Chapter 22:Romantic Music: Piano Music
The Piano• Improved by the new technologies of the Industrial
Revolution – Range extended to 88 keys
• Home music making
• Virtuosi pianists
Robert Schumann: Carnaval (1834) • Collection of 21 short piano pieces written while a
student in Leipzig
• “Carnivalesque goings-on:” Musically depicted colorful character, including mardi gras characters, Clara, Chopin, and Paganini
• Signs of bipolar disorder already evident here– “Eusebius” is meek and sensitive while “Florestan” is
assertive, even fiery
• Started the high-end music magazine Die neue Zeitschrift für Musik– Wrote both as Eusebius and Florestan
Frédéric Chopin (1810-1849)• “The Poet of the Piano”
• Born in Warsaw, Poland
• Made his career in Paris
• Use of Tempo Rubato
Nocturne in Eb major, Op. 9, No. 2 (1832)
• Nocturne:
Franz Liszt (1811-1886)• Flamboyant artistic personality
• Compositions demand great virtuosity
• Established the modern piano recital
• Etude:
Transcendental Etude No. 8 “Wilde Jagd” (1851)
• “Wild Hunt”