# The Common Practice Era - Help!



## 0212 (Dec 28, 2009)

Hi there,
I'm just wondering if anybody here might be able to suggest a few pieces to me that DON'T sound like they come from the Common Practice Era but do in fact fall within that period of around 1600 - 1900? I need to find some for an assignment I'm doing and don't really know where to start!
Thanks in advance!


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## danae (Jan 7, 2009)

Debussy of course!


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## Aramis (Mar 1, 2009)

Doesn't sound for who? For someone educated and experienced in music? I can't think of such pieces. But for someone that is not well aware of music history? In Mahler you can easily find music that sounds like modern stuff (6th symphony?), at least much younger than it really is (late XIXth century). 

Danae suggested Debussy, I would also add other french impressionists: Ravel and Erik Satie.

Beethoven's Grosse Fugue could work as well.


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## danae (Jan 7, 2009)

I only suggested Debussy because he is the only pre-1900 (he died in 1918 though) who wrote music totally outside the common practice (regarding harmonic relations I mean). As for Ravel, he is more or less considered a 20th century composer. Satie is a prankster.

Mahler, Wagner, pre-1900 Schoenberg, all of them stretch the common practice to its limits but are never really away from it like Debussy is.


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## Aramis (Mar 1, 2009)

> (regarding harmonic relations I mean)


Hym, thats why we have to know for what purpose he need those pieces. "Sounds like" is very subjective term - not everyone will recognize original harmonies in Debussy, while the same person can be stunned by mahlerian noise and find it a modern thing.


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## danae (Jan 7, 2009)

Aramis said:


> Hym, thats why we have to know for what purpose he need those pieces. "Sounds like" is very subjective term - not everyone will recognize original harmonies in Debussy, while the same person can be stunned by mahlerian noise and find it a modern thing.


No, no, I wasn't talking about "original harmonies", but harmonic relations that are functional (in the way that the Common Practice Era uses functional harmony).

Example: in Mahler, every dissonance has a solution, even though it may come later rather than earlier. Everything is resolved.

Debussy: have you in any other common practice composer seen parallel ascending dominant seventh chords leading nowhere?


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## Aramis (Mar 1, 2009)

danae said:


> No, no, I wasn't talking about "original harmonies", but harmonic relations that are functional (in the way that the Common Practice Era uses functional harmony).
> 
> Example: in Mahler, every dissonance has a solution, even though it may come later rather than earlier. Everything is resolved.
> 
> Debussy: have you in any other common practice composer seen parallel ascending dominant seventh chords leading nowhere?


I suffer...!


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## danae (Jan 7, 2009)

Aramis said:


> I suffer...!


I'm sorry


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## Argus (Oct 16, 2009)

Scott Joplin - 'Maple Leaf Rag'. Copyright September 1899.

That sounds nothing like anything before it. It's not quite 'swinging' but it makes most classical from the time look positively square. It took the old minuets, mazurkas, waltzes and contredanses from the old world and reinvented them.


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## 0212 (Dec 28, 2009)

Thanks very much, this discussion has been really interesting and given me some ideas. Perhaps my question was a little vague, what I'm really looking for is pieces that cannot be easily catergorized into a particular style such as Baroque, Classical or Romantic - would you say this is true of the composers that have been mentioned?


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## tenor02 (Jan 4, 2008)

unfortunately, we've catagorized pretty much all of the major composers...debussy being considered impressionistic. maybe be a little more specific; are you looking for composers who practiced outside of their era? IE- mendelson practiced in a "baroque" style?


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## 0212 (Dec 28, 2009)

Kind of - mostly I'm looking for composers who might sound like they come from outside the Common Practice era, I think Debussy seemed to be a good example of that. Composers who practiced outside their specific style era within the C.P.E could also be relevant, but for the most part I'm looking for examples of the former.


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## Weston (Jul 11, 2008)

Well, Beethoven's Grosse Fuge sounds like it's outside of anything experienced by mankind, let alone the common practice. It is however on closer listen firmly common practice I think. It only sounds like Shostakovich meets Baalzeebub on first hearing.

Also - I remember hearing a radio show about an early vocal music composer, early Renaissance maybe, who would use bizarre dissonance and somehow was not excommunicated. I have searched for decades for this composer and still don't know who he was. I wish someone knew. I remember it sounding eerie even by today's standards. I've got to start keeping notes on these things someday.


