# Why did music slow down?



## Brad (Mar 27, 2014)

I often wonder about the trend in the history of music that shows, generally, music getting slower over time. Baroque and Classical era music was full of short and sweet movements with slower movements in between. Then the late romantic era started producing the massive symphonies of Bruckner, Brahms, and Mahler. Obviously there were/are still faster pieces, but overall after the late nineteenth century composers seemed to do this. 

Why did this happen? What is the effect? Is my observation correct?

EDIT: not all music...just a lot of it


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## brotagonist (Jul 11, 2013)

There appears to be some substance to your observation, but there are exceptions, and we don't know if the universe is still infinitely expanding... I mean, if music is still continuing to slow down. I think the effect is a broader range of emotional expression: fast music tends to sound lively and upbeat. Why did this happen? Perhaps to overcome the limitations of upbeat and lively music and to be able to express other sentiments?


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## Aramis (Mar 1, 2009)

They finally noticed that it's economic, because with fast tempo you have to put more notes to have your piece reach X minutes in duration.


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## shangoyal (Sep 22, 2013)

I think it has definitely to do with how music in the early 19th century and before was commissioned by people looking for entertainment - and later music became more an instrument in the hands of the composers who used it for dramatic and serious self expression.


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## PetrB (Feb 28, 2012)

Ravel ~ piano concerto in G, 3rd movement





There are many, many more allegro first movements and up tempo final movements, all you need to do is look to the century following the 19th -- classical music does not end there, as it seems you think 

The later romantic did get very preoccupied with rhythm used to obscure a sense of bar-line. If you listen to Brahms, he goes about obscuring which part of any moment is the stronger pulse as well, throwing that element also (done with masterly contrapuntal expertise) into a state of question or ambiguity. While all those techniques allowed for extremely plastic shaping / contouring of the musical materials, sculptural in a way, it also created a loss of palpable pulse for the listener.

Too, if you're writing and tending to use the full palette of a large orchestra most of the time, fast activity gets more difficult, the sound blurs with such an acoustic mass, and the way to avoid that is, basically, either a lot of points of cessation (as in the antiphonal music of the renaissance, i.e. a tacet moment to allow the sound to clear) or generally slower tempi.

But I think your premise is not right, there are lively tempo movements in Bruckner, and Brahms, as well... and without checking, I am near certain there are scherzi strewn throughout that literature.

The absence in the romantic of that feeling of a chugga chugga motor drive often present in baroque music, the clear and steady pulse of classical era music, including some of the more remarkable presti (Overture to Marriage of Figaro) or the later early-mid romantic scherzi which Mendelssohn did so well, as being of less interest in the romantic era is probably partially true. If that did not go away, it at least made less and less frequent appearances in the late romantic era.

This late romantic trend of obscuring the bar lines and pulse was so predominant that it later became 'newsworthy' when Stravinsky came along and "re-established" a recognizable and lively pulse in his music (rather like the short-term memory / lack of awareness of history shock for that generation who 'discovered' acoustic pop music via the MTv "Unplugged" series.) <g> [However, since no one works or creates in a total vacuum, it should be said that the Russians, including the late romantics, can generally be counted on for a fondness and adeptness in writing music which is rhythmically lively and feels "driven," i.e. having a feel of a forceful forward momentum.]

The 20th century aesthetic included a paring down of the orchestra, or using it more frequently as a large varying chamber orchestra as well as the occasional tutti (which, incidentally, Mahler was a master of), and 'motor drive' came very much back into the forefront.

P.s. Totally unrelated, but I've noticed in pop music that just about any later re-do of an earlier 'classic' song is invariably taken at a noticeably faster tempo than the original -- go figure.


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## Alypius (Jan 23, 2013)

Brad said:


> I often wonder about the trend in the history of music that shows, generally, music getting slower over time ... overall after the late nineteenth century composers seemed to do this ...
> Why did this happen? What is the effect? Is my observation correct?


Are you asking about the late 19th century? Or the "history of music"? And are you only thinking about orchestral works? It sounds like it.

Have you listened to Prokofiev? Example, movement #4 of Piano Concerto #2: "Allegro temptuoso". I frankly have no idea how a pianist can play anything that fast. It has slower lyrical sections, but overall it blazes. Here it is on YouTube (in two parts):










Sticking with Prokofiev: Listen to Piano Sonata #2, movement #4 ("Vivace")





I could find similar things in the late romantic works of Rachmaninov. Have you listened to any 20th-century works? The Rite of Spring? How about Samuel Barber's Piano Concerto, movement #3?





