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Romantic music
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Romantic music is a term that denotes an era of

Western classical music that began in the late
18th or early 19th century. It was related to
Romanticism, the European artistic and literary
movement that arose in the second half of the
18th century, and Romantic music in particular
dominated the Romantic movement in Germany.

Periods and eras of

Western classical music
Early
Medieval
Renaissance

c. 5001400
c. 14001600

Common practice
In the Romantic period, music became more
expressive and emotional, expanding to
Baroque
c. 16001750
encompass literary, artistic, and philosophical
Classical
c. 17301820
themes. Famous early Romantic composers
Romantic
c. 17801910
include Schumann, Chopin, Mendelssohn,
Bellini, and Berlioz. The late 19th century saw a
Impressionist
c. 18751925
dramatic expansion in the size of the orchestra
Modern and contemporary
and in the loudness and diversity of instruments
Modern High modern
c. 18901975
used in this ensemble. As well, public concerts
became a key part of urban middle class society,
20th-century
(19002000)
in contrast to earlier periods, when concerts were
Contemporary Postmodern
c. 1975present
mainly paid for by and done for aristocrats.
21st-century
(2000present)
Famous composers from the second half of the
century include Johann Strauss II, Brahms, Liszt,
Tchaikovsky, Verdi, and Wagner. Between 1890
and 1910, a third wave of composers including Dvok, Mahler, Richard Strauss, Puccini, and
Sibelius built on the work of middle Romantic composers to create even more complex and often
much longer musical works. A prominent mark of late 19th century music is its nationalistic
fervor, as exemplified by such figures as Dvok, Sibelius, and Grieg. Other prominent late-century
figures include Saint-Sans, Faur, Rachmaninoff and Franck.

Contents
1 Background
2 Traits
3 Trends of the 19th century
3.1 Non-musical influences
3.2 Nationalism
4 See also
5 References

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6 Further reading
7 External links

Background
The Romantic movement was an artistic, literary, and intellectual
movement that originated in the second half of the 18th century in Europe
and strengthened in reaction to the Industrial Revolution (Encyclopdia
Britannica n.d.). In part, it was a revolt against social and political norms
of the Age of Enlightenment and a reaction against the scientific
rationalization of nature (Casey 2008). It was embodied most strongly in
the visual arts, music, and literature, but had a major impact on
historiography (Levin 1959,) and education (Gutek 1995, 22054), and
was in turn influenced by developments in natural history (Nichols 2005,
308309).
One of the first significant applications of the term to music was in 1789,
in the Mmoires by the Frenchman Andr Grtry, but it was
E.T.A. Hoffmann who really established the principles of
musical romanticism, in a lengthy review of Ludwig van
Beethoven's Fifth Symphony published in 1810, and in an
1813 article on Beethoven's instrumental music. In the first of
these essays Hoffmann traced the beginnings of musical
Romanticism to the later works of Haydn and Mozart. It was
Hoffmann's fusion of ideas already associated with the term
"Romantic", used in opposition to the restraint and formality
of Classical models, that elevated music, and especially
instrumental music, to a position of pre-eminence in
Romanticism as the art most suited to the expression of
emotions. It was also through the writings of Hoffmann and
other German authors that German music was brought to the
centre of musical Romanticism (Samson 2001).

Traits

The title character

from a 19th-century
performance of
Wagner's opera
Siegfried

Wanderer Above the Sea of Fog, by

Caspar David Friedrich is an
example of Romantic painting.

Characteristics often attributed to Romanticism, including

acting and singing with tyrance
a new preoccupation with and surrender to Nature
a fascination with the past, particularly the Middle Ages and legends of medieval chivalry
a turn towards the mystic and supernatural, both religious and merely spooky
a longing for the infinite

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mysterious connotations of remoteness, the unusual and fabulous, the strange and surprising
a focus on the nocturnal, the ghostly, the frightful, and terrifying
fantastic seeing and spiritual experiences
a new attention given to national identity
emphasis on extreme subjectivism
interest in the autobiographical
discontent with musical formulas and conventions
Such lists, however, proliferated over time, resulting in a "chaos of antithetical phenomena",
criticized for their superficiality and for signifying so many different things that there came to be no
central meaning. The attributes have also been criticized for being too vague. For example, features
of the "ghostly and supernatural" could apply equally to Mozart's Don Giovanni from 1787 and
Stravinsky's The Rake's Progress from 1951 (Kravitt 1992, 9395).

