General Approach to Musical Periods

period: Medieval
The Medieval Period, or Middle Ages (from the Latin
medium aevum), is a commonly used expression referring to
the vast period between the fall of the Roman Empire (c.476)
and the beginning of the Renaissance in the early 15th
century. It is perhaps the most misunderstood era of
European history among the general public, partly due to the
widely used term "Dark Ages" to which it is often equated.
While it is true that many aspects of classical education and civic society were lost or
compromised in the chaotic years following the fall of Rome, the era as a whole witnessed
dramatic achievements in politics, science, and the arts that continue to shape our world
today. As urban society crumbled, learning and unity were initially fostered by the Church,
and indeed the Early Middle Ages (6th-11th c.) is appropriately called the Age of Faith. The
dominant musical impulse, therefore, was to compose music that complimented the rituals of
the Catholic Church, giving rise to a huge body of Gregorian chant - monophonic (singlevoiced) settings of liturgical and related texts associated with Christian worship; these years
also saw the gradual creation of a system of musical notation, whereby this huge repertoire
could be widely disseminated. The advent of vocal polyphony (two or more voices in
counterpoint) arose only in the so-called High Middle Ages (12th-13th c.), and is particularly
associated with the great Cathedral of Notre Dame in Paris. The music composed at Notre
Dame, by such early masters as Lonin and Protin, included organum, conductus, and the
motet, which soon became the dominant genre of the era. By the early 13th century, secular
texts, particularly those associated with Courtly Love, began to stand aside purely religious
ones - both in polyphony and in the monophonic songs of the Troubadours and Trouvres.
Instrumental or dance music, too, increased in popularity at this time, though maintained a
decidedly secondary status compared to vocal music. The Late Middle Ages (14th c.) saw the
rise of the first towering figures of Western music, most especially Guillaume de Machaut,
who composed elaborate religious motets, secular chansons, and the first setting of a
polyphonic Mass - the Messe de Nostre Dame. As the 14th c. came to a close, however, the
complexities of Late Medieval polyphony (e.g., the so-called "ars subtilior") began to
stimulate a reactive move toward a more simplified approach - and the dawn of a new era, the
Renaissance.
period: Renaissance
"Renaissance" is, of course, the French word for "re-birth",
and refers most literally to the renewed interest among artists
and thinkers of the 15th and 16th centuries in the philosophy
and culture of Ancient Greece and Rome. More broadly it
has come to signify the "re-birth" of human creativity during
this period, an unprecedented flowering of arts, letters, and

science, a golden era of discovery, and the veritable birth of the modern era - the age of
Leonardo, Michelangelo, Erasmus, Copernicus, and Columbus. Though perhaps less wellknown today, the music of the Renaissance is likewise worthy of this same high esteem, as
the greatest composers of the age achieved an artistic success equal to that of their more
famous contemporaries in the visual and literary arts.
Early signs of a Renaissance musical aesthetic appeared in the works of English composers of
the early 15th century, such as John Dunstaple and Lionel Power, where a new emphasis on
simplicity and pleasing consonance (3rds, 6ths) contrasted with the more mannered and
austere style of the Late Middle Ages. Within a short time, composers on the Continent,
especially France, took heed of the new style and expanded it to even greater expressive
heights, most especially Guillaume Dufay and Gilles Binchois in the 1430s-50s. In the
succeeding two generations, a series of top-rank composers emerged, mostly from the region
known as Flanders (Northern France, Southern Belgium): first that of Johannes Ockeghem
and Antoine Busnois in the 1470s and 80s, and then that of Josquin des Prs in the "golden
era" between 1490-1520 - which likewise included such giants as Heinrich Isaac, Loyset
Compre, Jacob Obrecht, among others. Indeed, Josquin must be considered among the
greatest composers of any age for his unrivaled mix of stunning technique and intense
expression; in so doing, Josquin and his contemporaries fulfilled the promise of the new
philosophy of Humanism, though always in consort with the era's deep religious conviction.
The dominant genres of this Early- to High-Renaissance period - all vocal - included the
religious Mass cycle and the motet, as well as the secular or "courtly love" chanson. From the
1530s, however, a new, more literary secular vocal genre took hold of composers and
audiences alike, the madrigal - whose popularity was aided by the fledgling music printing
industry. Outstanding madrigal composers included Jacob Arcadelt and Cypriano de Rore in
its early phase and Orlando de Lassus and Adrian Willaert in its so-called "classical era". This
is to not to suggest that religious genres held a diminished role in the Late Renaissance, as the
top composers - Lassus, Giovanni Pierlugi da Palestrina, Toms Luis de Victoria, and
William Byrd - all wrote substantial amounts of sacred vocal music. As the 16th century wore
on, composers of both sacred and secular music increasingly strove for a commensurate
musical rendering of the extreme, even mannered, emotional content of the texts - and thus
laid the groundwork for the next era, the Baroque.
period: Baroque
The French word baroque means misshapen pearl, which
suggests the generally ornate and stylized approach to works
of art, architecture, and music during these years. This is the
period that saw the birth of opera, as well as the rise of
purely instrumental forms such as the concerto and sonata; it
is also the period in which modern-day harmony (major and
minor keys, modulation, etc.) was developed. Musically, this
was a tremendously dynamic and experimental period, one in
which the expression of human emotion became a primary

