1. Program Music

2. Program music is a type of art music that attempts to musically render an extra- musical narrative. The narrative itself might be offered to the audience in the form of program notes, inviting imaginative correlations with the music. – The paradigmatic example is Hector Berlioz's Symphonie fantastique, which relates a drug- induced series of morbid fantasies concerning the unrequited love of a sensitive poet involving murder, execution, and the torments of Hell.

3. Absolute Music Absolute music, in contrast, is intended to be appreciated without any particular reference to the outside world. The term is almost exclusively applied to works in the European classical music tradition, particularly those from the Romantic music period of the 19th century, during which the concept was popular, but pieces which fit the description have long been a part of music. The term is usually reserved for purely instrumental works (pieces without singers and lyrics), and not used, for example for Opera or Lieder.

4. Program Music in the 19 th Century Program music particularly flourished in Romantic era. Program music during the Romantic Music Period was purely instrumental and the composer wrote this type of piece based off of non-musical ideas, images,or events. – Ludwig van Beethoven’s 1808 Symphony No. 6 (Pastoral) is "whole work can be perceived without description – it is more an expression of feelings rather than tone-painting.” Yet the work clearly contains depictions of bird calls, a babbling brook, a storm, and so on.

5. Examples of Romantic Program Music Hector Berlioz's Symphonie fantastique was a musical narration of a hyperbolically emotional love story he wrote himself. Franz Liszt did provide explicit programs for many of his piano pieces but he is also the inventor of the term symphonic poem. In 1874, Modest Mussorgsky composed using only the dynamic range of one piano a series of pieces describing seeing a gallery of ten of his friend's paintings and drawings in his Pictures at an Exhibition, later orchestrated by Maurice Ravel. The French composer Camille Saint-Saëns wrote many short pieces of program music which he called Tone Poems. His most famous are probably the Danse Macabre and several movements from the Carnival of the Animals. The composer Paul Dukas is perhaps best known for his tone poem The Sorcerer's Apprentice, based on a tale from Goethe.

6. Possibly the most adept at musical depiction in his program music was the German composer Richard Strauss – symphonic poems include Tod und Verklärung (portraying a dying man and his entry into heaven), Don Juan (based on the ancient legend of Don Juan), Till Eulenspiegels lustige Streiche (based on episodes in the career of the legendary German figure Till Eulenspiegel), Don Quijote (portraying episodes in the life of Cervantes' character, Don Quixote), Ein Heldenleben (which depicts episodes in the life of an unnamed hero often taken to be Strauss himself) and Sinfonia Domestica (which portrays episodes in the composer's own married life, including putting the baby to bed). – Strauss is reported to have said that music can describe anything, even a teaspoon!

7. Nationalism Musical nationalism refers to the use of musical ideas or motifs that are identified with a specific country, region, or ethnicity, such as folk tunes and melodies, rhythms, and harmonies inspired by them. Musical nationalism can also include the use of folklore as a basis for programmatic works including opera. Although some evidence of the trend can be seen as early as the late 18th century, nationalism as a musical phenomenon is generally understood to have emerged part way into the Romantic era, beginning around the mid-19th century and continuing well into the twentieth.

8. It initially began as a reaction against the dominance of "German" music (that is, the European classical tradition) and later developed alongside the growing movements for national liberation and self-determination that characterized much of the 19th century. Countries or regions most commonly linked to musical nationalism include Russia, Czechoslovakia, Poland, Romania, Scandinavia, Spain, UK, Latin America and the United States. musical nationalism is a term often used to describe non-European 20th century music as well, in particular that originating in Latin America.

9. Russia Until the 19th century, Russian art music had been dominated by foreign musicians. Peter the Great (1689– 1725) had begun this trend by importing foreign musicians to modernize his kingdom. As a result, very few Russian compositions in the western European art music tradition exist before Glinka. Mikhail Glinka (1804-1857) – Mikhail Glinka was the first Russian composer to give a native voice to common musical styles of the day. – After studying music and visiting Italy and Berlin, Glinka composed an opera about the Russian peasant and hero Ivan Susanin. The work was titled A Life for the Tsar, and used several aspects new to Russian music. It used recitative instead of spoken dialogue, and had recurring themes. – There were two Russian folk tunes in the opera, and several more tunes that had the characteristics of folk music.

