"Seventeenth Century--Monodic Revolution"
The Monodic Revolution marks the period when a great change occurred in musical thought: composers began writing simpler music, sung by a single voice and accompanied by instruments playing a simple succession of chords. This technique was first implemented in the opera, but eventually worked its way into many types and is still dominant today.
"Beginnings of Opera in France, Germany, and England"
The most direct impulse toward the creation of opera in France was given by the Mascarades. These were aristocratic entertainment presented with elaborate scenes and costumes in which a thin plot was maintained with singing and dancing.
The primary form of opera in Germany was the Singspiel (sung play) in which music was merely incorporated into spoken drama. This remained the only true German opera until the nineteenth century.
England had Masques, a derivative of the French Mascarade. There some evidence of Italian influence, but that seems to be the exception rather than the rule.
"Forms of Instrumental Music At the Opening of the Eighteenth Century"
The harmonic aspects of chords began to be perceived. Chords were no longer a combination of voices but a single unit. Major and minor keys also became apparent.
"Perfecting of the Sonata--Form--Haydn and Mozart"
Haydn and Mozart were two of the handful of geniuses who could accomplish the task of molding the sonata into the form "which was to be the principal vehicle for the expression of musical ideas for more than a century" (250). This chapter deals with the sonata work of these two composers.
"The Sonata and the Revolution--Beethoven"
Beethoven made the sonata more solid and suggestive, giving coherence to each movement. He also enlarged it and gave the needed strength to each part, causing another musical revolution.
"The Flowering of Romanticism--The Song and Its First Great Master, Schubert"
Romance is has come to be associated with "fantastic unreality or overemotional sentiment" (287), but this does not connote the qualities of all Romantic art. Romantic feelings first flow in the music of Franz Schubert.
"The Romantic Idealists--Mendelssohn, Schumann, and Chopin"
In idealistic Romanticism the subject is represented as the artist feels it. The artist uses all that is under his command to make his subject more vivid. The aforementioned pioneers in this area are the subjects in this chapter.
"The Romantic Realists--Berlioz and Liszt"
The realist portrays his subject how he sees it rather than how he feels it. He shares his vision of the subject so we may realize his emotions through that vision. The realist does not use mere physical suggestions such as thunder or bird songs, for that is not music. His music is designed to awaken emotions and greatly intensify the suggestions.
"Anti-Wagnerian Tendencies--Johannes Brahms--Giuseppe Verdi"
In the mid-1800s, a group of young composers, headed by Brahms, expressed discontent with the traditional techniques of the masters of the past. They realized that much could be expressed in sound which had not been accepted into the legitimate scope of music, and revised the rules and principles of structure that had guided music for so long.
Other chapters in the book whose titles offer sufficient explanation of their subject matter:
"Forms of Vocal Music at the Opening of the Eighteenth Century"
"Bach and Handel"
"Gluck's Reform of the Opera"
"Evolution of the Modern Sonata"
"Opera from Gluck to Wagner"
Wagnerian Music Drama"
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Jesse D. Hurlbut--Last Updated November 5, 1993