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3000 BCE
THE ANCIENT AGES
The Ancient Ages is the period of history that begins with the invention of writing around 3000 BC and ends with the fall of the Western Roman Empire in 476 AD. -
400
THE MIDDLE AGES
The Middle Ages or Middle Ages is the historical period of Western civilisation from the 5th to the 15th century. It began in 476, the year of the fall of the Western Roman Empire, and ended in 1492, the year in which Colón arrived to America. -
700
Gregorian chant
Gregorian chant was the liturgical chant of the Church of Rome, influenced by Gallican chant in the second half of the 8th century, and spread throughout the West at the same time as the Latin rite itself. -
992
Guido d'Arezzo
He perfected musical writing with the incorporation of the tetragram, which was a musical pattern of four horizontal lines, a precursor of the stave with which the heights of the sound were fixed with greater precision, a system similar to today's, as well as pneumatic notation. -
1098
Hildegard von Bingen
Hildegard von Bingen, the saint who first described the female orgasm. Caption, Hildegard von Bingen, also known as the Rhine Sibyl and Teutonic prophetess: German saint, composer, writer, philosopher, naturalist, physician, abbess, mystic and prophetess. -
1100
Bernart de Ventadorn
Also known as Bernart de Ventadour, he was a popular Provençal troubadour, composer and poet. -
1150
Leonin
Along with Perotin, the first known composer of polyphonic organum, related to the School of Notre Dame. -
1155
Perotin
He was a medieval French composer, who was born in Paris between 1155 and 1160 and died around 1230. He is considered the most important composer of the School of Notre Dame de Paris, -
1170
Ars Antiqua
Ars antiqua, also called Ars veterum or Ars vetus, refers to the music of Europe from the late Middle Ages roughly between 1170 and 1310, encompassing the period of the Notre Dame School of polyphony and the years thereafter. It covers the 12th and 13th centuries. -
Nov 23, 1221
Alfonso X el Sabio
He was the son of the Castilian-Leonese monarch Ferdinand III and his wife, the German princess Beatrix of Swabia. Alfonso X was king of Castile and León between 1252, the year of his father's death, and 1284, the year of his death. -
1300
Guillaume de Machaut
He was a French composer and poet. He was the most prolific author of the 14th century, both in music and poetry. His musical compositions include all the usual forms of his time and mix conservative and progressive elements. -
1325
Francesco Landini.
He was an Italian composer, organist, singer, poet, instrument maker and astrologer. He was one of the most famous and admired composers of the second half of the 14th century and undoubtedly the most famous composer in Italy. -
1400
Ars Nova
Designates the musical production, both French and Italian, after the last works of the ars antiqua until the predominance of the Burgundian school, -
1400
Johannes Gutenberg
Johannes Gutenberg was a German inventor who created the printing press with movable metal type and caused books to be mass-produced. -
1400
THE RENAISSANCE
The Renaissance is a cultural phenomenon that takes up the principles of classical antiquity and updates them through humanism. Humanism is thus the intellectual movement of the Renaissance that links the culture of the time with classical antiquity; it is the philosophical and cultural aspect of the Renaissance. -
Jun 12, 1468
Juan del Encina
He was a poet, musician and playwright of the Spanish Renaissance at the time of the Catholic Monarchs. He is considered, along with the Guipuzcoan Juan de Anchieta, to be one of the greatest exponents of religious and secular polyphony in Spain in the late 15th and early 16th centuries. -
Nov 10, 1483
Martín Lutero
He was an Augustinian theologian, philosopher and Catholic friar who initiated and promoted the Protestant Reformation in Germany and whose teachings inspired the theological and cultural doctrine known as Lutheranism. -
1500
Cristóbal de Morales
Spanish composer. An undisputed master of sacred polyphonic music, his work is considered one of the summits of Spanish Renaissance polyphony. -
Mar 30, 1510
Antonio de Cabezón
Composer and organist considered to be the best instrumentalist of his time. He was chamber musician to Carlos I and Felipe II. -
Feb 3, 1525
Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina
He is seen as the most representative author of polyphonic works in keeping with the new demands of the Counter-Reformation. His works from these years are notable for the clarity achieved. -
1532
Orlando di Lasso
He was a Franco-Flemish composer of the late Renaissance. Along with Palestrina and Victoria, he is considered one of the most influential composers of the 16th century. -
1533
Andrea Gabrieli
He was an Italian composer and organist of the late Renaissance. An uncle of perhaps the most famous composer Giovanni Gabrieli, he was the first internationally renowned member of the Venetian School of composers. -
