Start with the music you like, and here are some recommendations:
Baroque era:
Bach-Aria on G String, Violin Concerto, Brandenburg Concerto
Vivaldi - Violin Concerto "The Four Seasons"
Classicism:
Beethoven - Symphony No. 3 in E flat major "Eroica", C minor Symphony No. 5 "Destiny", Violin Concerto in D major, Piano Sonata No. 14 in C-sharp minor "Moonlight", For Alice
Mozart - Opera "The Marriage of Figaro", Turkish March , String Serenade in G major, Piano Concerto No. 21 in C major, Symphony No. 40 (the basic soundtrack of S.H.E.'s "Don't Want to Grow Up"), Serenade, Waltz of the Flowers
Haydn-l Symphony No. 45 in F minor "Farewell", Cello Concerto in C major
Romanticism:
Chopin - Grand Waltz, Nocturne in E flat major, F sharp major Nocturne, Nocturne in B flat minor, Nocturne in A flat major, Etudes in C minor "Revolution", Polonaise in A flat major "Hero"
Mendelssohn - A Midsummer Night's Dream, Riding the Song Wings, Violin Concerto in E minor
Schubert - Serenade, Wild Rose, Ave Maria
Wagner - Wedding March (you don’t know...), opera "Valkyrie" "
Post-romanticism:
Tchaikovsky - Symphony No. 4 in F minor "Destiny", dance drama "Swan Lake", "Romeo and Juliet"
Johann Strauss the Younger - Blue Danube Waltz, Sound of Spring Waltz, Southern Rose Waltz
Bizet - Opera "Carmen"
If you are of the right age, then In addition, if you are interested, you can learn violin, cello, trumpet, piano, etc., which will give you more depth. Girls are best at playing violin.
In fact, everyone has different feelings about listening to classical music.
I like Bach's unaccompanied violin sonatas and suites very much. My friends heard them and said they were noise (just kidding, he actually likes classical music very much).
So, don’t care what others say, and don’t care about which artistic achievement is higher - what you should care about is your own love for music. If you care too much about academic things, it will affect the experience of listening to music.
Take a step back, which great musicians left so many classics, and why?
Is it for future generations to study?
I think the biggest significance is not this (of course it is not against the study of music theory), but it should allow us to share this beauty with them.
So, don’t care about the authoritative evaluation - because your love for classical music is the greatest comfort to those deceased masters.
Back to business
First check the information about the author to find out more. Then divide the symphony into several parts and enjoy them in sections. Listen to what instruments are used in each part, and finally write down your feelings. Talk to a friend or teacher to share ideas.
Actually, I am not a professional musician, I just like to enjoy it. I suggest you start with the Strauss family waltzes! The music of the Strauss family is relatively simple, neither as rigorous as the music of the classical era, nor as complex as the music of Shostakovich and others. Of course, my favorite is Baroque music, especially Bach's organ music and Vivaldi's concertos. I feel that they express the true meaning of life. However, these pieces are more rigorous and not easy to accept at first.
As for books, I don’t think it’s necessary if you don’t want to be a professional, just like you don’t need to read grammar books if you don’t want to specialize in English linguistics. The main thing is to appreciate it more. I have this feeling: Sometimes when I think back to a piece of music I listened to a few years ago, I suddenly feel that I understand it completely, but no matter how I thought about it at the time, it didn't work.
How to enjoy a symphony?
Some people think symphony is unattainable and incomprehensible. As everyone knows, like articles, it also has depth and depth. As long as you know how to appreciate it, it is not difficult to get started. Because what it reflects and describes is, after all, human life and human thoughts and feelings. Ordinary people, after getting started, can go from not understanding to understanding, from not knowing deeply to gradually becoming better. Of course, when appreciating higher-level symphonies, you need to have certain and corresponding life experiences and a higher cultural level. "You must supplement it with your own experience, impressions and knowledge accumulation."
Introduction below Several different symphonies, briefly talk about the methods of appreciation:
There is a type of symphony called "music painting", which mainly describes the scenery of nature and life, which is relatively easy to understand. For example, the Russian composer Mossorgsky's "Pictures at an Exhibition", Borodin's "Central Asian Steppe", the great German composer Beethoven's "Pastoral Symphony", the French composer De Biaoxi's "The Sea" can be said to be this type of work.
Listening to the music "The Sea", the listener feels as if he is on the shore of the sea. From dawn to noon, he appreciates the changes in color, light, sound and shape of the sea. Sometimes he feels the roar of the wind, sometimes the waves hit the shore, and sometimes the waves are floating. Sometimes there are waves splashing, it’s really ever-changing. Appreciating these works, coupled with rich imagination, you can invisibly get conceptual associations - how beautiful nature is, how interesting life is, and how everything grows endlessly.
There is a type of symphony called "dance music", which has a strong national style. The music is relatively short, the emotions are relatively simple, and the melody is relatively clear. Most of them describe customary festive activities and have the characteristics of singing and dancing. There are also excerpts from dance dramas cut into individual instrumental pieces. This type of symphonic dance music is easy to understand and will soon become popular, such as the more than 400 waltzes by Austrian John Strauss, the "Bolero" by French Ravel, the Czech composer De Vo?ák's "Slavic Dances", German Brahms's "Hungarian Dances", Chinese composers' "Yao Dances", etc., are all symphonic dances.