Just one tiny venture into more recent works: 
Ligeti, Etude #1 ("Desordre"). Fast enough?


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## violadude (May 2, 2011)

Ok, few observations, ideas and hypothesis:

1. Your idea that music of the past was often quicker and short in duration is only true up to a certain point in the past, namely the Early Baroque Period. The Medieval period and the early to mid Renaissance era is made of almost entirely slower paced pieces. Since the church basically owned music, quick tempos were probably considered too frivolous for the Almighty. 

2. Secular music of the Baroque and Classical era was primarily written for entertainment, not personal expression (as expressive as that music could be). Given its social functionality, writing long, drawn out slow pieces with heavy expression would probably be seen as way too overindulgent to the people who hired these composers to write entertaining music for them. When the attitude about music's place and purpose shifted to more personal-expression oriented in the 19th century, this sort of freed composers up to be as indulgent as they wanted to (self-indulgence perhaps even being thought of as a virtue at this time?) and slower paced music is maybe better suited to fit this attitude.

3. I'm not sure exactly how accurate this is, but I did read once that, while composers of the 19th century did write slow movements more frequently, the performance practice and tempo interpretation of orchestras actually sped up during this time. In other words, a 19th century "allegro" was played faster than a 17th or 18th century "allegro" would have been. 

4. Music is pretty obviously used as a form of escapism for many people and I think this has always been true. Therefore, it makes sense that pre-industrial music was quick in order to get away from the slow paced life of the average person. But around the time of the industrial revolution, daily life started to speed up; and as daily life sped up the music slowed down in order to compensate and keep music as an art fit for escapism. If this did happen, it was probably at a collective subconscious level, of course.


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## GreenMamba (Oct 14, 2012)

violadude said:


> 4. Music is pretty obviously used as a form of escapism for many people and I think this has always been true. Therefore, it makes sense that pre-industrial music was quick in order to get away from the slow paced life of the average person. But around the time of the industrial revolution, daily life started to speed up; and as daily life sped up the music slowed down in order to compensate and keep music as an art fit for escapism. If this did happen, it was probably at a collective subconscious level, of course.


You could argue the opposite: in our sped up modern world, a slow movement can be faster and still feel slow.


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## PetrB (Feb 28, 2012)

violadude said:


> Ok, few observations, ideas and hypothesis:
> 
> 1. Your idea that music of the past was often quicker and short in duration is only true up to a certain point in the past, namely the Early Baroque Period. The Medieval period and the early to mid Renaissance era is made of almost entirely slower paced pieces. Since the church basically owned music, quick tempos were probably considered too frivolous for the Almighty.
> 
> ...


_Ka-ching._ zOMG you're good! :tiphat:


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## Ukko (Jun 4, 2010)

To answer the question posed by the thread title: Audiences got slower, so the performers had to too.


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## Brad (Mar 27, 2014)

To clear things up, "history of music" was an incorrect way to put it. I guess I mean from the Baroque era to the early 20th century. Also, I am aware that not every single piece of music since the late romantic era is slow. I enjoy Prokofiev and Schostakovich and Stravinsky with all of their energetic music. And I am speaking of music as a whole, not just orchestral. I hope you know what I mean by a lot of music getting slower by the end of that time frame.


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## Aramis (Mar 1, 2009)

shangoyal said:


> I think it has definitely to do with how music in the early 19th century and before was commissioned by people looking for entertainment - and later music became more an instrument in the hands of the composers who used it for dramatic and serious self expression.


And, as we all know, there is no drama and serious self-expression in fast tempi.


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## shangoyal (Sep 22, 2013)

Aramis said:


> And, as we all know, there is no drama and serious self-expression in fast tempi.


Of course there is. What was I thinking?


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## violadude (May 2, 2011)

I guess if we were to take this idea about music slowing down over time and run with it, minimalism could sort of be thought of as the culmination of music's slow down trend. In the minimalist style, even if the tempo is technically fast, the progression of the piece is still set at a slow pace.


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## PetrB (Feb 28, 2012)

Brad said:


> To clear things up, "history of music" was an incorrect way to put it. I guess I mean from the Baroque era to the early 20th century. Also, I am aware that not every single piece of music since the late romantic era is slow. I enjoy Prokofiev and Schostakovich and Stravinsky with all of their energetic music. And I am speaking of music as a whole, not just orchestral. I hope you know what I mean by a lot of music getting slower by the end of that time frame.