1543
William Byrd
William Byrd was a British composer, the most famous of the late Tudor and early Stuart periods, and a member of the Late Renaissance. -
1544
Maddalena Casulana
Maddalena Casulana was an Italian composer, violinist and singer of the late Renaissance. She was the first woman composer to have an entire volume of her music printed and published in the history of Western music. -
1548
Tomás Luis de Victoria
He was a Catholic priest, chapel master and celebrated polyphonic composer of the Spanish Renaissance. He has been considered one of the most relevant and advanced composers of his time, with an innovative style that heralded the imminent baroque. -
1555
Giovanni Gabrieli
He was an Italian composer and organist, born and died in Venice. One of the most influential musicians of his time, he represents the culmination of the Venetian school, framed in the transition from Renaissance to Baroque music. -
Feb 25, 1555
Alonso Lobo
Alonso Lobo de Borja was a Spanish Renaissance chapel master of religious music. Although not as famous as Victoria, he was held in high regard. -
Mar 8, 1566
Carlo Gesualdo
He was an Italian composer, one of the most significant figures of late Renaissance music with intensely expressive madrigals and pieces of sacred music with a chromaticism that would not be heard again until the end of the 19th century. -
May 15, 1567
Claudio Monteverdi
Claudio Monteverdi, cuyo nombre completo era Claudio Giovanni Antonio Monteverdi, fue un compositor, violagambista, cantante, director de coro y sacerdote italiano. -
THE BAROQUE
Baroque is understood as the architectural style produced in the 17th and part of the 18th centuries (1600 to 1750), characterised by a profusion of ornamentation in contrast to the sober style of the classical Renaissance. -
Giacomo Carissimi
He was one of the most eminent Italian composers of the early Baroque period and one of the leading representatives of the Roman School. He was born in Marino, near Rome, in 1604 or 1605. -
Barbara Strozzi
An Italian Baroque singer and composer, she published eight volumes of her own music during her lifetime and had more secular music in print than any other composer of the time. -
Henry Purcel
He was a German baroque composer, although his work also had characteristics of early classicism. He is considered the most prolific composer in the history of music. Self-taught in music, he studied law at the University of Leipzig. -
Stradivarius
Antonio Stradivari was Italy's most prominent luthier. The Latin form of his surname, Stradivarius, is used to refer to his instruments. -
Antonio Vivaldi
Antonio Vivaldi was a Venetian Baroque composer, violinist, impresario, teacher and Catholic priest. He was nicknamed Il prete rosso because he was a priest and had red hair. -
Georg Philipp Telemann
He was a German baroque composer, although his work also had characteristics of early classicism. He is considered the most prolific composer in the history of music. Self-taught in music, he studied law at the University of Leipzig. -
Georg Friedrich Händel
He was a German composer, later naturalised English, considered one of the leading figures in the history of music, especially Baroque music, and one of the most influential composers of Western and world music. -
Johann Sebastian Bach
He was a German composer, musician, conductor, chapel master, cantor and teacher of the Baroque period. He was the most important member of one of the most prominent families of musicians in history, with more than 35 famous composers: the Bach family. -
ROMANTICISM
Romanticism is a cultural movement that originated in Germany and the United Kingdom at the end of the 18th century as a reaction against enlightenment and neoclassicism, giving priority to feelings. It is considered to be the first cultural movement that covered the entire map of America. -
Gluck
Christoph Willibald Gluck, since 1756 knight of Gluck, was a German composer from the Bohemian region of the Czech Republic. He is considered one of the most important opera composers of Classicism in the second half of the 18th century. -
Franz Joseph Haydn
Franz Joseph Haydn , known as Joseph Haydn, was an Austrian composer. He is one of the leading representatives of the Classical period, and is known as the "father of the symphony" and the "father of the string quartet" for his important contributions to both genres. -
CLASSICAL MUSIC
Classical music generally refers to the art music of the Western world, considered to be distinct from Western folk music or popular music traditions. It is sometimes distinguished as Western classical music, as the term "classical music" can also be applied to non-Western art musics. -
Nannerl Mozart
Maria Anna Walburga Ignatia Mozart, also called Nannerl and Marianne, was a famous musician of the 18th century. She was the elder sister of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and daughter of Leopold and Anna Maria Mozart. -
