MHST 419 Expressionism in Music
An exploration of the aesthetic impulses that created a dramatic shift in musical and artistic developments in the period between the 1890's and 1920's. One path to expressionism follows the dissolution of romanticism in the works of Mahler, Strauss, Scriabin and early Schoenberg. Another important path that will be examined is the return to the primal, uninhibited past in the works of Stravinsky and Bartok. At the center of our exploration will be the expressionist angst in works by Schoenberg, Berg, Webern where we will follow the path from the abandonment of tonality and thematicism to 12-tone technique. These works will be studied against the background of contemporaneous developments in visual arts and literature (Kokoschka, Schiele, Kandinsky, Nolde, Kirchner, Munch, Dehmel, Wedekind, Strindberg).