History+of+Romantic+Music

**The Romantic Period ** Romantic Period Prezi The Romantic period occurred after the Classical period from 1850 - 1920. It was an extremely dramatic change in music, while the Classical period was about strict rules, balance and restriction. The Romantic period contradicted the Classical period by introducing freedom, artistic creativity, and experimentation. In this period expressing an emotion or an idea was most important, therefore the melody was the dominant feature. With the dramatic change between periods came a range of new musical techniques, introduced to accommodate the rapid changes. The music and the composers of the Romantic period started to experiment with the length of compositions, interesting and expressive harmonies, and the relationship between tones. Also because of the high interest in emotional expression a great deal of dissonance was used as a way to present emotional music to its audience. Another feature of the Romantic period that was important was the experimentation and unique use of musical colour. With new instruments being added to the orchestra, composers wanted to get new and different sounds out of the instruments already used. One of the new forms of music that was used in the Romantic period was the symphonic poem. A symphonic poem is an orchestral piece that portrayed a story or had a literary or artistic background. Another was the art song, a vocal piece or work that place great importance on the written text or symbolic meaning of the text. This was created through an expressive melody line. Likewise, opera became extremely popular around this time, as continued express the issue of the day through music and stories. Political domination and the rise of religious group were some of the themes that composers built operas around. Another popular theme was stories about exotic and far away places that gave the audience an element of mystery and fantasy, this lent itself well to the expressive nature of the Romantic period. During the Romantic period, the virtuoso became extremely popular. A virtuoso could be any musical performer, ranging from singers to violinists. Most composers were also virtuoso performers, mostly pianists, so it was inevitable that the music they wrote was extremely difficult to play. The Romantic period was one of the most drastic changes in music. It broke all the rules of the Classical period and wanted to use music as another way to express a person’s emotions. It focused on the meaning and purpose behind the music and its main objective was to get an emotional reaction from its audience.
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