♪ Classical Unpacked

Musical Form

Rhapsody

A free-form, episodic piece that follows mood rather than a fixed structure.

The ornate 1851 first-edition title page of Liszt's 'Rhapsodie hongroise' (Hungarian Rhapsody) for piano
First edition: F. Liszt, Rhapsodie hongroise, Leipzig: Bartholf Senff, 1851 / IMSLP via Wikimedia Commons, Public Domain

Orchestral / Solo

Associated eras: Romantic, 20th Century / Modernist

A rhapsody is a piece, for orchestra or solo instrument, that deliberately avoids the fixed structural templates (sonata form, the multi-movement symphony layout) that govern most other classical forms. Instead, it moves through a sequence of contrasting sections and moods, held together more by emotional flow and often by folk or national musical material than by formal architecture.

Franz Liszt's Hungarian Rhapsodies, drawing on Hungarian and Romani folk melodies, established the genre in the Romantic era. The idea carried well into the 20th century — George Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue applies the same free, episodic logic to a fusion of orchestral music and jazz.

Where to start listening: Rachmaninoff's Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini (technically a set of variations, but rhapsodic in spirit) and Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue both show how flexible the genre can be.