Shopping on line can be easy, simple and save you lots of money. It can also take a lot of your time, frustrate you, and result in unwanted purchases. Now the same can be said for regular high street shopping, but with the vast opportunity presented by the Internet it will pay you to spend a few minutes reading this and understanding how to better optimize your Classical Music shopping experience:

1. Compare - without doubt the biggest advantage that the Classical Music offers shoppers today is the ability to compare thousands of Classical Music at a time. This is a great thing, but not necessarily all the time! Too much can be daunting at times so take advantage of the great comparison sites and where possible let them do the hard work for you.

2. Research - if it has been said it will be on the internet. Ignorance is no longer a justifiable reason for buying the wrong thing. Take the time to research in detail everything that you could possible want to know about

3. Testimonials - don't know anybody that has bought a Classical Music? Wrong! If the Classical Music is good the internet will let you know. Use the Internet as a friend and get testimonials before you buy.

4. Questions - Got a question about Classical Music then search the Forums, FAQ's, Blogs etc. Don't be afraid to ask .....

5. Reputation - Never heard of the company selling Classical Music? Don't worry, no reason why you should know every company in the world, but you know someone that does! Use the internet to find out what people are saying about Classical Music and build up a picture of their reputation for sales, returns, customer service, delivery etc.

6. Returns - still worried that even after all of the above your Classical Music wont be what you want? Check out the returns policy. There is so much competition now that someone, somewhere is bound to offer the terms that you are comfortable with.

7. Feedback - happy with your Classical Music then let people know, after all you are depending on others people input in your buying decision, so why not give a little back.

8. Security - check for the yellow padlock on the Classical Music site before you buy, and the s after http:/ /i.e. https:// = a secure site

9. Contact - got a question about Classical Music, or want to leave a comment then check out the sites contact page. Reputable companies have them and respond.

10. Payment - ready to pay for your Classical Music, then use your credit card or PayPal! Be aware of companies that don't accept them, there may be genuine reasons but given the huge amount of choice you have when buying online there is no reason at all not to buy via credit card or PayPal.



Classical music is a broad term that usually refers to music produced in, or rooted in the traditions of, Western art history, Christian music and concert music, encompassing a broad period from roughly the 9th century to the 21st century."Classical", The Oxford Concise Dictionary of Music, ed. Michael Kennedy, (Oxford, 2007), Oxford Reference Online, accessed 23 July, 2007 The central norms of this tradition became codified between 1550 and 1900, which known as the common practice period.

When the term is used as a synonym for Western art music, the term encompasses a range of musical styles and approaches, ranging from compositional techniques (such as fugue) to entertaining operettas. Adorno, Theodore, "On the Social Situation of Music", Essays on Music, ed. Richard Leppart, trans. Susan H. Gillespie, (California, 2002), 429.

European classical music is largely distinguished from many other non-European and popular musical forms by its system of musical notation, in use since about the 16th century. Western staff notation is used by composers to prescribe to the performer the Pitch (music), speed, Meter (music), individual rhythms and exact execution of a piece of music. This leaves less room for practices, such as improvisation and ad libitum ornamentation, that are frequently heard in non-European art musics (compare Indian classical music and Music of Japan), and popular music.

The public taste for and appreciation of formal music of this type waned in the late 1900s in the United States and United Kingdom in particular.Julian Lloyd Webber's speech to the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland stated that "Declining audiences, government cuts, disastrous CD sales, sponsors pulling out of the arts, fewer children learning musical instruments, and a total lack of interest from the general media, unless semi-naked bimbo violinists ... are involved. ... It is in stark contrast to music-making in the Far East, where there are still huge numbers of children learning instruments, healthy classical CD sales, media that take a real interest in classical music and, above all, concert halls that are packed with young people as a direct result of that media interest." Certainly this period has seen classical music falling well behind the immense commercial success of popular music, in the opinion of some, although the number of CDs sold is not indicative of the popularity of classical music. The economic importance of music in the European Union includes comparison of the number of concerts, venues and musicians employed in classical and popular music

