The 2nd half of the 20th centruy

One of the biggest musical acts in history, The Beatles were John Lennon(guitar), George Harrison(guitar), Paul McCartney (bass) and Ringo Starr (drums). Lennon and McCartney began playing together in The Quarrymen in 1957; Harrison joined later that year. Before they became The Beatles, they were also Johnny and the Moondogs and The Silver Beatles, joined at times by bandmates including bassist Stuart Sutcliffe (23 June 1940 - 10 April 1962) and drummer Pete Best (b. 24 November 1941); Best was replaced by Ringo to form the final foursome. The early Beatles performed shows in Hamburg, Germany and Liverpool, England, playing covers of early American rock and roll plus original songs by Lennon and McCartney. Their 1962 release of "Love Me Do" charted in the U. K., and in 1963 their song "She Loves You" was the biggest hit in U. K. history.

The Who were one of the great rock bands of the 1960s and 1970s. In its glory years the group consisted of guitarist and main songwriter Pete Townshend(b. 19 May 1945), singer Roger Daltrey (b. 1 March 1944), bassist John Entwistle (b. 9 October 1944, d. 27 June 2002) and drummer Keith Moon (b. 23 August 1946, d. 7 September 1978). Early on the group was part of the "Mod" movement, playing R&B music in stylized tailored suits, before morphing into an unruly proto-punk band famous for smashing its instruments at the end of live performances. This period is epitomized by the oft-mentioned lyric "Hope I die before I get old" in the band's 1965 tune "My Generation."

British musical group. Its original members were Mick Jagger (b. 1943), Keith Richards (b. 1943), Brian Jones (1944 – 69), Bill Wyman (b. 1936), and Charlie Watts (b. 1941). The band was formed in 1962 when Jagger, Richards, and Jones, who had been performing sporadically in a blues band, recruited Wyman and formed their own group. Watts joined the band in 1963. Jagger was the lead vocalist, while Jones and Richards played guitars, Wyman played bass, and Watts played drums. The band's name was adopted from a Muddy Waters song. By 1966 a series of outstanding songs had made the band second in popularity only to the Beatles. Jagger and Richards wrote most of its songs, which are marked by a driving backbeat, biting and satirical lyrics, and simple but expressive instrumental accompaniments. You can find the rest fo this infomation at http://www.answers.com/

Early 20th-century music

"The years spanning the end of the nineteenth century and the earliest part of the twentieth were a time of great expansion and development of, as well as a dramatic reaction to, the prevailing late Romanticism of previous years. In music, as in all the arts, expression became either overt (as in the early symphonic poems of Richard Strauss (1864-1949), the huge symphonies of Gustay Mahler, or the operas of Giacomo Puccini), or was merely suggested (as in the so-called "impressionist" music of Claude Debussy. The previous century’s tide of Nationalism found a twentieth century advocate in the Hungarian Bela Bartok. It was a time of deepening psychological awareness, with the works of both Nietzsche and Freud in circulation; and the horrors of the First World War brought death and destruction to the very doorsteps of many people living in Europe. Possibly in reaction to such influences, the expressionistic music of Arnold Schoenberg and his disciples germinated and flourished for a time. Experimentation and new systems of writing music were attempted by avant-garde composers like and although none gained a foothold with the public, these techniques had a profound influence Edgard Varese on many of the composers who were to follow." http://www.ipl.org/div/mushist/twen/index.html

Classical period

The dates of the Classical period in Western music are generally accepted as being between 1750 to 1820. However, the term classical music is used colloquially to describe a variety of Western musical styles from the ninth century to the present, and especially from the sixteenth or seventeenth to the nineteenth. This article is about the specific period from 1750 to 1825.The Classical period falls between the Baroque and the Romantic periods. The best known composers from this period are Joseph Haydn, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and Ludwig van Beethoven; other notable names include Luigi Boccherini, Mauro Giuliani, Fernando Sor, Muzio Clementi, Jan Ladislav Dussek, Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach, and Christoph Willibald Gluck. Beethoven is also sometimes regarded either as a Romantic composer or a composer who was part of the transition to the Romantic; Franz Schubert is also something of a transitional figure, as are Johann Nepomuk Hummel, Luigi Cherubini and Carl Maria von Weber. The period is sometimes referred to as the era of Viennese Classic or Classicism (German: Wiener Klassik), since Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Joseph Haydn, and Ludwig van Beethoven all worked at some time in Vienna.If you want to get more info about the Classical period go to en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Classical_period_(music)

