UNT Theses and Dissertations - 90 Matching Results

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Accessibility and Authenticity in Julia Smith's Cynthia Parker

Description: In 1939, composer Julia Smith's first opera Cynthia Parker dramatized the story of a Texas legend. Smith manipulated music, text, and visual images to make the opera accessible for the audience in accordance with compositional and institutional practices in American opera of the 1930s. Transparent musical themes and common Native Americans stereotypes are used to define characters. Folk music is presented as diegetic, creating a sense of authenticity that places the audience into the opera's We… more
Date: December 2007
Creator: Buehner, Katie R.
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Alban Berg as Liedkomponist: An Analytical Study of his Two Settings of "Schliesse mir die Augen beide," 1907 and 1925

Description: Alan Berg's two musical settings of Theodor Storm's poem"Schliesse mir die Augen beide" have received little in the way of scholarly analytical attention. The three major chapters of this thesis deal with the two settings on three different levels. Chapter II surveys the political and cultural milieu in which Berg functioned as a young composer of Lieder in the years 1900-1910. Chapter III examines the special quality of lyricism which is often attributed to Berg and his works. Chapter IV provi… more
Date: May 1986
Creator: Ray, Karen, 1951-
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An analysis of Brahms' Quintet in B minor, op. 115, for clarinet and strings

Description: Although many volumes concerning the life and works of Johannes Brahms have been written, it has been found that the majority of these writings treat the material of the subject in a rather poetic and romanticized fashion. This is especially unfortunate in those volumes where the works of Brahms are analyzed with pragmatic implications, since Brahms himself eschewed the use of extramusical elements in his composition. This investigation, therefore, is an attempt to present a careful analysis of… more
Date: January 1968
Creator: Graham, Jack E. (Jack Eldon)
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Anton Bruckner's Treatment of the Credo Text in His Last Three Masses

Description: In order to investigate the stylistic transformation that occured before Bruckner abandoned the composition of Masses, this paper analyzes the Credo settings in his last three great Masses, with special attention to the treatment of the text. The relationship between the text and specific musical techniques is also considered. The trends found in these three works, especially in the last setting in F minor, confirm the assumption that Bruckner's Mass composition served as a transition to the co… more
Date: December 1985
Creator: Lee, Namjai
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Asserting Identity in Wagner's Shadow: The Case of Engelbert Humperdinck's Königskinder (1897)

Description: Engelbert Humperdinck (1854-1921), who was considered a Wagnerian due to to his past work in Bayreuth and the Wagnerian traits of his Hänsel und Gretel, seems to have believed that to define himself as a composer, he had to engage somehow with that designation, whether through orthodox Wagner imitation or an assertion of his independence from Wagner's musical legacy. The latter kind of engagement can be seen in Humperdinck's Königskinder (1897), in which he developed a new kind of declamatory … more
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Date: August 2004
Creator: Kinnett, Forest Randolph
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"Being" a Stickist: A Phenomenological Consideration of "Dwelling" in a Virtual Music Scene

Description: Musical instruments are not static, unchanging objects. They are, instead, things that materially evolve in symmetry with human practices. Alterations to an instrument's design often attend to its ergonomic or expressive capacity, but sometimes an innovator causes an entirely new instrument to arise. One such instrument is the Chapman Stick. This instrument's history is closely intertwined with global currents that have evolved into virtual, online scenes. Virtuality obfuscates embodiment, but … more
Date: May 2010
Creator: Hodges, Jeff
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Belle Musique and Fin' Amour: Thibaut de Champagne, Gace Brulé, and an Aristocratic Trouvére Tradition

Description: Many consider Gace Brulé (c1160-c1213) and Thibaut IV, Count of Champagne, (1201-1253) to have been the greatest trouvères. Writers on this subject have not adequately examined this assumption, having focused their energies on such issues as tracking melodic variants of individual works as preserved in different song-books (or chansonniers), the interpretation of rhythm in performance, and creation of modern editions of these songs. This thesis examines the esteem enjoyed by Gace and Thibaut in… more
Date: December 2008
Creator: Bly, Emily
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Beyond the Human Voice: Francis Poulenc's Psychological Drama La Voix humaine (1958)