The term "classical music" did not appear until the early 19th century, in an attempt to "canonize" the period from Johann Sebastian Bach to Ludwig van Beethoven as a golden age Rushton, Julian, Classical Music, (London, 1994), 10 The earliest reference to "classical music" recorded by the Oxford English Dictionary is from about 1836."Classical", The Oxford Concise Dictionary of Music, ed. Michael Kennedy, (Oxford, 2007), Oxford Reference Online, accessed 23 July, 2007

Timeline Though classical music is considered to have spanned the period in Europe between Medieval to present, classical music actually began and had its roots in the era of the Ancient Greece. The mathematician Pythagorus created a tuning system and helped to codify music. Ancient Greek instruments such as the aulos and lyre eventually led to the modern day instruments of a classical orchestra.

The major time divisions of classical music are the early period (which includes Medieval music (476 – 1400) and Renaissance music (1400 – 1600)); the Common practice period (which includes Baroque music (1600 – 1760), Classical period (music) (1730 – 1820), and Romantic music periods (1815 – 1910)); and the modern and contemporary period which includes 20th century music (1900 – 2000) and Contemporary classical music (1975 – current).

The antecedent to the early period was the era of ancient music from before the fall of the Roman Empire (476 AD), very little of which survived. The music that survived from this period is mostly from ancient Greece. The Medieval period includes music from after the fall of Rome to about 1450. Monophony chant, also called plainsong or Gregorian Chant, was the dominant form until about 1100. Polyphony (multi-voiced) music developed from monophonic chant throughout the late Middle Ages and into the Renaissance Era. The Renaissance music was from 1450 – 1600. It was characterized by greater use of instrumentation (music), multiple interweaving melodic lines and by the use of the first Bass (musical term).

The common practice era began with the Baroque period in about 1600 and extended until 1750. Baroque music is characterized by the use of complex tonal counterpoint and the use of a basso continuo, a continuous bass line. During this period keyboard music played on the harpsichord and pipe organ became increasingly popular. The classical period, from about 1750 – 1820, established many of the norms of composition, presentation and style, and the piano became the predominant keyboard instrument.

The Romantic era, from 1820 – 1910, codified practice, expanded the role of music in cultural life and created institutions for the teaching, performance and preservation of music. It is characterized by increased attention to melody and rhythm, as well as expressive and emotional elements, paralleling romanticism in other art forms.

The modern era began with Impressionist music from 1910-1920, which was dominated by French composers who went against the traditional German ways of art and music. Impressionist music by Claude Debussy and Maurice Ravel was arrhythmic, and it used the pentatonic scale, long, flowing phrases and brass instruments rather than stringed instruments. Modernism (music), 1905-1985, was a period which represented a crisis in the values of classical music and the extension of theory and technique. 20th century classical music, a wide variety of post-Romantic styles composed through the year 1999, includes late Romantic, Modern and Postmodern styles of composition. The term contemporary music is sometimes used to describe music composed in the late 20th century through present day.

The prefix neo is used to describe a 20th century or contemporary composition written in the style of an earlier period, such as classical, romantic, or modern. Igor Stravinsky Pulcinella (ballet), for example, is a Neoclassicism (music) composition.

The dates are Dates of classical music eras, since the periods overlapped and the categories are somewhat arbitrary. The use of counterpoint and fugue, which is considered characteristic of the Baroque era, was continued by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, who is generally classified as typical of the classical period, by Beethoven who is often described as a founder of the romantic period, and Johannes Brahms, who is classified as romantic.

Aspects Classical music is considered primarily a written musical tradition, preserved in music notation, as opposed to being transmitted orally, by rote, or in recordings of particular performances. While there are differences between particular performances of a classical work, a piece of classical music is generally held to transcend any musical interpretation of it. The use of musical notation is an effective method for transmitting classical music, since the written music contains the technical instructions for performing the work. The written score, however, does not usually contain explicit instructions as to how to interpret the piece in terms of production or performance, apart from directions for dynamics, tempo and expression (to a certain extent); this is left to the discretion of the performers, who are guided by their personal experience and musical education, their knowledge of the work's idiom, and the accumulated body of historic performance practices.

