Romanticism is the music of the “heart.” Composers seek to convey the deepest experiences: love, longing, fear, ecstasy, the mystery of death. Miniature genres arise (Chopin's nocturnes, Brahms's intermezzi), along with the program symphony (Berlioz's Symphonie fantastique) and the music drama (Wagner).
The orchestra expands (Mahler had over 100 performers), harmony is enriched, chromaticism intensifies (Wagner's Tristan und Isolde — the work that loosened traditional tonal harmony). It is an era of virtuoso solos, often with the composer-performer as hero (Liszt, Paganini, Chopin). Ukraine has its Romantics: Mykola Lysenko — the father of the Ukrainian national school, who wrote the opera Taras Bulba, song cycles, and piano works on Ukrainian themes.