goal of musical creation - often subsumed under the phrase "doctrine of affections". Given the
length of the era, it is hard to speak of a single musical thread that runs throughout, with the
possible exception of the thoroughbass or Continuo accompaniment (generally harpsichord
and cello or double bass) that is found in works ranging from the operas of Claudio
Monteverdi to the concertos of J.S. Bach, and it may be easier to divide the Baroque into three
sub-periods: Early (c.1600-1650), in which the chromaticism and instrumental experiments of
the late Renaissance were richly and freely continued; Middle (c.1650-1700), which saw the
rise of such prominent genres as the trio sonata and the da capo Aria; and Late (c.1700-1750),
in which the more familiar genres of the sonata and concerto came into being, and reached
tremendous heights in the works of the 3 masters all born in 1685: J.S. Bach, George Frideric
Handel, and Domenico Scarlatti. The highly stylized and elaborate nature of the musical
discourse in these later years eventually gave rise to a reaction among younger composers,
leading to a new style developing in the 1730s and 40s - and into a new era we call the
Classical period.
period: Classical
The musical designation "classical period" was first coined in
the 1830s to refer especially to the "Viennese School" of
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and Franz Joseph Haydn, but has
since been broadened to subsume the entire period between
the more heavily-ornate Baroque and the more emotionallycharged Romantic eras - roughly 1730 to 1800. While
admittedly simplistic, the term "classical" does suggest the
emphasis on orderly, balanced, and natural musical discourse
that marks this period. It is not unrelated that these years correspond to the Enlightenment and
the rise of democracy, to which the straightforward and often "popular" approach to musical
expression formed a logical counterpart. It is also not surprising that the term "classical" is
commonly used by the lay public to connote all of Western Art music, since for many it is the
accessible musical syntax of the late 18th century that they most associate with the broader
genre.
In reality, however, the period outlined here was quite dynamic, beginning as a fairly nuanced
transition away from the complex approach of contrapuntal composers like J.S. Bach and
George Frideric Handel and toward a simpler, more "melodic" approach favored by
composers of Italian opera in the 1730s - most notably Giovanni Pergolesi. The new style
became known as "galant", suggesting "pleasant" music with clear, periodic melodies and
light accompaniment. The galant aesthetic soon spread beyond Italy, and a new musical era
was underway - with the older, contrapuntal style (e.g., of J.S. Bach) being labeled as
decidedly "old fashioned". By the 1740s and 50s, fresh approaches and techniques were being
devised by composers in various musical centers including Johann Stamitz in Mannheim,
Giovanni Sammartini in Milan, and J.C. Bach in London; new musical genres (or new
approaches to older genres) likewise blossomed during this time, including the symphony, the
string quartet, and the piano concerto - the latter signifying the recent triumph of the piano

