A concerto ( / k ə n ˈ tʃ ɛər t oʊ / ; plural concertos , or concerti from the Italian plural) is, from the late Baroque era , mostly understood as an instrumental composition, written for one or more soloists accompanied by an orchestra or other ensemble . The typical three(music)|movement]] structure, a slow movement (e.g., lento or adagio ) preceded and followed by fast movements (e.g., presto or allegro ), became a standard from the early 18th century.
50-399: A number of concertos (as well as non-concerto works) have been written for the oboe , both as a solo instrument as well as in conjunction with other solo instrument(s), and accompanied by string orchestra , chamber orchestra, full orchestra, concert band , or similar large ensemble. These include concertos by the following composers: Concerto The concerto originated as
100-415: A Concerto for Flute, Harp, and Orchestra , and Exsultate, jubilate , a de facto concerto for soprano voice. They all exploit and explore the characteristics of the solo instrument(s). Haydn wrote an important trumpet concerto and a Sinfonia Concertante for violin, cello, oboe and bassoon as well as two horn concertos. Haydn also wrote a concerto for double bass but has since been lost to history in
150-581: A cello concerto , a piano concerto and a double concerto for violin and cello ), Karol Szymanowski (two violin concertos and a "Symphonie Concertante" for piano), and Richard Strauss (two horn concertos, a violin concerto, Don Quixote —a tone poem that features the cello as a soloist—and among later works, an oboe concerto ). However, in the first decades of the 20th century, several composers such as Debussy , Schoenberg , Berg , Hindemith , Stravinsky , Prokofiev and Bartók started experimenting with ideas that were to have far-reaching consequences for
200-566: A woodwind instrument , and concerti grossi for a group of soloists. The first keyboard concertos , such as George Frideric Handel 's organ concertos and Johann Sebastian Bach 's harpsichord concertos , were written around the same time. In the second half of the 18th century, the piano became the most used keyboard instrument , and composers of the Classical Era such as Joseph Haydn , Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and Ludwig van Beethoven each wrote several piano concertos , and, to
250-422: A child, made arrangements for keyboard and orchestra of four sonatas by now little-known composers. Then he arranged three sonata movements by Johann Christian Bach . By the time he was twenty, Mozart was able to write concerto ritornelli that gave the orchestra admirable opportunity for asserting its character in an exposition with some five or six sharply contrasted themes, before the soloist enters to elaborate on
300-447: A concerto for a rock band . Concertos from previous ages have remained a conspicuous part of the repertoire for concert performances and recordings. Less common has been the previously common practice of the composition of concertos by a performer to be performed personally, though the practice has continued via certain composer-performers such as Daniil Trifonov . The Italian word concerto , meaning accord or gathering, derives from
350-484: A concerto for wordless coloratura soprano by Reinhold Glière . As a result, almost all classical instruments now have a concertante repertoire. Among the works of the prolific composer Alan Hovhaness may be noted Prayer of St. Gregory for trumpet and strings, though it is not a concerto in the usual sense of the term. In the later 20th century the concerto tradition was continued by composers such as Maxwell Davies , whose series of Strathclyde Concertos exploit some of
400-509: A full concerto, though the distinction has never been formalised and many Concertinos are still longer than the original Baroque concertos. During the Romantic era the cello became increasingly used as a concerto instrument; though the violin and piano remained the most frequently used. Beethoven contributed to the repertoire of concertos for more than one soloist with a Triple Concerto for piano, violin, cello and orchestra while later in
450-404: A genre of vocal music in the late 16th century: the instrumental variant appeared around a century later, when Italians such as Giuseppe Torelli and Arcangelo Corelli started to publish their concertos. A few decades later, Venetian composers, such as Antonio Vivaldi , had written hundreds of violin concertos , while also producing solo concertos for other instruments such as a cello or
500-482: A lesser extent, violin concertos, and concertos for other instruments. In the Romantic Era , many composers, including Niccolò Paganini , Felix Mendelssohn , Frédéric Chopin , Robert Schumann , Johannes Brahms , Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky and Sergei Rachmaninoff , continued to write solo concertos, and, more exceptionally, concertos for more than one instrument; 19th century concertos for instruments other than
