CONTENTS Introduction 1 Banging and Blowing: The First Musical Instruments 2 Sing a Song of Christmas: The Development of the Carol 3 Getting it Written Down: The Introduction of Musical Notation 4 Changing the Tune: The First Use of Polyphony 5 The Cruellest Cut: Castrati Come to Prominence 6 Strike Up the Band: The Invention of the Symphony 7 Making it in a Man’s World: Hildegard of Bingen 8 Sharing the Music: The Invention of the Printing Press 9 By Royal Appointment: The Master of the King’s Musick 10 Music and Movement: The First Ballet 11 Baroque ’n’ Roll: A New Musical Era 12 A Capital Hit: Handel in London 13 Religious Change: Martin Luther and the Protestant Reformation 14 Words and Music: The First Opera 15 The World’s Greatest Opera House: La Scala, Milan 16 Classic Discovery: Another Era of Change 17 The Instrument-Maker Extraordinaire: Antonio Stradivari 18 Taking the Orchestra to Another Level: Hector Berlioz 19 The World’s First Classical Music Superstar: Franz Liszt 20 Romanticism Arrives: Beethoven’s ‘Eroica’ 21 Putting on a Show: The Founding of the Royal Philharmonic Society 22 Beating Time: The Baton and the Conductor 23 Rewriting the Rules: The ‘Tristan Chord’ 24 A New World Order: Impressionism and Classical Music 25 A Matter of Record: The Invention of the Gramophone 26 Musical Numbers: The Advent of Serialism 27 We Predict a Riot: Stravinsky’s The Rite of Spring 28 The Lure of the Silver Screen: The First Film Soundtrack 29 A New Polish: ‘Furniture Music’ 30 Making Money and All That Jazz: George Gershwin 31 Back to the Future: The Rediscovery of Vivaldi’s Violin Concertos 32 Silence Is Golden: John Cage’s 4'33" 33 The TV Age: Leonard Bernstein’s Young People’s Concerts 34 After This Break: Classical Music and Advertising 35 Russian Revolution: The Death of Joseph Stalin 36 The Pianist Who Conquered Russia: Van Cliburn 37 Cartoon Classics: Walt Disney’s Fantasia 38 Less Is More: The Introduction of Minimalism 39 Hitting the Right Note: The 1980 International Chopin Piano Competition 40 The Medium Is the Message: The Invention of the Compact Disc 41 New Ways of Doing Business: The Budget Classical Label 42 On Top of the World: The Three Tenors in Rome 43 Music for the Masses: Classic FM Is Born 44 Classical – But Not as You Know It: Crossover Music 45 Digital Dexterity: Composing on Computer 46 Music as Peace: The West-Eastern Divan Orchestra 47 The Next Generation: The Simón Bolívar Youth Orchestra and El Sistema 48 Technology Changes Everything Again: The Digital Download Revolution 49 World Wide Web: Eric Whitacre’s Virtual Choir 50 Could Video Kill the Classical Star? Videogame Soundtracks Where to Find Out More Acknowledgements About the Authors Index Copyright INTRODUCTION his is one of those books that might cause arguments. Not the sort of T argument that results in slammed doors, long-term sulks and all- round falling out, but rather the sort of argument that you might have with a close friend over a pint in the pub or while sipping a tall skinny wet latte in Starbucks. It will probably spark more of what you’d think of as an ‘informed discussion’ than an out-and-out row. You see, it’s quite possible that we have set ourselves up for a bit of a fall with the whole concept of this book. Here we are writing the introduction and already we realise that we could be pilloried both for what we choose to include and because of what we choose to leave out. If the truth be told, the idea of identifying 50 moments that have rocked the classical music world is a wholly subjective exercise. If you were sitting an exam and were asked to ‘List the top 50 biggest changes in the development of classical music’, there would be no definitive right and wrong answers, rather a set of differing points of view. This is the sort of book that critics love to review in the Sunday papers, because they can take issue with the central proposition and then give example after example of things that the author should have written. So, right at the start, we hold our hands up and admit the subjectivity of the book. It’s partisan, and for that we are unapologetic. We realise it is unlikely that we have published a definitive list and that there could ever be complete consensus on how that list might look. One of the great things about classical music is that it’s a voyage of personal discovery. Even though Classic FM has been broadcasting the world’s greatest music for more than two decades, every day we discover new classical works, exciting young artists and fresh recordings that cast old favourites in a completely new light. So, it’s quite possible that if we had written this book ten years ago, or we were to sit down and write it all over again in ten years’ time, then we might well arrive at a completely different set of 50 moments. It’s true to say that some of the moments we have chosen