Baroque to Classical: How Western Music Found Its Structure
Intermediate
View all programsProgram Structure
Each stage builds directly on the previous, creating a coherent arc through the material.
Weekly Topics
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Week 1 — The invention of opera and the Florentine Camerata. Monteverdi and the birth of monody.
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Week 2 — Baroque instrumental music. Concerto grosso, trio sonata, dance suite.
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Week 3 — Bach and Handel compared. German counterpoint versus English oratorio tradition.
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Week 4 — Late Baroque harmony. Chromatic language, sequences, and the well-tempered system.
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Week 5 — The transition period. CPE Bach, Gluck, and the pre-Classical aesthetic debate.
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Week 6 — Haydn and the development of sonata form. String quartet as a genre.
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Week 7 — Mozart: opera, concerto, and symphony. How one composer worked across every major genre.
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Week 8 — Early Beethoven and where the Classical style begins to strain. Assessment and discussion.
Two eras that shaped everything after them
Baroque and Classical music are often lumped together in survey courses. This program treats them as genuinely distinct periods with different aesthetic goals, social contexts, and technical vocabularies.
The Baroque period in context
Between roughly 1600 and 1750, music became a tool of persuasion. Rhetoric, drama, and emotional contrast drove composers like Monteverdi, Vivaldi, and Bach. The basso continuo texture, sequences, and ornamental language all serve this rhetorical purpose.
Why the Classical style broke with Baroque habits
By the 1750s, composers and audiences grew tired of constant ornamentation. The Empfindsamkeit movement in Germany and the galant style in France both pushed toward simplicity and emotional directness. Sonata form emerged as a way to create large-scale drama through tonal contrast rather than melodic embellishment.
Listening as analysis
Each week pairs historical context with close listening sessions. You will analyze specific movements — not just describe them, but trace how compositional decisions produce specific effects on attentive listeners.
By the end of the course, students regularly report hearing familiar repertoire in a genuinely different way — not just enjoying it but understanding what is happening structurally.