period and lastly the Post-War period. Drawing from the assumption that remarkable changes in music composition during the 20th century included the mixing of ethnic music, the compositions of George Gershwin (1898-1937) are also explored to establish the role he played in bridging the gap between jazz and classical styles of music, resulting to ‘jazz concerto.” Early 20th century and Pre-War period All through the 19th century and early 20th century during the Romantic period, minstrel shows were fundamental form of popular music and carried the elements of African music, where music was composed from the heart for purposes of self-expression. Such an influence dominated the American popular music during the pre-war era (Gioia 1997). Two interrelating cultural systems dominate the cultural elements of the United States. One is derived from Africa while the other is derived from Europe. The European systems tend to dominate in terms of scientific and intellectual culture (MFiles 2014; (Gioia 1997). Indeed, before 1910, composers still composed from their hearts and made music that pleased them. They also used a common musical language anchored in tonality. At the same time, the composers during the late Romantic period (1900-1910) expanded the language to ensure they could express their personal feelings through music. The pre-war and post-war period in America and Europe witnessed a total overhaul of the common language. In fact, it was replaced by varied attempts to make new ones (MFiles 2014). The pre-war and post-war period also witnessed an end to the Austro-German dominance in musical composition that characterised the early part of the 20th century. Although various nationalist musical schools in Eastern Europe, Northern Europe, and Russia were emerging during the later part of the Romantic period, the post-war period saw the complete decentralisation of the compositional activities (Williams 2013). A new generation of great composers emerged in England for the first time after 300 years. France featured as a breeding ground of innovation. Great compositions from South America and Mexico emerged as composers moved freely across different countries. In the United States during the pre-war period, new popular music created fresh dilemmas and energy within concert music. The jazz music gained popularity across the United States as several compositions and jazz musicians became influenced by the concert music. Conversely, a newly composed music started to lose its honoured place within the cultural life as classical record labels and symphony orchestras started to become conservativeness in taste. They started to prefer newly untested compositions, many of which were difficult for the listener, rather than the reputable and standard music (Cerchiari et al 2012). The musical compositions drawn from the late Romantic era of the nineteenth century to the early twentieth century gained increased consideration of an “extended melodic line,” in addition to emotional and expressive aspects that paralleled romanticism in alternative forms of art (Classic FM 2013). The musical forms started to detach themselves from the forms of music of the Classical era. They were characterised by free-form pieces, such as fantasias, nocturnes, as well as preludes that were written where accepted idea regarding the development and exposition of themes became ignored, as well as minimised. The forms of music started to become dissonant, chromatic and colourful tones with tensions regarding increased key signatures. During this period, the grand opera and art songs gained maturity (MFiles 2014). During the early twentieth century in Europe and America, the musical institutions that developed during the nineteenth century matured, as musicians and composers constructed lives that were autonomous of the nobility. There was increased interest in music among the middle class across Europe and America, which encouraged the creation of institutions for teaching, performing and preserving music. At the same time, the piano, which had gained its prominence in the nineteenth century because of technological revolution, became popular among the middle class. In regards to orchestra, the family of instruments increased as a larger assortment of percussion instruments came to the fore (Washburne & Derno 2013). For instance, the Brass instruments were used for the larger tasks even as the use of rotary valves increased, which allowed them to play a wider notes range. In addition, the size of the orchestra (which comprised about 40 during the Classical period) increased to more than 100. For instance, in 1906, Gustav Mahler's Symphony No. 8 was made with a choir of more than 400 people and more than 150 instrumentalists. During the post-war period, classical music encompassed a broad array of post-Romantic styles into the year 2000. They included the post-modern styles, the late romantic, the high modern, and the modern (Gioia 1997; Attinello 2007). Between 1990 and 1930 during the Modernism era, a large number of compositions