might unite pretty much all musicologists in agreement because there is a sense that they are universally regarded as being important factors in the way that music has developed; but other entries in our top 50 choices could bring some classical music experts out in hives. Equally, one or two musical historians will be very cross that their particular musical passions might seemingly have been overlooked altogether. Those people who earn a living from composing and performing music right now might well take a different view again from those with a more historical perspective, possibly regarding the key points of substantial change in classical music’s development as centring around their particular musical instrument or type of composition. And then there’s another group: those people who haven’t studied classical music and don’t work in the classical music industry, but nonetheless have built up a good working knowledge of the genre. They know what they like and might be surprised to find that there is less of a reflection of their own personal tastes in this book than they would perhaps like to see. When you add in that people also tend to regard classical music slightly differently depending on where in the world they come from and which aspects of the genre they have been exposed to during their formative years, then our job is even further complicated. We believe that each one of these groups is absolutely right in its view of the important bits of classical music – even though they all have slightly differing opinions of exactly what these important bits actually are. At the same time, we’re more than happy to defend our own choices over the following pages. So, let’s be clear at the start. We have chosen these 50 moments after a huge amount of debate between ourselves. At first, we wondered whether we should include many more examples, but after hours of discussions (some of them over a pint in the pub, but more often while sipping one of countless tall skinny wet lattes in Starbucks) we eventually arrived at these 50 particular moments. What were the criteria that we used? Well, as with all of our Classic FM books, we have rooted ourselves in the world of Classic FM itself and used this as the starting point for our deliberations. Since we first began broadcasting back in 1992, we have crystallised a very clear idea of what music our listeners want to hear and also what they would rather we didn’t broadcast. Much of this information has been gleaned through extensive research among those people who already tune in to Classic FM on a regular basis as well as among those who are potential future listeners to the station. We know that there is a great thirst for knowledge among the millions of people who listen to Classic FM across the UK each week. So, this book should very much be seen as a companion to two of our previous books: The Classic FM Hall of Fame and Everything You Ever Wanted To Know About Classical Music . . . But Were Too Afraid To Ask. The first of these books was an exploration of the top 300 most popular classical works, as voted in our annual listeners’ poll, while the latter was an introduction to the whole gamut of classical music. We didn’t just attempt to demystify the composers, eras and general musical terminology, but also to lift the lid on attending live concerts and building a collection of recordings for those people starting to find out about classical music for the very first time. If you have already enjoyed reading these two books, you might well see this new addition to your bookshelves as a natural next step along your journey of classical music discovery, as it allows us to pause along the way and delve into those major moments in more detail than we have done previously. We are unequivocal in our belief that classical music can – and should – be enjoyed by everyone, no matter who they are or where they come from. So, it is inevitable that our own personal choices of the 50 moments that rocked the classical music world will centre on those events that have tended to have a democratising and proselytising effect. For us, each one of the 50 moments that we have chosen marks an important turning point in classical music’s history. Usually, it consists of a radical departure from what had previously been seen as the norm. This change could have come from within the music itself, from the composers or performers, or it could be as a result of external forces, such as a particular technological advance or a new invention. It’s worth noting at this stage that although we talk throughout the book about particular ‘moments’ in classical music history, it would be fair to say that many of these ‘moments’ are hard to pin down. For example, there wasn’t a particular day in a particular month in a particular year when every composer woke up in the morning and suddenly