Trends of the 19th century

Non-musical influences
Events and changes that happen in society such as ideas, attitudes, discoveries, inventions, and
historical events always affect music. For example, the Industrial Revolution was in full effect by
the late 18th century and early 19th century. This event had a very profound effect on music: there
were major improvements in the mechanical valves, and keys that most woodwinds and brass
instruments depend on. The new and innovative instruments could be played with more ease and
they were more reliable (Schmidt-Jones and Jones 2004, 3).
Another development that had an effect on music was the rise of the middle class. Composers
before this period lived on the patronage of the aristocracy. Many times their audience was small,
composed mostly of the upper class and individuals who were knowledgeable about music
(Schmidt-Jones and Jones 2004, 3). The Romantic composers, on the other hand, often wrote for
public concerts and festivals, with large audiences of paying customers, who had not necessarily
had any music lessons (Schmidt-Jones and Jones 2004, 3). Composers of the Romantic Era, like
Elgar, showed the world that there should be "no segregation of musical tastes" (Young 1967, 525)
and that the "purpose was to write music that was to be heard" (Young 1967, 527).

Nationalism
During the Romantic period, music often took on a much more nationalistic purpose. For example,
Jean Sibelius' Finlandia has been interpreted to represent the rising nation of Finland, which would
someday gain independence from Russian control (Child 2006). Frdric Chopin was one of the
first composers to incorporate nationalistic elements into his compositions. Joseph Machlis states,
"Poland's struggle for freedom from tsarist rule aroused the national poet in Poland. Examples of
musical nationalism abound in the output of the romantic era. The folk idiom is prominent in the
Mazurkas of Chopin" (Machlis 1963, 14950). His mazurkas and polonaises are particularly

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notable for their use of nationalistic rhythms. Moreover, "During World War II the Nazis forbade
the playing of Chopin's Polonaises in Warsaw because of the powerful symbolism residing in
these works" (Machlis 1963, 150). Other composers, such as Bedich Smetana, wrote pieces that
musically described their homelands; in particular, Smetana's Vltava is a symphonic poem about
the Moldau River in the modern-day Czech Republic and the second in a cycle of six nationalistic
symphonic poems collectively titled M vlast (My Homeland) (Grunfeld 1974, 11213). Smetana
also composed eight nationalist operas, all of which remain in the repertory. They established him
as the first Czech nationalist composer as well as the most important Czech opera composer of the
generation who came to prominence in the 1860s (Ottlov, Tyrrell, and Pospil 2001).

See also
List of Romantic-era composers
Neoromanticism (music)
History of music

References
Beard, David, and Kenneth Gloag. 2005. Musicology: The Key Concepts. Cornwall:
Routledge.
Casey, Christopher. 2008. "'Grecian Grandeurs and the Rude Wasting of Old Time': Britain,
the Elgin Marbles, and Post-Revolutionary Hellenism". Foundations 3, no. 1
(http://web1.johnshopkins.edu/foundations/wp-content/pdfs/foundations-full-3-1pdf.pdf):3164 (Accessed 24 September 2012).
Child, Fred. 2006. "Salonen on Sibelius (http://www.npr.org/templates/story
/story.php?storyId=6565718)". Performance Today. National Public Radio.
Encyclopdia Britannica (n.d.). "Romanticism". Britannica.com. Retrieved 2010-08-24.
Feld, Marlon. n.d. "Summary of Western Classical Music History (http://www.columbia.edu
/itc/music/ito/history/)". Linked from John Ito, Music Humanities, section 16. New York:
Columbia University (accessed 11 April 2016).
Grtry, Andr-Ernest-Modeste. 1789. Mmoires, ou Essai sur la musique. 3 vols. Paris: Chez
lauteur, de L'Imprimerie de la rpublique, 1789. Second, enlarged edition, Paris: Imprimerie
de la rpublique, pluvise, 1797. Republished, 3 vols., Paris: Verdiere, 1812; Brussels:
Whalen, 1829. Facsimile of the 1797 edition, Da Capo Press Music Reprint Series. New York:
Da Capo Press, 1971. Facsimile reprint in 1 volume of the 1829 Brussels edition, Bibliotheca
musica Bononiensis, Sezione III no. 43. Bologna: Forni Editore, 1978.
Grunfeld, Frederic V. 1974. Music. New York: Newsweek Books. ISBN 0-88225-101-5
(cloth); ISBN 0882251023 (de luxe).
Gutek, Gerald Lee. 1995. A History of the Western Educational Experience, second edition.
Prospect Heights, Ill.: Waveland Press. ISBN 0881338184.
Hoffmann, Ernst Theodor Amadeus. 1810. "Recension: Sinfonie pour 2 Violons, 2 Violes,
Violoncelle e Contre-Violon, 2 Fltes, petite Flte, 2 Hautbois, 2 Clarinettes, 2 Bassons,

