Style is the sum of all the elements and techniques used in music, its “final” appearance. Style includes harmonic, melodic, polyphonic, and rhythmic material, how it is used, as well as form, instrumentation, and other factors that determine the character of a piece of music and the impression it makes on the listener. Styles are usually classified by composer and by era. For example, we can speak of the “Bach style,” referring to the harmonic, melodic, polyphonic, rhythmic, and other material that is characteristic of most Bach works; in comparison with this norm, the characteristics of, for example, Beethoven’s “style” are clearer. In addition, Bach was one of the greatest composers of the 18th century and in many respects reproduced the norms of other composers of that era, so we can speak of the “18th century style”, implying “the style of most composers of that time, including Bach”.
The term musical style defines the system of musical expression, which serves to embody a particular ideological and imaginative content. Commonality of style features in musical works based on socio-historical conditions, worldview and worldview of composers, their creative method, the general laws of the musical and historical process. Accordingly distinguish the style of history, national and individual.
Sophisticated listener easily navigate in a system of styles and thus better understand the music, He can easily distinguish, for example, dismembered, strict and slender, almost architectural forms of musical classicism from the fluid massiveness of the Baroque, feels the national characteristic of music. С. Prokofiev, M. Ravel, A. I. Khachaturian, by the first sounds determines what composer’s work is being performed.
Musical styles are related to the styles of other arts. How similar are the harpsichord pieces by 18th century French composers J.F. Rameau and Francois Couperin, full of graceful and gallant embellishments, to Rococo paintings with their fine scrolls of lines! How close is the music of Carlo Debussy, one of the brightest representatives of musical impressionism, to painting, inspired by the vibration of light, the flickering of strokes, misting the hard contours of objects! These connections also enrich the understanding of music.
The peculiarity of the styles is revealed in the distinctive features, they bring together different works of the same style, while at the same time distinguishing them from the music of other styles. Signs of style permeate strongly all aspects of music – texture, rhythm, melody, harmony, etc.
But the style is not reduced only to the sum of the distinctive features of content and form. It is a living unity, not a mechanical set of signs. It is this spiritual depth, the uniqueness of the composer’s worldview expressed in the work that attracts us. We can clearly feel, for example, the romantic’s restless and dreamy soul in the music of Franz Chopin, R. Schumann, Franz Liszt and H. Berlioz. In the energy of rhythm, the severity of harmony of musical works of the 1910s, one can clearly hear the emergence of a new attitude to the world, typical of the style of the 20th century.
The individual style reveals its worldview most clearly. For, by composing music, the composer puts his whole soul into it, lives the same fate as the characters of his works. And so it is not surprising that his frame of mind, temperament, character, prevailing moods, world outlook and the very method of creation find expression in music. Many of the statements of Beethoven, for example, reveals the main in his personality – the desire to overcome difficulties, to struggle. And in his music you can often hear the willful impulse to run into obstacles, overcoming them.
To gain a deeper understanding of the peculiarity of his musical style, it is necessary to listen to several pieces. A single work, especially a miniature, presents us with a character in a single situation, for example at a moment of rapture at the beauty of nature. But what will he be like in a moment of deepest sorrow, how will he show himself in the struggle of life, full of dangers? The style expresses the attitude not to one situation, but to life as a whole, to the world. This ideological depth – the spiritual essence of style – will only be revealed by familiarity with different works.
In the historical development of styles the listener will see the way of spiritual quest of mankind, more and more profound and complete comprehension of changing reality, the formation of new human ideals.
