# Composers who embodied each era?



## Guest (Feb 13, 2019)

I'm talking not of the composers' music, but their philosophies on music and society in general, which embodied the spirit of each era. For me, I'd go for Beethoven for early Romantic, and Wagner (minus the anti-Semitism) for Romantic in general.


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## Xisten267 (Sep 2, 2018)

For me:

Middle Ages - Machaut;
Early Renaissance - Josquin;
Late Renaissance - Palestrina;
Early Baroque - Monteverdi;
Middle Baroque - Lully;
Late Baroque - Bach;
Classical - Mozart;
Early Romantic - Beethoven;
Middle Romantic - Wagner;
Late Romantic - Mahler;
Impressionism - Debussy;
Early 20th Century - Stravinsky;
Middle 20th Century - Messiaen.


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## Enthusiast (Mar 5, 2016)

An interesting question! It is difficult because the really big names were often more than prototypical. So I could say Bach embodies the Baroque ... but what about the very different Handel and Vivaldi? If I choose Bach does that mean the very different others are somehow less typical? And which is the compliment? Is it "better" to be the one who embodies the time or the one who goes beyond being merely that?

Haydn might work better than Mozart as embodying the Classical era. Beethoven practically defines early Romaticism and Mahler (or the vary different Strauss) could be said to embody late Romanticism. I always see Schumann as the most archetypal Romantic composer. For the Modern (say, 1910-1950) there are just so many different strands that no-one could come close to embodying the period: is it Stravinsky, Prokofiev, Shostakovich, Schoenberg, Bartok? And how does the one you choose somehow represent the others? And after that it becomes even more difficult!


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## Guest (Feb 13, 2019)

I'm not that familiar with Mahler. Why would he embody late Romantic? Just curious.


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## Guest (Feb 13, 2019)

Also I think Schumann was a bit too restrained for being the archetypal Romantic. But that's just my opinion.


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## hammeredklavier (Feb 18, 2018)

HSW said:


> their philosophies on music







_"This movement is one of the finest examples of the much written about duality in the Classical Style of Haydn, Mozart and Beethoven. Between the learned style of complex dense counterpoint and the popular style of homophonic melodies with subjugated accompaniment."_

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neoclassicism_(music)
"Neoclassicism in music was a twentieth-century trend, particularly current in the interwar period, in which composers sought to return to aesthetic precepts associated with the broadly defined concept of "classicism", namely order, balance, clarity, economy, and emotional restraint."

https://www.gresham.ac.uk/lecture/transcript/print/mozart-quartet-in-c-major-k465-dissonance/
_"However, the set of six quartets that Mozart wrote in the first half of the 1780s, to which the 'Dissonance' belongs, is very different, and the differences come precisely in the absence of that clear division between 'old-style' counterpoint and 'new-style' melody and accompaniment. The string quartet, at least in the hands of Mozart, found a new balance, one sometimes associated the very ideals of the Enlightenment. It is as if the elements of old-style fugal writing, with its strict independence of the voices, has somehow been combined with the new-style, melody-and-bass simplicity, in a 'modern' texture which has obvious elements of melody and accompaniment, but which constantly injects into this a sense of independence among the parts. No single instrument accompanies for very long: each of them plays an essential part in both the melodic development and its accompaniment. People near the time gave this new, more complex texture a severe-sounding German name; they called it thematische Arbeit, thematic working - all elements of the ensemble are independent (and individual), but each works with the others to produce the total effect."_


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## Eschbeg (Jul 25, 2012)

Enthusiast said:


> It is difficult because the really big names were often more than prototypical. So I could say Bach embodies the Baroque ... but what about the very different Handel and Vivaldi?


Considering that the king of genres in the Baroque period was opera, Bach was not only atypical but downright outmoded by comparison to Handel or Vivaldi. So either of the latter two would definitely be a better poster boy for the era than Bach.


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## Reichstag aus LICHT (Oct 25, 2010)

Allerius said:


> For me:
> 
> Middle Ages - Machaut;
> Early Renaissance - Josquin;
> ...


Looks good to me, although I'd put Haydn instead of Mozart and Richard Strauss instead of Mahler.


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## Botschaft (Aug 4, 2017)

Palestrina, Bach, Mozart, Brahms.