I would add two things to what Violadude and I have already stated:

Along with the industrial revolution, the time when many people used to live in the country or more rural areas dramatically changed; many who had lived for generations in environs relatively bucolic flocked to cities, and the numbers in population of cities greatly expanded.

The more removed people became from nature, where they before lived with open or even vast landscape within sight, the more music and some of the visual art of the time went about evoking that as a substitution for the real thing, as it were. I even believe this explains the near exponential increase in the the middle and working class audience of the era, who began to aggressively flock to concerts, which became a newer and more readily available form of public entertainment.

Even if the music of the late romantic is absolute, there is that one aspect with some of its more notable works of a preoccupation with huge and long structures, an architecture (reflected in the actual architecture of the era) which in music was also striving to evoke the feeling of the listener being in a vast landscape -- while there was still a lot of absolute music, it is noteworthy the number of "Tone Poems" of the later romantic era which were directly aimed at invoking in the listener a sense of being in a natural landscape.

The second aspect, that _Fin de siècle_ ethos which was very real: 
There was a populace highly aware (intuitively or consciously) that a way of life _which had gone on for generations, with few changes -- and those changes relatively slow ones -- was truly at its very end (death-throes)_, and therein are most of the accompanying sentiments many still recognize as being a part of what romantic composers went about expressing, 'end of the world as we know it,' and all the sentimental longing of (emotionally) _looking back_, dwelling on what was, loss, etc. vs. being in the present (to be contrary and pedantic, that _was_ their present or looking forward. [Mahler's Symphony no. 9 is generally thought to be 'about' a looking back on older music, that older way of life, and a resigned "_farewell to all that_."]

Other than that well-known premise of one's entire life in review rapidly flashing in the synapses in the few mere seconds just prior death, I can not think of any presentation which is occupied with looking back as its principal ethos -- theater, film, opera, piece of absolute music, even a novel -- where the creative choice was for any sort of rapid pacing -- it just seems, imo, to not appropriately fit that particular intent.


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## aleazk (Sep 30, 2011)

violadude said:


> 4. Music is pretty obviously used as a form of escapism for many people and I think this has always been true. Therefore, it makes sense that pre-industrial music was quick in order to get away from the slow paced life of the average person. But around the time of the industrial revolution, daily life started to speed up; and as daily life sped up the music slowed down in order to compensate and keep music as an art fit for escapism. If this did happen, it was probably at a collective subconscious level, of course.


I was going to comment something similar to this.

At least in my personal experience, sometimes I do precisely that. After a stressed day, I like to listen to slow music. And not because it may be "relaxing", but to "escape", as you say.


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## Ukko (Jun 4, 2010)

This notion that the environment 'speeded up' for Joe Doaks with the change from country to city life... that's kinda strange. There is hardly anything more boring than factory routine, or factory office routine for that matter. You folks must be 'a class above' not to understand that.


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## PetrB (Feb 28, 2012)

violadude said:


> I guess if we were to take this idea about music slowing down over time and run with it, minimalism could sort of be thought of as the culmination of music's slow down trend. In the minimalist style, even if the tempo is technically fast, the progression of the piece is still set at a slow pace.


LOL. Leave it to a musician / composer to make mention of the rate of occurrence / tempo of the harmonic activity.

But, in this instance, I would not 'run with the premise,' as it does not truly fit the bill.

I think even those who don't care for much or any minimalist music are aware that the relative static harmonic activity has an intent of inducing something akin to a meditation or spiritual experience, as the ethnic musics from which these composers took that premise are also about; African Drumming, chants, Gamelan music, etc.

Besides, most minimalist music (early "school" at least) is often fully engaged with and deploys a very palpably lusty pulse, and much of that at a fair clip [Steve Reich, _Music for 18 musicians._]


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## SONNET CLV (May 31, 2014)

Brad said:


> I often wonder about the trend in the history of music that shows, generally, *music getting slower over time. Baroque and Classical era music was full of short and sweet movements *with slower movements in between. Then the late romantic era started producing the massive symphonies of Bruckner, Brahms, and Mahler. Obviously there were/are still faster pieces, but overall after the late nineteenth century composers seemed to do this.
> 
> Why did this happen? What is the effect? Is my observation correct?


It's obvious, of course, why music is slowing down. You cite how "fast" the Baroque and Classical music was. But, hey, those guys have gotten old. Cut 'em a break. They can't move as fast as they once did. You'll slow down, too, in a couple of years. Just watch.


