Genius Mindset.

com 2007

geniusmindset.com

The Bluffers Guide to Classical Music

www.geniusmindset.com

Genius Mindset.com 2007

geniusmindset.com

The Bluffers Guide to Classical Music

Extras
Piccolo (small flute),
Cor Anglais (deep oboe),
Bass Clarinet, Contra Bassoon

The Brass
Section

and Saxophone

Trumpets, Horns,
Trombones and Tubas

The Woodwind
Section

Brass instruments are not

always made of brass. They
get their name from HOW
they are played, using valves
or slides to make a tube
longer (deeper note) or shorter
(higher note).

Flutes, Oboes,
Clarinets and Bassoons
Woodwind instruments are
not always made of wood.
They get their name from
HOW they are played, using
holes covered by fingers to
make the wind tube longer or
shorter.

The
Orchestra

The Percussion
Section
Bass drums, Side (snare)
drums, Cymbals, Wood blocks
and triangles

The String
Section

Instruments you strike with

a hand or stick

Violins, Violas,
Cellos and Double Basses

Can include a full drum kit

but not the Timpani

String instruments are played

in two basic ways: plucking
the string with fingers
(pizzicato) or vibrating the
string with a bow (arco).

Piano
Considered both a
stringed and a
percussion instrument.

Melodic percussion
(xylophone, glockenspiel)
written as separate parts
in the musical score

The Timpani
The Harp
A stringed instrument with its
own special place in the
musical score

Genius Mindset.com 2007

(also called the Kettledrums)

Written separately from the
main percussion group
in the musical score

geniusmindset.com

The Bluffers Guide to Classical Music

SYMPHONY

CONCERTO

A piece of music for the

whole orchestra.
Usually has four movements.

A piece of music for a soloist

and the whole orchestra.
Usually has three movements.

WIND QUINTET
A piece of music for five
wind instruments (usually
flute, oboe, clarinet, horn
and bassoon)

Musical
Forms

PIANO TRIO
A piece of music
usually for piano, violin
and cello (but sometimes
other instruments)

SONATA

STRING QUARTET

A piece of music for a

solo instrument.
A piano sonata is for piano
only; a violin or flute sonata
will usually also have a piano.

A piece of music for four

individual string instruments
(usually 2 violins, a viola and
a cello)

Genius Mindset.com 2007

geniusmindset.com

The Bluffers Guide to Classical Music

Tempo
(speed)

Loudness
(volume)

Measured in beats per

minute (bpm) and witten
as a numerical value.

p means soft (piano)

f means loud (forte)
m means moderate

Andante (a walking pace,

approx. 72 bpm)

pp is very soft,
mf is moderately loud
and ff is very loud.

Moderato (moderate
pace, approx. 96 bpm)
Allegro (lively, approx.
120 bpm)
Presto (very fast, approx.
140 bpm)

Articulation
(how notes are played)
Legato (smoothly)
Staccato (short and
detached)
A curved line over a group
of notes means to play
them smoothly (legato)
A dot under or over a note
means to play it short and
detached (staccato).
For extra emphasis a note
can also be accented (<)
which means play it louder
than the others near it.

Genius Mindset.com 2007

Musical
Terms

These terms come from

pianoforte (piano) which
was the first keyboard
instrument that could be
played soft, medium, or
loud by hitting the keys
either gently or forcefully.

The Stave
(music notation)
The five lines music is
written on are called the
stave.
Instruments use either the
Treble clef or the Bass
clef.
The Treble clef contains
most of the notes above
middle C.
The Bass clef contains
most of the notes below
middle C.

geniusmindset.com

The Bluffers Guide to Classical Music

Musical Timeline
PERIOD

DATES

Medieval

500-1450

Renaissance

Baroque

Classical

DEVELOPMENTS
Monophonic (single melody)
gives way to polyphonic
(more than one melody);
2- and 3-part songs written in
France;
First 6-part round

1450-1600

Madrigals (songs in four

parts, all equal) first written;
Music for mass

1600-1750

Rise of instrumental music

(suites, sonatas, concerto
grossi, canons and fugues);
Beginnings of opera and
oratorio

1750-1820

Development of symphonic
form, sonata form, piano
music, operas

Early Romantic

Surge in Operatic arias;

German Lieder (especially
Schubert)

Romantic

Piano music becoming

widely popular (Chopin and
Liszt);
Opera exploding (Wagners
Ring Cycle);
Orchestra expanding

1820-1910

Late Romantic

Orchestra continues to
expand;
Rise of Program Music

Post Romantic

Orchestra grows to mammoth

proportions (particularly in
the music of Mahler);
Symphonic form taken to its
limits

Genius Mindset.com 2007

COMPOSERS

Guido DArezzo
Guillame de Machaut

Josquin des Prez

Giovanni Palestrina
William Byrd
Claudio Monteverdi
Henry Purcell
Antonio Vivaldi
Johann Sebastian Bach
Domenico Scarlatti
George Frideric Handel
Christoph Willibald Gluck
Joseph Haydn
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Ludwig van Beethoven
Carl Maria von Weber
Franz Schubert
Gioacchino Rossini
Hector Berlioz
Frederik Chopin
Franz Liszt
Richard Wagner
Giuseppe Verdi
Cesar Franck
Bedrich Smetana
Anton Bruckner
Johann Strauss II
Johannes Brahms
Camille Saint-Saens
Modest Mussorgsky
Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky
Edvard Grieg
Antonin Dvorak
Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov
Leos Janacek
Edward Elgar
Giacomo Puccini
Gustav Mahler

geniusmindset.com

Modern Romantic

Impressionist

Modern

1910-1930

Some
overlap
with
Modern
Romantic

Early 20th
century

th

Contemporary

Mid 20
century
and
onward

Genius Mindset.com 2007

Music becomes more

chromatic and less reliant on
the nature of keys
French composers seize on
the art term impressionism
to paint music in soundscapes of color and light;
Extensive use of the wholetone scale;
Music for piano, orchestra,
and ballet
Movement away from
tonality to atonality and
Schoenbergs 12-tone
method (serialism);
Expressionism and
pointillism
Influences from jazz and
popular culture;
Electronic music;
Music for prepared piano;
Tonality popular again

Richard Strauss
Carl Nielsen
Jean Sibelius
Sergei Rachmaninov

Claude Debussy
Maurice Ravel

Arnold Schoenberg
Bela Bartok
Igor Stravinsky
Anton Webern
Alban Berg
Sergei Prokofiev
George Gershwin
Dmitri Shostakovich
Olivier Messiaen
Benjamin Britten
Samuel Barber
John Cage
Karlheinz Stockhausen

geniusmindset.com