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## Bulldog (Nov 21, 2013)

Baroque - Embodied (Telemann), Transcended (Bach)
Classical - Embodied (Haydn), Transcended (Mozart)
Early Romantic - Embodied (Schubert), Transcended (Beethoven)
Romantic - Embodied (Chopin), Transcended (Wagner)
Late Romantic - Embodied (R. Strauss), Transcended (Mahler)
20th Century - Embodied (Shostakovich), Transcended (Schoenberg)


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## tdc (Jan 17, 2011)

Eschbeg said:


> Considering that the king of genres in the Baroque period was opera, Bach was not only atypical but downright outmoded by comparison to Handel or Vivaldi. So either of the latter two would definitely be a better poster boy for the era than Bach.


I'm not sure outmoded is really an accurate term in this context, it seems like more of an issue of preference and circumstance. For example in Bach's secular cantatas he often explored the format of _dramma per musica_, a term that also designates opera. In fact in both textual dramaturgy and musical design there is no difference between the genres. The only difference being that cantatas are shorter and unstaged. As in opera seria the subjects are generally drawn from classical mythology. There being no opera house in Leipzig, this format could give audiences there a taste of what was offered at the opera, such as at the royal opera in Dresden. Bach's work in this genre is in fact not at all a poor substitute for real opera, rather he shows a complete mastery of the dramatic genre and full understanding of the pacing of dialogue.

edit - also the Baroque era kicked off with the operas of Monteverdi, so again I'm not sure how being outmoded applies here. Opera is among the most old fashioned of all Baroque genres.


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## Red Terror (Dec 10, 2018)

Improbus said:


> Palestrina, Bach, Mozart, Brahms.


Desprez, Bach, Haydn, Beethoven.


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## Eschbeg (Jul 25, 2012)

tdc said:


> I'm not sure outmoded is really an accurate term in this context, it seems like more of an issue of preference and circumstance. For example in Bach's secular cantatas he often explored the format of _dramma per musica_, a term that also designates opera. In fact in both textual dramaturgy and musical design there is no difference between the genres. The only difference being that cantatas are shorter and unstaged. As in opera seria the subjects are generally drawn from classical mythology. There being no opera house in Leipzig, this format could give audiences there a taste of what was offered at the opera, such as at the royal opera in Dresden. Bach's work in this genre is in fact not at all a poor substitute for real opera, rather he shows a complete mastery of the dramatic genre and full understanding of the pacing of dialogue.


Given the direction European culture was going in the mid-18th century--musically, socially, politically, etc.--I think "outmoded" is exactly the right term. You're right to single out Bach's cantatas: while it is true that the cantata shares the same formal features as opera, the social functions of the two genres were worlds apart, and the hermetic world Bach occupied in the last 25 years of life, during which the bulk of the cantatas were written, couldn't have been further from the worldly, cosmopolitan one opera served. The success of opera seria, especially, born as it was in the Age of Absolutism, depended on how easily its clientele could read the historical and mythological situations in the libretto as metaphors for the stability and universality of the social order. So it seems fitting that the growth of the genre coincided with Bach's retreating further and further into the librettos of Picander, Neumeister, and other poets of Lutheranism (a faith founded on the very notion that the arbitrary categories of social order were a trivial matter in the eyes of God). When we consider the kind of anti-Enlightenment messages in those cantata librettos (my favorite is BWV 178 and its tenor aria "Schweig, schweig nur, taumelnde Vernunft!", or "Shut up, just shut up, overbearing reason!"), the case for Bach being out of step with the 18th century is even stronger.



tdc said:


> also the Baroque era kicked off with the operas of Monteverdi, so again I'm not sure how being outmoded applies here. Opera is among the most old fashioned of all Baroque genres.


The fact that the genre of opera was over a century old by the time of Bach did little to undermine its prominence during his lifetime. In fact, the literally epoch-making boost that opera got in the 1730s courtesy of Pergolesi, without which the career of Mozart is almost unthinkable, not only attested to the genre's continuing vitality but also, and fittingly, coincided with Bach's holing up in Leipzig for the remainder of his life.