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## Alypius (Jan 23, 2013)

Brad said:


> I hope you know what I mean by a lot of music getting slower by the end of that time frame.


Actually, I don't know what you mean. Give examples. Make the case. I listen to lots of 20th century music -- and going slow is not how I would characterize music of the 20th century.


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## PetrB (Feb 28, 2012)

Ukko said:


> This notion that the environment 'speeded up' for Joe Doaks with the change from country to city life... that's kinda strange. There is hardly anything more boring than factory routine, or factory office routine for that matter. You folks must be 'a class above' not to understand that.


Drudgery with a few colleagues in the open fields, sunlight, weather, fresh air and far or infinite view when you look up is something else compared to the same drudgery in a noisy crowded factory, a shadowed and crowded hovel in a town or city.

Maybe what you said was an attempt at humor, but your comment seems near a non-sequitur, imo.


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## mitchflorida (Apr 24, 2012)

Where is the evidence for your thesis? When was the fastest music in vogue? When was the slowest music?

Please give me the years you think fast music was popular and what year it slowed down.


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## Ukko (Jun 4, 2010)

PetrB said:


> Drudgery with a few colleagues in the open fields, sunlight, weather, fresh air and far or infinite view when you look up is something else compared to the same drudgery in a noisy crowded factory, a shadowed and crowded hovel in a town or city.
> 
> Maybe what you said was an attempt at humor, but your comment seems near a non-sequitur, imo.


Nope. It's the difference between opening up and closing down. BTW in hill country the long view is the much appreciated exception, not the rule. It cleanses the mind; kind of a giddy-up. Those non-so-open fields are in the valley bottoms usually - where there is good dirt for crops, but no long views. On the factory floor, there are no giddy-ups.


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## Richannes Wrahms (Jan 6, 2014)

I enjoy sped up Brahms' Symphony No. 1 and No. 4 to the tempo of a Haydn or Beethoven allegro, it makes them very lively.


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## PetrB (Feb 28, 2012)

Ukko said:


> Nope. It's the difference between opening up and closing down. BTW in hill country the long view is the much appreciated exception, not the rule. It cleanses the mind; kind of a giddy-up. Those non-so-open fields are in the valley bottoms usually - where there is good dirt for crops, but no long views. On the factory floor, there are no giddy-ups.


...or long views, or direct daylight, or the relative tranquility of sound, or fresh air and breezes, etc. etc. etc.

I am convinced, whether people are consciously aware or not, that physical environment has a huge influence and effect on us, both the natural environment and the synthetic environments we create.


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## Ukko (Jun 4, 2010)

PetrB said:


> ...or long views, or direct daylight, or the relative tranquility of sound, or fresh air and breezes, etc. etc. etc.
> 
> I am convinced, whether people are consciously aware or not, that physical environment has a huge influence and effect on us, both the natural environment and the synthetic environments we create.


Me too. I think it's harder to lie to oneself 'out there'. Whatever I have accomplished, ripples made in the pond, the hills are still there, and they don't care.


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## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

Brad said:


> I often wonder about the trend in the history of music that shows, generally, music getting slower over time. Baroque and Classical era music was full of short and sweet movements with slower movements in between. Then the late romantic era started producing the massive symphonies of Bruckner, Brahms, and Mahler. Obviously there were/are still faster pieces, but overall after the late nineteenth century composers seemed to do this.
> 
> Why did this happen? What is the effect? Is my observation correct?


I think it's because the first signs of 'rubato' were in the early Baroque, when ornamentation began to be added to melodies. Sometimes these were so ornate that it caused the tempo to suffer.

Violadude was on the right track when he said it was due to church music; the Baroque marked the first time music began to move away from the strict forms of the church, from modal to tonal, and from strict rhythm to 'expressive' figurations which distracted from the beat. Sometimes the rhythm would stand still in order to squeeze in these new ornaments.


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## PetrB (Feb 28, 2012)

Ukko said:


> Me too. I think it's harder to lie to oneself 'out there'. Whatever I have accomplished, ripples made in the pond, the hills are still there, and they don't care.


The dearth or lack of anything 'synthetic' -- i.e. man-made -- tends to have us facing at least one kind of bald truth.

It is I think an equal to the higher levels of the 'beauty' which artists, mathematicians and physicists strive to achieve or understand. (As well as the fact with 'all that out there,' and no man-made or social construct dynamics, you end up very much _in your face_ confronted _with yourself,_)


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## Brad (Mar 27, 2014)

I apologize for not illustrating my point well enough for some..so I found the video that inspired this question. I watched it a long time ago and now that I looked at it, embarrassingly, I think it answered the question itself.