over the harpsichord. Another key development, starting in the late 1760s, was the musical
response to the Sturm und Drang ("storm and stress") movement, a literary aesthetic
emphasizing extreme emotion and stunning effects - in instrumental works by C.P.E. Bach
and, most significantly perhaps, in the operatic reforms of Christoph Gluck. It was the varied
richness of these and other developments that the two great figures of the late Classical Era,
Haydn and Mozart, synthesized and perfected in the 1780s and 90s. Rumblings of more
decisive changes came when a young student of Haydn began testing the harmonic and formal
boundaries of the day, in search of a more profound musical expression; his name, of course,
was Ludwig van Beethoven - the pioneer of the next era, the Romantic period.
period: Romantic
The term Romanticism was first applied to trends in
literature in the late-18th century, as an idealized revival of
the Medieval romance, and soon spread to its sister arts,
painting and music. In each of these, the term embraces a
belief in the power of human emotions, and especially in the
vital expression of an artists innermost truths in defiance
of the rule-bound traditions of the preceding age. In music
history, the term generally refers to the period between
Beethovens maturity and the rise of the Modernist trends of the early 20th century; at the
same time, it has become common to draw a division between the (Early) Romantic and Lateor Post-Romantic eras such as is adopted here.
The principal musical trends of the 19th century stem not so much from the introduction of
new musical techniques or systems, but rather from an increased accentuation on those
elements found already in 18th century music newly driven by the Romantic ideals of
subjective expression and organic unity. For example, the chromatic (sophisticated)
harmonies found in the late string quartets of Beethoven, Franz Schubert, or Felix
Mendelssohn follow directly from the harmonic developments of Mozart and Haydn, though
are heightened to a degree beyond what might have occurred without the noted aesthetic
impetus. Similar trends can be seen in the new, sometimes exotic approach to orchestration
heard in the symphonic works of Hector Berlioz and Carl Maria von Weber, with natural
evolution being pushed by philosophical imperatives. Social and cultural trends likewise
made their impact on musical practice in the first half of the 19th century, most notably the
coming of age of the middle class, and the related decline in the nobility; composers now had
to respond more directly to the demands of the public, and less to the whims of a wealthy
patron. Among the notable consequences of this latter trend was the birth of the private
musical salon, and the great works written for them: the piano miniatures of Frdric Chopin
and Robert Schumann, the songs of Schubert and Schumann, etc. Another consequence was a
new fascination with the virtuoso soloist, satisfied by the technical prowess required by the
works of Niccol Paganini and Franz Liszt. Perhaps nowhere was the combination of the
Romantic impulse and market forces more palpable than in early 19th-century opera where
composers such as Weber, Gioacchino Rossini, Vincenzo Bellini, and Gaetano Donizetti

ushered in a new era of opera both artistically and in terms of popularity. By 1850, the
Romantic aesthetic had fully ripened, and composers sought ever more potent ways to infuse
their works with emotion and unity, yielding a new era the so-called Late Romantic period.
period: Late- Post-Romantic
The expressions "Late-Romantic" and "Post-Romantic" are
relatively recent constructs used to delineate the later and/or
"declining" phases of the Romantic period (after 1850),
whose initial and overarching aspects are described on the
Romantic page. By the mid-19th century, the Romantic
impulses of subjective expression and organic unity had
become fully internalized by most composers, leading to
more pronounced applications of both. The ultimate
personification of these Late-Romantic trends is surely Richard Wagner, whose operas and
"Music Dramas" are largely defined by intense emotional expression, elaborate structural
unity, and vast artistic scope - embodied in his term, Gesamskunstwerk (total or integrated
artwork). Even composers who embraced differing conceptions of musical form and
substance, most notably Johannes Brahms, were impelled by the same basic forces, and
sought ever-tighter means to create structural cohesion in their music. As in earlier decades of
the century, the realm of harmony formed a principal means of expanding expressive power;
in the works of Wagner, Brahms, Anton Bruckner, Pyotr Tchaikovsky, Giuseppe Verdi, and
others, the diatonic (simple) harmony of the Classical era was increasingly replaced by a
chromatic (sophisticated) approach, eventually undermining the very integrity of Tonality the harmonic language that had reigned since the late Baroque. Another dynamic trend of the
period was the rise of musical Nationalism, where composers from countries outside the
central nexus of Western music (Germany, Austria, France, Italy, and England) strove to
explore and celebrate the folk traditions of their native lands within an art context - such as
Edvard Grieg (Norway), Antonn Dvork and Bedrich Smetana (Czechoslovakia), Jean
Sibelius (Finland), Mikhail Glinka, Nicolay Rimsky-Korsakov, and Alexander Borodin
(Russia), etc. - which in turned help to expand the overall musical language of the time,
harmonically as well as rhythmically and in orchestration. By the closing decades of the 19th
century, the developments noted above began to stretch to an extreme or "mannered" extend,
as heard in the lengthy symphonies and orchestral works (tone poems, etc.) of Wagner's
"successors", Gustav Mahler and Richard Strauss, as well as in vocal and instrumental works
of other so-called "Post-Romantics", such as Alexander Scriabin, Sergey Rachmaninov,
Giacomo Puccini, and Modest Mussorgsky - leading in many ways to a crisis of sorts, and
thus to the kinds of experiments that defined the coming Impressionist and Modern eras.