550-668: A neoclassical rejection of specific features which typically characterized the concerto form during the Baroque or Romantic periods. Several of them achieved this objective by incorporating various musical elements from the realm of jazz within the structure of the concerto. Included in this group were: Aaron Copland ( Concerto for Piano , 1926), Maurice Ravel ( Concerto for the Left Hand , 1929), Igor Stravinsky ( Ebony Concerto for clarinet and jazz band, 1945) and George Gershwin ( Concerto in F , 1925). Still others called upon
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#1732797152549600-571: Is a Russian stringed musical instrument with a characteristic triangular wooden, hollow body, fretted neck, and three strings. Two strings are usually tuned to the same note and the third string is a perfect fourth higher. The higher-pitched balalaikas are used to play melodies and chords. The instrument generally has a short sustain , necessitating rapid strumming or plucking when it is used to play melodies. Balalaikas are often used for Russian folk music and dancing . The balalaika family of instruments includes instruments of various sizes, from
650-462: Is drilled into one of its corners. It is possible that the emergence and evolution of the balalaika was a product of interaction with Asian-Oriental cultures. In addition to European culture, early Russian states, also called Rus' or Rusi , were also influenced by Oriental-Asian cultures. Some theories say that the instrument is descended from the domra , an instrument from the East Slavs . In
700-509: Is linked by the twelve-tone serial method. In the 20th century, particularly after the Second World War, the cello enjoyed an unprecedented popularity. As a result, its concertante repertoire caught up with those of the piano and the violin both in terms of quantity and quality. The 20th century also witnessed a growth of the concertante repertoire of instruments, some of which had seldom or never been used in this capacity, and even
750-847: Is now the Verkhotursky district of Russia. Peter the Great requested balalaika performers to play at the wedding celebrations of N.M. Zotov in Saint Petersburg . In the Ukrainian language , the word was first documented in the 18th century as "balabaika"; this form is also present in South Russian dialects and the Belarusian language, as well as in Siberian Russia . It made its way into literature in
800-404: Is used to form chords . Traditionally, the side of the index finger of the right hand is used to sound notes on the prima, while a plectrum is used on the larger sizes. Because of the large size of the contrabass's strings, it is not uncommon to see players using a plectrum made from a leather shoe or boot heel . Bass and contrabass balalaikas rest on the ground, on a wooden or metal pin that
850-630: The skomorokhs , sort of free-lance musical jesters whose tunes ridiculed the Tsar , the Russian Orthodox Church , and Russian society in general. In the 1880s, Vasily Vasilievich Andreyev , who was then a professional violinist in the music salons of St Petersburg, developed what became the standardized balalaika, with the assistance of violin maker V. Ivanov. The instrument began to be used in his concert performances. A few years later, St. Petersburg craftsman Paserbsky further refined
900-898: The Caucasus , similar instruments such as the Mongolian topshur , used in Kalmykia , and the Panduri used in Georgia are played. It is also similar to the Kazakh dombra , which has two strings. Variants of the dombra played by the Bashkirs often have 3 strings and may represent an instrument related to both the dombra and the balalaika. Early representations of the balalaika show it with anywhere from two to six strings. Similarly, frets on earlier balalaikas were made of animal gut and tied to
950-514: The Sinfonia Concertante for violin, viola, and orchestra. Beethoven wrote only one violin concerto that remained obscure until revealed as a masterpiece in a performance by violin virtuoso Joseph Joachim on 27 May 1844. C.P.E. Bach's keyboard concertos contain some virtuosic solo writing. Some of them have movements that run into one another without a break, and there are frequent cross-movement thematic references. Mozart, as
1000-411: The double bass (by composers like Eduard Tubin or Peter Maxwell Davies ) and cor anglais (like those by MacMillan and Aaron Jay Kernis ), but also folk instruments (such as Tubin's concerto for Balalaika , Serry 's Concerto in C Major for Bassetti Accordion , or the concertos for Harmonica by Villa-Lobos and Malcolm Arnold ), and even Deep Purple 's Concerto for Group and Orchestra ,
