Art song Totally Explained

Everything about Art Song totally explained

An art song is a vocal music composition, usually written for one singer with piano accompaniment. By extension, the term "art song" is used to refer to the genre of such songs. Aficionados of the genre consider art songs (when written by composers who excel at text setting, lyrical vocal lines, and beautiful, supportive accompaniments) to be among the highest forms of art, unsurpassed in sophistication, subtlety and dramatic truth. Although categorizing a piece of vocal music as art song rather than as another type of song (such as a folk song, or an aria) can be difficult sometimes, most art songs are

settings of lyric poetry
not part of a staged work (such as an opera or a musical)
intended for performance as part of a recital or other relatively formal social occasion

Exceptions can be found to any of these rules. Although piano accompaniment is usual, the singer may be accompanied by instrumental forces of any number, including a full orchestra. A guitar, a harp or a string quartet are some of the more common accompaniments. Songs may be written to be performed in a group to form a narrative or dramatic whole, comprising a song cycle.
   A folk song can form the basis of an art song, but a composer must reinvent it with respect to one or more of form, harmony, melody, rhythm or sonority. Aaron Copland and Benjamin Britten are two composers famous for their arrangements of respective American and British *folk songs.
   An art song can be in any language, although English songs, French chansons, German lieder, Spanish canciones or canciones líricas, and Italian canzoni are the most numerous. The Austrian composer Franz Schubert is considered the greatest art song composer of all. Despite a brief life, Schubert created an impressive output of some 600 lieder, including "Der Erlkönig", "Die Forelle", and "Gretchen am Spinnrade" as well as the two cycles, "Winterreise" and "Die Schöne Müllerin".
   Even though classical vocalists generally embark on successful performing careers as soloists by seeking out opera engagements, a number of today's most prominent singers have built their careers primarily by singing art songs, including Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau, Thomas Quasthoff, Ian Bostridge, Matthias Goerne, Susan Graham, and Elly Ameling.

Prominent composers of art songs

Austrian

Franz Joseph Haydn

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

Franz Schubert

Hugo Wolf

Gustav Mahler German

Ludwig van Beethoven

Johann Carl Gottfried Loewe

Fanny Mendelssohn Hensel

Kurt Weill French

Hector Berlioz

Charles Gounod

Pauline García-Viardot

Francis Poulenc British

Ralph Vaughan Williams

Benjamin Britten Spanish 19th century Composers of Spain include:

Emilio Arrieta (y) Corera

Francisco Asenjo Barbieri

Juan Miguel Asensi

Salvador Bartolí Soler

Justo Blasco y Compáns

Paulina Cabrero y Martínez

Juan Cantó Francés

Ramón Carnicer y Batlle

Ruperto Chapí

Vicente Costa y Nogueras

Antonio de la Cruz

J. Cumellas Ribó

José Espí Ulrich

Joaquín Espín y Guillén

Felipe Espino Iglesias

José Falcó Torro

Manuel Fernández Caballero

Francisco Fuster

Manuel García

Manuel Giró

José Melchor Gomis

Isidoro Hernández

Rafael Hernando Palomar

Pablo Huertos

Sebastián de Iradier

Mariano Nicasio Rodríguez de Ledesma

José León

Antonio Mercé Fondevila

Lázaro Núñez Robres

Mariano Obiols Tramullas

Florencio Lahoz Otal

Cristóbal Oudrid

José Mariano Padilla

Felipe Pedrell Sabaté

Rafael Taboada Mantilla

Antonio Reparaz

Gabriel Rodríguez

Manuel Rücker

Emilio Serrano y Ruiz

José Sobejano Ayala

Fernando Sor

Mariano Soriano Fuertes

Rafael Taboada y Mantilla

Ignacio Tabuyo Muro

Francisco de Borja Tapia

José Valero

Joaquín Valverde

Amadeo Vives 20th Century Composers include:

Joaquín Turina among many others Italian

Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco

Luciano Berio Eastern European

Franz Liszt - Hungary (born Hungarian, but more accurately a cosmopolitan native of Europe at large)

Antonín Dvořák - Czechoslovakia

Leoš Janáček - Czechoslovakia

Béla Bartók - Hungary

Zoltán Kodály - Hungary

Frédéric Chopin - Poland Nordic

Edvard Grieg - Norway

Jean Sibelius - Finland

Yrjo Kilpinen - Finland

Wilhelm Stenhammar - Sweden

Hugo Alfvén - Sweden

Carl Nielsen - Denmark Russian

Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky

Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov

Sergei Rachmaninoff

Sergei Prokofiev

Igor Stravinsky

Dmitri Shostakovich American

Amy Marcy Cheney Beach

Daron HagenFurther Information

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