period: Impressionist
The term "Impressionist" was first coined in the mid-1870s,
as a critically derisive term, of the light- and color-focused
paintings of a small band of Paris-based artists, the so-called
"Salon des Refuss" (Salon of the Refused) - among them
Manet, Renoir, Degas, and especially Monet, whose
"Impression, soleil levant" inspired the name. The
application of the term to music, from the 1880s, was a rather
predictable extension, though most composers to whom it
was applied renounced its application - most famously
Claude Debussy, who claimed that those critics who apply it
to music are "imbeciles", and that instead he is simply trying
to do "something different."
Their protestations notwithstanding, however, there are indeed aesthetic and technical
corollaries between visual and musical "impressionism" that can be identified empirically.
Most prominent is the notion of "color". In music, the more conventional term is "timbre",
which is defined largely through orchestration, but likewise through harmonic usage, texture,
etc. Creative exploration of musical timbre via orchestration certainly predates the
Impressionist period, but it was especially this generation that opened up timbre as a first-tier
parameter, to be exploited and pursued in its own right. In orchestral works such as Debussy's
La Mer or Maurice Ravel's Daphnis et Chlo, unusual usage or combinations of instruments,
particularly at soft dynamic levels, are a common feature and give the works a distinctly
"coloristic" sound, that would open up new possibilities to later composers. Even in works for
solo piano - such as Debussy's Preludes - new timbres are explored via extremes of register,
as well as by unique and "colorful" approaches to harmony and melody. Indeed, it is in the
realm of harmony that the Impressionist "sound" is most readily identified: via such
techniques as parallel triads, whole-tone scales, blurring of tonal identity, extended or
chromatic chords (9ths, 11ths, 13ths), etc. Another corollary between music and painting can
be discerned in their mutual fascination with certain "impressionist" themes or topics - such as
water, reflection, reverie, etc. More generally, though, artists in both fields were motivated by
a desire to break down old conventions in order to explore new methods and techniques; in
music this meant turning away from the Romantic-Germanic emphasis on traditional largescale forms, thematic unity, and development, in favor of smaller, individual forms and workspecific techniques.
Beyond the giants of the Impressionist period, Debussy and Ravel, other figures associated
with the movement include the French composers Erik Satie and Paul Dukas, the Spaniard
Manuel de Falla, and the American Charles Griffes, as well as - to some degree at least Karol Szymanowski, Ralph Vaughan Williams, Frederick Delius, and Ottavino Resphigi.
Among composers hailed as precursors or inspirations to later Impressionist developments

include especially Modest Mussorgsky, Alexander Scriabin, and Gabriel Faur, as well as
Emmanuel Chabrier and Csar Franck. Further, Impressionist techniques and sonorities had
resurgence among Jazz composers and performers such as Bix Biederbecke, Bill Evans, Gil
Evans, and Duke Ellington. Above all, the Impressionist musical language, techniques, and
aesthetic had a direct and profound influence on the revolutionary Modern period that
followed.
period: Modern
The term modern is admittedly vague, and yet within the
realm of art history it holds a rather specific meaning, as
subsumed under the rubric modernism: applied to the
period roughly 1880 to the end of WW II, the term refers to
the conviction among progressive artists to offer a unique if
not radical form of expression yielding a cutting-edge view
of history, pointing decidedly to the future, and bringing
forth the subjective experience of the artist and of modern
life in general. The roots of the aesthetic go back to earlier 19th c. notions of arts inherent
independence of moral or social standards as discerned in Victor Cousins famous
expression lart pour lart (Art for arts sake) and especially to mid-century claims by
Baudelaire and others regarding the revolutionary or avant-garde obligations of artists to
reject historical models. In music, the roots lie in Richard Wagners notion of music history
and the imperative of art to transcend the past, in opposition of those (e.g., Giacomo
Meyerbeer) who merely conceded to popular taste. In the years after 1900, following leads
established by Gustav Mahler, Richard Strauss, Claude Debussy, and Alexander Skriabin,
among others, composers yielded to the demands of modernity to shatter expectations and
conventions, and instead to reflect the conditions of modern life with its progress in science,
technology, urbanization, and industry.
The first dominant proponents of musical Modernism included especially Igor Stravinsky,
Arnold Schoenberg, and Bla Bartk; despite their differing musical approaches, all three
responded to an imperative to move beyond the established practices of tonality (major and
minor keys, modulation, etc.), rhythmic regularity, use of traditional instruments and
established forms, etc. The often violent response of the audience and critics to this music was
in fact a reinforcing phenomenon to serious composers, who were critical of contemporary
standards of culture and the prevailing addiction to the mere entertaining dimension of music.
Indeed, it was in response to the growing schism between composer and public, especially
after World War I, that many composers turned to private societies or organizations dedicated
to modern music such as Schoenbergs Verein fr Musikalische Privatauffhrungen
(Society for Private Musical Performances, 1918), and similar efforts by Edgard Varse,
Henry Cowell, Aaron Copland, Roger Sessions, and many others. As in painting, poetry, and
other art forms, music flew through a number of short-lived movements Expressionism
(Schoenberg, Alban Berg, Anton Webern), Primitivism (Stravinsky), Folkorism (Bartk, Leo
Janek, Bohuslav Martin,), Neo-Classicism (Stravinsky, Sergey Prokofiev, Darius

