BM or BMus Bachelor of Music Western Music History Periods 5 — Questions and Answers
Question 1: The Burgundian school of the early 15th century was influential for developing which characteristic texture?
- Dense, six-voice sacred polyphony
- Three-voice texture with the melody in the top voice (Correct answer)
- Strict monophonic plainchant
- Two-voice parallel organum
Correct answer: Three-voice texture with the melody in the top voice
Burgundian composers like Dufay and Binchois favored three-voice texture with the main melody in the uppermost voice, influencing subsequent European polyphony.
Question 2: The madrigal, a defining Renaissance secular genre, is associated primarily with which two countries?
- France and Germany
- Italy and England (Correct answer)
- Spain and Portugal
- Netherlands and Flanders
Correct answer: Italy and England
The madrigal flourished first in Italy during the 16th century and was adopted enthusiastically in England by composers such as Morley, Weelkes, and Wilbye.
Question 3: The Baroque concerto grosso contrasts which two forces?
- Male and female voices
- A small group of soloists (concertino) and the full ensemble (ripieno) (Correct answer)
- Two equal choirs in antiphony
- Solo violin and solo cello
Correct answer: A small group of soloists (concertino) and the full ensemble (ripieno)
The concerto grosso alternates between the concertino (a small group of soloists) and the ripieno or tutti (the full orchestra), exploiting contrast of texture and volume.
Question 4: Classical-era composers generally avoided which harmonic practice that later became common in Romantic music?
- Using diminished seventh chords
- Extended chromatic modulations to remote keys within a movement (Correct answer)
- Employing the dominant seventh chord
- Writing in minor keys
Correct answer: Extended chromatic modulations to remote keys within a movement
While Classical composers modulated to closely related keys, the frequent and extended excursions to remote chromatic keys became a hallmark of the Romantic era.
Question 5: Which Romantic genre consists of a set of songs unified by a narrative or poetic theme, intended for performance as a complete cycle?
- Ballad
- Song cycle (Liederkreis) (Correct answer)
- Cantata
- Scena
Correct answer: Song cycle (Liederkreis)
A song cycle (Liederkreis) is a collection of art songs linked by a unified text, narrative thread, or poetic theme, such as Schubert's 'Winterreise.'
Question 6: Minimalism in late 20th-century music is characterized by:
- Complex chromaticism and frequent meter changes
- Gradual transformation of simple patterns through repetition (Correct answer)
- Return to Baroque counterpoint as a structural model
- Use of electronic sounds to replace acoustic instruments
Correct answer: Gradual transformation of simple patterns through repetition
Minimalism uses slowly evolving, repetitive musical patterns, gradual additive or subtractive processes, and steady pulse, as exemplified by Reich, Glass, and Riley.
Question 7: The term 'musique concrète,' coined by Pierre Schaeffer in 1948, describes music that:
- Is composed on paper without any electronic means
- Uses recorded real-world sounds manipulated and assembled on tape (Correct answer)
- Requires performers to follow a strictly notated score
- Incorporates concrete architectural acoustics into composition
Correct answer: Uses recorded real-world sounds manipulated and assembled on tape
Musique concrète uses recorded sounds from the environment (voices, machinery, nature), which are then edited, layered, and transformed on magnetic tape.
BM or BMus Bachelor of Music Western Music History Periods 5
The Burgundian school of the early 15th century was influential for developing which characteristic texture?