decided that polyphonic music was the order of the day. Instead, this was a culmination of years of musical development and the growth of a particular sound and style as different composers wrote music that added to the music of the time. But, nonetheless, the introduction of polyphonic music remains a momentous occasion in the overall story of classical music – and so we have chosen to include it here. We hope that you agree with all 50 of our choices of the moments that rocked the classical music world, but we’re sure you’ll feel that some of your own personal favourites are missing. We would love to hear what you think – you can let us know by going to our website and filling in the online form at www.ClassicFM.com/50moments. Perhaps we will very quickly end up with enough of your ideas to fill the pages of a second volume. In the meantime, happy reading! BANGING AND BLOWING: THE FIRST MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS n the mid-1850s, ancient human remains were discovered in the I Neander Valley in Germany, providing evidence of some of the oldest human life known to date. The skeletons of people – soon nicknamed ‘Neanderthals’ after the place in which they were found – have provided a fascinating insight into life as far back as 100,000 years ago. Some of the more recent Neanderthal remains to have been uncovered demonstrate how music has been central to human existence for a great many centuries. In 1995, Neanderthal skeletons were discovered at Divje Babe in Slovenia. Believe it or not, the leg bone of a young cave bear provided one of the most fascinating insights into the importance of music in the lives of our ancestors. The bone in question had clearly been broken at both ends and contained a series of adjacent separate holes. In other words, it could well have been a very early form of flute. Soon after its discovery, though, a debate raged among scholars as to whether this really was the world’s oldest musical instrument, or whether it was, in fact, just a bone with a few bite marks in it. The debate has continued for many years, with a number of archaeological experts absolutely certain that the object is indeed a flute. If that is the case, then it provides proof that humankind has been making its own musical instruments for around 50,000 years or more. Whether or not the so-called ‘Neanderthal Flute’ is indeed bona fide (if you’ll excuse the pun), it’s clear that many musical instruments have been around for thousands of years. The flute was definitely one of the earliest ones: even if the discovery in Slovenia was nothing more than an animal’s leg bone, we know for sure that in c. 5000 BC, people in India were making primitive flutes out of wood. They even carved some of them into the shape of animals or birds. But the discovery at Divje Babe was an important moment in the history of classical music, because it encouraged people to question exactly when these instruments first made their imprint on history. We should emphasise that it’s impossible to pinpoint the exact moment of any early instrument’s ‘invention’. Very early humans probably knew a thing or two about percussion, even if they didn’t yet have drums to hit or sticks with which to beat. And most of the instruments we hear today evolved over time, rather than being the brainchild of one particular man or woman. Nevertheless, the arrival of one instrument on the scene arguably changed the course of classical music more than any other. Prior to the 18th century, ‘piano’ was just an Italian word, meaning ‘softly’ or ‘quietly’. But between 1700 and 1720, ‘piano’ took on a new sense, referring to the instrument that today transcends classical music, pop and rock to be one of the most famous inventions in world history. And, on this occasion, it is justified to refer to it as an invention. Bartolomeo Cristofori worked for Prince Ferdinando de’ Medici in Florence, where his role was to look after the royal court’s instrument collection. He evidently had a little spare time, though, because when he wasn’t tending to Prince Ferdinando’s harpsichords he was able to invent an entirely new keyboard instrument, which would go on to change classical music for ever. In 1700, Cristofori created the first ever piano – which, crucially, had hammers and dampers, enabling the player to alter the volume of the sound each key made, something that had never before been possible. One of the earliest documents to describe this new instrument was written in 1711, by the journalist and poet Scipione Maffei. He referred to it as a ‘gravicembalo col piano, e forte’ – which translates as ‘a harpsichord with soft and loud’. Hence the instrument eventually gaining the full name of ‘pianoforte’, (meaning ‘soft loud’), which is commonly shortened to ‘piano’. Given its popularity across the world today, it seems remarkable that