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart was an Austrian composer, pianist, conductor and teacher of the former Archbishopric of Salzburg, a master of Classicism, considered one of the most influential and outstanding musicians in history. -
Maria Theresia Von Paradis
Maria Theresia von Paradis was an Austrian pianist and composer. Although she completely lost her sight from the age of three, this did not prevent the production and work of this great pianist, singer and composer from continuing to stand out. -
Ludwig van Beethoven
Ludwig van Beethoven was a German composer, conductor, pianist and piano teacher. His musical legacy spans, chronologically, from Classicism to the beginnings of Romanticism. -
Gioachino Rossini
Gioachino Rossini was an Italian composer who gained fame for his 39 operas, although he also wrote many songs, some chamber and piano pieces and some sacred music. -
Franz Peter Schubert
Franz Peter Schubert was an Austrian composer of early Romantic music, but at the same time a continuator of the classical sonata on the model of Ludwig van Beethoven. -
Hector Berlioz
Louis Hector Berlioz was a French composer and leading figure of Romanticism. His best known work is the Symphonie fantastique, premiered in 1830. -
Felix Mendelssohn
Felix Mendelssohn, whose full name was Jakob Ludwig Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy, was a German composer, conductor and pianist of Romantic music, and brother of the pianist and composer Fanny Mendelssohn. -
Frédéric Chopin
Frédéric François Chopin fue un profesor, compositor y virtuoso pianista franco-polaco, considerado uno de los más importantes de la historia y uno de los mayores representantes del Romanticismo musical. -
Robert Schumann
Robert Schumann was a 19th-century German composer, pianist and music critic, considered one of the most important and representative composers of musical Romanticism. Schumann gave up his law studies, intending to pursue a career as a virtuoso pianist. -
Franz Liszt
Franz Liszt was an Austro-Hungarian Romantic composer, virtuoso pianist, conductor, piano teacher, arranger and secular Franciscan. His name in Hungarian was Liszt Ferencz, in modern usage Liszt Ferenc, and from 1859 to 1865 he was officially known as Franz Ritter von Liszt. -
Richard Wagner
Wilhelm Richard Wagner was a German composer, conductor, poet, essayist, playwright and music theorist of the Romantic period. His operas are particularly noteworthy in which, unlike other composers, he also wrote the libretto and set design. -
Giuseppe Verdi
Giuseppe Fortunino Francesco Verdi was an Italian Romantic opera composer, one of the most important of all time. His work bridges the gap between the bel canto of Rossini, Bellini and Donizetti, and the verismo movement and Puccini. -
Clara Schumann
Clara Wieck, known as Clara Schumann, was a German pianist, composer and piano teacher. She was one of the great European concert pianists of the 19th century, and her career was instrumental in the dissemination of the compositions of her husband, Robert Schumann. -
Bedřich Smetana
Bedřich Smetana was a composer born in Bohemia, a region that was part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire during his lifetime. He was a pioneer in the development of a musical style that was closely linked to Czech nationalism. For this reason, he is recognised in his country as the father of Czech music. -
Johannes Brahms
Johannes Brahms was a German Romantic composer, pianist and conductor, considered the most classical of the Romantic composers. Born in Hamburg into a Lutheran family, he spent much of his professional life in Vienna. -
Modest Mussorgsky
Modest Mussorgsky was a Russian composer, a member of the group of "The Five". His works include the operas Boris Godunov and Jovánschina, the symphonic poem A Night on Bald Mountain and the piano suite Pictures at an Exhibition. Musorgsky was an innovator of Russian music in the Romantic period. -
Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky
Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky was a Russian composer of the Romantic period. He is the author of some of the most famous classical music works in today's repertoire, such as the ballets Swan Lake, The Sleeping Beauty and The Nutcracker, the 1812 Overture, the overture-fantasy Romeo and Juliet, among others. -
Antonín Leopold Dvořák
Antonín Leopold Dvořák was a post-Romantic composer from Bohemia, a territory then belonging to the Austrian Empire, one of the first Czech composers to achieve worldwide recognition and one of the great composers of the second half of the 19th century. -
Edvard Grieg
Edvard Hagerup Grieg, commonly cited as Edvard Grieg, was a Norwegian composer and pianist, considered one of the leading representatives of late Romanticism. -
Rimski Korsakov