However, musical improvisation once played an important role in classical music. A remnant of this improvisatory tradition in classical music can be heard in the cadenza, a passage found mostly in concertos and solo works, designed to allow skilled performers to exhibit their virtuoso skills on the instrument. Traditionally this was improvised by the performer; however more often than not, it is written for (or occasionally by) the performer beforehand.

Its written transmission, along with the veneration bestowed on certain classical works, has led to the expectation that performers will play a work in a way that realizes in detail the original intentions of the composer. During the 19th century the details that composers put in their scores generally increased. Yet the opposite trend — admiration of performers for new "interpretations" of the composer's work — can be seen, and it is not unknown for a composer to praise a performer for achieving a better realization of the composer's original intent than the composer was able to imagine. Thus, classical music performers often achieve very high reputations for their musicianship, even if they do not compose themselves. Generally however, it is the composers who are remembered more than the performers.

Classical composers often aspire to imbue their music with a very complex relationship between its affective (emotional) content and the intellectual means by which it is achieved. Many of the most esteemed works of classical music make use of musical development, the process by which a musical germ, idea or motif is repeated in different contexts or in altered form. The History of sonata form and fugue employ rigorous forms of musical development.

Another consequence of the primacy of the composer's written score is that improvisation plays a relatively minor role in classical music, in sharp contrast to traditions like jazz, where improvisation is central. Improvisation in classical music performance was far more common during the Baroque era than in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, and recently the performance of such music by modern classical musicians has been enriched by a revival of the old improvisational practices. During the classical period, Mozart and Beethoven sometimes improvised the cadenzas to their piano concertos (and thereby encouraged others to do so), but they also provided written cadenzas for use by other soloists.

Complexity Classical works often display musical complexity through the composer's use of development, Modulation (music) (changing of keys), variation rather than exact repetition, musical phrases that are not of even length, counterpoint, polyphony and sophisticated harmony. Larger-scale classical works (such as symphony, concertos, operas and oratorios) are built up from a hierarchy of smaller units: namely phrases, periods, sections, and movements. Musical analysis often seeks to distinguish and explain these structural levels.

Emotion Autobiographies of composers reveal that some composers of classical music aspired to communicate a transcendent quality of emotion, what has been called the "sublime" in art. For example, Beethoven set Friedrich Schiller's poem, Ode to Joy in his Symphony No. 9 (Beethoven). However, some composers, such as Iannis Xenakis, argue that the emotional effect of music on the listeners is arbitrary and therefore the objective complexity or informational content of the piece is paramount.

Instrumentation Classical and popular music are often distinguished by their choice of instruments. The instruments used in common practice classical music were mostly invented before the mid-19th century (often much earlier), and codified in the 18th and 19th centuries. They consist of the instruments found in an orchestra, together with a few other solo instruments (such as the piano, harpsichord, and organ (music)). Electric instruments such as the electric guitar appear occasionally in the classical music of the 20th and 21st centuries. Both classical and popular musicians have experimented in recent decades with electronic instruments such as the synthesizer, electric and digital techniques such as the use of sampled or computer-generated sounds, and the sounds of instruments from other cultures such as the gamelan.

None of the bass instruments existed until the Renaissance. In Medieval music, instruments are divided in two categories: loud instruments for use outdoors or in church, and quieter instruments for indoor use.Many instruments which are associated today with popular music used to have important roles in early classical music, such as bagpipes, vihuelas, hurdy gurdy and some woodwind instruments. On the other hand, the acoustic guitar, for example, which used to be associated mainly with popular music, has gained prominence in classical music through the 19th and 20th centuries.

While equal temperament became gradually accepted as the dominant musical temperament during the 19th century, different historical temperaments are often used for music from earlier periods. For instance, music of the English Renaissance is often performed in mean tone temperament.

Influence One criterion used to distinguish works of the classical musical canon is that of cultural durability. However, this is not a distinguishing mark of all classical music: while works by J. S. Bach continue to be widely performed and highly regarded, music by many of Bach's contemporaries is deemed mediocre and is rarely performed, even though it is squarely in the "classical" realm. To some extent, the notion of such durability is a self-fulfilling prophecy (and therefore a fallacy), simply because classical music is studied and preserved at much higher levels than other music.

