Musical styles of the 20th century Art music

1.EXPRESSIONISM
The term expressionism “was probably first applied to music in 1918, especially to Schoenberg,”
because like the painter Kandinsky he avoided “traditional forms of beauty” to convey powerful feelings
in his music. Arnold Schoenberg, Anton Webern and Alban Berg, the members of the Second Viennese
School, are important Expressionists (Schoenberg was also an Expressionist painter). Other composers
that have been associated with expressionism are Krenek (the Second Symphony), Paul Hindemith (The
Young Maiden), Igor Stravinsky (Japanese Songs), Alexander Scriabin (late piano sonatas) (Adorno 2009,
275). Another significant expressionist was Béla Bartók in early works, written in the second decade of
the 20th-century, such as Bluebeard’s Castle (1911), The Wooden Prince (1917), and The Miraculous
Mandarin (1919). Important precursors of expressionism are Richard Wagner (1813–83), Gustav Mahler
(1860–1911), and Richard Strauss (1864–1949

Expressionism is a term applied to an artistic style that depicts the expression of individual subjective
experience, as opposed to objective reality. Expressionist artists use their art to convey feelings and
emotion rather than physical reality. These feelings can be derived from nature, society, or aesthetics.

Expressionism in music is a term for composition and performance that emphasizes the expression of
strong feelings. Though expressionism was first defined as an artistic movement, it has since been
applied to other branches of the arts. The word expressionist is sometimes used as a synonym for
“modern artist” or composer.

Why Was Expressionistic Music Developed

Expressionistic music was developed by a group of composers who wanted to make their compositional
style different from the traditional music of the time. It was also developed in response to the
modernism movement.

The music focused on creating pieces that captured the composer’s imagination and emotions. This
differentiated it from other styles of music, such as baroque, classical, and romantic, in which

representative imitation and the recreation of reality were very impo rtant.
Style of Expressionism
Expressionism music has an expressionistic style, that is, an expression of subjective feeling, expression
of alienation, and expression of anxiety.

Artists use expressionistic techniques to emphasize the expressionist movement in art. The most
common expressionist techniques are dissonant harmony caused by a clash between two different
pitches (dissonant harmony), expressionist decorations on melody, expressionist tone painting, and
expressionist decorations.

Expressionism Art Movement

Expressionism is a movement that was developed as a reaction against the academic rules of
composition of the Romantic Period, which are based on mechanical repetition, the development of
musical forms by following strict rules, and the expression of feelings through music.It is difficult to
describe the expressionist movement since it has many similarities with other movements, such as
Impressionism, Symbolism, and Futurism.

Expressionists wanted to express their own individuality, but they also had their own style of expression,
which are generally based on an expressionist technique called the synthesis of several expressionist
techniques

1. Distortion of sounds and melodies expresses the subjective feelings of expressionists in music. When
you listen to expressionist music with distortions or atonal harmony, it seems that your mind is trying to
understand with difficulty what is happening – this gives an expressionist piece emotion and suggests
anxiety.

2. Harshness and bitterness show expressionist music as expressions of criticism, discontent, and social
alienation.

3. Irrationalism expresses expressionist feeling by giving the listener a sense that an expressionist piece
is not organized or planned like other styles such as classical or impressionistic music. Irrationalism in
expressionist music shows you unpredictable endings and a lack of emotional balance.

These techniques cause expressionist music to have negative emotions, expression of anxiety, and
alienation.

Importance of Expressionism in Music

Expressionism was an important phase in the history of music for two reasons:

1. It challenged people’s thinking about music and art because it made people think that art does not
have to be composed in a conventional style.

2.Expressionism forced composers to look for new methods of music composition. This made them
create their own original style of music instead of using other people’s ideas, which made it possible for
them to develop their own individual sound that is different from the rest of the composers.

3. Expressionism was significant for music because it made people think about how they were listening
to music and what they thought about it. This encouraged creativity and uniqueness in music
composition, which is why many composers today use this style of music.
Composers of Expressionism
Major figures. The three central figures of musical expressionism are Arnold Schoenberg (1874–1951)
and his pupils, Anton Webern (1883–1945) and Alban Berg (1885–1935), the so-called Second Viennese
School.

IMPRESSIONISM
A Brief History of Impressionist Music
The impressionist era began around the late 1800s. During this time, Maurice Ravel (born 1875) was a
music student at the Paris Conservatoire and Claude Debussy (born 1862) was embarking on a career as
a professional composer.The impressionist movement in classical music arose from the late Romantic
era and focused on emotion, mood, and symbolism.

In the world of classical music, impressionism refers to a style that explores mood and atmosphere
through the use of timbre, orchestration, and progressive harmonic concepts. Impressionism spawned
from the late Romantic music of the late nineteenth century and early twentieth century. It is most
commonly associated with French composers Claude Debussy and Maurice Ravel, although neither used
the term to describe their own work.

