American culture

Classical music

Colonial music

During the colonial era, there were two distinct fields of what are now considered classical music. The First New England School was inarguably the more influential in the long-term, and was based around simple hymns that were performed with increasingly sophistication over time.

The other colonial classical tradition was that of the mid-Atlantic cities like Philadelphia and Baltimore, which produced a number of prominent composers who worked almost entirely within the European model, and are little appreciated today; these composers were mostly English in origin, and worked specifically in the style of prominent English composers of the day, like Samuel Arnold and George Frideric Handel.

First New England School

European classical music was brought to the United States during the colonial era. Many American composers of this period worked exclusively with European models, while others, such as William Billings, Supply Belcher, Daniel Read, Oliver Holden, and Justin Morgan, also known as the First New England School, developed a native style almost entirely independently of European models.

Of these, Billings is by far the most well-remembered of these composers; he formed the basis of the first major musical organization in the country, the Stoughton Musical Society, and was also influential "as the founder of the American church choir, as the first musician to use a pitch-pipe, and as the first to introduce a violoncello into church service".

Many of these composers were amateurs, and many were singers: they developed new forms of sacred music, such as the fuging tune, suitable for performance by amateurs, and often using harmonic methods which would have been considered bizarre by contemporary European standards.

Many writers have criticized the First New England School for what they consider a "faulty technique", but Struble points out that this criticism is "valid (only) if one assumes that the choral models developed between the 12th and 18th enturies in France, Germany, England, Italy and the Netherlands are the only appropriate ones" and that the supposedly faulty techniques, including the "presence of parallel fifths, octaves and unisons, the crossing of voices and false relations between them are (also found in European classical fields like the) Notre Dame school of Perotin or other examples of early polyphony, where such phenomena are accepted as legitimate elements of the style".

Jean Ferris, another music historian, called these composers "Yankee pioneers (who were) untouched by the influence of their sophisticated European contemporaries" and who were not entirely aware of the development of "tonality (as) the major harmonic system" of European classical music.

Ferris also notes that the First New England School based "their melodies upon modal or pentatonic scales" instead of using the European model, and that the "European rules harmony, that governed relationships between 'tense' and 'relaxed' (or dissonant and consonant) sounds were quite unfamiliar to the American pioneers".

19th century- Second New England School

During the mid to late 19th century, a vigorous tradition of home-grown classical music developed, especially in New England. The composers of the Second New England School included such figures as George Whitefield Chadwick, Amy Beach, Edward MacDowell, and Horatio Parker.

20th century

In the early 20th century, George Gershwin was greatly influenced by African American music; however, this was during an era of legally enforced "Jim Crow" segregation during which his music perhaps enjoyed undue fame owing to the refusal of white listeners to listen to music that formed Gershwin's sources. On the other hand, he created a convincing synthesis of music from several traditions once considered to be irreconcilable, and which continues to enjoy enormous popularity.

Many of the major classical composers of the 20th century were influenced by folk traditions, none more quintessentially, perhaps, than Aaron Copland. Other composers adopted features of folk music, from the Appalachians, the plains and elsewhere, including Roy Harris, William Schuman, David Diamond, and others. Yet other early to mid-20th century composers continued in the more experimental traditions, including such figures as Charles Ives, George Antheil, and Henry Cowell.