1050-833: The ripieno , functioning as a continuo keyboard accompaniment. Later, the concerto approached its modern form, in which the concertino usually reduces to a single solo instrument playing with (or against) an orchestra. The main composers of concertos of the baroque were Tommaso Albinoni , Antonio Vivaldi (e.g., published in L'estro armonico , La stravaganza , Six Violin Concertos, Op. 6 , Twelve Concertos, Op. 7 , Il cimento dell'armonia e dell'inventione , Six Flute Concertos, Op. 10 , Six Concertos, Op. 11 and Six Violin Concertos, Op. 12 ), Georg Philipp Telemann , Johann Sebastian Bach , George Frideric Handel , Pietro Locatelli , Jean-Marie Leclair , Giuseppe Tartini , Francesco Geminiani and Johann Joachim Quantz . The concerto
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#17327971525491100-476: The 18th century, first appearing in "Elysei", a 1771 poem by V. Maykov. "Balalaika" also appears in Nikolai Gogol 's Dead Souls , written between 1837 and 1842. The most common solo instrument is the prima, which is tuned E 4 –E 4 –A 4 (thus the two lower strings are tuned to the same pitch). Sometimes the balalaika is tuned "guitar style" by folk musicians to G 3 –B 3 –D 4 (mimicking
1150-452: The 19th century such as the clarinet , viola and French horn . In the second half of the 20th century and onwards into the 21st a great many composers have continued to write concertos, including Alfred Schnittke , György Ligeti , Dimitri Shostakovich , Philip Glass and James MacMillan among many others. An interesting feature of this period is the proliferation of concerti for less usual instruments, including orchestral ones such as
1200-460: The Baroque period, before the invention of the piano, keyboard concertos were comparatively rare, with the exception of the organ and some harpsichord concertos by Johann Sebastian Bach . The concertos of the sons of Johann Sebastian Bach , such as C. P. E. Bach , are perhaps the best links between those of the Baroque period and those of the Classical era. It is conventional to state that
1250-512: The Latin verb concertare , which indicates a competition or battle. Compositions were for the first time indicated as concertos in the title of a music print when the Concerti by Andrea and Giovanni Gabrieli [ scores ] were published in 1587. In the 17th century, sacred works for voices and orchestra were typically called concertos, as reflected by J. S. Bach 's usage of
1300-607: The balalaika. In particular, Alexey Arkhipovsky is well known for his solo performances. In particular, he was invited to play at the opening ceremony of the second semi final of the Eurovision Song Contest 2009 in Moscow because the organizers wanted to give a "more Russian appearance" to the contest. See Category: Russian balalaika players (English Misplaced Pages) and a larger one in Russian Through
1350-464: The century, Brahms wrote a Double Concerto for violin, cello and orchestra. Many of the concertos written in the early 20th century belong more to the late Romantic school, hence modernistic movement. Masterpieces were written by Edward Elgar (a violin concerto and a cello concerto), Sergei Rachmaninoff and Nikolai Medtner (four and three piano concertos, respectively), Jean Sibelius (a violin concerto), Frederick Delius (a violin concerto,
1400-692: The concerto as a musical form. Beside more or less radical effects on musical language, they led to a redefinition of the concept of virtuosity that included new and extended instrumental techniques and a focus on previously neglected aspects of sound such as pitch , timbre and dynamics . In some cases, they also brought about a new approach to the role of soloists and their relation to the orchestra. Two great innovators of early 20th-century music, Schoenberg and Stravinsky , both wrote violin concertos. The material in Schoenberg's concerto, like that in Berg's ,
1450-630: The design and arranged numerous traditional Russian folk melodies for the orchestra. He also composed a body of concert pieces for the instrument. The result of Andreyev's labours was the establishment of an orchestral folk tradition in Tsarist Russia, which later grew into a movement within the Soviet Union . The balalaika orchestra in its full form consists of balalaikas, domras , gusli , bayan , Vladimir Shepherd's Horns , garmoshkas , and several types of percussion instruments. With
1500-552: The establishment of the Soviet system and the entrenchment of a proletarian cultural direction, the culture of the working classes (which included that of village labourers) was actively supported by the Soviet establishment. The concept of the balalaika orchestra was adopted wholeheartedly by the Soviet government as something distinctively proletarian (that is, from the working classes) and was also deemed progressive. Significant amounts of energy and time were devoted to support and foster
