The Baroque period is exciting for me because I recently went to an NYPhilharmonic performance of George Frideric Handel’s “Messiah“, and the fact that it was from the Baroque period is new information to me. Technically speaking, the historical event I do know of “Messiah” then, not as the opera, but as classical music. However, except for that tidbit, I don’t actually know of any actual historical events that took place during the Baroque period. The textbook describes the music from the Baroque period as “ornamentation” as most if not all the music from this period had “the addition of decorative notes, called ornaments, to melodic…performers”. They also included the fact that Baroque music often had the “basso continuo” as a “foundational accompaniment”.

I picked Johann Sebastian Bach and listened to “Orchestral suite no. 3 in d major, bwv 1068: ii. Aria” . Based on the textbook, if I was listening to it for the first time, I would have thought it would be more of a flamboyant type of piano solo, with more energy to the melody’s composition. When in fact, based on my own knowledge and opinion, I knew it to be a more soothing, calm, piece of music. It does have “ornaments” as the textbook said, with delicate high notes bringing the piece together, and the ending part was simple, yet had impact to it from the trill.