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## Artemis (Dec 8, 2007)

I'm afraid to say that I don't think that many of the suggestions so far have answered the question correctly. There is one exception which I will mention below.

The "common practice era" (CPE) comprises baroque, classical and romantic styles and broadly corresponds to the period 1600-1910. The romantic style survived beyond 1910 (eg Nielsen, Respighi) but was giving way to new forms by then. The CPE does not include styles like impressionism that began to develop in the late 19th C styles with Satie and Debussy, and Ravel to a more limited extent.

As I understand the question, it asks what pieces of music which are normally classified as belonging to the CPE don't sound much like music from that era (at least to a non-expert). The matter of impressionisn, or any other 20th C styles which may have appeared prematurely in the late 19th C, is therefore irrelevant.

The possible exception I mentioned is Beethoven's Gross Fuge, Op 133, which doesn't sound like a movement from a classical era SQ. It was highly unusual in its own time and remained a peculiarity for many decades afterwards. No-one else in the 19th C went anywhere near that style. 

Beyond this work it is very difficult to pick any other obvious cases. I guess what we are looking for is anything which is romantic but which stretched the definitions to the limit in the direction of 20th C forms. I'm stuck for ideas, pro tem, so I'll leave it there and think about it further.


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## kmisho (Oct 22, 2009)

Charles Ives, but I think he was one of the pivotal figures ending the era and beginning a new one.


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## Artemis (Dec 8, 2007)

kmisho said:


> Charles Ives, but I think he was one of the pivotal figures ending the era and beginning a new one.


What particular pieces by Ives are you thinking of?


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## kmisho (Oct 22, 2009)

Artemis said:


> What particular pieces by Ives are you thinking of?


Both Central park in the Dark and The Unanswered Question appeared before 1910 and they are way out in left field for their time.


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## 0212 (Dec 28, 2009)

I think the question could also refer to composers such as Schubert who has one foot in the classical period and one in romantic, would it be fair to say his work is representative of both periods? Are there examples of his work that sound BOTH classical and romantic and hence we cannot define them as one?


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## 0212 (Dec 28, 2009)

Also thanks for all the advice so far!


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## kmisho (Oct 22, 2009)

Mozart's 40th symphony in G minor clearly straddles the classical/romantic fence.


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## Dim7 (Apr 24, 2009)

kmisho said:


> Mozart's 40th symphony in G minor clearly straddles the classical/romantic fence.


How? For being a classical symphony in a minor key?


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## kmisho (Oct 22, 2009)

In its inclination toward a more emotional tone.


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## Artemis (Dec 8, 2007)

0212 said:


> I think the question could also refer to composers such as Schubert who has one foot in the classical period and one in romantic, would it be fair to say his work is representative of both periods? Are there examples of his work that sound BOTH classical and romantic and hence we cannot define them as one?


I'm not following this discussion too well, I'm afraid.

Your original request was for a list of composers, or their music, which was produced in the common practice era which doesn't sound as though it belongs there. As already advised, the main answer is primarily impressionist music or anything with a predominantly nationalist flavour outside the romantic sphere.

Now you appear to asking for names of composers - or any specific works - belonging to the common practice era who/which had a foot in more than one camp. Is that right? I trust you realise that this is a totally different question to the former.

If so, it's common knowledge that Beethoven and Schubert are the two primary composers who are often regarded as transitional figures between the classical and romantic eras. Another example from that same time-frame would be Weber.

But to ask for examples of specific works which are a mixture of romantic and classical elements is decidedly very hazardous. You can't really say, for example, that one movement is classical, the next romantic, etc, so that the work is classical/romantic. If any multi-movement work contains a clear romantic element then the whole work would normally be regarded as romantic, not just half of it or whatever fraction is relevant according to the number of movements.

If you want an example of such a work which changes in this way then a good one would be Schuberts's piano sonata No 20, D 959 (the so-called A flat sonata). The first movement is in pretty conventional classical period form. However, the slow second movement of that work hits you loud and clear as a romantic piece. It's an astonishing contrast and one of the most incredible surprises in the whole of Schubert's music. If you can, try to listen to the whole sonata and I trust you will see what I mean.


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## Dim7 (Apr 24, 2009)

kmisho said:


> In its inclination toward a more emotional tone.