1550-413: The fingers or a plectrum (pick), depending on the music being played, and the bass and contrabass (equipped with extension legs that rest on the floor) are played with leather plectra. The rare piccolo instrument is usually played with a pick. The earliest mention of the term balalaika dates back to a 1688 arrest document. Another appearance of the word is found in a claim dated October 1700 in what
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1600-536: The first movements of concertos from the Classical period onwards follow the structure of sonata form . Final movements are often in rondo form, as in J.S. Bach's E Major Violin Concerto . Mozart wrote five violin concertos, all in 1775. They show a number of influences, notably Italian and Austrian . Several passages have leanings towards folk music , as manifested in Austrian serenades . Mozart also wrote
1650-491: The following sizes: Factory-made six-string prima balalaikas with three sets of double courses are also common. These have three double courses similar to the stringing of the mandolin and often use a "guitar" tuning. Four-string alto balalaikas are also encountered and are used in the orchestra of the Piatnistky Folk Choir . The piccolo, prima, and secunda balalaikas were originally strung with gut with
1700-687: The formal study of the balalaika, from which highly skilled ensemble groups such as the Osipov State Russian Folk Orchestra emerged. Balalaika virtuosi such as Boris Feoktistov and Pavel Necheporenko became stars both inside and outside the Soviet Union. The movement was so powerful that even the renowned Red Army Choir , which initially used a normal symphonic orchestra, changed its instrumentation, replacing violins, violas , and violoncellos with orchestral balalaikas and domras . Often musicians perform solo on
1750-569: The great fire of Esterhaza in 1779. In the 19th century, the concerto as a vehicle for virtuosic display flourished, and concertos became increasingly complex and ambitious works. Whilst performances of typical concertos in the baroque era lasted about ten minutes, those by Beethoven could last half an hour or longer. The term concertino (composition) , or the German Konzertstuck ("Concert Piece") began to be used to designate smaller pieces not considered large enough to be considered
1800-656: The highest-pitched to the lowest: the piccolo balalaika, prima balalaika, secunda balalaika, alto balalaika, bass balalaika, and contrabass balalaika. There are balalaika orchestras which consist solely of different balalaikas; these ensembles typically play Classical music that has been arranged for balalaikas. The prima balalaika is the most common; the piccolo is rare. There have also been descant and tenor balalaikas, but these are considered obsolete. All have three-sided bodies; spruce, evergreen, or fir tops; and backs made of three to nine wooden sections (usually maple). The prima, secunda, and alto balalaikas are played either with
1850-458: The instrument. In the early 18th century the term appeared in Ukrainian documents, where it sounded like "Balabaika". Balalaika appeared in "Elysei", a 1771 poem by V. Maikov. In the 19th century, the balalaika evolved into a triangular instrument with a neck that was substantially shorter than that of its Asian counterparts. It was popular as a village instrument for centuries, particularly with
1900-422: The instruments by adding a fully chromatic set of frets and also a number of balalaikas in orchestral sizes with the tunings now found in modern instruments. One of the reasons why the instruments were not standardised, was because people in the outlying areas built their own instruments because there was so little communication for them. There were no roads and weather conditions were generally bad. Andreyev patented
1950-846: The instruments less familiar as soloists. In addition, the 20th century gave rise to several composers who experimented further by showcasing a variety of nontraditional orchestral instruments within the center of the orthodox concerto form. Included within this group are: Paul Hindemith ( Concerto for Trautonium and String Orchestra in 1931), Andre Jolivet ( Concerto of Ondes Martenot in 1947), Heitor Villa-Lobos ( Concerto for Harmonica in 1956), John Serry Sr. ( Concerto in C Major for Bassetti Accordion in 1966), Astor Piazzolla ( Concerto for Bandoneon , String Orchestra and Percussion , "Aconcagua" in 1979), Peter Maxwell Davies ( Concerto for Piccolo and Orchestra, Op. 182 in 1996), and Tan Dun ( Concerto for Water Percussion and Orchestra in 1998) Other composers of this era adopted
2000-430: The material. Of his 27 piano concertos , the last 22 are highly appreciated. A dozen cataloged keyboard concertos are attributed to Haydn, of which only three or four are considered genuine. C. P. E. Bach wrote five flute concertos and two oboe concertos. Mozart wrote five horn concertos, with two for flute, oboe (later rearranged for flute and known as Flute Concerto No. 2), clarinet , and bassoon , four for horn ,