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## Tchaikov6 (Mar 30, 2016)

Baroque - Bach
Classical - Mozart
Romantic - Brahms
Early Modern - Debussy
Late Modern - Messiaen


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## tdc (Jan 17, 2011)

Eschbeg said:


> The fact that the genre of opera was over a century old by the time of Bach did little to undermine its prominence during his lifetime. In fact, the literally epoch-making boost that opera got in the 1730s courtesy of Pergolesi, without which the career of Mozart is almost unthinkable, not only attested to the genre's continuing vitality but also, *and fittingly, coincided with Bach's holing up in Leipzig for the remainder of his life.*


Except the part in bold is misleading because Bach was in fact trying to get out of Leipzig almost from the moment he got there, due to being promised an income much larger than what he actually received, and also clashing with some of his superiors there over musical matters. This is one of the reasons he applied for and eventually got a court title in Dresden. He also travelled to visit the Dresden opera regularly, often with his eldest son Wilhelm Friedemann.



Eschbeg said:


> we consider the kind of anti-Enlightenment messages in those cantata librettos (my favorite is BWV 178 and its tenor aria "Schweig, schweig nur, taumelnde Vernunft!", or *"Shut up, just shut up, overbearing reason!"*), the case for Bach being out of step with the 18th century is even stronger.


To me lines like that reflect an eternal immutable truth - human reason is folly when it is not anchored in spirituality. Timeless wisdom doesn't change regardless of what is currently being pedalled as 'truth' socially and politically. The so called Age of Reason I believe was taking a step farther back from the truth, (of course Religion is a mixed bag of lies and truths) but the "Age of Enlightenment" just replaced one form of mythology with another more dangerous form. We can see clearly where man's reason has taken us today.

Getting back to music and staying current Bach used his time to elevate the solo keyboard genre to heights never before dreamed of, showing an adaptation over time and rapprochement with current tastes, you can see a clear step forward from Books I and II of the WTC for example. He also made the keyboard concerto a viable genre, a newer Baroque form than opera and one that has enjoyed immense popularity to this day.


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## tdc (Jan 17, 2011)

It is not really possible to separate Bach's music from his philosophy on music. His music was his philosophy on music.


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## BrahmsWasAGreatMelodist (Jan 13, 2019)

As much as I love Brahms, I don't think it's fair to say that he's the poster-child of Romanticism (or any sub-era of Romanticism). Also, making choices for Late Romanticism onward is very tough seeing as "classical music" since then has been super variegated and arguably has entirely split into entirely different styles.


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## Eschbeg (Jul 25, 2012)

tdc said:


> Bach was in fact trying to get out of Leipzig almost from the moment he got there, due to being promised an income much larger than what he actually received, and also clashing with some of his superiors there over musical matters.


Just so: those musical matters were about finances and bureaucracy rather than the kind of musical culture he had been hired to direct. From the beginning of his Leipzig employment, the expectation was that Bach would remake the musical life of the city and put its cultural standing on par with its already venerable academic standing. His bickering with bureaucrats over musical authority revolved not around what form this was to take but over who ran it. Some twenty years before his Leipzig tenure, he had already professed that his ultimate career goal was to be in charge of "a regulated church music."

So one can fairly treat the music Bach produced in those Leipzig decades as an indication of the kind of musical culture he was inclined to be part of, and it starkly differs from the careers of the above mentioned composers carved out for themselves. And it was definitely a conscious choice on Bach's part to focus on church cantatas. He didn't have to. His job of providing music to the city's four churches could have been fulfilled by simply using previously written music, both his own and others'. In fact, in the early years of his Leipzig stay Bach fell into a pattern of composing new church works every other week while using previously written music in between, and his reason for doing eventually became evident: he was maximizing the amount of time he had to write new material, so that he eventually he had written enough cantatas to meet the needs of the entire church calendar with his own music.

When the first documented signs of discontent in Leipzig appear, Bach voiced them to acquaintances with connections to similar church-oriented positions. It is the image on which he staked his career, again in marked contrast to the likes of Handel or Vivaldi, or even Telemann, who quintipled Bach's cantata output without ever pigeon-holing himself into the role of cantor-composer as Bach did.



tdc said:


> This is one of the reasons he applied for and eventually got a court title in Dresden. He also travelled to visit the Dresden opera regularly, often with his eldest son Wilhelm Friedemann.


And the work he wrote to cement that appointment, BWV 232, says quite a lot about how Bach chose to present himself to a court accustomed to opera.


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## Botschaft (Aug 4, 2017)

Robert Schumann on Johannes Brahms:

"I thought, [...] that [...] there should and must suddenly appear one called to give voice to the highest expression of the times in an ideal way, one who would bring us mastery not in gradual developments, but rather, like Minerva, should spring fully armored from the head of Jupiter. And he is come, a young blood, over whose cradle graces and heroes kept watch."


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