Timeline 3: The Classical Era

By barnes.tyler

  • Jean-Philippe Rameau (1683-1764)

    Rameau was a French composer and theorist. He tried to establish a rational 
foundation for harmonic 
practice with his “Treatise on Harmony”
 (1722).

  • Pietro Metastasio (1698-1782)

    Court poet in Vienna: primary librettist for opera seria in the late Baroque and Classic periods.

  • Giovanni Battista Sammartini (1700-1775)

    Credited with invented the symphony in Milan, Italy.

  • Franz Xaver Richter (1709-1789)

    Richter was the inventor of the string quartet genre, which was a prestigious chamber music genre that appealed to aristocratic social life

  • Frederick the Great (1712-1786)

    A great patronage of Prussian Arts, Frederick the Great was a gifted musician played flute. He composed at least 100 sonatas and 4 symphonies.

  • Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach 
(1714-88)

    Worked in Berlin for Frederick the Great (Frederick II) who reigned over the Kingdom of Prussia from 1740 to 1786.

  • Charles Burney (1726-1814)

    Organist, amature composer, writer, and music scholar
.

  • Rococo Style (1730s-60s)

    “Rococo” derives from the French word, “rocaille” meaning “scroll.”


  • Franz Joseph Haydn (1732-1809)

    Haydn was credited as the primary mover within the new classic style concerning instrumental music but he did not invent the style.

  • Franz Joseph Haydn (1732-1809)

    Haydn was a very important composer who worked for the Esterhazys for his whole life. Lead the esteemed orchestra for the Esterhazy court.

  • Giovanni Paisiello (1740-1816)

    A good Italian composer, Paisello spent time in Naples, St. 
Petersburg, and Paris, ending his 
career back in Naples.

  • William Billings (1746-1800)

    One of the first American composers, he was self taught.

  • Antonio Salieri (1750-1825)

    Antonio Salieri was one of the successful 
court composers in 
Vienna; very popular 
and talented. He composed many operas in Italian, German, and French.

  • First String Quartets (1750s)

    Invented by Franz Xaver Richter.

  • Maria Anna Mozart (Nannerl) (1751-1829)

    Sister to Mozart, she was a skilled composer and pianist in her own right.

  • Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756-1791)

    Mozart was and extremely important composer. He was child prodigy who toured Europe with his father, Leopold Mozart (1719-1787). Was influenced by other composers, but eventually his style became the dominant sound of the era.

  • Maria Theresa 
von Paradis 
(1759-1824)

    An excellent organist, she was renowned for her remarkable 
musical memory.

  • Opera Buffa (c. 1760)

  • Sonata Form (1770s and 1780s)

    The most widely used form in the 1770s and 80s for symphonic and chamber pieces.
  • Period: to

    American Revolution

  • Piano Patented (1777)

  • Don Giovanni (1787)

    Considered the greatest opera every composed.
  • Period: to

    French Revolution