Debussy, who notably despised the term "impressionism," was the first to shock audiences with his 1894
symphonic poem Prélude à l'après-midi d'un faune (Prelude to the afternoon of a faun). The short piece
used multiple motifs, in the style of tone poems by Berlioz and leitmotifs by Richard Wagner. Debussy
also made notable use of chromatic scales, another technique he admired in Wagner's music. This
chromaticism, along with whole tone scales and unusual timbres, helped set Debussy's prelude apart
from other music at the time. Debussy’s other prominent orchestral pieces, such as La mer (1905),
eschewed the standard symphony format that was still being practiced by contemporaries like Gustav
Mahler and Ralph Vaughan Williams.

Maurice Ravel was more faithful to classical forms than Debussy, but he was nonetheless considered too
radical for the conservatively minded Paris Conservatoire. Ravel originally made his name via piano
music, including Pavane pour une infante défunte in 1899 and Gaspard de la nuit in 1908, and his 1905
string quartet. He is best known to classical audiences, however, for his orchestral work including Boléro
(1928) and his orchestral adaptation of Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition (1922).

Impressionist music does have some ties to impressionistic visual art. Both movements were centered in
France, and emphasized perspective and emotion over traditional forms. Where impressionist painters
like Claude Monet, Eduard Manet, Pierre-Auguste Renoir, and Edgar Degas used broad brush strokes
and hazy perspective to convey emotion, impressionist composers like Debussy, Ravel, Ottorino
Respighi, and Erik Satie used whole tone scales, pentatonic scales, and parallel motion to emphasize
atmosphere and musical symbolism. Ultimately, however, both visual and musical impressionism were
more the notions of critics than the actual artists

3 Characteristics of Impressionist Music

Impressionist music is known for multiple characteristics, including:

1. Rejection of traditional structure: Impressionist composers spent little time mimicking the structural
forms laid out by titans like Mozart, Beethoven, and Brahms. Debussy in particular focused on interplay
between motifs and short vignettes. Ravel showed comparatively greater reverence for formalism, as
did his student Ralph Vaughan Williams. Still, none of these composers rigidly adhered to traditional
forms.

2. Progressive harmony: Impressionistic music makes use of chromatic scales, pentatonic scales, whole
tone scales, and brief flourishes of atonality. These techniques were not completely radical; there was
nineteenth century precedent from composers like Chopin, Liszt, and, most of all, Wagner. Still, the full
scale embrace of such harmonic concepts was considered a bold step forward.

3. Emphasis on atmosphere and mood: Impressionist composers are known for experimenting with the
textural and timbral potential of orchestral instruments, with the purpose of creating emotive moods
and atmospheres. Some impressionist pieces are tone poems that tell narratives, but others simply
evoke general emotion.

One of the most important tools of musical Impressionism was the tensionless harmony. The dissonance
of chords was not resolved, but was used as timbre. These chords were often shifted parallel. In the
melodic field the whole tone scale, the pentatonic and church tonal turns were used. The melodics were
characterized by their circular melodic movements. The timbre became the stylistic device of
Impressionism instead of concise themes or other traditional forms.

NEOCLASSICISM
Neoclassicism in music was a twentieth-century trend, particularly current in the interwar period, in
which composers sought to return to aesthetic precepts associated with the broadly defined concept of
"classicism", namely order, balance, clarity, economy, and emotional restraint. As such, neoclassicism
was a reaction against the unrestrained emotionalism and perceived formlessness of late Romanticism,
as well as a "call to order" after the experimental ferment of the first two decades of the twentieth
century. The neoclassical impulse found its expression in such features as the use of pared-down
performing forces, an emphasis on rhythm and on contrapuntal texture, an updated or expanded tonal
harmony, and a concentration on absolute music as opposed to Romantic program music.In form and
thematic technique, neoclassical music often drew inspiration from music of the eighteenth century,
though the inspiring canon belonged as frequently to the Baroque and even earlier periods as to the
Classical period—for this reason, music which draws inspiration specifically from the Baroque is
sometimes termed neo-Baroque music. Neoclassicism had two distinct national lines of development,
French (proceeding partly from the influence of Erik Satie and represented by Igor Stravinsky, who was
in fact Russian-born) and German (proceeding from the "New Objectivity" of Ferruccio Busoni, who was
actually Italian, and represented by Paul Hindemith). Neoclassicism was an aesthetic trend rather than
an organized movement; even many composers not usually thought of as "neoclassicists" absorbed
elements of the style.

