First Readings & Concert Excitement

Diving into my first two books; 

Johann Sebastian BACH: The Learned Musician by Christoph Wolff 

A History of Western Music by Donald Jay Grout

Yesterday I met up with my advisor and she gave me a plethora of amazing books, including the two books in my photo above, to read for my research and concert dates for local performances. I could not be more excited to hear some live music. I am especially looking forward to the Bach Cantata Series at Emmanuel- it doesn't get much better than *free* music in a beautiful church. And though I don't find myself to be involved spiritually in any one specific religious practice, I find nothing more holy and God-like than music; for me, the church atmosphere only adds to the intimacy and beauty of that experience.

Today I am delving into the beginnings of Baroque music, starting with some general music history information and then moving into some Bach specifics. I'll have some information and reactions to my readings up here soon.

Should you care to join in on any of the concerts I'm attending, I will also be posting the information about a few of the different performances I hope to go to. If you have any good ideas of concerts or performances, please feel free to comment a suggestion to me!

As I'm starting to get into the Baroque-mood, I have been listening to some music via youtube. Here is one of the first videos that came up when searching "Bach Cantata." Enjoy the beautiful resolution from intense, powerful, minor chords to a bold beautiful major chord (4:58-5:20); these little moments- especially when experienced live- never cease to take my breathe away.

Johann Sebastian Bach- Cantata 105: Herr, gehe nicht ins Gericht mit deinem Knecht, BWV 105 (1723)

Happy listening!
-Elana

Welcome to Baroque, Beethoven & Beyond

So- you found my blog! Welcome! My name is Elana and I am a Holistic Psychology student (with a minor in music) from the College of Liberal Arts and Professional Studies at Lesley University and I'm  exploring classical music through an independent study! I have a wonderful Lesley faculty member advising me through this process (Thanks, Kelly!!) and I can't wait to get going.

This blog is what I am utilizing as the main tool to record my progress of my independent study in Western Classical Music. I am organizing my exploration and readings through time periods- Baroque, 18th Century, Romantic, and Modern. I will be looking at specific composers from each of those eras and the music those individuals made and why they made it. I'm excited to delve into all of this information and to be in awe of why we are still studying music from hundreds of years ago; I can't wait to to see what made these musical accomplishments so revolutionary for their time and why they still hold so much significance today.

My exploration of music will be multidimensional; I hope to immerse myself in each time period as much as possible. I will be reading literature on the music of each time periods and the specific composers as well as finding research from journal articles and general reference sources to try and gain a diversity of information about each topic. 

In addition to the readings, I wanted to incorporate an experiential piece so that I can feel the music and assess my reactions from being right in the middle of the sound. In order to do this, I've decided to go to a concert or performance for each era (and possibly hone in on a few specific composers- depending on what music is available and being performed in the Boston area). If some great opportunities present themselves, hopefully I'll be able to engage in pre-concert talks, interview some musicians, and maybe hear some reactions from patrons and attendees of the concerts.

All the technicalities aside, you may still have some questions about this blog. Maybe you don't know me. Maybe you're wondering why a college student is interested in taking on an independent study- let alone an independent study outside of her major... and in classical music.

Well, if you're wondering or curious, I organized some info to hopefully get us on the same page about who I am, what this blog is all about, and why I've already become so passionate about it! Hopefully that will tie up all the loose ends so that that I can start getting into the music and 

you can (hopefully) have something to read about!

Coming Soon...

COMING SOON to BAROQUE, BEETHOVEN, & BEYOND:

• MY FIRST BLOG POST
• An introductory blog post about me
• Information about why I'm writing this blog
• My hopes, intentions, and aspirations for this blog (and my independent study)
• My plan of action 

To start things off right- here is a very cool video, with amazing visual representation, of Claude Debussy's Arabesque; as if the music wasn't mesmerizing enough, they added the visual to increase the swooning effect that this piece has on the listener. 

I can't wait to get moving on this project! Stop back soon to see my first real post of this blog.

Musically Yours, 

-Elana