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1. elegant, lyrical melodies
a. symmetrical four– bar phrases, clear– cut
cadences
b. clarity: repetition, sequence; balanced structure
2. diatonic harmonies; homophonic texture
3. basic meters, steady tempos
4. frequent use of folk and popu lar ele ments
5. Romantic ele ments in later music
III. The Patronage System
A. Sponsorship of aristocracy
1. arts viewed as necessary adornment of life
2. music part of elaborate lifestyle
3. palace: center of musical life
4. steady demand for new works
5. economic security and social framework for
composers
B. Opportunities for Women
1. Italy, France: prominence in opera and court
ballets
2. court instrumentalists, music teachers
3. per for mances at home, aristocratic salons, and at
court
C. Keyboard players associated with Mozart
1. Maria Anna Mozart (Nannerl) (1751–1829):
Mozart’s sister, toured extensively with Mozart
2. Maria Theresa von Paradis (1759–1824): friend
of Mozart, blind composer, toured Eu rope
IV. Per for mance Matters
A. From palace to concert hall
1. rise of the public concert; new per for mance venues
2. Haydn, Mozart, and Beethoven: conducted and
performed their own works
3. audiences eager for new music
4. connection between composer– genius and recep-
tive listener
OUTLINE
I. Classicism and Enlightenment Culture (c. 1750–1825)
A. Rule of strong aristocratic sovereigns; hereditary right
1. Louis XV: Versailles
2. Frederick the Great: Prus sia
3. Maria Theresa: Austria
4. Catherine the Great: Rus sia
B. Industrial Revolution: new economic power
1. significant advances in science, impor tant
inventions
2. intellectual life, first publication of encyclopedias
C. Age of Reason/Enlightenment
1. social and po liti cal issues: reason and science
2. phi los o phers: advocates for rising middle class
3. revolutionary upheavals, end of the century
D. Ancient Greeks and Romans idealized
1. architecture, fine arts: classical revival
2. values of order and reason
3. revered unity and proportions
4. clarity and regularity of structure, “natu ral
simplicity”
E. 1760s Emerging Romantic view
1. Jean- Jacques Rousseau, French phi los o pher,
“ father of Romanticism”
2. Sturm und Drang, literary movement in
Germany: Goethe, Schiller
II. Classicism in Music
A. Characterized by music of Haydn, Mozart,
Beethoven, and Schubert
1. age of musical experimentation
a. explore major– minor system
b. perfect large– scale instrumental form (sonata
form)
B. Ele ments of Classical style
PRELUDE 4 Music as Order and Logic
112 | Prelude 4
Bach), Frederick the Great composed several sonatas
for flute, as well as symphonies and concertos, and
exemplifies the active role that enlightened aristocratic
and po liti cal leaders played in cultivating music during
the Classical period.
ASSIGNMENT SUGGESTIONS
1. Compare Bach’s Contrapunctus I from The Art of Fugue
with the first movement of Mozart’s Eine kleine Nacht–
musik. What are the stylistic differences between these
pieces? How do they reflect their respective identities as
Baroque or Classical music?
2. “ Music [is] the favorite passion of my soul.”
This quote from Thomas Jefferson, which begins this
Prologue (p.164), emphasizes the importance of music
TEACHING CHALLENGES
The Prelude to Part 4 discusses ancient Greek culture, which
was revived in the eigh teenth century as it was in the Re nais-
sance (Part 2). To keep students from conflating these two
revivals of Greek and Roman culture, discuss the differing
impressions that antiquity made on the “enlightened” eigh-
teenth century and the “humanized” sixteenth century.
SUPPLEMENTAL REPERTORY
SUPPLEMENTAL BIBLIOGRAPHY
Downs, PhilipG. Classical Music: The Era of Haydn, Mozart,
OVERVIEW
The Prelude to Part 4 elaborates on the place of music within
the culture of Classicism and the Enlightenment during the
late eigh teenth and early nineteenth centuries. Classical era
music is noted for its melodic lyricism, clear tonal language,
and preference for regular patterns of form and phrasing.
Classical music is also discussed within the context of the
patronage system, the rise of middle- class women perform-
ers, and the shifting sites of musical per for mance from aris-
tocratic palaces to public concert halls.
LEARNING OBJECTIVES
1. To understand the later eigh teenth and early nineteenth
centuries as an age that embraced the Classical sensibility
and Enlightenment values
LECTURE SUGGESTIONS
1. After reviewing the style and aesthetic sensibilities of
Classical art and architecture, compare the images of
the Parthenon in Athens, the Pantheon in Rome, and
Jefferson’s Rotunda at the University of Virginia cam-
pus. (The Pantheon was the inspiration for Jefferson’s
design of the Rotunda.) Compare these structures with
the palace at Versailles, introduced in the Prelude to
eighteenth- century musical Classicism as discussed in
the Prelude to Part 4 (elegant, lyrical melody; clear
tonal language; symmetry of phrases; steady tempo in