In symphony music, there is a type of music with a storyline, usually with a title or a subtitle for each movement. Most of this type of music is based on familiar and widely circulated dramas, poems, legends, myths, novels, stories, etc., such as "Arabian Nights" (suite) by Russian Rimikiki Kausakov, which is from Arabia. The mythological novel "One Thousand and One Nights" is based on the music; the French Bizet's "Carmen Suite" is based on the music of the opera of the same name; the Chinese "Butterfly Lovers Violin Concerto" by He Zhanhao and Chen Gang is based on the folk story of "Liang Shanbo and Zhu Yingtai".
These pieces of music do not provide viewers with specific characters or plots visually or linguistically like drama, literature, poetry, folk arts, movies, and television, but rather perform the function of music. The main method is to express the delicate inner feelings of the characters, so that the listeners can feel it from the soul. If the listener understands the content described in it in advance, when listening to the music, along with the sound, he will have some imagination in his mind, and he will enter the specific artistic conception specified by the music, arousing emotional excitement.
In symphonies, there is a type that has no storyline and does not describe scenery, but it reflects people's very delicate, rich and changeable emotional ups and downs through musical means. This type of music has no title (if there is a title, it is only a few words), and reflects people's views and hopes for society in a specific society. Such as Beethoven's "Hero", "Destiny" and "Chorus" symphonies, Tchaikovsky's "Fifth" and "Pathétique" symphonies, etc.
To appreciate this kind of symphony, the listener must have some understanding of the composer's era, environment, experience, encounters, life experience, etc., and at the same time, he must also understand his motivations when writing the music, as well as the composition of the music. Basic content (it is best to also understand some musical forms and techniques, etc.). In this way, when listening to music, the listener can follow the ups and downs of the music's emotions, and get a signal in his heart. He will be happy, sad and sad, angry and angry with the music, and transform it into philosophical concepts. Of course, to get this step, you need certain cultural knowledge and life experience. For example, Beethoven's (1770-1827) famous symphony "Destiny" expresses himself and his destiny through the sweet and bitter experiences of Beethoven's own life and connects with the vast number of people who shared the same fate with him at that time. God's will to fight. It reflected the people's demands for freedom, equality and the liberation of human nature at that time. When Beethoven wrote this piece (38 years old), it was an era when the bourgeoisie was fighting a desperate struggle against the feudal system. What the "Destiny" symphony shows is sometimes turbulence, sometimes meditation, sometimes gathering strength, sometimes fierce struggle, sometimes marching forward, sometimes cheering for victory, which expresses his firm will, tenacious struggle, and passionate hope. .
When appreciating a symphony, if the appreciator also has certain basic knowledge of music, such as music style, mode, theme changes and developments, orchestration, expression techniques, tonal and color contrast, etc. , then you can get richer knowledge and enjoyment of beauty.
1 Adjustment of mentality when appreciating symphony
Appreciating symphony requires a suitable psychological environment. We have seen that many people go to appreciate symphony music without good psychological preparation. They always feel that they are out of tune with the music and gain nothing. This is the result of an unadjusted mentality.
First of all, the appreciation of symphony is mainly performed by the auditory system, so a "static" internal and external environment is particularly needed. Whether you are going to a concert or listening to music, you need to appreciate it carefully and quietly. Although your emotions are fluctuating with the music, you cannot applaud a certain line or point like you can when you appreciate pop music or comedy. Your auditory system should remain stimulated and focused on the music. Some people listen to music while reading or doing things, and some people even do other things while attending concerts. These are particularly detrimental to the appreciation of symphony, which requires concentration on details, especially the whole. Many symphonies even require us to listen to several movements in one go before we know what they mean. Without a state of mind that is conducive to appreciating symphonies, the quality of appreciation will inevitably be affected.
Secondly, when appreciating a symphony, you should not be too rational. Some people always think that after appreciating a symphony, you should be inspired and gain something like appreciating a novel or a movie, but the result is often the opposite.
When appreciating music, especially symphonies, the content expressed by music is highly abstract. You must not say that a certain sentence must be a flower, a certain paragraph must be a grass, here is the sun, and there is the moon. The process of appreciating a symphony is a In the process of physical and mental consumption, you should be more tired after enjoying a symphony. You will often experience more emotional feelings, and this should be the most important. If we analyze very rationally what the writer wants to say here, what he wants to say there, or how this orchestra is playing, how that orchestra is playing, it will actually affect the understanding of the music and the writer. Successful appreciation should be about admiring the composer and the beauty of the music rather than admiring anything else.
2 Grasp the music image in music appreciation
Whether it is a traditional symphony or a modern symphony, most of them have one or more main music images. In most cases, the main musical image appears multiple times in the piece. The main musical images generally have characteristics, some in melody, some in rhythm, some in the sequence of harmony or the development of chords, and some are also expressed through instruments with certain characteristics. In a symphony, this musical image usually appears after the introduction. It is either repeated as it is or in a modified form. After going through a larger evolution process, it often enters the stage of repeating the same. In the final part, this image There will also be multiple "flashes". When appreciating symphony, pay attention to identify these images and grasp its emotional characteristics, and it will be very easy to understand the music.