Popular music Classical music has often incorporated elements or even taken material from popular music. Examples include occasional music such as Brahms' use of student drinking songs in his Academic Festival Overture, genres exemplified by Kurt Weill's The Threepenny Opera, and the influence of jazz on early- and mid-twentieth century composers including Maurice Ravel, as exemplified by the movement entitled "Blues" in his sonata for violin and piano. Certain Postmodern music, Minimalist music and Postminimalism classical composers acknowledge a debt to popular music.See, for example,

There are, likewise, numerous examples of influence flowing in the opposite direction, including List of popular songs based on classical music, the use to which Pachelbel's Canon#Pachelbel's canon in popular culture has been put since the 1970s, and the musical Crossover (music) phenomenon, where classical musicians have achieved success in the popular music arena (one notable example is the "Hooked on Classics" series of recordings made by the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra in the early 1980s).

Folk music Composers of classical music have often made use of folk music (music created by untutored musicians, often from a purely oral tradition). Some composers, like Antonín Dvořák and Bedřich Smetana, have used folk themes to impart a nationalist flavor to their work, while others (like Béla Bartók) have used specific themes, lifted whole from their folk-music origins.

Commercialism Certain staples of classical music are often used commercially (that is, either in advertising or in the soundtracks of movies made for entertainment). In television commercials, several loud, bombastically rhythmic orchestral passages have become clichés, particularly the opening "O Fortuna" of Carl Orff's Carmina Burana (Orff); other examples in the same vein are the Dies Irae from the Giuseppe Verdi Requiem, Edvard Grieg's In the Hall of the Mountain King, and excerpts of Aaron Copland's "Rodeo".

Similarly, movies and television often revert to standard, clichéd snatches of classical music to convey refinement or opulence: some of the most-often heard pieces in this category include Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's Eine kleine Nachtmusik and Antonio Vivaldi's The Four Seasons (Vivaldi).

Education Throughout history, parents have often made sure that their children receive classical music training from a young age. Some parents pursue music lessons for their children for social reasons or in an effort to instill a useful sense of self-discipline. Some consider that a degree of knowledge of important works of classical music is part of a good general education.

During the 1990s, several research papers and popular books emergence touting the so-called Mozart effect: a temporary, small elevation of scores on certain tests as a result of listening to Mozart. The popularized version of the controversial theory was expressed succinctly by a New York Times music columnist: "researchers have determined that listening to Mozart actually makes you smarter." Promoters marketed CDs claimed to induce the effect. Florida passed a law requiring toddlers in state-run schools to listen to classical music every day, and in 1998 the governor of Georgia budgeted $105,000 per year to provide every child born in Georgia with a tape or CD of classical music. One of the original researchers commented "I don't think it can hurt. I'm all for exposing children to wonderful cultural experiences. But I do think the money could be better spent on music education programs."

See also

Notes References

External links





Classical music is a broad term that usually refers to music produced in, or rooted in the traditions of, Western art history, Christian music and concert music, encompassing a broad period from roughly the 9th century to the 21st century."Classical", The Oxford Concise Dictionary of Music, ed. Michael Kennedy, (Oxford, 2007), Oxford Reference Online, accessed 23 July, 2007 The central norms of this tradition became codified between 1550 and 1900, which known as the common practice period.

When the term is used as a synonym for Western art music, the term encompasses a range of musical styles and approaches, ranging from compositional techniques (such as fugue) to entertaining operettas. Adorno, Theodore, "On the Social Situation of Music", Essays on Music, ed. Richard Leppart, trans. Susan H. Gillespie, (California, 2002), 429.

European classical music is largely distinguished from many other non-European and popular musical forms by its system of musical notation, in use since about the 16th century. Western staff notation is used by composers to prescribe to the performer the Pitch (music), speed, Meter (music), individual rhythms and exact execution of a piece of music. This leaves less room for practices, such as improvisation and ad libitum ornamentation, that are frequently heard in non-European art musics (compare Indian classical music and Music of Japan), and popular music.

