# The Game Changer



## Olias (Nov 18, 2010)

Various sources I've come across have said something to the effect that:

"What Beethoven's 9th was to the first half of the 19th century, so the Rite of Spring was to the first half of the 20th.......the artistic game changer by which afterwards all music had to acknowledge its influence".

So what exactly were the "Game Changers" of each half century. I came up with a few suggestions. Perhaps someone can fill in the gaps:

1600-1650 - Monteverdi's L'Orfeo (justification: the first operatic masterpiece)

1650-1700 - Ideas?

1700-1750 - Several possibilities: Handel's Messiah, Bach's WTC or Goldberg Variations. Not sure which to go with. Any suggestions?

1750-1800 - Mozart's Marriage of Figaro (justification: opera buffa raised to the level of high art and the embodiment of Enlightenment thought)

1800-1850 - Beethoven's 9th (justification: assertion that all aspects of music including form and genre are contextual to the needs of the artist's expression)

1850-1900 - Wagner's Tristan and Isolde (justification: beginnings of harmonic atonality)

1900-1950 - Stravinsky's Rite of Spring (justification: new uses of rhythm, timbre, motivic layering, and dance to create spectacle)

1950-2000 - Ideas?


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## Sid James (Feb 7, 2009)

I suppose you're looking at larger scale things, but in 1900-1950 bracket I would put Schoenberg's _Pierrot Lunaire_. Even Stravinsky himself called it "the solar plexus of 20th century music." For what Igor's opinion is worth. But this work did influence a lot of things after it, composers incl. Britten, Walton, Ravel, Stravinsky himself, later on Messiaen and Boulez, and so on. Basically every song cycle in the more modern or experimental mould that came after.

As for another contender, if you want something large scale, Berg's _Wozzeck_ made a big impact then & later.

I just don't see Stravinsky's _Rite_ as making that big an impact on others, he himself after that brief "rhythm man" phase went into "Neo-Classicist" style for a long stretch. Of course, the innovations of_ The Rite _were incorporated and fully part of his work thereafter. But it stands alone as a work in itself. Things that I've heard influenced by it literally, eg. ballets, come across to me to be kind of rehash (eg. REvueltas' _Sensimaya_, Prokofiev's_ Scythian Suite_, Bartok's _Miraculous Mandarin_). As far as beknownst to me, only Varese made something unique out of _The Rite_, but some say that Varese wasn't much interested in _The Rite _anyway, although he was at the premiere, he was doing his own things parallel to that anyway. Another possible one was Holst with his_ Planets _suite, but I'm not sure if Holst had heard _The Rite _before he came to compose _The Planets_.

Maybe_ The Rites' _biggest influence was on popular culture, esp. music for films and television. I have no problem with that, but it's a matter of how you approach this.

But of course, depends what angle you're looking at the various "canons."

The whole thing is a bit dodgy though cos 50 years is a long time, esp. in the c20th when styles turned over at a rapid rate. It also talks to this old "grand narrative" view of music/creative arts history.

That's why I think one single "game changer" work after 1945 is impossible, or maybe even a single series of works by the same composer...


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## jalex (Aug 21, 2011)

After L'Orfeo I don't think there were any until the Eroica, after which they came pretty thick and fast (Symphonie Fantastique, Tristan, Prelude a l'Apres Midi being a few more 19th century examples). Trying to pick one for 1900-1949 is hopeless.


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## Sid James (Feb 7, 2009)

I think late Haydn & MOzart, their works did change the game, so to speak, paving the way for Beethoven, Schubert and beyond. Esp. both their symphonies, moving the genre beyond being just a kind of diversion, also their string quartets, but mostly I agree with Olias, Mozart's operas he did with da Ponte, esp. *Don Giovanni*. Gone were these tired old conventions of guys standing around singing about the gods, eg. opera without any "real" plot, all stifling convention. With that opera, Mozart put in an element of "real" human drama, and also the aspect of heightened emotions - imaging in music outright fear for the first time - some would say proto-Romantic. But whatever the label, this work esp. was one that revolutionised the genre of opera as a whole...


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## jalex (Aug 21, 2011)

For operatic reform, more credit should be given to Gluck who was really the one to strip all the crap from the genre, and who influenced Mozart. In general, I think the changes between Monteverdi and Beethoven were pretty gradual and incremental, although obviously these small changes added up to massive differences on larger time scales. I can't think of any individual works which made everyone stop and totally rethink what they were doing. Gluck's Orfeo ed Euridice maybe comes closest, but my history of opera is sketchy.


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## Sid James (Feb 7, 2009)

jalex said:


> For operatic reform, more credit should be given to Gluck who was really the one to strip all the crap from the genre, and who influenced Mozart...


I cannot comment in depth on Gluck, you may well be right, but I was thinking largely of the plot of operas. & how those conventions affected the resulting music. Eg. restricted it. I thought Gluck's operas were about the same "gods" focusssed plots, in which case Mozart's "real" plots about real people would have still changed the game hugely. But I am arguing largely by inference, I am not familiar with Gluck's work beyond an odd aria or that famous dance thing.



> ...
> In general, I think the changes between Monteverdi and Beethoven were pretty gradual and incremental, although obviously these small changes added up to massive differences on larger time scales.


Yes, it's also the fact that by the time Beethoven had arrived, the middle classes in Europe were getting more stronger and more in numbers. The decline of the aristocracy and kind of feudal systems was at it's beginning stages (eg. French revolution, but also trends in general). The economy was expanding, eg. industrial revolution in England. So without the primacy of the bluestockings, you had a widening middle class, the start of subscription concerts open to the paying public (in late c18th), and all this kind of stuff which I think lead to a "game changer" in itself for composers as far as the context surrounding them was concerned, the politics and the society, etc...