Nikolai Andreyevich Rimsky-Korsakov was a Russian composer, conductor and educator who was a member of the group of composers known as The Five. -
Giacomo Puccini
Giacomo Puccini was an Italian opera composer, considered among the greatest, of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. He was a visionary, creating the concepts of music that would govern cinema during the 20th century. -
Hugo Wolf
Hugo Filipp Jakob Wolf was an Austrian composer of Slovenian origin who lived in Vienna in the late 19th century. An enthusiastic follower of Richard Wagner, he became embroiled in the disputes in Vienna at the time between Wagnerians and Formalists or Brahmsians. -
Gustav Mahler
Gustav Mahler was an Austro-Bohemian composer and conductor whose works are considered, along with those of Richard Strauss, the most important of the post-Romantic period. In the first decade of the 20th century, Gustav Mahler was one of the most important conductors and opera directors of his time. -
Claude Debussy
Achille Claude Debussy was a French composer, one of the most influential composers of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Some authors consider him to be the first impressionist composer, although he categorically rejected the term. -
Jean Sibelius
Jean Sibelius, registered at birth as Johan Julius Christian Sibelius, was a Finnish composer and violinist of late Romanticism and early Modernism. -
Arnold Schönberg
Arnold Schoenberg was an Austrian composer, music theorist and painter of Jewish origin. Since emigrating to the United States in 1934, he has adopted the name Arnold Schoenberg, and this is how he often appears in English-language publications and around the world. -
Maurice Ravel
Joseph Maurice Ravel was a French composer of the 20th century. His work, often linked to impressionism, also displays a bold neoclassical style and, at times, traces of expressionism, and is the fruit of a complex heritage and musical discoveries that revolutionised music for piano and orchestra. -
Manuel de Falla
Manuel de Falla y Matheu was a Spanish composer of musical nationalism, one of the most important composers of the first half of the 20th century, along with Isaac Albéniz, Enrique Granados, Joaquín Turina and Joaquín Rodrigo, and one of the most important Spanish composers of all time. -
Béla Bartók
Béla Viktor János Bartók, known as Béla Bartók, was a Hungarian musician who excelled as a composer, pianist and researcher of Eastern European folk music. He is considered one of the greatest composers of the 20th century. -
Ígor Stravinski
Igor Fyodorovich Stravinsky was a Russian composer and conductor and one of the most important and transcendental musicians of the 20th century. His long life allowed him to become acquainted with a wide variety of musical trends. -
Joaquín Turina
Joaquín Turina Pérez was a Spanish composer and musicologist who represented nationalism in the first half of the 20th century. Manuel de Falla, Isaac Albéniz and he composed the most important works of impressionism in Spain. His most important works are Danzas fantásticas and La procesión del Rocío. -
Zoltán Kodály
Zoltán Kodály was a prominent Hungarian musician whose musical style first went through a post-romantic-Viennese phase and then evolved into its main characteristic: the mixture of folklore and complex 20th century harmonies, shared with Béla Bartók. -
Heitor Villa-Lobos
Heitor Villa-Lobos was a Brazilian conductor and composer whose music was influenced by both Brazilian folk music and European classical music. He received some musical instruction from his father. -
George Gershwin
George Gershwin was an American musician, composer and pianist. He is popularly known for having achieved a perfect amalgamation of classical music and jazz, which is evident in his prodigious works. -
Olivier Messiaen
Olivier Messiaen was a French composer, organist, pedagogue and ornithologist, one of the most outstanding musicians of the 20th century. -
Pierre Schaeffer
Pierre Henri Marie Schaeffer fue un compositor francés. Es considerado el creador de la música concreta. Es autor del libro titulado Tratado de los objetos musicales, en donde expone toda su teoría sobre este tipo de música. Compuso distintas obras, todas ellas basadas en la técnica de la música concreta. -
John Cage
John Milton Cage Jr., artistically John Cage, was an American composer, music theorist, artist and philosopher. A pioneer of aleatoric music, electronic music and the non-standard use of musical instruments, Cage was one of the leading figures of the post-war avant-garde. -
Pierre Henry
Pierre Henry was a French musician, considered to be the creator, together with Pierre Schaeffer, of the so-called concrete music and one of the godfathers of electroacoustic music. -
Philipp Glass
Philip Glass is an American composer of minimalist classical music. He studied at the Juilliard School in New York. His international recognition has grown since the appearance of his opera Einstein on the Beach.