23:00-30:00

He basically says that since the orchestra got bigger, the sound was more impressive. Therefore, composers were able to keep interest with the sheer power and variety of the orchestra. So, I was wrong in assuming that this applied to all music instead of just orchestral.


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## ArtMusic (Jan 5, 2013)

Brad said:


> I often wonder about the trend in the history of music that shows, generally, music getting slower over time. Baroque and Classical era music was full of short and sweet movements with slower movements in between. Then the late romantic era started producing the massive symphonies of Bruckner, Brahms, and Mahler. Obviously there were/are still faster pieces, but overall after the late nineteenth century composers seemed to do this.
> 
> Why did this happen? What is the effect? Is my observation correct?


Exception would be opera. Baroque opera could last as long as any other.


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## Taggart (Feb 14, 2013)

One entertaining point that seems to have been missed is the importance of dress. I'm talking here about dance music. If you have large full skirts or whatever then the speed of movement is limited. If you have simpler dress, then you can move faster. Baroque dance suites were written for a simpler age where movement was freer. As you move into the 19th century, it slows down a bit - waltzes at around 120 - then we get the really sped up mazurkas at around 170 as dress allows for faster movement. Interesting to note that in Scotland the Strathspey - around 65 to 70 - started to fall into disfavour as people preferred the faster scottiches (up to 120 or reel time) and that if you speed this up - say 150 or higher- then you end up with a polka or step hop dance. The RCSDS was not best pleased with this change to Scottish dance and restored the Strathspey to a more respectable form.


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## Mahlerian (Nov 27, 2012)

Brad said:


> He basically says that since the orchestra got bigger, the sound was more impressive. Therefore, composers were able to keep interest with the sheer power and variety of the orchestra. So, I was wrong in assuming that this applied to all music instead of just orchestral.


I don't think that's it. The biggest difference between Classical and Romantic is in the harmonies used. After all, there's a big difference between the String Quartets of Mozart and those of say, Brahms, and it's not in the makeup of the ensemble.

The music became slower so that an increased variety of harmonies could be used without losing track of the original home key, and the music became longer because the harmonic tension generated by such excursions needed more definite resolution and because the structure thus generated could be lengthened without collapsing under its own weight. Even the longest of classical-era movements, like the finale of Beethoven's Ninth, doesn't match the longer movements of Mahler and Bruckner in scope, especially if one considers that Beethoven's form is sectional and divided into smaller episodic segments while Mahler's and Bruckner's are not.


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## violadude (May 2, 2011)

Mahlerian said:


> I don't think that's it. The biggest difference between Classical and Romantic is in the harmonies used. After all, there's a big difference between the String Quartets of Mozart and those of say, Brahms, and it's not in the makeup of the ensemble.
> 
> The music became slower so that an increased variety of harmonies could be used without losing track of the original home key, and the music became longer because the harmonic tension generated by such excursions needed more definite resolution and because the structure thus generated could be lengthened without collapsing under its own weight. Even the longest of classical-era movements, like the finale of Beethoven's Ninth, doesn't match the longer movements of Mahler and Bruckner in scope, especially if one considers that Beethoven's form is sectional and divided into smaller episodic segments while Mahler's and Bruckner's are not.


That's a great point too! I didn't think of it from that perspective.


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## Ukko (Jun 4, 2010)

More doesn't equate with slower. Duration doesn't relate only with pace.


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## Brad (Mar 27, 2014)

violadude said:


> That's a great point too! I didn't think of it from that perspective.


Agreed! that makes sense.


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## mitchflorida (Apr 24, 2012)

No one will tell me what year this "Great Slow-Down" started. Please what year ? I want to be able to verify it.


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## Brad (Mar 27, 2014)

mitchflorida said:


> No one will tell me what year this "Great Slow-Down" started. Please what year ? I want to be able to verify it.


No particular year, but it seems to have emerged as a trend in some music in the mid 1800's and on.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

Mahlerian said:


> I don't think that's it. The biggest difference between Classical and Romantic is in the harmonies used. After all, there's a big difference between the String Quartets of Mozart and those of say, Brahms, and it's not in the makeup of the ensemble.
> 
> The music became slower so that an increased variety of harmonies could be used without losing track of the original home key, and the music became longer because the harmonic tension generated by such excursions needed more definite resolution and because the structure thus generated could be lengthened without collapsing under its own weight. Even the longest of classical-era movements, like the finale of Beethoven's Ninth, doesn't match the longer movements of Mahler and Bruckner in scope, especially if one considers that Beethoven's form is sectional and divided into smaller episodic segments while Mahler's and Bruckner's are not.