Within the broad movement of new-age music, neoclassical new-age music is influenced by and
sometimes also based upon baroque or classical music, especially in terms of melody and composition.
The artist may offer a modern arrangement of a work by an established composer or combine elements
from classical styles with modern element to produce original compositions. Many artists within this
subgenre are classically trained musicians. Although there is a wide variety of individual styles,
neoclassical new-age music is generally melodic, harmonic, and instrumental, using both traditional
musical instruments as well as electronic instruments

Characteristics of Neoclassicism
Neoclassical new-age music takes a lot of its inspiration from baroque/classical music for its style. Music
of this genre is primarily instrumental and heavily takes elements from classical music while drawing on
religious traditions from around the world to give it more of a "mystical" vibe to the music.

Neoclassical new-age music has also been characterized by its smooth and romantic
sound.Characteristic features include balance, objectivity, economy, and clarity. In spite of its obvious
intent of classical parody, with frequent musical quotation, Neo-classic music still sounds fresh and new,
never relying on exact mimicry of older styles. Neo-classicism was once considered the pre-eminent
20th century style (prior to 1950), and there were many composers who wrote music under its
influence. A related style, Neo-romanticism, likewise follows this model of "re-visiting" older musical
styles.

Composers of Neoclassicism
Neoclassical new-age music composer Chris Field has created neoclassical music for many movie trailers
for years.Some of these movie trailers including The Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter and the Philosophers
Stone, and Alice in Wonderland. Fields has also won the best neoclassical album of 2006 for his album
Sub-Conscious.

Mannheim Steamroller is a neoclassical band that has been very successful. They have sold over 41
million albums and produced a Christmas album that went on to sell 5 million copies. Mannheim
Steamroller has received 19 gold, 8 platinum and 4 multi-platinum from the RIAA.

SERIALISM: In music, serialism is a method of composition using series of pitches, rhythms,

dynamics, timbres or other musical elements. Serialism began primarily with Arnold Schoenberg's
twelve-tone technique, though some of his contemporaries were also working to establish serialism as a
form of post-tonal thinking. Twelve-tone technique orders the twelve notes of the chromatic scale,
forming a row or series and providing a unifying basis for a composition's melody, harmony, structural
progressions, and variations. Other types of serialism also work with sets, collections of objects, but not
necessarily with fixed-order series, and extend the technique to other musical dimensions (often called
"parameters"), such as duration, dynamics, and timbre.

serialism, in music, technique that has been used in some musical compositions roughly since World
War I. Strictly speaking, a serial pattern in music is merely one that repeats over and over for a
significant stretch of a composition. In this sense, some medieval composers wrote serial music, because
they made use of isorhythm, which is a distinct rhythmic pattern that repeats many times regardless of
what melodies it belongs to. Another pre-20th-century example of serialism is the ground bass, a
pattern of harmonies or of melody that repeats, most often in the lower vocal or instrumental parts of a
composition. Countless numbers of composers have written music with a ground bass. The term serial
music is often used interchangeably with 12-tone music

Some Serialism Composers

Composers such as Arnold Schoenberg, Anton Webern, Alban Berg, Karlheinz Stockhausen, Pierre
Boulez, Luigi Nono, Milton Babbitt, Elisabeth Lutyens, Henri Pousseur, Charles Wuorinen and Jean
Barraqué used serial techniques

MODERNISM
In music, modernism is an aesthetic stance underlying the period of change and development in musical
language that occurred around the turn of the 20th century, a period of diverse reactions in challenging
and reinterpreting older categories of music, innovations that led to new ways of organizing and
approaching harmonic, melodic, sonic, and rhythmic aspects of music, and changes in aesthetic
worldviews in close relation to the larger identifiable period of modernism in the arts of the time. The
operative word most associated with it is "innovation" Its leading feature is a "linguistic plurality", which
is to say that no one music genre ever assumed a dominant position.

According to Edward Campbell Inherent within musical modernism is the conviction that music is not a
static phenomenon defined by timeless truths and classical principles, but rather something which is
intrinsically historical and developmental. While belief in musical progress or in the principle of
innovation is not new or unique to modernism, such values are particularly important within modernist
aesthetic stances.

Some Composers of modernism

Alban Berg (1885–1935)

Ernst Krenek (1900–1991)

Gustav Mahler (1860–1911)

Arnold Schoenberg (1874–1951)

Anton Webern (1883–1945)

Alexander Zemlinsky (1871–1942)

Karel Goeyvaerts (1923–1993)

Erik Bergman (1911–2006)

Aarre Merikanto (1893–1958)

Claude Debussy (1862–1918)

André Jolivet (1905–1974)

Charles Koechlin (1867–1950)

Olivier Messiaen (1908–1992)

Darius Milhaud (1892–1974)

Francis Poulenc (1899–1963)

Maurice Ravel (1875–1937)

Erik Satie (1866–1925)

Edgard Varèse (1883–1965)