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Excursions (Barber)
''Excursions'', Op. 20, is the first published solo piano piece by Samuel Barber. Barber himself explains: These are ‘Excursions’ in small classical forms into regional American idioms. Their rhythmic characteristics, as well as their source in folk material and their scoring, reminiscent of local instruments are easily recognized.Barber, p. 2 This is typical of neo-Romantic composers such as Barber. As Susan Carter explains in her dissertation, "The Piano Music of Samuel Barber", that “neo-Romantic composers returned to a style characterized by broad lyricism and dramatic expression.” She also states that the traditional structures of form from the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries were conserved while drawing upon a “contemporary technical vocabulary.” From a boogie-woogie style of a five-part rondo to a theme and variations of a well known cowboy ballad, and even to a barn-yard dance with a fiddler, Barber uses each style effectively and accurately, accordi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
Samuel Barber
Samuel Osmond Barber II (March 9, 1910 – January 23, 1981) was an American composer, pianist, conductor (music), conductor, baritone, and music educator, and one of the most celebrated composers of the mid-20th century. Principally influenced by nine years' composition studies with Rosario Scalero at the Curtis Institute and more than 25 years' study with his uncle, the composer Sidney Homer, Barber's music usually eschewed the experimental trends of Modernism (music), musical modernism in favor of traditional 19th-century harmonic language and formal structure embracing lyricism and emotional expression. However, he adopted elements of modernism after 1940 in some of his compositions, such as an increased use of dissonance and chromaticism in the ''Cello Concerto (Barber), Cello Concerto'' (1945) and ''Medea's Dance of Vengeance'' (1955); and the use of tonal ambiguity and a narrow use of serialism in his ''Piano Sonata (Barber), Piano Sonata'' (1949), ''Prayers of Kierkegaard ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