2050-553: The neck so that they could be moved around by the player at will (as is the case with the modern saz , which allows for the playing distinctive to Turkish and Central Asian music). The first known document mentioning the instrument dates back to 1688. A guard's logbook from the Moscow Kremlin records that two commoners were stopped from playing the Balalaika whilst drunk. Further documents from 1700 and 1714 also mention
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2100-511: The orchestra itself to function as the primary virtuosic force within the concerto form. This approach was adopted by Bela Bartok in his Concerto for Orchestra as well by other composers of the period including: Walter Piston (1933), Zoltan Kodaly (1939), Michael Tippet (1962) and Elliott Carter (1969). Concertos with concert band include: 20th century: Baroque era: 20th century: Baroque era: 20th century: Baroque era: Classical era: Early Romantic traits can be found in
2150-490: The piano, violin and cello remained comparatively rare however. In the first half of the 20th century, concertos were written by, among others, Maurice Ravel , Edward Elgar , Richard Strauss , Sergei Prokofiev , George Gershwin , Heitor Villa-Lobos , Joaquín Rodrigo and Béla Bartók , the latter also composing a concerto for orchestra , that is without soloist. During the 20th century concertos appeared by major composers for orchestral instruments which had been neglected in
2200-403: The thinnest melody string made of stainless steel. Today, nylon strings are commonly used in place of gut. Amateur and/or souvenir-style prima balalaikas usually have a total of 16 frets, while in professional orchestra-like ones that number raises to 24. An important part of balalaika technique is the use of the left thumb to fret notes on the lower string, particularly on the prima, where it
2250-601: The three highest strings of the Russian guitar ), whereby it is easier to play for Russian guitar players, although classically trained balalaika purists avoid this tuning. It can also be tuned to E 4 –A 4 –D 5 , like its cousin, the domra , to make it easier for those trained on the domra to play the instrument, and still have a balalaika sound. The folk (pre-Andreev) tunings D 4 –F ♯ 4 –A 4 and C 4 –E 4 –G 4 were very popular, as this makes it easier to play certain riffs . Balalaikas have been made in
2300-516: The title "concerto" for many of the works that we know as cantatas . The term "concerto" was initially used to denote works that involved voices and instruments in which the instruments had independent parts—as opposed to the Renaissance common practice in which instruments that accompanied voices only doubled the voice parts. Examples of this earlier form of concerto include Giovanni Gabrieli 's "In Ecclesiis" or Heinrich Schütz 's "Saul, Saul,
2350-805: The violin concertos of Viotti , but it is Spohr 's twelve violin concertos, written between 1802 and 1827, that truly embrace the Romantic spirit with their melodic as well as their dramatic qualities. 20th century: 21st century: Baroque era: Classical era: 20th century: The 'core' repertoire—performed the most of any cello concertos—are by Elgar , Dvořák , Saint-Saëns, Haydn, Shostakovich and Schumann, but many more concertos are performed nearly as often. Baroque era: Classical era: Romantic era: 20th century: 20th century: 20th century: Baroque era: Classical era: Romantic era: 20th century: Baroque era: Balalaika Baglama Dombra Domra Panduri The balalaika (Russian: балала́йка , pronounced [bəɫɐˈɫajkə] )
2400-404: The way music is written and, in some cases, performed. Some of these innovations include a more frequent use of modality , the exploration of non-western scales , the development of atonality and neotonality , the wider acceptance of dissonances , the invention of the twelve-tone technique of composition and the use of polyrhythms and complex time signatures . These changes also affected
2450-492: Was intended as a composition typical of the Italian style of the time, and all the composers were studying how to compose in the Italian fashion ( all'Italiana ). The Baroque concerto was mainly for a string instrument ( violin , viola , cello , seldom viola d'amore or harp ) or a wind instrument ( flute , recorder , oboe , bassoon , horn , or trumpet ,). Bach also wrote a concerto for two violins and orchestra. During
2500-451: Was verfolgst du mich". The concerto began to take its modern shape in the late- Baroque period, beginning with the concerto grosso form developed by Arcangelo Corelli . Corelli's concertino group was two violins, a cello and basso continuo. In J. S. Bach's Fifth Brandenburg Concerto , for example, the concertino is a flute, a violin, and a harpsichord; although the harpsichord is a featured solo instrument, it also sometimes plays with
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