rejected particular values that characterised the period, including the traditional melody, tonality, structure, and instrumentation. On the other hand, the High-modern era witnessed the coming of serial and neoclassical music. According to Botstein (2013), the period around 1930 saw the emergence of postmodern music, which went on into the post-war era and into the 21st century (Attinello 2007). In the early twentieth century, classical music composers experimented with a progressively more dissonant pitch language that often gave way to atonal pieces. After the World War I, however, there was a hostile response against what they witnessed as an increased formlessness of late Romanticism. It is during this period that composers used neoclassic style, which recaptured the balanced forms, as well as more definite thematic processes that characterised styles of the earlier period (Cerchiari et al 2012). Significant shifts during the Pre-War Era Remarkable changes in music composition during the Post-War era included the growth of cultural integration and multiethnic society. This led to the mixing of ethnic music. Essentially, while classical music had elements of European music, the jazz music had some elements of African music. Efforts to bridge jazz and classical music started in the early 1900s, immediately after jazz gained recognition as a distinctive music style. Some ragtime music drew upon classical music, and symphonic pieces, such as the “Rhapsody in Blue,” which was characteristically a blend of jazz and symphonic music (Fowler 2014. George Gershwin (1898-1937) composed the “Rhapsody in Blue” in 1924 to pioneer in bridge between popular American music and classical genres. Gershwin was an American pianist and composer. His compositions ranged between popular and orchestral styles. His popular melodies are also extensively known to have embodied growing cultures from America’s multiethnic society (Gioia 1997). Indeed, Gershwin’s compositions bridged the gap between jazz and classical styles of music, resulting to ‘jazz concerto.” Gershwin’s compositions also formed a bridge because of his direct access to both popular and orchestral styles. In fact, some scholars, such as Fowler (2014) shows that Gershwin was particularly fascinated with jazz and blues during a period when such genres witnessed explosive development. He was also among the earliest American’s of European extraction who successfully and significantly attained direct contact with Afro-American innovators, including the legendary bandleader called James Reese and pianist James Johnson. Consequently, Gershwin integrated jazz harmony and inflections of blues into his works in a manner that gained appeal from the multiracial audience. As Botstein (2013) describes it, Gershwin’s music had a unique aspect that struck a receptive chord in the black and white American audience. In return, such indescribable quality, according to Benzon (1997), found its way in a range of his songs, to which the white and black American responded impulsively. Most listing of repertories of black jazz musicians produced between 1920s and1940s comprise Gershwin’s songs (Gioia1997).  In fact, most of Gershwin’s other orchestral works, such as “Porgy and Bess,” “Second Rhapsody,” “An American In Paris,” “Rhapsody in Blue,” and “Concerto in F” had a unique test of American popular music and became dubbed as ‘jazz-influenced.” Among Gershwin’s most phenomenal compositions, which were between jazz and classical genre was the “Rhapsody in Blue.” As Fowler (2014) mentions, the “Rhapsody in Blue” became the first of Gershwin’s classical orchestral works. He further observes that among the reasons credited for making Gershwin’s composition to form the bridge was based on his training and background. This remarks are echoed by Gioia (1997), who mentioned that Gershwin’s early training in classical music and his outstanding confidence drove him to ‘bridge the gap’ between popular and orchestral styles, or jazz and classical genres. Gershwin produced the ‘Rhapsody in Blue’ with the help of composer Ferde grofe. It was initially a makeup of piano and jazz band to make it effectively bridged the divide between popular jazz and classical styles (Classical Notes 2013). Indeed, Fowler (2014) review claims that the “Rhapsody in Blue became among the greatest orchestral compositions in the 20th century (Gioia1997). His other phenomenon composition that formed a bridge was the “Concerto F.” Fowler (2014) explains that Gershwin made conscious efforts to apply his brilliant gift as a pop composer onto the traditional orchestral form, through his 1926 piano concerto called Concerto in F. He called this work “a jazz opera with a Negro subject.” Botstein (2013) points out that Concerto F. provided Gershwin with a timely opportunity to prove his stature as a serious composer in the New York Symphony Society. Through the Concerto F, Gershwin made sure that the successes he made with his Rhapsody in Blue was not an accident Regarding the Concerto F, Botstein (2013) describes