Marche Diabolique is composed by Brian Balmages. Brian Balmages is an award winning composer and has bachelor’s degree in music from James Madison University. He has composed pieces that have been performed worldwide. He has also won awards like the Albert Austin Harding award from the American School Band Directors Association.
“A Modest Proposal” written by Jonathan Swift in 1729 begins by deploring indigent Irish families who struggle tirelessly to make an honest living for their large families. This speech pivots on an satirical structure with its use of rhetoric that utilizes the form of ethos, an appeal to the reader's sense of ethics and moral values held throughout Irish society. Pathos, an appeal to invoke countless emotional responses from the readers, and logos, the appeal of logic-statistics that the above subject carries to persuade an audience by reason. By using doublespeak, Swift alludes to different types of rhetoric used throughout this speech such as ironic positive slanting, charged language and even satire to exaggerate and expose the stupidity people exemplify when offering solutions regarding the political issues Ireland was dealing
On November 15, 205 at 2pm I was able to see the Rutgers Percussion Ensemble. I was very interested in this show, because I have never been able to see a group of only percussionists perform in the same space. The first piece they did was called Ionisation, which was written in 1929. There were thirteen musicians on stage playing various instruments. This song began with a rolling unpitched sound coming from four snare drums with the claves. This idea was an interesting start, because it caught the audience’s attention to really listen to what was going to happen next. Then the song, went into a lighter more atmospheric section, where there were many crescendos and decrescendos. The instruments in the piece included the chimes, maracas, timpani,
Harrison’s egotistic character in “Harrison Bergeron” evolves into a clustered ball of power and control. Throughout the passage from Kurt Vonnegut, the narrator aims to reveal the “emperor” the character Harrison wishes to be. Vonnegut discloses a tone of negativity at the beginning of the story, pertaining Harrison’s character complexion. This negativity originates from the dystopian society’s view of Harrison’s essential arrogance.
Speeches are used to commemorate points of history, and inform the general public of the product of their history but what makes a speech so impacting on it’s audience? Rhetorical devices give speeches and works of literature a way that can convey feelings or ideas to a viewer. When addressing during times of war or chaos, people such as Ronald Reagan, Abraham Lincoln, and Winston Churchill used these terms to better connect with their audience. Without these tools of the english language, dialogue and literature would be all the more dull and unappealing. However, with these useful instruments, writers and speakers can better communicate through some of the many rhetorical devices.
Instruments are introduced at the beginning of new sections, such as the pre-chorus and chorus.
I attended to a concert performed by the San Francisco Symphony Youth Orchestra on November 13th this year. This concert took place in the Davies Symphony Hall in San Francisco. I chose to attend to this concert because I have never been to a performance by any youth orchestra, I was curious to see how their performance would compare to other orchestras.
Schumann’s Op. 94 Romances were composed in 1849, during a time when his mental health was deteriorating rapidly. Originally written for the oboe, the first performance featuring the violin and piano was given by Clara Schumann and François Schubert in a private concert. The three pieces are all written in ABA form, the typical form for songs, and feature lyrical, heartfelt melodies that evoke storytelling and vivid imagery.
For assignment 2, I choose the piece “Lohengrin: Act III: Prelude” composed by Richard Wagner. This piece is located in the “Types of Listeners I: Introduction and Casual Listeners” section.
Richard Strauss (1864-1949), was a leading German composer and conductor. His orchestral compositions and operas have made him one of the best known composers of the late Romantic and early modern eras. While Strauss did not pay much attention to his chamber music in his later life, in earlier years he tried to compose several different types of chamber works such as a string quartet, two piano trios, a piano quartet and several instrumental sonatas. Now I will introduce his last work of chamber music, the violin sonata.
Desperation and hysteria makes people susceptible to believe anything, which provides an opportunity for anyone to gain power. In “The Crucible” by Arthur Miller, a group of young girls gain a significant amount of power in the court that is run by the majority of male Puritans in hysteric Salem. These girls, mostly Abigail Williams, portray themselves as victims of witchcraft to get the court officials to believe their stories. What they say gives them control over what happens in the court. Individual people can establish and maintain power over the majority through what they say and how they say it. This can be accomplished through lies, persuasion, and tone.
There were many musical elements heard throughout these pieces and it was interesting to hear how they varied in each song and suite. In Intermezzo, it began with a quieter violin solo melody creating a monophonic texture. Soon after, it became accompanied by the other violins and cellos, then the full ensemble came in creating a moderate, flowing melody at about mezzo forte and switching to a polyphonic texture. Next, there was a harp solo at forte with many crescendos and decrescendos. The full ensemble enters again raising the dynamics to forte before decrescendoing and slowing down to end with a held note and final tone. The first movement of the Swan Lake Suite, Scene, which began with the violins playing with an oboe solo on top. The oboe was playing various crescendos and decrescendos at a mezzo piano dynamic and the tempo was moderate. This ends with the high woodwinds playing a string of the melody, passing it to the low brass with the strings very quietly in the background and then what seemed to be a diminuendo. The second movement of the Swan Lake
Evocative of much of the work he composed during his younger years Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s Symphony No. 29 is a testament to his genius and mastery of classical musical forms. Written when he was just eighteen years old the composition is a concise and peculiar example of classical Sonata form. Instead of having an introduction before the exposition Mozart ops to present the primary theme of the piece’s Allegro movement at the start of the first downbeat.
The introduction of the piece is the same as that of “The Raiders March”, but with strings playing in the background. The A melody begins with the trumpet as the strings fade out (0:07). The first minute and a half of the song is played the same as that of “The Raiders March”, though due to differing sound equalization, some parts stick out more or less than they do in the original. For example, in the third repetition of the A melody, one can more clearly hear the xylophone accompanying the melody here than in “The Raiders March”. The piece begins to differ more significantly after the break following the third repetition of the A melody when the piece modulates down a half step instead of up like in the original (1:37). This fourth instance of the A melody is otherwise played the same as in “The Raiders March” until the last two bars, where it immediately jumps into what was the coda of the original piece (1:53).
IC2016 World Premiere Concert has given me a wonderful experience of magnificent pieces of music works. Among those amazing works in the concert, the masterpiece of Prokofiev’s, Romeo and Juliet Suite No.2, 64B was the one who caught my attention the most. This report will discuss how Prokofiev evokes the elements of romantic music in the movements of Romeo and Juliet Suite No.2, 64B by looking at each of the movements.