Right. Complex harmony - chromaticism and modulation - wants time. Constant harmonic change at a fast tempo, like rapidly changing emotions (which modulation evokes), can be exciting but exhausting. Slow down the pulse, and a world of expression through harmony opens up.


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## mitchflorida (Apr 24, 2012)

Brad said:


> No particular year, but it seems to have emerged as a trend in some music in the mid 1800's and on.


There really is no trend, you can't even put a date on it. There has always been fast and slow music, and always will be. Offenbach's Can-Can? Is that fast or slow? Do you know what year that was created? Was it after the mid 1800s or before?


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## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

I think we need to re-phrase the problem in terms of 'interrupted rhythm,' which happened when the Baroque started interrupting the pulse of the music with ornamentations on the vocals; and the general trend of the Baroque to be "affective" and more expressive. Frescobaldi indicated in his organ works for endings to be drawn out, used more tempo indications, and so on. This expressive singing gave birth to the kind of opera we now know.


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## PetrB (Feb 28, 2012)

mitchflorida said:


> No one will tell me what year this "Great Slow-Down" started. Please what year ? I want to be able to verify it.


Sure, Schubert wrote things with that extended harmonic syntax Mahlerian mentioned, and then too added long wholesale repeat sections... (Schuman commented on Schubert, "That divine length!"

But I think we can all most certainly blame Wagner... that's pretty accurate, really.


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## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

Woodduck said:


> Right. Complex harmony - chromaticism and modulation - wants time. Constant harmonic change at a fast tempo, like rapidly changing emotions (which modulation evokes), can be exciting but exhausting. Slow down the pulse, and a world of expression through harmony opens up.


I don't know if I agree with this theory, because after 1600, the big difference in part writing was the resolution of dissonance, and that was based on rhythmic considerations; so it just went from strong beat to weak beat resolutions.

Harmonically, most stuff was performed in some variant of mean-tone tuning, so they couldn't modulate that far anyway. Early Baroque was still (harmonically) wild territory, and tonality (progression based on chord movement rather than as the result individual voices), and the functions of tonality, evolved slowly out of this, not all at once.

The slow-down was the result of expressive figurations demanded by the "new stile" of composition the Baroque ushered in, and rubatos.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

PetrB said:


> Sure, Schubert wrote things with that extended harmonic syntax Mahlerian mentioned, and then too added long wholesale repeat sections... (Schuman commented on Schubert, "That divine length!"
> 
> *But I think we can all most certainly blame Wagner*... that's pretty accurate, really.


I agree with this, though I might substitute the word "credit" for "blame," being partial to long, harmonically rich slow movements... 

In any case, Wagner's sense of time is one of his most original traits; he slowed down the progression of musical events in order to express the emotional, and even the physical, qualities of his theatrical events in something close to real-life time, as opposed to the more compressed time-frame of traditional musical forms. The Romantic assumption (which didn't originate with Romanticism but reached its apogee there, and particularly in Wagner) that music could be an articulate language, an evocative analogue to extra-musical psychic and physical events, quite naturally implies exploitation for their expressive potential of the harmonic and sonorous possibilities of music, along with the expansion of the time-frame in which these effects can take place. Wagner was the composer who saw these possibilities most clearly in a context - musical drama - most accommodating to them, and he was quick to apply this expressive/temporal protraction to self-sufficient musical movements as well: the prelude to _Lohengrin_ is unprecedented in its extension of a single melodic-sonorous-expressive idea, employed to create an unbroken emotional arc in which we have hardly any longer an awareness of discrete musical elements structured in time - or, perhaps, of a time-structure in which such events are manipulated.

I feel that Wagner's extension of musical time into a "stream of consciousness," correlative to his expansion of harmony to fill that enlarged frame, was a major constituent of the crisis of nineteenth-century music with huge implications for musical form and aesthetics, forcing composers to come to terms with it in radically different ways. I also think it's a major aesthetic (as opposed to moral or philosophical) reason for both the enthusiasm and the dislike Wagner engenders in different listeners (although just how and why this happens is a subject for a discussion of its own).

Parsifal: "I scarcely walk, yet seem to have come far!"
Gurnemanz: "You see, my son, time here becomes space."


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