Gershwin as a seasoned and professional composer who became the point of reference in which all compositional projects that integrated jazz and classical music are framed. He adds that Gershwin became the foremost American to approach classical music as component of a greater continuum, and to embrace jazz music as being among equals. Gershwin had utilized certain jazz rhythms to work out along more symphonic lines. According to Fowler (2014), Gershwin’s melodies and harmonies were developed from jazz rhythms. In a related review, Botstein (2013) notes that Gershwin may have been motivated by the need to transform jazz with orchestra as he viewed the jazz during his time to be vulgar, crude, boisterous and noisy. Therefore, he looked forward to merge into classical music, not to make a predominant genre but to absorb it into the great dominion of musical tradition that could be regarded as musical expression to the America spirit (Classical Notes 2013). According to Gioia (1997), the fact that Concerto and the Rhapsody in blue were perceived to be jazz music was more of a manifestation of a great cultural divide during the time than any other factor. Similar attempts to integrate serious music to jazz appeared wanting when compared to Gershwin’s Concerto F. Large-scale works appeared to miss out on the complete measure of integration realised in Concerto F (Classical Notes 2013). Hence, a composition of Aaron Copland in 1924, called “Piano Concerto” appeared to portray a difference between the elements of calm, of astringent introduction that steeps where the soloist explodes with a range of rhythms of jazz. Indeed, despite many decades later in 1954, a composition by Rolf Liebermann called “Concerto” for jazz and symphony featured blues, jazz and sections of mambo separated by orchestral interlude. Indeed, in spite of the irregular surges of energy in the “Concerto” and the “Piano Concerto,” the two still lack the melodic ease, natural attitude, and flowing structure that Gershwin integrated in his Concerto F or the “Rhapsody in Blue.” Gershwin had by, 1930s, created a style of music that was definitely America. Created from the roots of Jazz and improved through consultations with American classical bands, such as Paul Whitman’s Orchestra, Gershwin managed to become an international voice for the jazz and classical music. However, Fowler (2014) opines that despite Gershwin mostly sounded American, his music was chiefly influenced by the music from European countries and composers. For instance, the Rhapsody in Blue had features of Liszt’s Hungarian Rhapsodies. The fact that Gershwin’s compositions embodied growing cultures from multiethnic society, mainly the African and European characteristics facilitated the process of bridging the gap between elements of African music in Jazz and elements of European music in orchestral styles. According to Benzon (1997), it is Gershwen’s voracious curiosity and admiration for varied musical forms and styles are largely the boldest component of his American voice. Gershwin’s music represented a growing America that integrated cultures from multiethnic society and its roots in these cultures, such as the European culture. Still, his impact on the popular American cultures that characterised the 1920s and 1930s cannot be overlooked, as well as his ratings at Hollywood and Broadwar. It was through this that he met Oscar Levant, who also bridged the gap between popular and classical worlds. Levant was greatly influenced by Gershwin. Like Gershwin, his musical influences are immense. Night Songs is an example of his music that borrows from the jazz tradition in terms of syncopated rhythms and harmonies, as well as by occasionally leveraging the use of a twelve-tone system (Fowler 2014). Greater advancements in compositions in the Post-War period In the post-war period however, modernist composers looked to attain greater control levels in their processes of compositions, such as using the 12-tone technique and total serialism later. During the post-war period, composers also started experimenting ways of relinquishing control or exploring indeterminacy processes in the larger and smaller degree (Attinello 2007). Between 1945 and 75, during the post-war period, the American and European traditions started diverging. A significant compositional technique during the period was serialism, which was characterised by total ordering of the tones. Prominent European composers included Anton Webern and Arnold Schoenberg who used total ordering of the tones. In America, prominent composers include Philip Glass, and John Cage, who started rejecting the basic notions of music like notation, repetition, duration, and performance, as well as other like George Rochberg, who used twelve-tone serialism (Botstein 2013). Between the 1940s and 1950s, advancements in technology spurred the emergence of electronic music, where composers, such as Pierre Schaeffer started using repetitive textures and tape loops, which led to the emergence of minimalism. Live electronic music