The public taste for and appreciation of formal music of this type waned in the late 1900s in the United States and United Kingdom in particular.Julian Lloyd Webber's speech to the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland stated that "Declining audiences, government cuts, disastrous CD sales, sponsors pulling out of the arts, fewer children learning musical instruments, and a total lack of interest from the general media, unless semi-naked bimbo violinists ... are involved. ... It is in stark contrast to music-making in the Far East, where there are still huge numbers of children learning instruments, healthy classical CD sales, media that take a real interest in classical music and, above all, concert halls that are packed with young people as a direct result of that media interest." Certainly this period has seen classical music falling well behind the immense commercial success of popular music, in the opinion of some, although the number of CDs sold is not indicative of the popularity of classical music. The economic importance of music in the European Union includes comparison of the number of concerts, venues and musicians employed in classical and popular music

The term "classical music" did not appear until the early 19th century, in an attempt to "canonize" the period from Johann Sebastian Bach to Ludwig van Beethoven as a golden age Rushton, Julian, Classical Music, (London, 1994), 10 The earliest reference to "classical music" recorded by the Oxford English Dictionary is from about 1836."Classical", The Oxford Concise Dictionary of Music, ed. Michael Kennedy, (Oxford, 2007), Oxford Reference Online, accessed 23 July, 2007

Timeline Though classical music is considered to have spanned the period in Europe between Medieval to present, classical music actually began and had its roots in the era of the Ancient Greece. The mathematician Pythagorus created a tuning system and helped to codify music. Ancient Greek instruments such as the aulos and lyre eventually led to the modern day instruments of a classical orchestra.

The major time divisions of classical music are the early period (which includes Medieval music (476 – 1400) and Renaissance music (1400 – 1600)); the Common practice period (which includes Baroque music (1600 – 1760), Classical period (music) (1730 – 1820), and Romantic music periods (1815 – 1910)); and the modern and contemporary period which includes 20th century music (1900 – 2000) and Contemporary classical music (1975 – current).

The antecedent to the early period was the era of ancient music from before the fall of the Roman Empire (476 AD), very little of which survived. The music that survived from this period is mostly from ancient Greece. The Medieval period includes music from after the fall of Rome to about 1450. Monophony chant, also called plainsong or Gregorian Chant, was the dominant form until about 1100. Polyphony (multi-voiced) music developed from monophonic chant throughout the late Middle Ages and into the Renaissance Era. The Renaissance music was from 1450 – 1600. It was characterized by greater use of instrumentation (music), multiple interweaving melodic lines and by the use of the first Bass (musical term).

The common practice era began with the Baroque period in about 1600 and extended until 1750. Baroque music is characterized by the use of complex tonal counterpoint and the use of a basso continuo, a continuous bass line. During this period keyboard music played on the harpsichord and pipe organ became increasingly popular. The classical period, from about 1750 – 1820, established many of the norms of composition, presentation and style, and the piano became the predominant keyboard instrument.

The Romantic era, from 1820 – 1910, codified practice, expanded the role of music in cultural life and created institutions for the teaching, performance and preservation of music. It is characterized by increased attention to melody and rhythm, as well as expressive and emotional elements, paralleling romanticism in other art forms.

The modern era began with Impressionist music from 1910-1920, which was dominated by French composers who went against the traditional German ways of art and music. Impressionist music by Claude Debussy and Maurice Ravel was arrhythmic, and it used the pentatonic scale, long, flowing phrases and brass instruments rather than stringed instruments. Modernism (music), 1905-1985, was a period which represented a crisis in the values of classical music and the extension of theory and technique. 20th century classical music, a wide variety of post-Romantic styles composed through the year 1999, includes late Romantic, Modern and Postmodern styles of composition. The term contemporary music is sometimes used to describe music composed in the late 20th century through present day.

The prefix neo is used to describe a 20th century or contemporary composition written in the style of an earlier period, such as classical, romantic, or modern. Igor Stravinsky Pulcinella (ballet), for example, is a Neoclassicism (music) composition.

The dates are Dates of classical music eras, since the periods overlapped and the categories are somewhat arbitrary. The use of counterpoint and fugue, which is considered characteristic of the Baroque era, was continued by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, who is generally classified as typical of the classical period, by Beethoven who is often described as a founder of the romantic period, and Johannes Brahms, who is classified as romantic.

