Classical Music

Justin

This article is written to help you appreciate the classical flute music that you’ve come to think of as boring or clichéd. Many people think to themselves, when they get assigned a Bach Sonata by there teacher, “ugh, another one! These are so boooriiiing!!!”. That’s the problem though, if you see a piece of music like that as an ancient piece of crap, only there to improve your playing skills or as a required piece for a performance or exam, that’s what it will be. If you think beyond what you believe it to be and actually listen and appreciate the music, you’ll realize how wonderful it really is. Sure, classical music often doesn’t seem as innovative and interesting to us as some of the 20th century flute pieces out there like Baker’s Sonata, or Fukushima’s Mei, but that’s because the rules of musical theory that you’ve been taught that you consider to be boring, and overused, were practically invented by classical composers like Bach or Beethoven. In their time, there was no definite set of rules to follow so in their era, they were being innovative, and that’s what we have to learn to appreciate even if it doesn’t initially sound like interesting music to us. Here I will talk a little bit about some classical composers and how they have affected my views on music and flute playing.

A Little Bit of Bach

I don’t think there’s very many experienced flute players out there who have not been exposed to any of Bach’s six Sonatas for Flute and Piano but if you haven’t, go out to your local music store right away and pick up the Chester Music Edition edited by William Bennett (It comes in two parts). My first real exposure to Bach was way back in grade 10 music class (I had of course heard Bach before, but never played it) when we played a concert band version of one of his Prelude and Fugues. All I could think when we were playing it was “wow”, as I played a short phrase and it was promptly answered by the brass section. JS Bach has a very distinct style to his music which I have never heard duplicated by any other composer. It’s fairly difficult to pick up on while playing his flute and piano sonatas on flute alone but as soon as the piano part is added in, it’s there. The only way to describe Bach’s music is that it’s like a dance between two or more hands or instruments. The best part of this music is though, is while he has this very distinct style, most of his works are varied and separately interesting. So do yourself a favour, next time you get assigned another Bach Sonata, listen to it and appreciate the musical genius that wrote it because Bach truly was, one of the greatest composers of all time.

Big Bad Beethoven

One of the most significant parts of music, is how the music expresses the composer’s emotions. No other composer expresses his emotions better than Beethoven himself. Beethoven’s life story has become so popular that it is practically common knowledge among all musicians and there have been many movie adaptations of his biography. It is easy to tell that Beethoven had a very difficult life just by listening to his music. In any of his works, even the movement of his 9th Symphony called “Ode to Joy”, you can tell that Beethoven lived a life of turmoil; he is one of the few composers that can make a piece of music in a major key sound angry or melancholic. The selection you hear playing right now is actually one of his many piano Sonatas, no.17 “The Tempest” Sonata, which to the question of what it was about he answered: “go and read Shakespeare’s, The Tempest”. It is also dedicated to a woman who was a possible candidate for his “immortal beloved”. I think the reason that people are so intrigued by the story of his life is that you can easily understand it by listening to his music. Although Beethoven has more symphonic and piano pieces than flute pieces, listening to his music is enough to inspire any musician.

-Hope you enjoyed this article. I will be adding more classical music composers to it eventually.