Discovering Music

R. Larry Todd is the Arts & Sciences Professor of Music, at Duke University. He has been recognized in the New York Times as "the dean of Mendelssohn scholars” in the United States, having authored the definitive biographies of both Mendelssohn and his sister Fanny (both published by Oxford University Press). He is the series editor for the Routledge Studies in Musical Genres. He has served as a Guggenheim fellow and fellow of the National Humanities Center. Todd is also a performing pianist who has recorded and performed extensively.

About the Author
Preface
Acknowledgments

PART I. The Elements of Music
The Listening Experience
Musical Elements: An Overview
What Is Classical Music?
timeline

CHAPTER 1. Pitch, Melody, and Key
Pitch
Notating Pitch
making connections: The Physics of Sound: The Octave
Melody
making connections: The Ancient Greeks and Consonances
Key
check your knowledge

CHAPTER 2. Rhythm, Meter, Texture, and Dynamics
Rhythmic Values
Tempo Markings
making connections: The Metronome
Pulse or Beat
Measures
Texture
Harmony
Tonality
Dynamics
making connections: The Sound of Silence
check your knowledge

CHAPTER 3. Timbre, Instruments, and Ensembles
Timbre
The Voice
The Family of Musical Instruments
Musical Ensembles
Benjamin Britten, The Young Person's Guide to the Orchestra (1946)
check your knowledge
listening map 1: Benjamin Britten, The Young Person's Guide to the Orchestra [1946]

CHAPTER 4. Musical Form
Binary and Ternary Form
making connections: Musical Form in Architecture and Painting
check your knowledge

CHAPTER 5. Learning How to Listen
Listening to Hamilton, "My Shot"
Mapping the Listening Experience
listening map 2: Lin-Manuel Miranda, Hamilton, "My Shot" [2015]
check your knowledge

Part I summary

PART II. The Middle Ages
Why Listen to Medieval Music?
timeline
Milestones of the Medieval Era

CHAPTER 6. Origins of Medieval Music
check your knowledge

CHAPTER 7. Music for the Christian Church
Gregorian Chant
The Divine Office and the Mass
Medieval Christmas Music: Viderunt omnes
check your knowledge
listening map 3: Anonymous, Viderunt omnes ("All the Ends of the Earth") [fifth century]

CHAPTER 8. Hildegard of Bingen
listening map 4: Hildegard of Bingen, O viridissima virga ("O Greenest Branch") [twelfth century]
check your knowledge

CHAPTER 9. Léonin and the Rise of Polyphony
making connections: Gothic Cathedrals and Polyphonic Architecture
check your knowledge
listening map 5: Léonin, First Respond from Viderunt omnes ("All the Ends of the Earth") [twelfth century]

CHAPTER 10. Secular Medieval Music
Musical Instruments
Secular Medieval Song
check your knowledge

CHAPTER 11. Machaut and the Rise of Secular Polyphony
check your knowledge
listening map 6: Guillaume de Machaut, Puis qu'en oubli sui de vous ("Since you have forgotten me") [ca. 1365]

Part II summary
global connections:
Myanmar: Buddhist Chant and Ritual Music
making connections: Music for Celebrations

PART III. The Renaissance
Why Listen to Renaissance Music?
Humanism
Rebirth
timeline
Classical Revival
Artists as Individual Creators
Transition to Modernity

CHAPTER 12. The Development of Renaissance Music
makin.g connections: The Renaissance Rediscovers Classical Antiquity
check your knowledge

CHAPTER 13. Guillaume Dufay and the Franco-Flemish Style
making connections: Brunelleschi's Dome
listening map 7: Guillaume Dufay, Mass Se la face ay pale, Kyrie [ca. 1450]
check your knowledge

CHAPTER 14. Josquin Desprez
making connections: Lorenzo the Magnificent
check your knowledge
listening map 8: Josquin Desprez, Ave Maria [ca. 1485]

CHAPTER 15. Palestrina and the Counter-Reformation
making connections: Martin Luther and the Reformation
check your knowledge

CHAPTER 16. New Currents: National Styles
The Italian Madrigal
making connections: Art Imitates Life: The Shocking Music of Carlo Gesualdo, Prince of Venosa
The English Madrigal
listening map 9: Thomas Weelkes, "As Vesta Was from Latmos Hill Descending" [1601]
check your knowledge

CHAPTER 17. The Rise of Instrumental Music
making connections: The English Reformation
listening map 10: William Byrd, "Pavana Lachrymae" for harpsichord solo, based on John Dowland's lute song "Flow My Tears" [ca. 1600]
check your knowledge

Part III summary
global connections:
Bali: Gamelan Music
making connections: The Gamelan and the West

PART IV. The Baroque
Why Listen to Baroque Music?
Baroque Art and Architecture
The Musical Legacy of the Baroque
timeline

CHAPTER 18. Elements of Baroque Music
The Development of Tonality
The Basso Continuo
Melody, Rhythm, and Dynamics in Baroque Music
check your knowledge

CHAPTER 19. Claudio Monteverdi and the Rise of Italian Opera
making connections: St. Mark's Basilica, Venice
making connections: Orfeo and the Rise of the Orchestra
listening map 11: Claudio Monteverdi, Orfeo, Act III, "Possente spirto" ("O Powerful Spirit"), excerpt [1607]
Barbara Strozzi and the Chamber Cantata
listening map 12: Barbara Strozzi, "Voglio morire" ("I Wish to Die") from L'Amante segreto (The Secret Lover) [1651]
check your knowledge

CHAPTER 20. The Spread of Opera
Opera in France
making connections: Music as Royal Power: Lully at the Court of Louis XIV
Henry Purcell and English Opera
check your knowledge
listening map 13: Henry Purcell, Dido and Aeneas, Act III, "When I Am Laid in Earth" [1689]

CHAPTER 21. Baroque Instrumental Music
The Violin Family
The Harpsichord
The Organ
New Musical Genres
Arcangelo Corelli
The Baroque Concerto
listening map 14: Arcangelo Corelli, Trio Sonata in A Minor, Op. 3 No. 10 [1689]
check your knowledge

CHAPTER 22. Antonio Vivaldi
listening map 15: Antonio Vivaldi, Spring from The Four Seasons, Op. 8 No. 1, First Movement [ca. 1725]
check your knowledge

CHAPTER 23. Johann Sebastian Bach's Life and Career
Bach's Early Life and Career Beginnings
The Move to Cöthen
Final Years in Leipzig
making connections: Bach's Children and Wives
check your knowledge

CHAPTER 24. Bach's Instrumental Music
Bach and the Fugue
making connections: Fugues beyond Music
listening map 16: J. S. Bach, " ("The Roman Saltarello") in A Minor, Op. 6 No. 4 [1841]
check your knowledge

CHAPTER 37. Orchestral Music
Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy
making connections: Mendelssohn as Conductor
listening map 45: Felix Mendelssohn, Overture to A Midsummer Night's Dream, Op. 21 [1826]
Hector Berlioz
making connections: The Romantics and Opium
listening map 46: Hector Berlioz, Fantastic Symphony, Finale, "Dream of a Witches' Sabbath" [1830]
check your knowledge

CHAPTER 38. Romantic Opera
Italian Romantic Opera
French Romantic Opera
listening map 47: Giuseppe Verdi, Rigoletto, Act III, Canzone,