Between Copland and Sessions
Aaron Copland was an American composer, composition teacher, writer, and conductor of American music. A pioneer in the development of an American style of music, he was dubbed “the Dean of American Composers” during his latter years and is most known for his works from the 1930s and 1940s, which he called “vernacular” and referred to as “populist” by the composer. This is attributed to the fact that the music composition was significantly influenced by jazz, which was street music. It was always the intention of Aaron Copland, who wrote most of the work for this cycle, to create music that would convey the sensation of being alive in the streets of Brooklyn. Thus, Copland quantified his composition as populous since it focused on highlighting popular at the time.
American composer Roger Sessions was one of the twentieth-most century’s important figures in American music. His compositions include symphony, chamber music, operas, and solo piano pieces in a wide range of styles. As a composer, he received commissions from some of the world’s most prominent orchestras, as well as a Pulitzer Prize for his work on two occasions. Roger Sessions’ composition focused on exploring the classical needs of the elite members of the society. Specifically, his composition was characterized by complexity, which earned him the reputation of a “difficult” composer (Sessions, nd). This meant that an average person in listening to Roger Sessions could not understand or comprehend Roger Sessions’ classical compositions. Furthermore, Roger Sessions was an intellectual composer who did not fuse much of his classical music with emotions. Thus, minimizing the population of individuals who connected with his music.
Bibliography
Sessions, Roger. Roger Sessions on Music. Princeton University Press, 2015.
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