Essay About Hungarian Composer Bйla Bartуk And 20Th Century Music

20th Century Music
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By the turn of the century and for the next few decades, artists of all nationalities were
searching for exciting and different modes of expression. Composers such as Arnold
Schoenberg explored unusual and unorthodox harmonies and tonal schemes. French
composer Claude Debussy was fascinated by Eastern music and the whole-tone scale,
and created a style of music named after the movement in French painting called
Impressionism. Hungarian composer Bйla Bartуk continued in the traditions of the still
strong Nationalist movement and fused the music of Hungarian peasants with twentieth
century forms. Avant-garde composers such as Edgard Varиse explored the manipulation
of rhythms rather than the usual melodic/harmonic schemes. The tried and true genre of
the symphony, albeit somewhat modified by this time, attracted such masters as Gustav
Mahler and Dmitri Shostakovich, while Igor Stravinsky gave full rein to his manipulation
of kaleidoscopic rhythms and instrumental colors throughout his extremely long and
varied career.
While many composers throughout the twentieth-century experimented in new ways
With traditional instruments such as the “prepared piano” used by American composer
John Cage, many of the twentieth-centurys greatest composers, such as Italian opera
composer Giacomo Puccini and the Russian pianist/composer Sergei Rachmaninoff,
remained true to the traditional forms of music history. In addition to new and eclectic
styles of musical trends, the twentieth century boasts numerous composers whose