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Featured: An Overview of Romantic Music

Romantic music is the name given to the period of music developed between roughly 1810 and 1900, leading directly off of the wildly popular Classical period. The Romantic period focused heavily on the use of emotion and other art forms within the music and, much like the Classical period, is most notably recognised by the use of pianos and orchestras.

History

Towards the end of the Classical period, there was a great push for music that showed more emotion and interacted more with the other art forms of the time. From this, the era of Romanticism was born. The Romantic period is widely acknowledged as having been defined from 1810 onwards and tailing off towards the turn of the century.

Although the types of music were fairly similar, the Romantic period introduced a more emotive sound and a different outlook. Romanticism in other art forms was shifting from the ‘socially acceptable’ and more towards class barriers, the supernatural, and other things previously unheard of in the arts. And in harmony with the movement, music also started to lean in a different angle. Composers started using music to convey emotions and specific types of issues going on around them – this could range from love to war, to anything in between. Most art of this time was heavily influenced by thoughts and feelings, and the main goal of many composers was to ensure that the listener felt those emotions through their music.

The Romantic period saw the introduction of nationalist music – music that used motifs and ideas from a specific country throughout the music composed. Composers would use rhythm, melodies and other methods to personify the country of their choice through their music. Almost every piece of nationalist music can be pinpointed to a specific region of the world just by listening to the different ideas conveyed through the instruments and compositional tools.

As the years edged on towards the dawn of the 1900’s, music began to take a new shape again. Composers were still trying to make the listeners feel the emotions they had been when writing, but the music was taking a more atonal and experimental shape. By 1900, music was rapidly shifting to suit the changing times in the composer’s surroundings. By this point the Romantic period had transitioned into the 20th Century, where the music was far more unique and unusual than the tight structure that the Classical period had influenced.

Influence

The Romantic period in itself was influenced by the work by composers during the Classical period, but as a period itself, it has influenced many contemporary musicians. Almost every composer now attempts to make the listener feel something, whether that person is classically trained or singing in a modern pop group. The Romantic period opened music up to a whole new level in terms of showing emotions and feelings. Without this period music would still be very cold and heavily reliant on structure.

Famous Romantic Composers

Many of the composers that lived at the tail end of the Classical period are also considered prolific Romantic composers in their own right. However, the introduction of a new way of thinking also introduced a new wave of composers, composers that – unlike their Classical period counterparts – were not necessarily born into a higher social class.

Franz Peter Schubert is widely cited as one of the most important nineteenth-century composers. Although he only lived for 31 short years, he left behind a considerable amount of work, most notably "600 Lieder" – works of German or Dutch origin that often set romantic German poems to music for a single voice and piano accompaniment – that he composed. One of his most famous works is "Symphony No. 9 in C Major", also known as "The Great C Major Symphony".

Frédéric Francois Chopin is another well-known composer whose name crops up throughout the Romantic period. Polish-born, Chopin is credited as one of the most important people in bringing elements of nationalism into music. Despite almost every single one of his compositions being for piano, he managed to publish a substantial amount of work, including what is perhaps his most famous piece, "Nocturne in E Flat Major".