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Contrabasson, 2 Cors, 2 Trompettes, Timbales et 3 Trompes, compose et dedie etc. par

Louis van Beethoven. Leipsic, chez Breitkopf et Hrtel, Oeuvre 67. No. 5. des Sinfonies.
(Pr. 4 Rthlr. 12 Gr.)". Allgemeine musikalische Zeitung 12, no. 40 (4 July), cols. 63042 [Der
Beschluss folgt.]; 12, no. 41 (11 July), cols. 65259.
Kravitt, Edward F. 1992. "Romanticism Today (http://www.jstor.org/discover/10.2307
/741914?uid=3739696&uid=2&uid=4&uid=3739256&sid=21101694078771)". The Musical
Quarterly 76, no. 1 (Spring): 93109. (subscription required)
Levin, David. 1959. History as Romantic Art: Bancroft, Prescott, and Parkman. Stanford
Studies in Language and Literature 20, Stanford: Stanford University Press. Reprinted as a
Harbinger Book, New York: Harcourt, Brace & World Inc., 1963. Reprinted, New York: AMS
Press, 1967.
Machlis, Joseph. 1963.
Nichols, Ashton. 2005. "Roaring Alligators and Burning Tygers: Poetry and Science from
William Bartram to Charles Darwin". Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society
149, no. 3:30415.
Ottlov, Marta, John Tyrrell, and Milan Pospil. 2001. "Smetana, Bedich [Friedrich]". The
New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, second edition, edited by Stanley Sadie and
John Tyrrell. London: Macmillan Publishers.
Philips, Abbey. 2011. "Spacebomb: Truth Lies Somewhere in Between (http://rvanews.com
/features/spacebomb-truth-lies-somewhere-in-between/49992)". RVA News: Joaquin in
Memphis. (accessed 5 October 2015)
Samson, Jim. 2001. "Romanticism". The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians,
second edition, edited by Stanley Sadie and John Tyrrell. London: Macmillan Publishers.
Schmidt-Jones, Catherine, and Russell Jones. 2004. Introduction to Music Theory. [Houston,
TX]: Connexions Project. ISBN 1-4116-5030-1.
Young, Percy Marshall. 1967. A History of British Music. London: Benn.

Further reading
Adler, Guido. 1911. Der Stil in der Musik. Leipzig: Breitkopf & Hrtel.
Adler, Guido. 1919. Methode der Musikgeschichte. Leipzig: Breitkopf & Hrtel.
Adler, Guido. 1930. Handbuch der Musikgeschichte, second, thoroughly revised and greatly
expanded edition. 2 vols. Berlin-Wilmersdorf: H. Keller. Reprinted, Tutzing: Schneider, 1961.
Blume, Friedrich. 1970. Classic and Romantic Music, translated by M. D. Herter Norton from
two essays first published in Die Musik in Geschichte und Gegenwart. New York: W. W.
Norton.
Boyer, Jean-Paul. 1961. "Romantisme". Encyclopdie de la musique, edited by Franois
Michel, with Franois Lesure and Vladimir Fdorov, 3:58587. Paris: Fasquelle.
Cavalletti, Carlo. 2000. Chopin and Romantic Music, translated by Anna Maria Salmeri
Pherson. Hauppauge, NY: Barron's Educational Series. (Hardcover) ISBN 0-7641-5136-3;
ISBN 978-0-7641-5136-1.
Dahlhaus, Carl. 1979. "Neo-Romanticism". 19th-Century Music 3, no. 2 (November):
97105.

