Program music was first composed during the Renaissance, but reached its greatest popularity during the Romantic Period of approximately 1850 to 1900. Composers used traditional operatic overtures as a model to create independent works that told a story, as opposed to absolute music, which has no narrative.
Mendelssohn originally wrote his "Midsummer Night's Dream Overture" as a piano duet in 1826 and finally premiered it as an orchestral piece in 1827. Music historians regard this piece as the first concert overture.
Romantic-era concert overtures that remain popular include Tchaikovsky's 1870 work "Romeo and Juliet-Fantasy Overture." Gioacchino Rossini's "William Tell Overture" became known to millions of radio listeners of the 1940s and '50s as the theme to "The Lone Ranger" and the overture was also used for the subsequent television series.