Baroque

Baroque music describes a style of European classical music approximately extending from 1600 to 1750. This era is said to begin in music after the Renaissance and was followed by the Classical era. The word "baroque" came from the Portuguese word barroco, meaning "misshapen pearl", a strikingly fitting characterization of the architecture of this period; later, the name came to be applied also to its music. Baroque music forms a major portion of the classical music canon, being widely studied, performed, and listened to. It is associated with composers such as Johann Sebastian Bach, Antonio Vivaldi, Jean-Baptiste Lully, George Frideric Handel, Arcangelo Corelli, Claudio Monteverdi, Jean-Philippe Rameau and Henry Purcell.The baroque period saw the development of functional tonality. During the period, composers and performers used more elaborate musical ornamentation, made changes in musical notation, and developed new instrumental playing techniques. Baroque music expanded the size, range, and complexity of instrumental performance, and also established opera as a musical genre. Many musical terms and concepts from this era are still in use today.

This is just a little pice of the baroque period you can find the rest at http://www.wikipedia.org/

These are just a few instruments that was used in the baroque period.

Renaissance Inventions

There are many things that we take for granted that were invented in the Renaissance era. Many of these inventions we use without thinking who created it and how it came about. Some of these inventions include the clock, gunpowder and artillery, eye glasses and spectacles, the printing press, the flush toilet, the microscope, the telescope, and the match.
In the beginning of the Renaissance time period, we can see the first portable clocks developed in Florenece, Italy, in 1410 by Filippo Brunelleschi, a famous architect. Before this time, mechanical clocks were large, fixed devices. The spring- driven clock made it possible to carry the time around with you.
Gunpowder was invented around 1040. Although hard to believe, rockets were launched as fireworks and weapons in China in the early 1230's. This led the way to William Congreve developing rockets to use during wars. Launching tubes were developed by this engineer to improve their accuracy. Also coming from the invention of gunpowder was the gun and other projectile-firing artillery. These new inventions greatly affected how war was fought. War used to be hand-to-hand combat with specific implied rules of chivalry. With these new, more powerful weapons, there were a higher number of casualties and more serious wounds. In turn this also affected the world of medicine.
Another important advance in science was the invention of convex and concave lenses. This led to the invention of bifocals which could correct people's eyesight. Also, lenses led to the inventions of telescopes and microscopes, which led to hundreds upon thousands of advances in multiple fields of science.
A big development in writing and literature was the invention of the printing press. Invented in 1436 by a 39 year old German man named Johann Gutenberg, the printing press was a great improvement over hand-copying. Before the development of this time-saving and economical machine, monks had to hand copy everything. This time-consuming process made books and scripts extremely hard to come by, and astronomically expensive. Gutenberg used his printing press to put ink on hundreds of individual letters that could be combined in numerous ways to create an entire page of text. After this stage was completed, as many copies as desired could be made. However, to print a different page, the individual letters had to be completely rearranged. This great invention helped Gutenberg reach his greatest achievement of the first mass-production of the Bible, which he published in 1456 in Mainz, Germany.
An important invention used by all, was the flush toilet. It was invented by Sir John Harington. Harington invented a valve that when pulled would release water from a water closet. Sir John recommended flushing the toilet once or twice a day, although with our modern technology, we know that is probably not sufficient. (Robin Hood didn’t name the toilet either.)
Fire was difficult to create until Robert Boyle invented the match in 1680. Although fire could be made by rubbing sticks together or by striking flint to steel, this was a time consuming process. Boyle discovered that when phosphorus and sulfur were rubbed together, they would burst into flame. Boyle knew that this was not because of friction, but because of chemical nature of these two substances. Boyle's matches were not safe because sometimes they accidentally went up in flames while in a pocket. With some improvements and a little fine tuning, this invention led to your modern safety match many years later.

Music in Medieval Times

In the medieval period music was used every day. It was used at every event indoors and out. Their were so many different instruments like the cornett or zink. Another popular instrument in the medieval period was the harp. The harp was mostly used for pre-christian purposes and it is still used today.

Ancient Music

In many ancient cultures, music was used much as it is today. For example the Ancient Greeks used music for teaching, to tell stories, for entertainment, and for ceremonies. One of the instruments used in Ancient Greece was the Panflute. They called it the Panflutin because the Greek god Pan was in love with a nymph that transformed into a reed.