10. The FiveMoguchaya kuchka (The Mighty Handful) is a phrase coined by Russian music critic Vladimir Stasov to describe a group of five Russian composers whose purpose was to compose music in a Russian style. Members of the five were Mily Balakirev (1836–1910), the leader of the group, César Cui (1835–1918), Modest Mussorgsky (1839–1881), Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov (1844– 1908), and Alexander Borodin (1833–1887). – The Five felt that the folk and religious music of the Russian people should be used a basis for composition. – They tried to avoid strict counterpoint in the Germanic style, as well as certain other techniques employed in western Europe. – They preferred Romanticism and realism over Classical form. Some of the distinguishing stylistic characteristics of this group included use of non-functional tonal progressions, asymmetrical meters, and a coloristic approach to orchestration.

11. Czechoslovakia Czechoslovakia was a country formed in 1918 by the combination of the Bohemian, Moravian, and Slovakian territories. These territories had been under the control of the Habsburg Empire. As a result, the imperial language, German, and the imperial religion, Catholicism, had become a way of life for the Czech people. To preserve the native language, the Provisional Theater was organized in Prague. This theater promoted the Czech language, composers, folk music, and programs using national themes. Bedřich Smetana (1824-1884) – the first great Czech nationalist composer. – He wrote his first nationalist work in 1863, in Czech, as a contest entry to the Provisional Theater. He learned to read and write Czech to enter the competition. – This opera Braniboři v Čechách (The Brandenburgers in Bohemia) has a historic plot, but the music does not represent folk song.His second opera, Prodaná nevěsta (The Bartered Bride, 1863–1866), incorporates folk melodies, and was a success beyond Czechoslovakia. Also included in his nationalistic works are the six tone poems Má vlast (My Fatherland, 1872–1880).

12. The Moldau from Má vlast Vltava, also known by its German name Die Moldau (or The Moldau), was composed between 20 November and 8 December 1874 and was premiered on 4 April 1875. Smetana uses tone painting to evoke the sounds of one of Bohemia's great rivers. – In his own words:The composition describes the course of the Vltava, starting from the two small springs, the Cold and Warm Vltava, to the unification of both streams into a single current, the course of the Vltava through woods and meadows, through landscapes where a farmer's wedding is celebrated, the round dance of the mermaids in the night's moonshine: on the nearby rocks loom proud castles, palaces and ruins aloft. The Vltava swirls into the St John's Rapids; then it widens and flows toward Prague, past the Vyšehrad, and then majestically vanishes into the distance, ending at the Labe (or Elbe, in German).

13. Antonín Dvořák (1841-1904) – The most successful of the Czech nationalist composers. He performed viola in the Provisional Theater under Smetana, and was mentored by Brahms. – Dvořák included Bohemian themes and elements into much of his music. In 1871, he left the Provisional Theater and began to set a libretto by a Czech writer, Lobesky, titled Král a uhlíř (The King and the Charcoal Burner). Unfortunately, this opera was not successful. – More notable for their national content are his sixteen Slavonic Dances, eight in Op. 46 (1878) and eight in Op. 72 (1886), plus the three Slavonic Rhapsodies, Op. 45 (1880). – Dvořák was invited to New York to direct the first national conservatory in America. While abroad, he studied African American and Native American music. Some say that these styles are incorporated into his American works: Symphony no. 9 op. 95 (From the New World), The “American" string quartet op. 96, and the "American" string quintet, op. 97.

14. Leoš Janáček (1854-1928) Janáček did a lot of work researching and cataloguing Moravian folk music. His work inspired further research. Because of his interest in folk music, he was predisposed to modality and pentatonic scales which appear frequently in Moravian folk music. He generally wrote without key signatures to freely move between modes. His most famous opera, Jenůfa (1904), was originally written in Czech and translated into German. Janáček supervised the translation carefully to preserve the integrity of the libretto.

15. Norway Edvard Grieg (1843–1907) – Grieg began composing national music after visiting Ole Bull, a violinist and researcher of folk music. – His most notable pieces are the incidental music for plays, including his music for Ibsen's Peer Gynt (1874–1875). He also composed many piano works in a national style.

16. Finland Jean Sibelius (1865–1957) – Jean Sibelius had strong patriotic feelings for Finland. He chose to write program music rather than base his works on Finnish folk music. For his contributions, the government awarded him a pension. In 1899, patriotism was running high in Finland. Sibelius composed the symphonic poem Finlandia (1899) for a festival, and this rallied the Finnish citizens into a patriotic fervor. A portion of this tone poem has been arranged as a chorale; it remains an important national song of Finland, and is also present in many Protestant hymnals.