音樂欣賞

1. 音樂欣賞 Music Appreciation

2. 19th Century Dance • During the 19th and 20th centuries, a period of extensive industrialization and development of leisure interests, • dancing became a recognized pastime of the public at large; • regular dance orchestras were no longer the prerogative of royal courts or the aristocracy but were able to maintain an independent existence, • directing dance bands and composing and arranging for them became a full-time activity very much in the public eye, its leading exponents enjoying international fame. In addition dance music increasingly came to be listened to as well as danced to.

3. Waltz, Vienna • The centre of 19th-century dance music was Vienna, • the upsurge of interest in dancing was prompted by the popularity of the waltz. • During the 18th century the waltz had developed from various country dances in triple time (such as the German dance and the landler) to make its way during the early years of the 19th century from the taverns in the suburbs of Vienna to the large dance halls that were being built in the city. • The significance of the waltz was to rival that of its predecessor, the minuet, and its period of survival as a ballroom dance was to exceed that of any other. It was the waltz that, in spreading through Europe, persuaded a wider public to take an interest not only in the dance itself but in the music.

4. Other Dances • In the early 19th century the waltz’s chief rivals for ballroom popularity were: • The quadrille, a formal square-dance, had developed from the country dance or contredanse as a ‘quadrille de contredanses’, and survived for most of the century as a more relaxed dance beside the other livelier dances. The quadrille had a complicated set of steps, • The galop. by contrast with the galop which was one of the simplest dances ever invented. A lively dance, and a suitable way to bring an evening to an end, the galop’s popularity finally faded during the second half of the century. • Perhaps second only to the waltz in popularity was the polka, a hopping dance which came from Bohemia in the 1830s; it was the rage in Vienna and Paris by 1840 and in Britain and the USA during the following years, remaining popular until around the turn of the century.

5. Polka • The polka was not only popular in the social dance arena but could also be witnessed on the professional stage. The choreographer Jean Coralli produced a version for the Paris opera in 1844, and Carlotta Grisi and her husband, Jules Perrot, performed their version at her majesty’s theatre in London. The polka also exerted an influence on music for the concert hall, though to a much lesser extent than the waltz. The first composer to develop it to any degree was Smetana, who not only composed polkas for dance orchestras but also incorporated the rhythm into weightier compositions like the bartered bride (1866).

6. 19th Century Dance • other dances that achieved lesser significance: • polonaise, a processional dance, served as a suitable way to start an evening; • cotillon reappeared in various forms as a novelty dance; • mazurka achieved popularity either independently or in compound form as the polka-mazurka. • There were indeed many variants of the main dances. The valse a deux temps was a quicker form of waltz with elements of the galop, while the redowa was another dance related to the waltz. The schottische achieved popularity around the mid-century and was closely related to the polka, while the polka itself was danced in German countries during the second half of the century either as the slower ‘polka francaise’ or as the quicker ‘polka schnell’. The ‘quadrille des lanciers’, a variant of the quadrille which appeared in Britain about 1817 and reappeared throughout Europe in the 1850s, finally achieved popularity in Britain as ‘the lancers’.

7. 19th Century Dance • Of the chief dances the quadrille in particular was restricted in its format and in the scope its regular eight-bar phrases gave for musical development. • Other dance formats allowed greater development and more scope for musical creativity, and the waltz in particular, by including an extended introduction anticipating the main themes, by allowing the melodies to expand, and by rounding off the whole with a recapitulatory coda, was able to achieve the status of a miniature tone poem. • The 19th-century dance was by no means confined to the ballroom; quite apart from the extensive influence the waltz in particular had on serious music, as the minuet had before it, the main dance bands supplemented their playing at balls by giving concerts in parks and entertainment centres. • The dance repertory was supplemented by operatic selections, instrumental showpieces and songs, but such dances as the waltz and polka became as much the main attractions of these concerts as of balls. Entertainment centres such as the Tivoli Gardens in Copenhagen were opened towards the middle of the century with such concerts as prime attractions, and many of the dance-band leaders of the time were at least as celebrated for their concerts as for their performances at balls.

8. 19th Century Dance • Most celebrated dance-band leaders • Lanner, the Strausses and Ziehrer in Vienna, • Labitzky in Carlsbad, Gungl in Berlin, • Musard, Isaac Strauss and Waldteufel in Paris • H.C. Lumbye in Copenhagen.

9. Orchestration 19th Century Dance • Mozart composed his dances for the Vienna Redoutensaal: double woodwind, a small body of strings without violas, and percussion; yet the maintenance of a regular orchestra and the requirements of novelty items for popular concerts encouraged elements of showmanship and displays of instrumental technique that make these bands recognizable forerunners of the show bands of the 20th century. • The spread of the waltzes of Johann Strauss I abroad during the 1830s in no way prepared audiences for the impression made by his orchestra on its international tours. In the Journal des debats in 1837 Berlioz enthused over the rhythmic precision of the band, the remarkable effect of the short, staccato themes being passed from one wind instrument to another and the thrilling effect of their fortissimo, and the enthusiasm was repeated wherever the orchestra went in Britain in 1838. • The greatest of the showmen was Jullien, whose orchestra produced all manner of eccentric sounds. By the 1860s, however, when the waltz had become somewhat institutionalized and when the most famous examples (such as The Blue Danube and Tales from the Vienna Woods) were written, the main dance-orientated orchestras had become similar to small symphony orchestras, the style more lyrical and the instrumentation more conventional.