Music in the Classic Period

If you are interested in studying classical history with a focus on Haydn, Mozart, and Beethoven, this book serves that purpose well.

This book is primarily used in classrooms for students taking a survey course on music in the Classic Period (just before Haydn through Beethoven and Schubert - these things are never cleanly cut); it is also wonderfully suited for the general reader and enthusiast who would like to appreciate their favorite music in a more fully developed context. It is comprehensive in that it includes the Classic period from its earliest beginnings through its transition into the Romantic Age, but it does not cover everything these is to talk about in these most important decades. However, it hits the high points very well. It not only includes important musical elements of style, form, instruments, harmonic development, and so forth, but it also includes the way social changes influenced music making and musical development. Where Haydn was clearly a servant of the Esterházys (a well compensated and well treated servant, but a servant nonetheless), Beethoven had patrons but was no one's servant and so it went on in later decades with the rise of the "Artist". The author provides a wonderful cultural context for the music and music making. We get wonderful pictures of the halls, churches, and great rooms for the music. He also shows us interesting instruments including pedal pianos and a baryton (a strange and difficult instrument that Haydn's employer loved and for which Haydn wrote many works). The reader will enjoy the grand tour of the period and will either be satisfied with the overview provided, or will want to dig more deeply into this or that aspect of the subject. To aid the latter, each chapter has its own bibliography. This is very handy so you know which additional readings go with which topic. Excellent book for students and aficionados of Classic Music.