Aspects Classical music is considered primarily a written musical tradition, preserved in music notation, as opposed to being transmitted orally, by rote, or in recordings of particular performances. While there are differences between particular performances of a classical work, a piece of classical music is generally held to transcend any musical interpretation of it. The use of musical notation is an effective method for transmitting classical music, since the written music contains the technical instructions for performing the work. The written score, however, does not usually contain explicit instructions as to how to interpret the piece in terms of production or performance, apart from directions for dynamics, tempo and expression (to a certain extent); this is left to the discretion of the performers, who are guided by their personal experience and musical education, their knowledge of the work's idiom, and the accumulated body of historic performance practices.

However, musical improvisation once played an important role in classical music. A remnant of this improvisatory tradition in classical music can be heard in the cadenza, a passage found mostly in concertos and solo works, designed to allow skilled performers to exhibit their virtuoso skills on the instrument. Traditionally this was improvised by the performer; however more often than not, it is written for (or occasionally by) the performer beforehand.

Its written transmission, along with the veneration bestowed on certain classical works, has led to the expectation that performers will play a work in a way that realizes in detail the original intentions of the composer. During the 19th century the details that composers put in their scores generally increased. Yet the opposite trend — admiration of performers for new "interpretations" of the composer's work — can be seen, and it is not unknown for a composer to praise a performer for achieving a better realization of the composer's original intent than the composer was able to imagine. Thus, classical music performers often achieve very high reputations for their musicianship, even if they do not compose themselves. Generally however, it is the composers who are remembered more than the performers.

Classical composers often aspire to imbue their music with a very complex relationship between its affective (emotional) content and the intellectual means by which it is achieved. Many of the most esteemed works of classical music make use of musical development, the process by which a musical germ, idea or motif is repeated in different contexts or in altered form. The History of sonata form and fugue employ rigorous forms of musical development.

Another consequence of the primacy of the composer's written score is that improvisation plays a relatively minor role in classical music, in sharp contrast to traditions like jazz, where improvisation is central. Improvisation in classical music performance was far more common during the Baroque era than in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, and recently the performance of such music by modern classical musicians has been enriched by a revival of the old improvisational practices. During the classical period, Mozart and Beethoven sometimes improvised the cadenzas to their piano concertos (and thereby encouraged others to do so), but they also provided written cadenzas for use by other soloists.

Complexity Classical works often display musical complexity through the composer's use of development, Modulation (music) (changing of keys), variation rather than exact repetition, musical phrases that are not of even length, counterpoint, polyphony and sophisticated harmony. Larger-scale classical works (such as symphony, concertos, operas and oratorios) are built up from a hierarchy of smaller units: namely phrases, periods, sections, and movements. Musical analysis often seeks to distinguish and explain these structural levels.

Emotion Autobiographies of composers reveal that some composers of classical music aspired to communicate a transcendent quality of emotion, what has been called the "sublime" in art. For example, Beethoven set Friedrich Schiller's poem, Ode to Joy in his Symphony No. 9 (Beethoven). However, some composers, such as Iannis Xenakis, argue that the emotional effect of music on the listeners is arbitrary and therefore the objective complexity or informational content of the piece is paramount.

Instrumentation Classical and popular music are often distinguished by their choice of instruments. The instruments used in common practice classical music were mostly invented before the mid-19th century (often much earlier), and codified in the 18th and 19th centuries. They consist of the instruments found in an orchestra, together with a few other solo instruments (such as the piano, harpsichord, and organ (music)). Electric instruments such as the electric guitar appear occasionally in the classical music of the 20th and 21st centuries. Both classical and popular musicians have experimented in recent decades with electronic instruments such as the synthesizer, electric and digital techniques such as the use of sampled or computer-generated sounds, and the sounds of instruments from other cultures such as the gamelan.

None of the bass instruments existed until the Renaissance. In Medieval music, instruments are divided in two categories: loud instruments for use outdoors or in church, and quieter instruments for indoor use.Many instruments which are associated today with popular music used to have important roles in early classical music, such as bagpipes, vihuelas, hurdy gurdy and some woodwind instruments. On the other hand, the acoustic guitar, for example, which used to be associated mainly with popular music, has gained prominence in classical music through the 19th and 20th centuries.

