Meet the composer with Ms. Ko!

J. S. Bach is the best known composer of the Baroque era of music.  He lived in Germany from 1685 to 1750.  If you’re not sure exactly where Germany is, be sure to check out the link to the Composers Map in the right sidebar.

Find out more about Bach’s life by visiting the Composer’s Gallery at the New York Philharmonic Kids website.  Besides looking up his name, you could also find him by his country or his musical style (Baroque).

Click here to read another short biography at the ClassicsforKids website.

Now about EE #89….

A cantata is a kind of piece for voices accompanied by instruments.  Cantatas have many movements (for example: Chorus, Recitative, Aria, Chorale) that are either for the whole choir to sing or just one vocal soloist.  Remember that Bach’s job was as musical director for a church.  Since cantatas were a part of the church service almost every week, Bach wrote over 300 of them over the course of his career.  He also wrote a number of secular cantatas which means that they were played outside of church.

Our band piece is a simplified melody from one of the chorales in Bach’s Cantata #147.  It is a beautiful melody and you may know it by the title, “Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring”.

Here is a video of “Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring” performed on the organ.  You will have to wait a short while until you hear the melody that we have been playing in band.  What part of his body is Norman the organist using to play this tune?

Although he only lived to be 31, Romantic era composer Franz Schubert wrote almost 1,000 compositions!!   He truly lived to compose music.  As a boy, Schubert had a beautiful voice and was part of a choir that still exists and is today called the Vienna’s Boys Choir.  As a composer, he wrote about 600 songs.  HIs other works included many kinds of instrumental pieces.

Here is an excellent article on Schubert, his music and what Vienna was like in his time.

• What are some of the kinds of music that Schubert wrote besides songs?
• What other famous composers lived in Vienna at various points in history?
• What did the Viennese of Schubert’s time do for fun?

Schubert originally wrote Marche Militaire as a four-hand piano duet.  Listen to the original version.  You will hear some sections of music that are not in our arrangement.  Follow along with your Essential Elements book and try to find the measures where our rhythm has been slightly changed from the original version.

Czechoslovakian composer Antonin Dvorak wrote his final and ninth symphony in 1893 while living and teaching in New York.  Both Native American melodies and African American spirituals were important creative influences on Dvorak when he composed this work.

Find out more about Dvorak by reading this short biography from the ClassicsforKids website.

EE #118 is from the second movement of the New World Symphony.  When he composed this music, Dvorak spoke about how he was inspired by the story told in Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s poem called “The Song of Hiawatha”.  The main theme of this movement is played by the English horn which is a member of the oboe family.  Watch this performance of the movement by the Dublin Philharmonic and you will see some great close-ups of the English horn player.

English horns are somewhat rare.  They are not a part of bands like ours and are only called for in orchestral music on an occasional basis.

Find out more about the English horn by taking  a virtual visit to the Instrument Locker Room at the NYPhilKids website.  Look for the English horn in the woodwinds locker.

Finally, just for fun, watch this video of Dvorak’s melody performed on a Native American flute.

The Classical era composer Franz Joseph Haydn lived from 1732 to 1809.  Over his long life, Haydn wrote a total of 104 symphonies!  Even though the symphonies of his day were on a much smaller scale, this is still a very impressive feat.  A symphony usually has four movements and is written for an orchestra.  EE #150 is a theme from the second movement of Haydn’s Symphony #94, nicknamed “Surprise Symphony”.  This music shows us Haydn’s sense of humor.  Look at the music in our band book.  What measure number contains the “surprise”?

Listen to at least the first minute of this audio clip of the Surprise Symphony in its original version.  Can you use your ear to identify at least three of the instruments in this recording?

Now read about Haydn’s life at the ArtsAlive website.

• In what city did Haydn spend most of his life?
• How old was he when he began learning music?
• Can you name two other famous composers who were friends of Haydn?
• Several other Haydn symphonies have nicknames.  Can you give three examples?

The music of Russian composer Peter Illyich Tchaikovsky gives us an excellent example of how folk tunes often found their way into the classical concert hall.  Tchaikovsky used several Russian and Serbian folk melodies in his work March Slav written in 1876.  This piece also includes the Russian National Anthem, “God Save the Tsar”.  Tchaikovsky wrote this entire piece in just five days and, for him, it was a musical expression of his support for a war that was going on at that time in the Balkans.

