Kelly Pryor
May 1, 2011 spring 2011
MUSHL 10100 sec 004

Concert Report On Friday May 18,2011 I went to see the Hunter College Symphony. It was composed of many movements but i will only be talking about my three favorites. The first movement was a solo piece from the opera "Robberto Devereux" sung by Emily Serotta. Opera is the art of story telling through music and song. The soloist or Aria as its called for opera was accompanied by the full orchestra. Since operas are usually sung in italian, there was no surprise that this one was also in Italian. The piece was also sung in mezzo soprano voice. The dynamics started out fortissimo or very loud and descended into piano(soft). These dynamics were meant to represent the dying love of a heart broken women. The texture was predominantly monophonic because there was one sound or melodic line accompanied by the orchestra playing the same notes. The second movement was a a concerto by W.A. Mozart in B flat major for the piano and orchestra. The concerto is a piece of musical work usually in three parts or movement in which one solo instrument is accompanied by an orchestra. The concerto was in three movements the first was Allegro or very fast, the second Adante or rather slow and the third Allegro again bringing the piece full circle. The dynamics started of Piano and gradually rose to a crescendo. The texture was polyphonic because there were two different melodic lines that stood out and were performed simultaneously. This format was very common for Mozart for he was the one who made this type of concerto popular in the classical period.
The closing piece was "Totentaz, paraphrase on Dies Irae" was performed next. It was much longer in duration than the first piece. It showed uniqueness in that it incorporated everyday sounds into the music such as birds. This piece began with a combination of strings and, woodwinds, which persisted continued throughout the entire piece. The entire orchestra began which ended with all the instruments playing a strong fortissimo beat, that was used to increase tempo for the solo trumpet. The texture was homophonic because there
Each of these pieces were different but fit together perfectly like a puzzle. Each was meant to give a diverse taste of music and i enjoyed it very much. The classical period stood out among all periods of music because it stressed order and balance. Its forms was very important to it tone and harmony.