While equal temperament became gradually accepted as the dominant musical temperament during the 19th century, different historical temperaments are often used for music from earlier periods. For instance, music of the English Renaissance is often performed in mean tone temperament.

Influence One criterion used to distinguish works of the classical musical canon is that of cultural durability. However, this is not a distinguishing mark of all classical music: while works by J. S. Bach continue to be widely performed and highly regarded, music by many of Bach's contemporaries is deemed mediocre and is rarely performed, even though it is squarely in the "classical" realm. To some extent, the notion of such durability is a self-fulfilling prophecy (and therefore a fallacy), simply because classical music is studied and preserved at much higher levels than other music.

Popular music Classical music has often incorporated elements or even taken material from popular music. Examples include occasional music such as Brahms' use of student drinking songs in his Academic Festival Overture, genres exemplified by Kurt Weill's The Threepenny Opera, and the influence of jazz on early- and mid-twentieth century composers including Maurice Ravel, as exemplified by the movement entitled "Blues" in his sonata for violin and piano. Certain Postmodern music, Minimalist music and Postminimalism classical composers acknowledge a debt to popular music.See, for example,

There are, likewise, numerous examples of influence flowing in the opposite direction, including List of popular songs based on classical music, the use to which Pachelbel's Canon#Pachelbel's canon in popular culture has been put since the 1970s, and the musical Crossover (music) phenomenon, where classical musicians have achieved success in the popular music arena (one notable example is the "Hooked on Classics" series of recordings made by the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra in the early 1980s).

Folk music Composers of classical music have often made use of folk music (music created by untutored musicians, often from a purely oral tradition). Some composers, like Antonín Dvořák and Bedřich Smetana, have used folk themes to impart a nationalist flavor to their work, while others (like Béla Bartók) have used specific themes, lifted whole from their folk-music origins.

Commercialism Certain staples of classical music are often used commercially (that is, either in advertising or in the soundtracks of movies made for entertainment). In television commercials, several loud, bombastically rhythmic orchestral passages have become clichés, particularly the opening "O Fortuna" of Carl Orff's Carmina Burana (Orff); other examples in the same vein are the Dies Irae from the Giuseppe Verdi Requiem, Edvard Grieg's In the Hall of the Mountain King, and excerpts of Aaron Copland's "Rodeo".

Similarly, movies and television often revert to standard, clichéd snatches of classical music to convey refinement or opulence: some of the most-often heard pieces in this category include Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's Eine kleine Nachtmusik and Antonio Vivaldi's The Four Seasons (Vivaldi).

Education Throughout history, parents have often made sure that their children receive classical music training from a young age. Some parents pursue music lessons for their children for social reasons or in an effort to instill a useful sense of self-discipline. Some consider that a degree of knowledge of important works of classical music is part of a good general education.

During the 1990s, several research papers and popular books emergence touting the so-called Mozart effect: a temporary, small elevation of scores on certain tests as a result of listening to Mozart. The popularized version of the controversial theory was expressed succinctly by a New York Times music columnist: "researchers have determined that listening to Mozart actually makes you smarter." Promoters marketed CDs claimed to induce the effect. Florida passed a law requiring toddlers in state-run schools to listen to classical music every day, and in 1998 the governor of Georgia budgeted $105,000 per year to provide every child born in Georgia with a tape or CD of classical music. One of the original researchers commented "I don't think it can hurt. I'm all for exposing children to wonderful cultural experiences. But I do think the money could be better spent on music education programs."

See also

Notes References

External links





Classical Music UK
CMUK is the leading general Classical Music website for the United Kingdom, featuring job listings, teacher directory, musician directory, online shop, magazine, and much much more

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Music Genre Homepage ... BBC Philharmonic. Watch video of the BBC Philharmonic under the direction of Gianandrea Noseda tackling Berio's Formazioni and Beethoven's 9th Symphony.

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Classical Music :: The Classical Source :: For Reviews, Interviews and ...
News, reviews and concert listings regularly updated. UK based site.

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