|
Danse Macabre (Saint-Saëns)
''Danse macabre'', Op. 40, is a symphonic poem for orchestra, written in 1874 by the French composer Camille Saint-Saëns. It premiered 24 January 1875. It is in the key of G minor. It started out in 1872 as an art song for voice and piano with a French text by the poet Henri Cazalis. In 1874, the composer expanded and reworked the piece into a symphonic poem, replacing the vocal line with a solo violin part. Analysis According to legend, Death appears at midnight every year on Halloween. Death calls forth the dead from their graves to dance for him while he plays his fiddle (here represented by a solo violin). His skeletons dance for him until the cockerel crows at dawn, when they must return to their graves until the next year. The piece opens with a harp playing a single note, D, twelve times (the twelve strokes of midnight) which is accompanied by soft chords from the string section. The solo violin enters playing the tritone, which was known as the '' diabolus in mu ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Opus Number
In music, the opus number is the "work number" that is assigned to a musical composition, or to a set of compositions, to indicate the chronological order of the composer's publication of that work. Opus numbers are used to distinguish among compositions with similar titles; the word is abbreviated as "Op." for a single work, or "Opp." when referring to more than one work. Opus numbers do not necessarily indicate chronological order of composition. For example, posthumous publications of a composer's juvenilia are often numbered after other works, even though they may be some of the composer's first completed works. To indicate the specific place of a given work within a music catalogue, the opus number is paired with a cardinal number; for example, Beethoven's Piano Sonata No. 14 in C-sharp minor (1801, nicknamed ''Moonlight Sonata'') is "Opus 27, No. 2", whose work-number identifies it as a companion piece to "Opus 27, No. 1" ( Piano Sonata No. 13 in E-flat major, 1800 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
IMSLP
The International Music Score Library Project (IMSLP), also known as the Petrucci Music Library after publisher Ottaviano Petrucci, is a subscription-based digital library of public domain, public-domain sheet music, music scores. The project uses MediaWiki software, and has uploaded more than 736,000 scores and 80,700 recordings by 1,900 performers of more than 226,000 works by 27,400 composers. IMSLP has both an App Store (Apple), iOS app and an Android (operating system)#Applications, Android app. History Overview The site was launched on February 16, 2006. The library consists mainly of image scanner, scans of old musical editions out of copyright. In addition, it admits scores by contemporary composers who wish to share their music with the world by releasing it under a Creative Commons license. One of the main projects of the IMSLP was the sorting and uploading of the complete works of Johann Sebastian Bach in the Bach Gesellschaft, Bach-Gesellschaft Ausgabe (1851–99), a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Piccolo
The piccolo ( ; ) is a smaller version of the western concert flute and a member of the woodwind family of musical instruments. Sometimes referred to as a "baby flute" or piccolo flute, the modern piccolo has the same type of fingerings as the standard transverse flute, but the sound it produces is an octave higher. This has given rise to the name ottavino (), by which the instrument is called in Italian and thus also in scores of Italian composers. Piccolos are often orchestrated to double the violins or the flutes, adding sparkle and brilliance to the overall sound because of the aforementioned one-octave transposition upwards. The piccolo is a standard member in orchestras, marching bands, and wind ensembles. History Since the Middle Ages, evidence indicates the use of octave transverse flutes as military instruments, as their penetrating sound was audible above battles. In cultured music, however, the first piccolos were used in some of Jean Philippe Rameau's works i ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
String Section
The string section of an orchestra is composed of bowed instruments belonging to the violin family. It normally consists of first and second violins, violas, cellos, and double basses. It is the most numerous group in the standard orchestra. In discussions of the Orchestration, instrumentation of a musical work, the phrase "the strings" or "and strings" is used to indicate a string section as just defined. An orchestra consisting solely of a string section is called a string orchestra. Smaller string sections are sometimes used in jazz, pop, and rock music and in the pit orchestras of musical theatre. Seating arrangement The most common seating arrangement in the 2000s is with first violins, second violins, violas, and cello sections arrayed clockwise around the Conductor (music), conductor, with basses behind the cellos on the right. The first violins are led by the concertmaster (leader in the UK); each of the other string sections also has a principal player (principal secon ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Obbligato
In Western classical music, ''obbligato'' (, also spelled ''obligato'') usually describes a musical line that is in some way indispensable in performance. Its opposite is the marking '' ad libitum''. It can also be used, more specifically, to indicate that a passage of music was to be played exactly as written, or only by the specified instrument, without changes or omissions. The word is borrowed from Italian (an adjective meaning ''mandatory''; from Latin ''obligatus'' p.p. of '' obligare'', to oblige); the spelling ''obligato'' is not acceptable in British English, but it is often used as an alternative spelling in the US. The word can stand on its own, in English, as a noun, or appear as a modifier in a noun phrase (e.g. ''organ obbligato''). The term has also come to refer to a countermelody. Independence ''Obbligato'' includes the idea of independence, as in C. P. E. Bach's 1780 Symphonies (with twelve ''obbligato'' parts) by which Bach was referring to the independent w ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Carnival Of The Animals