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Dahlhaus, Carl. 1980. Between Romanticism and Modernism: Four Studies in the Music of
the Later Nineteenth Century, translated by Mary Whittall in collaboration with Arnold
Whittall; also with Friedrich Nietsche, "On Music and Words", translated by Walter Arnold
Kaufmann. California Studies in 19th Century Music 1. Berkeley: University of California
Press. ISBN 0-520-03679-4 (cloth); 0520067487 (pbk). Original German edition, as Zwischen
Romantik und Moderne: vier Studien zur Musikgeschichte des spteren 19. Jahrhunderts.
Munich: Musikverlag Katzbichler, 1974.
Dahlhaus, Carl. 1985. Realism in Nineteenth-Century Music, translated by Mary Whittall.
Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-26115-5 (cloth); ISBN
0-521-27841-4 (pbk). Original German edition, as Musikalischer Realismus: zur
Musikgeschichte des 19. Jahrhunderts. Munich: R. Piper, 1982. ISBN 3-492-00539-X.
Dahlhaus, Carl. 1987. Untitled review of Leon Plantinga, Romantic Music: A History of
Musical Styles in Nineteenth-Century Europe and Anthology of Romantic Music, translated by
Ernest Sanders. 19th Century Music 11, no. 2:19496.
Einstein, Alfred. 1947. Music in the Romantic Era. New York: W. W. Norton.
Geck, Martin. 1998. "Realismus". Die Musik in Geschichte und Gegenwart: Allgemeine
Enzyklopdie der Musik begrnde von Friedrich Blume, second, revised edition, edited by
Ludwig Finscher. Sachteil 8: QuerSwi, cols. 9199. Kassel, Basel, London, New York,
Prague: Brenreiter; Suttgart and Weimar: Metzler. ISBN 3-7618-1109-8 (Brenreiter); ISBN
3-476-41008-0 (Metzler).
Grout, Donald Jay. 1960. A History of Western Music. New York: W. W. Norton & Company,
Inc.
Lang, Paul Henry. 1941. Music in Western Civilization. New York: W. W. Norton.
Mason, Daniel Gregory. 1936. The Romantic Composers. New York: Macmillan.
Plantinga, Leon. 1984. Romantic Music: A History of Musical Style in Nineteenth-Century
Europe. A Norton Introduction to Music History. New York: W. W. Norton. ISBN
0-393-95196-0; ISBN 978-0-393-95196-7.
Rosen, Charles. 1995. The Romantic Generation. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University
Press. ISBN 0-674-77933-9.
Rummenhller, Peter. 1989. Romantik in der Musik: Analysen, Portraits, Reflexionen.
Munich: Deutscher Taschenbuch Verlag; Kassel and New York: Brenreiter. ISBN
9783761812365 (Brenreiter); ISBN 9783761844939 (Taschenbuch Verlag); ISBN
9783423044936 (Taschenbuch Verlag).
Spencer, Stewart. 2008. "The 'Romantic Operas' and the Turn to Myth". In The Cambridge
Companion to Wagner, edited by Thomas S. Grey, 6773. Cambridge and New York:
Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-64299-X (cloth); ISBN 0-521-64439-9 (pbk).
Wagner, Richard. 1995. Opera and Drama, translated by William Ashton Ellis. Lincoln:
University of Nebraska Press. Originally published as volume 2 of Richard Wagner's Prose
Works (London: Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner & Co., 1900), a translation from Gesammelte
Schriften und Dichtungen (Leipzig, 187173, 1883).
Warrack, John. 2002. "Romanticism". The Oxford Companion to Music, edited by Alison
Latham. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-866212-2.
Wehnert, Martin. 1998. "Romantik und romantisch". Die Musik in Geschichte und

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Gegenwart: allgemeine Enzyklopdie der Musik, begrndet von Friedrich Blume, second
revised edition. Sachteil 8: QuerSwi, cols. 464507. Basel, Kassel, London, Munich, and
Prague: Brenreiter; Stuttgart and Weimar: Metzler.

External links
Music of the Romantic Era (http://public.wsu.edu/~brians/hum_303/romantic.html)
The Romantic Era (http://library.thinkquest.org/15413/history/history-rom.htm)
Era on line (http://www.essentialsofmusic.com/eras/romantic.html)
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