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Classical Music Test Answers

By Robert Kennedy, About.com

What class of people became the newest patrons to the arts in the Classical era?
The common wealth.

A Gabrieli canzona is performed with two ensembles separated from each other, playing across a great space separately and together. This type of music is called __________ music.
Stereotypical.

What is the name of the movement that attempted to right wrongs in the Catholic Church and to counter the Reformation movement?
Re-Reformation.

What is the title of a person who is hired to be the 'house composer,' to stay in a location and compose works especially for the hiring ensemble?
Stable-composer.

What Classical era philosophical system promoted applying the principles of scientific objectivity to issues of social justice?
Scientology.

A technique whereby the music is in more than one tonality at a time is called _______
Biotonality.

The book lists four ways in which Copland made his music especially "American." Name two.
Used hymns (as opposed to new ones?) "Go Tell It On The Mountain."

Two musical innovations arose during [the Middle Ages]. Name one.
Wheel barrow

What part of a sonata form brings back the two themes, this time with the conflict resolved?
Decapitulation.

What does Die Forelle mean?
Die for her.

How did audiences first react to Stravinsky's Rite of Spring?
They held a riot.

Name a scene depicted in The Moldau.
Pheasant wedding

Who composed "O successores"?
Hildegard of Benign

Define castrato.
A castrato is a man who has been castrated before singing in a opera or concert.

What was Beethoven's great physical affliction?
Death.

Name the three languages used in A Survivor from Warsaw and their significance in the composer's life.
English -- he moved to US and learned to speak.

Name the three main sections of sonata form.
Exposition, deposition, recapitulation.

What four institutions supported music in the Baroque era?
Church, nobility, municipalities, pheasants.

Describe Baroque dynamics. Include the phrase that is typically used to describe it.
Terrance

Define Expressionism.
Using or writing music to expressing how you fell.

The movement of the Concerto for Orchestra is subtitled "Game of Pairs." What does this mean?
All solo parts are played by two people on the same instrument.

List two ways nationalism can be expressed in the music itself.
Exoticism and eroticism.

Define program music.
This is music that is programmed by some sort of keyboard.

What event in the 20th century prompted Copland to write in a decidedly American style, and why?
The depression made Copland write in an American Style; he felt that he could give something to the people that would boost their moral.

List the four characters depicted in The Erlking.
Guy in love; girl he's in love with; other guy she's in love with; her father

What did Bartok do to promote the folk music heritage of his native land?
He advertised on Public Television. He recorded the folk songs so that people could listen to them if they forgot.

What makes Copland's Appalachian Spring "nationalistic"?
Its name is derived from the mountain range on the east coast, it was based on recordings of Quakers found in the Appalachians.

List four advantages to listening to a musical performance live in concert versus recorded through a stereo system.
The performers are not planned. It is a natural occurance.

Define 'tempo rubato'.
The tempo usually reserved for a rumbha discovered by Chopin on a swing through South America.

Define nationalism in general, non-musical terms.
This is having a huge amount of ethic pride in your country.

What is incidental music?
Music that is not written in stone. It usually happens as a result of the players ad libing with their instruments or improvising.

Describe Primitivism.
Deliberate avocation of primitive elemental powers

Copland purposely composed music that was distinctly American. Why?
To give America some music that it could call its own. He was paid to do so.

Define musique concrete.
Tangible music where sounds are made in nature or by the conductor himself.

Haydn was a servant of a royal Family in hungry.

Beethoven started out as a young musician.

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