''The Carnival of the Animals'' () is a humorous musical suite of 14 movements, including " The Swan", by the French composer Camille Saint-Saëns. About 25 minutes in duration, it was written for private performance by two pianos and chamber ensemble; Saint-Saëns prohibited public performance of the work during his lifetime, feeling that its frivolity would damage his standing as a serious composer. The suite was published in 1922, the year after his death. A public performance in the same year was greeted with enthusiasm, and it has remained among his most popular. It is less frequently performed with a full orchestral complement of strings. History Following a disastrous concert tour of Germany in 1885–86, Saint-Saëns withdrew to a small Austrian village, where he composed ''The Carnival of the Animals'' in February 1886. From the beginning he regarded the work as a piece of fun. On 9 February 1886 he wrote to his publishers Durand in Paris that he was composing a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Motif (music)
In music, a motif () or motive is a short musical idea, a Salience (neuroscience), salient recurring Figure (music), figure, musical fragment or succession of notes that has some special importance in or is characteristic of a musical composition, composition. The motif is the smallest structural unit possessing theme (music), thematic identity. History The defines a motif as a "melodic, rhythmic, or harmonic cell (music), cell", whereas the 1958 maintains that it may contain one or more cells, though it remains the smallest analyzable element or phrase within a subject (music), subject. It is commonly regarded as the shortest subdivision of a Theme (music), theme or Phrase (music), phrase that still maintains its identity as a musical idea. "The smallest structural unit possessing thematic identity". The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, Grove and Éditions Larousse, Larousse also agree that the motif may have harmonic, melodic and/or rhythmic aspects, Grove a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Xylophone
The xylophone (; ) is a musical instrument in the percussion family that consists of wooden bars struck by mallets. Each bar is an idiophone tuned to a pitch of a musical scale, whether pentatonic or heptatonic in the case of many African and Asian instruments, diatonic in many western children's instruments, or chromatic for orchestral use. The term ''xylophone'' may be used generally, to include all such instruments such as the marimba, balafon and even the semantron. However, in the orchestra, the term ''xylophone'' refers specifically to a chromatic instrument of somewhat higher pitch range and drier timbre than the marimba, and these two instruments should not be confused. A person who plays the xylophone is known as a ''xylophonist'' or simply a ''xylophone player''. The term is also popularly used to refer to similar instruments of the lithophone and metallophone types. For example, the Pixiphone and many similar toys described by the makers as xylophones have b ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Oboe
The oboe ( ) is a type of double-reed woodwind instrument. Oboes are usually made of wood, but may also be made of synthetic materials, such as plastic, resin, or hybrid composites. The most common type of oboe, the soprano oboe pitched in C, measures roughly long and has metal Key (instrument), keys, a conical Bore (wind instruments), bore and a flared bell. Sound is produced by blowing into the Reed (instrument), reed at a sufficient air pressure, causing it to vibrate with the air column. The distinctive tone is versatile and has been described as "bright". When the word ''oboe'' is used alone, it is generally taken to mean the soprano member rather than other instruments of the family, such as the bass oboe, the cor anglais (English horn), or oboe d'amore. Today, the oboe is commonly used as orchestral or solo instrument in Orchestra, symphony orchestras, concert bands and chamber music, chamber ensembles. The oboe is especially used in classical music, film music, some ge ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cockerel
The chicken (''Gallus gallus domesticus'') is a domesticated subspecies of the red junglefowl (''Gallus gallus''), originally native to Southeast Asia. It was first domesticated around 8,000 years ago and is now one of the most common and widespread domesticated animals in the world. Chickens are primarily kept for their meat and eggs, though they are also kept as pets. As of 2023, the global chicken population exceeds 26.5 billion, with more than 50 billion birds produced annually for consumption. Specialized breeds such as broilers and laying hens have been developed for meat and egg production, respectively. A hen bred for laying can produce over 300 eggs per year. Chickens are social animals with complex vocalizations and behaviors, and feature prominently in folklore, religion, and literature across many societies. Their economic importance makes them a central component of global animal husbandry and agriculture. Nomenclature Terms for chickens include: * ''Bid ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Coda (music)
In music, a coda (; ; plural ) is a passage (music), passage that brings a piece (or a movement (music), movement) to an end. It may be as simple as a few bar (music), measures, or as complex as an entire section (music), section. In classical music The presence of a coda as a structural element in a movement is especially clear in works written in particular musical forms. Codas were commonly used in both sonata form and Variation (music), variation movements during the Classical era. In a sonata form movement, the recapitulation (music), recapitulation section will, in general, follow the exposition (music), exposition in its thematic content, while adhering to the home key (music), key. The recapitulation often ends with a passage that sounds like a termination, paralleling the music that ended the exposition; thus, any music coming after this termination will be perceived as extra material, i.e., as a coda. In works in variation form, the coda occurs following the last va ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Requiem
A Requiem (Latin: ''rest'') or Requiem Mass, also known as Mass for the dead () or Mass of the dead (), is a Mass of the Catholic Church offered for the repose of the souls of the deceased, using a particular form of the Roman Missal. It is usually celebrated in the context of a funeral (where in some countries it is often called a Funeral Mass). Musical settings of the propers of the Requiem Mass are also called Requiems, and the term has subsequently been applied to other musical compositions associated with death, dying, and mourning, even when they lack religious or liturgical relevance. The term is also used for similar ceremonies outside the Catholic Church, especially in Western Rite Orthodox Christianity, the Anglo-Catholic tradition of Anglicanism, and in certain Lutheran churches. A comparable service, with a wholly different ritual form and texts, exists in the Eastern Orthodox and Eastern Catholic churches as well as some Methodist churches. The Mass and i ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
