WHAT?
Romantic music refers to classical music associated with the Romantic era and, more broadly, Romanticism in general. In Romantic music, emphasis is often placed on narratives (especially in program music) and emotion evoked by the music. Being informed by the wider cultural context of Romanticism, and reacting to industrialisation and scientific rationalisation, Romantic music often echoes themes such as the pastoral, innocence, freedom, spiritual and supernatural experience, imagination and the importance of emotional and creative expression.
Rather than sticking to the rules and conventions of the Classical era, Romantic music experimented with form in favour of greater emotional expression. Music generally became more complex and elaborate, rejecting musical formula and utelising greater range of dynamics, tone, musical structures and instruments in orchestras.
WHO?
Beethoven is generally viewed as either the first Romantic or the last Classical composer, bridging the gap between the two eras of classical music. I'm personally inclined to view Beethoven as a Romantic composer simply because I like his music and I'm not a fan of Classical, but you could really argue it either way.
Other well known Romantic composers include Mendelssohn, Chopin, Schumann, Liszt, Wagner, Bruckner, Brahms, Saint-Saëns, Tchaikovsky, Dvořák, Elgar, Mahler, Debussy, Strauss and Sibelius.
WHEN?
The 19th century. Whether you view Beethoven as a Romantic composer or not, as his music is considered the bridge between Classical and Romantic music, music composed after his death in 1827 can certainly be considered Romantic. Romantic music started to transition to Modernism in the late 19th and early 20th centuries with the work of composers like Mahler, but again, where Romanticism ends and Modernism begins is really pretty blurry.
WHERE?
Central Europe, mostly, with many composers coming from Germany and France, but also Czechia, Russia, Poland and many other countries. Romantic music actually has a not insignificant link with nationalism - for example, Sibelius' work embodied Finnish nationalism. Nationalism and classical music were most connected, however, in Germany, with the importance of German composers being an integral part of German identity in the early 1900s.
This idea is explored in some depth in Thomas Mann's novel Doctor Faustus (Doktor Faustus in its original German), which revolves around both the biography of a fictional German composer called Adrian Leverkühn and the deterioration of German national identity in the first half of the 20th century - unsurprisingly, the link between the two is classical music. (I recommend the book if you're into classical music, German identity, theology, frustratingly unreliable narrators that go on incredibly long tangents and novels that could probably have been half the length. It was good, but my God, it was long.)
WHY?
Well. Romantic music was largely a response to what came before it musically - people got bored of the strict conventions of the Classical era - and what was happening around it, namely, the Age of Enlightenment and the Industrial Revolution, and an increasing cultural emphasis on rationality and pragmatism. Romantic music can be understood best, I think, when you view it as a rebellion of sorts - both in a musical sense, as it rejected the conventions established in the Classical era, and in a philosophical sense, as it rejected increasingly dominant cold and pragmatic approaches to the world in favour of focusing on passion, beauty, love and pain. In contrast to the cultural focus on progress for progress' sake, Romanticism as a movement focused on the wonder inspired by the natural world and our internal worlds. Romantic music was often inspired by other mediums of art like literature and visual art.
I've not gone into a whole lot of depth here, but it's a decent overview, and I at least feel like I vaguely know what I'm talking about. Pretty much all of my favourite composers - Mahler, Dvořák, Bruckner, Tchaikovsky - are Romantic (Prokofiev, who I'd describe as modernist myself but whose name I did see a couple of times in my research, being the exception). I think Romantic music to me most hits the nail on the head in regards to why I personally like classical music - it's an external way into our internal worlds, our imagination, our unconscious, our emotions, our dreams. I've been listening to Dvořák as I've been reading and writing all this out, and I don't know why I'm still surprised at how good his work is. I do still have a question though - how come Romantic gets a capital 'r' but modernist doesn't? Probably a question for another day, though, as I'm pretty much about to fall asleep. Bis morgen!
- A.L.