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oratorio

(Encyclopedia)oratorio ôrətôrˈēō [key], musical composition employing chorus, orchestra, and soloists and usually, but not necessarily, a setting of a sacred libretto without stage action or scenery. The imme...

anthem

(Encyclopedia)anthem [ultimately from antiphon], short nonliturgical choral composition used in Protestant services, usually accompanied and having an English text. The term is used in a broader sense for “nation...

Dent, Edward Joseph

(Encyclopedia)Dent, Edward Joseph, 1876–1957, English musicologist. He studied and taught at Cambridge. Dent wrote biographies of Alessandro Scarlatti (1905), Busoni (1933), and Handel (1934), and many critical w...

Hogwood, Christopher Jarvis Haley

(Encyclopedia)Hogwood, Christopher Jarvis Haley, 1941–2014, British conductor, musicologist, and harpsichordist, b. Nottingham, grad. Cambridge (1964). He was an leader of the early-music movement, which sought t...

Bononcini

(Encyclopedia)Bononcini bwō– [key], musical family of Modena, Italy. Giovanni Maria Bononcini, 1642–78, choirmaster and organist at Bologna and Modena, was a composer and the author of Musico prattico (1673). ...

Franz, Robert

(Encyclopedia)Franz, Robert rōˈbĕrt fränts [key], 1815–92, German composer of about 350 lieder, intimate songs, usually in strophic form. The first of them (pub. 1843) drew warm praise from Schumann. Franz ch...

Graupner, Gottlieb

(Encyclopedia)Graupner, Gottlieb (Johann Christian Gottlieb), 1767–1836, German-American musician. In 1795 he came to the United States, settling in Charleston, S.C., where he played in the City Theatre Orchestra...

jig

(Encyclopedia)jig, dance of English origin that is performed also in Ireland and Scotland. It is usually a lively dance, performed by one or more persons, with quick and irregular steps. When the jig was introduced...

hornpipe

(Encyclopedia)hornpipe, English folk dance known since the 16th cent., when it obtained its name from the wind instrument that accompanied it. The hornpipes of the 17th and 18th cent. have moderate 3–2 time and 4...

Sweelinck, Jan Pieterszoon

(Encyclopedia)Sweelinck, Jan Pieterszoon yän pēˈtərsōn swāˈlĭngk [key], 1562–1621, Dutch organist and composer, called the “maker of German organists” because the succession of his pupils descended di...