Music in the making; Choral music of the Classical period

Music in the making. Produced by Millikan university under a grant from the Educational Television and Radio Center in cooperation with the National Association of educational broadcasters. And Milliken School of Music presents Professor Wesley Sneider and the Millikan choir in a recorded consideration of choral music in the classical period during this period which comprises the last half of the eighteenth century composers produced an astonishing number of instrumental compositions but apparently neglected the purely choral forms. Other several reasons for this but perhaps the most important is the fact that the artistry had only recently developed into symphonic stature instruments had been improved and with them the technical proficiency of the players had increased. The orchestra offered therefore a vast new and practically unexplored territory for composers. And they responded with a wealth of compositions and new

forms. The great composers of the period were of course Haydn and Mozart whose compositions in the instrumental field are among the lasting monuments of musical art when they chose to write choral works. Maybe still the full measure of their genius on the task and produced choral works which are equal to their instrumental compositions before commenting upon the subject at hand. Professor Snyder would like you to listen to the smoothly flowing by the with bliss from Haydn's the creation as sung by the Milliken University Choir Professor Snyder is conducting. It was.

Was. Close was. We're good. At it.

Yeah it. Was. What you just heard is music of the age of Haydn and Mozart. It's the age of reason in music and this period consists of the last 25 years of the 18th century the last quarter and it was an era of form of architectural music and by that is meant that music was constructed almost like a building. Regular phrases were balanced one against another and whole sections were placed side by

side and a wonderful edifice of sound was erected there upon Haydn's music is music of the arching phrase each phrase seems to rise and fall as if by reason of some logical plan or some compelling need. His music is strictly within the limits of tonality and consequently sounds so right to our ears. Now the limits of tonality by that is meant that within the keys established there is a clear feeling of return to home base so to speak. He Haydn used nearly related keys and stayed within the boundaries of tonality so that you always have of a feeling of being close to home. A short

going away and a return that is the basis of Haydn's music. Now in his great choral work the creation his use of the solo voice against the chorus is always effective. The phrases follow one another in a logical order and yet you're seldom aware of any concern for design that Hyde may have had. The music seems to pour forth effortlessly. The chorus that comes to mind is the marvelous work. This is a brilliant chorus with a solo voice soaring high above the chorus. The phrases are regular in length and they fall into a sort of pattern easily recognizable. The effect is that the music poured forth from Haydn spin with no trouble at all. Let us hear that work Nol as done by the Millikan archipelago choir

the soloist is Arlene Steinberg Soprano. And. When.

The end. The end. The music of Haydn was mentioned as being strictly within tone limits of tonality.

So also is that of Mozart but Mozart had begun to use tones and chords that were foreign to the tonality of a given composition. His melodic and harmonic resources were enriched by this but he began a trend that eventually led to the breakdown of tonality. I've mentioned tonality several times and perhaps a word of explanation is in order at this point. It's an interesting fact that no sooner had the tonal system evolved from the modal system of the earlier period then the seeds of its destruction were sown in the Renaissance period which is generally the sixteenth century church modes were used as the scales out of which music was built. The church modes with the same as our own white note scales on the piano by beginning on D for instance and playing all the white notes up to the next higher D. We sound the notes of the Dorian mode. The

East scale on white notes is the Phrygian mode and the F scale is the Lydian and the G scale the Mixolydian. If the Dorian mode a B flat is substituted for the B natural then the result is the pure minor scale. If B flat is substituted for the B in the Lydian Mode The result is the major scale. Now such substitutions were common and consequently the modes lost their distinctive character and began to sound somewhat like our own major or minor scales. This is the simple explanation of what tonality is. It's simply the use of major major and minor keys as the basis for musical composition. As the classical period progressed more and more sharps and flats were inserted into the scales and by the end of the Romantic period which followed the whole tonal system was felt to have served its purpose it had been used up

the increasing use of sharps and flats is very clear in the music of Mozart. We can notice that especially in the beginning of the last section of his are they their own corpus. Yes the Word of God incarnate which we hear now as sung by the Millikan choir. Professor Wesley Snyder in the Milliken University choir who brought you recorded consideration of the

choral music of Mozart and Haydn. Music in the making was produced by Milligan university under a grant from the Educational Television Radio Center. This program was distributed by the National Association of educational broadcasters. This is the end E.B. Radio Network.