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## Trout (Apr 11, 2011)

If you go beyond the 1600s, Machaut's _Messe de Nostre Dame_ (before 1365) is a big game changer being the earliest complete setting of the Ordinary of the Mass. I don't know if 4'33'' counts, but it can also be considered a game changer.


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## hocket (Feb 21, 2010)

I'd suggest that Monteverdi's Book 8 of Madrigals is far more of a 'game changer' than L'Orfeo. Whilst not the first, it fully established the Secunda Prattica which virtually all music has followed ever since.

1650-1700 Stradella's Concerto Grosso, Froberger's Toccatas, Lully's Operas?


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## violadude (May 2, 2011)

hocket said:


> I'd suggest that Monteverdi's Book 8 of Madrigals is far more of a 'game changer' than L'Orfeo. Whilst not the first, it fully established the Secunda Prattica which virtually all music has followed ever since.
> 
> 1650-1700 Stradella's Concerto Grosso, Froberger's Toccatas, Lully's Operas?


May I ask out of ignorance, what the "Secunda Prattica" is?


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## Rasa (Apr 23, 2009)

violadude said:


> May I ask out of ignorance, what the "Secunda Prattica" is?


IT's music with the use of instruments, basso continuo etc. as opposed to the vocal style of the rennaisance.


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## Manxfeeder (Oct 19, 2010)

I think Josquin's Missa Pangua Lingua was a game-changer. As Peter Phillips noted, "It was in this work that Josquin finally made the art of imitation, by which all the voices must be treated as being equal, of primary importance. This technique had profound repercussions for later Renaissance music through Europe."


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## ComposerOfAvantGarde (Dec 2, 2011)

1600-1750 Hmm... Something by Purcell maybe? His semi-operas perhaps? Or perhaps "Dido and Aeneas" the first proper English opera.


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## Guest (Dec 22, 2011)

1950-2000: Cage's _4'33"._

This (premiered in 1952) was the first full expression of the idea that composers need not intend or try to control everything that happens in a piece. That they can be open to things out of their control.

Of course, any performance contains elements beyond the composer's control, but the whole point of music up to 1952 was to try to diminish those things as much as possible. (One of the allures of electronic music in the late 40's and early 50's was the promise of being about to control everything.)

Cage suggested that embracing the things one has not intended might be more practical and maybe even more fruitful.

After 1952, the big choice for composers was between intention and non-intention.


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## norman bates (Aug 18, 2010)

some guy said:


> 1950-2000: Cage's _4'33"._
> 
> This (premiered in 1952) was the first full expression of the idea that composers need not intend or try to control everything that happens in a piece. That they can be open to things out of their control.


it seems you're talking of jazz music


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## bassClef (Oct 29, 2006)

1950-2000 - There's not a great deal to choose from, a couple of the later Shostakovich symphonies or Gorecki's 3rd were perhaps the greatest works in this era, but for a game-changer I'd have to go with Bernstein's West Side Story : though not perhaps the first to be written for stage / cinema, I'd view it as iconic and symbolic of this new medium.


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## Manxfeeder (Oct 19, 2010)

bassClef said:


> 1950-2000 - There's not a great deal to choose from.


Would you consider Terry Riley's _In C_ in this category? It seems to be the spark that ignited minimalism/process music, which was pretty big from the '60s on, and it showed many composers a way away from serialism.


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## Vaneyes (May 11, 2010)

Shostakovich Symphonies and The Cold War.

Bernstein's Mahler influence via TV and recordings. Prior to 1950, there was a total of 22 recordings for Mahler Symphonies, and 6 for DLVDE.

Bernstein in Berlin re Russia's collapse. Ode to Freedom.


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## Manxfeeder (Oct 19, 2010)

Maybe Messiaen's _Quartet for the End of Time _ fits in there somewhere.


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## bassClef (Oct 29, 2006)

Manxfeeder said:


> Would you consider Terry Riley's _In C_ in this category? It seems to be the spark that ignited minimalism/process music, which was pretty big from the '60s on, and it showed many composers a way away from serialism.


Yes, that's a good call.


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## Sid James (Feb 7, 2009)

Interesting stuff. I would be stuck to choose who is "the one" between the names proferred - esp. Cage, Bernstein, Riley. In 1950-2000 category, that is. I agree with norman bates' view of jazz being in the mix as well, esp. bebop which came in after 1945, & stuff like free jazz which is much like some contemporary classical; & also fusion of classical, jazz, rock, folk/traditional elements & other things in guys coming later, eg. Steve Reich & Astor Piazzolla...


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## hocket (Feb 21, 2010)

violadude said:


> May I ask out of ignorance, what the "Secunda Prattica" is?


Hi, sorry I meant to reply much earlier but I've been changing locations over the festive season and experienced some connectivity problems. Rasa is waaaay more qualified to explain this to you but is nonetheless being simplistic (and yet simultaneously eloquent). Essentially the whole structure of how music was composed was altered at this time.

Compare Palestrina (b.1525)






(It seems you'll have to press the wee YouTube button to hear this one.)

with Monteverdi (b.1567)





It's not that instruments were introduced at this time but rather that the use of basso continuo (rather than construction around the tenor part) was more conducive to them taking on a more central role. As exemplars here are a few renaissance pieces using instruments but with structural imitation as a fundamental constituent:

Byrd (b.c.1538)





Gibbons (b. 1583)





It might be said that a music that was focused more on the human than the divine emerged at this time. (Discuss!). A much greater emphasis on harmony and a less pronounced use of counterpoint and polyphony are features.


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