Milhaud), etc.
By the mid-1930s, opposition to Modernism came directly from political doctrines as well,
namely in the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany, both of which attacked the modernist trends
as degenerate, subversive, and anti-nationalist leading to official bans. Ironically, the decade
before World War II had witnessed an internal reactionary aesthetic among many composers
throughout Europe and in America (Francis Poulenc, Benjamin Britten, Paul Hindemith,
Copland, etc.) one, however, that would reverse itself markedly following the War,
commencing the so-called Contemporary Period.
period: Contemporary
The expression contemporary music is generic to an
extreme meaning simply music written today, but has
become commonplace to denote art music written since
World War II, or more generally music written by composers
living in our time. Broadly speaking, a division can be made
between the reigning aesthetic before and after around 1970,
although the entire period constitutes perhaps the most eclectic and pluralistic in music
history. From 1945 through the late-1960s, a rejuvenated and rather austere application of
Modernism was instituted under the influence of music theorists such as Adorno, who saw
Arnold Schoenbergs serial or 12-tone technique as the true path toward progress dismissing
as false prophets composers such as Igor Stravinsky and Bla Bartk who maintained some
allegiance to tonality. The young, post-War generation of composers, led by Pierre Boulez,
Karlheinz Stockhausen, Gyrgy Ligeti, Luciano Berio, Elliott Carter, and others, adopted
especially Anton Weberns abstract and pointillist language as a point of departure, and
seemed to relish in the growing schism between composer and public, finding sanctuary in
academia, as well as at modern music festivals at Darmstadt, Cologne, Paris, and elsewhere.
New technology, especially via computers, was readily integrated into the progressive agenda,
spawning the rise of electronic music, by composers such as Edgard Varse, Luigi Nono, and
Milton Babbitt in turn further alienating traditional concert audiences.
From the mid-1970s, an opposing anti- or post-modernist aesthetic began to emerge, where
modernist assumptions were questioned if not rejected. Eccentric thinkers such John Cage
promoted a free approach to composition, with an openness to adopt any technique or
aesthetic, including the possibilities of chance. An unprecedented eclecticism or pluralism
arose among composers in Europe and America where rock, pop, non-Western, modernist,
or historical classical styles could be easily incorporated without claiming any one perspective
as more legitimate than the other. Composers adopting a Minimalist approach such as Philip
Glass, Steve Reich, Terry Riley, and John Adams more directly challenged the modernist
tendencies via a highly diatonic and deliberately repetitive, non-linear approach. A return to
diatonic, accessible music, moreover, was derived not only from a desire to regain connection
with larger audiences, but also as an expression of a new internationalism, spirituality, or
mysticism as in the works of Arvo Prt, Lou Harrison, and Toru Takemitsu.

Multiculturalism, otherness, and progressive views of race, class, and gender, are all
aesthetic options for composers in todays world, as are more traditional approaches of
modernism and the incorporation of historical musical styles. Indeed, this is a truly fascinating
time for composers and audiences alike!