AQA A-level Music (7272) · Area of Study 7: Art Music since 1910
Mini-Lesson
Art Music since 1910
This mini-lesson covers AQA Area of Study 7 — Art Music since 1910: the movements and techniques of modern concert music — impressionism, serialism, neoclassicism, minimalism and the experimental.
Set works rotate, so learn the movements and their compositional techniques that you will meet in any modern work, rather than one prescribed piece.
Set works rotate: exam boards re-issue prescribed pieces on a rolling cycle, so this lesson teaches the area-of-study style features, musical elements and listening skills you apply to any work — not a single prescribed piece. Always check the current set works in the live specification. Press Start to begin.
Overview
Modern music breaks in many directions
After 1910, composers broke from the Romantic mainstream in many directions. Learn the movements and their techniques:
Impressionism, expressionism and atonality, serialism.
Neoclassicism, minimalism, and experimental / electronic music.
Quick check
Hazy colour
?A hazy, colouristic passage uses a scale built entirely of whole tones, blurring any sense of key. This is characteristic of...
Impressionism
Impressionism
Impressionism prizes colour and atmosphere over strong direction:
Whole-tone and modal scales; pentatonic melodies.
Parallelism (planing) — chords moved in parallel; unresolved 7ths and 9ths.
Delicate orchestration, pedal points and washes of sound.
Quick check
Moving in parallel
?A pianist moves a whole chord shape up and down the keyboard in exact parallel motion. This impressionist device is...
Sort it
Which movement?
Tap a technique, then tap the movement it belongs to.
🎨 Impressionism
🔢 Serialism
🔁 Minimalism
Serialism
Atonality and serialism
Some composers abandoned tonality altogether:
Atonality — no tonal centre; expressionism conveys extreme, raw emotion.
Serialism — a fixed tone row of all twelve notes, used as prime, inversion, retrograde and retrograde inversion.
No note is favoured as a tonic, so no key emerges.
Quick check
The twelve-note method
?A piece is built from an ordered series of all twelve chromatic notes, transformed by inversion and retrograde, with no note favoured as a tonic. This method is...
Neoclassicism
Neoclassicism
Others looked back to earlier clarity:
Neoclassicism revives Baroque/Classical forms and textures with a modern harmonic twist (added-note chords, spiky rhythms).
Clear counterpoint, dance forms and balanced structures return, but sound freshly dissonant.
Match it
Match the term
Tap a term on the left, then its meaning on the right.
Term
Meaning
Quick check
Old form, new sound
?A 20th-century composer writes a witty gigue in clear counterpoint but harmonises it with crunchy added-note chords. This reworking of an old form is...
Minimalism
Minimalism
Minimalism builds large structures from tiny materials:
Repeating cells and ostinati over a steady pulse.
Additive process — notes gradually added or removed; phasing — identical parts slip out of sync.
Slow harmonic change and hypnotic texture.
Quick check
Drifting apart
?Two players begin a short pattern in unison; one speeds up almost imperceptibly so the parts drift apart and interlock. This minimalist technique is...
Experimental
Experimental music and appraising
Beyond these, composers explore new sounds:
Extended techniques — unusual ways of playing (bowing behind the bridge, prepared piano, multiphonics).
Aleatoric (chance) elements and graphic scores.
Electronic and electro-acoustic music, tape and live processing.
Appraising: name the movement, then cite the technique (whole-tone, tone row, ostinato, extended technique) as evidence.
Quick check
New ways to play
?A cellist is asked to bow the strings behind the bridge to produce a scratchy, pitchless sound. Such unconventional playing methods are called...