By the turn of the century and for the next few decades, artists of all nationalities were searching for exciting and different modes of expression. Composers such as Arnold Schoenberg explored unusual and unorthodox harmonies and tonal schemes. French composer Claude Debussy was fascinated by Eastern music and the whole-tone scale, and created a style of music named after the movement in French painting called Impressionism.
Hungarian composer Bela Bartok continued in the traditions of the still strong Nationalist movement and fused the music of Hungarian peasants with twentieth century forms. Avant-garde composers such as Edgard Varese explored the manipulation of rhythms rather than the usual melodic/harmonic schemes. The tried and true genre of the symphony, albeit somewhat modified by this time, attracted such masters as Gustav Mahler and Dmitri Shostakovich, while Igor Stravinsky gave full rein to his manipulation of kaleidoscopic rhythms and instrumental colors throughout his extremely long and varied career. While many composers throughout the twentieth-century experimented in new ways With traditional instruments such as the “prepared piano” used by American composer John Cage, many of the twentieth-century’s greatest composers, such as Italian opera composer Giacomo Puccini and the Russian pianist/composer Sergei Rachmaninoff, remained true to the traditional forms of music history. In addition to new and eclectic styles of musical trends, the twentieth century boasts numerous composers whose harmonic and melodic styles an average listener can still easily appreciate and enjoy.
The advance of technology has also had an enormous impact on the evolution of music in this century, with some composers using, for instance, the cassette player as a compositional tool or electronically generated sounds alongside classical instruments, the use of computers to compose music, and so on. Some important composers of the 20th century were Leos Janacek 1854-1928, Claude Debussy 1862-1918, Richard Strauss 1864-1949, Carl August Nielsen 1865-1931, Arnold Schonberg 1874-1951, Ralph Vaughan Williams 1872-1958, Maurice Ravel 1875-1937, Bela Bartok 1881-1945, Igor Stravinsky 1882-1971, Anton von Webern 1883-1945, Alban Berg 1885-1935, Sergei Prokofiev 1891-1953, Paul Hindemith 1895-1963, George Gershwin 1898-1937, Kurt Weill 1900-1950, Aaron Copland 1900-1990, Olivier Messiaen 1908-1992, and John Cage 1912-1992.