Tchaikovsky lived from 1840 to 1893 and his music belongs to the Romantic era.  Find out more about what Tchaikovsky was like as a person by reading his biographical article on the ArtsAlive website.

It’s hard to pick the most interesting fact from Beethoven’s story because there are so many of them!  He lived in Germany from 1770 to 1827 during a time of great political and social change in Europe.  In keeping with the mood of the times, music moved away from the elegant restraint of the Classical era and became much more passionate and large in scale.  Beethoven was a pivotal composer in music history because you can hear this transformation taking place in his music over time.  In many ways, his genius defined the new musical era of Romanticism.  Beethoven also suffered probably the greatest tragedy that a musician can face: when he was around 30, he started to go deaf and for the last 15 years of his life, he couldn’t hear anything at all.

Like his music, Beethoven was passionate and larger than life.  It’s well documented that he could also be rude and unpleasant at times!  However, I doubt that Beethoven was ever boring to be around.  He would be my top choice of a composer that I wish I could have met.

The duet in our book is from the second movement of Beethoven’s Seventh Symphony.  It’s a very haunting but beautiful melody.  Listen to this recording of the movement as performed by the Cleveland Orchestra conducted by George Szell.

Opening of Beethoven Symphony #7, mvmt 2

Did you hear how Beethoven starts out incredibly simply and quietly?  But each time he starts the theme again, he adds on another layer so that the music keeps becoming more intense, rich and dramatic.  (Can you tell that this is one of my favorite pieces of music?)

Now read an account of Beethoven’s life and music from the ArtsAlive website.

Or, if you’d rather listen to a podcast about Beethoven’s life, click here for a podcast produced by Classics for Kids.

Beethoven’s nine symphonies were a huge contribution to this genre of music and each one is worth getting to know.  Finish this unit by listening to this second podcast from Classics for Kids on Beethoven’s Symphonies.

Capriccio Italien is our second piece by this famous Russian Romantic composer.  If you missed the website unit for Tchaikovsky’s March Slav (EE #172), please go back and follow the two links to articles about Tchaikovsky’s life and personality.  Here too is a second image of Tchaikovsky, this time later in life.

Tchaikovsky was a gifted orchestra composer and that is the original ensemble for which he wrote Capriccio Italien.  Listen to my podcast below to hear some of the original version:

Tchaikovsky Podcast by Ms Ko

For some final inspiration, look at these photos of scenes from Italy.  Keep these in mind the next time you play Capriccio Italien!

Many people might say that Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart is the most brilliant of all the Classical composers.  Mozart wrote over 600 pieces of music!  This is even more amazing when you consider that he died very young.  You will often see the titles of his pieces followed by the letter K and then a number.  This is an identification system just for Mozart’s music.  The K stands for Kochel (pronounced “KER-SHAL”).  The numbers help people to immediately know which of Mozart’s many works are being discussed.  The higher the number, the later in his life Mozart wrote the piece.  Here’s a little word problem for you:

Mozart lived from 1756 to 1791 and wrote K. 1 when he was 5 years old.  Recall that he wrote over 600 pieces altogether.  About how old do you think he was when he wrote our piece, K. 525?

Being an Austrian, Mozart’s first language was German.  That’s the language of the title of our piece and it means “A Little Night Music”.  Eine Kleine Nachtmusik is a serenade, a kind of music meant to be light and entertaining.  It has four movements and in Essential Elements #185, we are playing music from the first movement.

Now watch a video clip of Eine Kleine Nachtmusik played on the instruments that Mozart originally had in mind.  You will notice some small differences in notes and rhythms between this version and what is in our book.  This is only because our version has been simplified to make it a little easier.

• What are the four instruments that you see in this video clip?
• Come up with three adjectives to describe the character of this music.
• You will hear our excerpt from the piece at the beginning  and end of this movement.  How would you describe the music in the middle of the movement?  Does it change mood?

Now let’s learn about Mozart and his life.  Read pages 1, 3 and 4 from this biography of Mozart on the website ArtsAlive.

• Name three ways in which Mozart’s life at 10 or 11 was different from yours.

If you play flute, clarinet, saxophone or trumpet, download the PDF of Mozart’s Sonata in A Major, K., 331.  You should be able to sightread this easily.  Don’t forget to notice the key signature and be sure to try playing it with the piano accompaniment track (also on the ArtsAlive website).