I'd prefer to hear less subjective arguments.


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## kmisho (Oct 22, 2009)

Dim7 said:


> I'd prefer to hear less subjective arguments.


I'm not making this up out of the blue. The progression into romanticism is frequently traced from late Mozart through Beethoven, Weber, Schubert into Liszt, Mendelssohn, Chopin.

Beethoven didn't just invent Romanticism in a dream. The kernel of it already existed in Mozart, Haydn, of whom Beethoven was well aware.


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## danae (Jan 7, 2009)

kmisho said:


> I'm not making this up out of the blue. The progression into romanticism is frequently traced from late Mozart through Beethoven, Weber, Schubert into Liszt, Mendelssohn, Chopin.
> 
> Beethoven didn't just invent Romanticism in a dream. The kernel of it already existed in Mozart, Haydn, of whom Beethoven was well aware.


First of all, no one "invented" romanticism!

Second, concerning the "pathos" and emotion in Mozart's K.550: indeed it's most romantic of all his symphonies, the majority of which is written in a major key. However, don't forget the _Sturm und Drang_ period that preceded this symphony for at least 15 years. Haydn, CPE Bach and others wrote a lot of "pathetic" (in the sense of "having pathos") music during the 1760s and 1770s.


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## kmisho (Oct 22, 2009)

danae said:


> First of all, no one "invented" romanticism!
> 
> Second, concerning the "pathos" and emotion in Mozart's K.550: indeed it's most romantic of all his symphonies, the majority of which is written in a major key. However, don't forget the _Sturm und Drang_ period that preceded this symphony for at least 15 years. Haydn, CPE Bach and others wrote a lot of "pathetic" (in the sense of "having pathos") music during the 1760s and 1770s.


That supports what I said. There is still a thing called the "romantic period" and Beethoven is typically counted as its first member. Beethoven, really, is an even better example of a transitional figure. While his music has emotional content and even outbursts at times, it remained firmly rooted in the classical world in terms of harmony, melody, form.

Sturm und drang was a clear sign of the onset of emotional tastes that led up to Romanticism. Mozart was not immune.

JS Bach, and some before him, wrote blatantly emotional music such as O Mensch Bewein dein Sunde Gross from the Orglebuchlein.

The history of music is replete with the notion that it can carry emotion going back farther than Plato's discussion of ethos.

I don't see that we have any real disagreements here.


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## Dim7 (Apr 24, 2009)

kmisho said:


> I'm not making this up out of the blue. The progression into romanticism is frequently traced from late Mozart through Beethoven, Weber, Schubert into Liszt, Mendelssohn, Chopin.
> 
> Beethoven didn't just invent Romanticism in a dream. The kernel of it already existed in Mozart, Haydn, of whom Beethoven was well aware.


Perhaps you're not making that out of the blue but you're not really arguing for the claim either. What in the symphony no. 40 foreshadows the romantic period? "Emotional" tone is a vague answer; personally I don't find it particularly emotional. I don't think it's any less emotional than your typical, ridiculously happy classical symphony.


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## Artemis (Dec 8, 2007)

kmisho said:


> .. Beethoven, really, is an even better example of a transitional figure. While his music has emotional content and even outbursts at times, it remained firmly rooted in the classical world in terms of harmony, melody, form.


Yes, yes it's all in Charles Rosen's books. I would agree with you but, since you are fairly new here, maybe I should point out that there have been several discussions of this very issue on various occasions over the past couple of years. There was one such thread quite recently. It generates the same kind of disagreements time and time again. Obviously you have every justification for making the point but be warned it's old hat here, and many people won't agree that Beethoven remained firmly in the classical camp. They like to think that he woke up one day around the time of Eroica and thenceforth all was "romantic". I can forsee all the same old arguments coming out yet again. Count me out this time.


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## 0212 (Dec 28, 2009)

I think you'll all be pleased to know I've finished my assignment now, sorry my questions were confusing/conflicting! Thank you for all the help though, I've used lots of your examples and it's been very interesting researching them all and discovering music I hadn't heard before.


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## Ravellian (Aug 17, 2009)

Yes. Check out the second movement of Beethoven's final piano sonata, Op. 111. It's pretty wacko. Also, one of Schubert's songs from the Schwanengesang cycle, I believe it's "Die Stadt", is atonal.


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