was invented where live electronic sounds were performed. Examples include John Cage's “Cartridge Music” and Gérard Grisey’s “Spectral music.” In the later parts of the century, elements of chance were introduced into music, especially by Cage, who wrote complete works to perform random action. Divergence between American and European music deepened during the Pre-War and Post-War period due to intensifying spirit of nationalism. This was different from the early twentieth century (Attinello 2007). In fact, nationalism became a significant expressive means between 1930s and 1950s. In the United States, American vernacular started to be integrated into the classical music. Examples of composers included folk music by Vaughan Williams and his works called “Five Variants of Dives and Lazarus,” and Gershwin and Leonard Bernstein with the American jazz music (Botstein 2013). In the post-war period, many composers turned to the past for inspiration and worked on compositions that drew elements from structure, harmony, melody and forms. The type of music was dubbed neoclassicism. Prominent Western composers included Paul Hindemith (Symphony: Mathis der Maler) and Sergei Prokofiev (Classical Symphony). In the later part of the twentieth century, composers like John Adams and Steve Reich started experimenting with minimalism that often featured iteration and repetition. Example includes Steve Reich's 1967 works called “Piano Phase” that used the method of ‘phasing in,’ where a phrase used by one player maintains a constant pace, which is played concurrently by another although at a slightly faster pace. According to Gioia (1997), minimalism was facilitated by serialism and indeterminism. This was different from the twelve-tone technique used in the earlier part of the century by Arnold Schoenberg in 1921 in his works “The Wind Quintet.” The emergence of recording technology facilitated the use of varied forms of sound for potential application during performance in the 1950s in America, Japan, and Europe. They depended on transmission through loud speakers. In 1957, use of computers in music generation started (Cerchiari et al 2012). The shift towards the use of computer technology intensified from1975 to1990, overtaking analogue synthesisers and accomplishing the traditional functions of scoring and compositions, as well as sound processing and sound synthesis, audio input sampling and optimal control of the external equipment. Towards the end of the century and into the 21st century, video game music and film music gained popularity, with examples of sound tracks, such as Harry Porter, Star Wars, and Lord of the Rings, which made their mark on classical music (Classic FM 2013). Conclusion In the European and American classical music, the 20th century witnessed immense change and development that reflected the political unrests during the pre-war period, in addition to the explosion of the mass-media and the deepening of intercultural integration during the post-war. The Post-War period saw increased freedom of expression and eclecticism in contrast to the lack of flexibility and aesthetic limitations that characterised the early 20th century. In fact, it became the hallmark of musical composition during the Post-War period. Among the remarkable shifts in the Pre-War period included the integrated of ethnic music from various countries. For instance, Gershwin’s compositions played a significant role in bridging the gap between jazz and classical styles of music. His works “Rhapsody in Blue” managed to straddle the classical/popular divide to become one of the most popular orchestral works of the 20th century. The fact that his compositions embodied growing cultures from multiethnic society, mainly the African and European characteristics, facilitated the process of bridging the gap between elements of African music in Jazz and elements of European music in orchestral styles. Reference List Attinello, P 2007, "Postmodern or Modern: A Different Approach to Darmstadt," Contemporary Music Review vol 26 no 1, pp.25-37 Benzon, W 1997, Music Making History: Africa Meets Europe in the United States of the Blues, Carolina Academic Press, Carolina Botstein, L 2013, "Musical Expression and the Challenge of Twentieth Century History," American Symphony Orchestra, viewed 23 Mar 2015, Cerchiari, L, Cugny, L & Kerschbaumer, F 2012, Eurojazzland: Jazz and European Sources, Dynamics, and Contexts, UPNE, New England Classic FM 2013, 20th Century Timeline, viewed 24 Mar 2015, Classical Notes 2013, George Gershwin Concerto F, viewed 23 Mar 2015, Fowler, A 2014, Reconsidering George Gershwin and an American in Paris as an Extension Of The Romantic Tradition, Missouri Western State University, Missouri Gioia, T 1997, The History of Jazz, Oxford University Press, Oxford MFiles 2014, Classical Music Periods, viewed 23 Mar 2015, Washburne, C & Derno, M 2013, Bad Music: The Music We Love to Hate, Routledge, New York Williams, A 2013, Music in Germany since 1968, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge Read More