Description: Francis Poulenc's one-character opera La Voix humaine (1958), a setting of the homonymous play by Jean Cocteau, explores the psychological complexities of an unnamed woman as she experiences the end of a romantic relationship. During the forty-minute work, she sings in a declamatory manner into a telephone, which serves as a sign of the unrevealed man at the other end. Poulenc uses musical motives to underscore the woman's changing emotional states as she recalls her past relationship. The musi… more
Date: May 2000
Creator: Beard, Cynthia C.
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Bridging the Fantastical Gap: Dread and the Uncanny in the Score of "It Follows"

Description: "It Follows" (2014), written and directed by David Robert Mitchell, premiered at the Cannes Film Festival in 2014. It chronicles the story of Jay, a college student who contracts a curse through sexual intercourse. The curse manifests itself as a human whom only the infected persons can see, always following at a walking pace, and determined to kill if it catches up. This thesis demonstrates the score's crucial role in establishing affect, setting, and character in a film with sparse dialogue a… more
Date: May 2020
Creator: Johnson, Kinley
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Busoni's Doktor Faust

Description: It is the intent of this thesis to shed a new investigative light upon a musician whose importance as a creative personality and aesthetician has been sorely underestimated or at least unappreciated by fellow musicians and audiences of his own and succeeding generations, a musician who formulated a new musical aesthetic which involved the utilization of compositional techniques diametrically opposed to those which had held dominant influence over the musical world for more than half a century, … more
Date: August 1976
Creator: Harrison, Charles Scott
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Carlo Milanuzzi's Quarto Scherzo and the Climate of Venetian Popular Music in the 1620s

Description: Although music publishing in Italy was on the decline around the turn of the seventeenth century, Venice emerged as one of the most prolific publishing centers of secular song in Italy throughout the first three decades of the 1600s. Many Venetian song collections were printed with alfabeto, a chordal tablature designed to facilitate even the most untrained of musicians with the necessary tools for accompanying singers on the fashionable five-course Spanish guitar. Carlo Milanuzzi's Quarto Sc… more
Date: August 2001
Creator: Gavito, Cory Michael
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The Chevalier de Saint-Georges: An Exponent of the Parisian Symphonie Concertant

Description: The symphonie concertante, a product of the late eighteenth-century Parisian concert societies, provided a vehicle for display of the virtuoso style sought by contemporary audiences. The works of the Chevalier Joseph Boulogne de Saint-Georges, one of its chief exponents, served as strong influences on the development of the form and its diffusion throughout Europe. The symphonies concertantes of Opus VI, No. 1 and Opus X, No. 2 (according to thematic numbering of Barry S. Brook) date from ca. 1… more
Date: August 1982
Creator: Braun, Melanie
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Clavichord Traits in Selected Late Eighteenth-Century Keyboard Pieces

Description: Several late eighteenth-century keyboard composers indicated that some of their works were written specifically for the clavichord, as opposed to the harpsichord or pianoforte. This demand was indicated by a composer's commentary, remarks made by a contemporary, or by Bebung and Tragen der Tone indications in the music. The thesis examines selected works of C.P.E. Bach, Johann Eckard, Nathanael Gruner, Johann Hassler, Christian Neefe, F.S. Sander, and Daniel Tt*rk, and discusses elements of the… more
Date: May 1983
Creator: Clark, Alice Ham
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A Comparative Study of Harmonic Tension in Hindemith's Piano Sonatas and in His Theoretical Writings

Description: The purpose of this paper will be to compare the Hindemith theory of harmonic tension as set forth in his book, Craft of Musical Composition, with his actual use of harmonic tension in compositional practice. The compositions used for this study are Hindemith's Sonaten für Klavier, published in 1936, consisting of three sonatas*. Although these pieces were published one year before the theory book, it seems reasonable to assume that Hindemith was at least formulating the ideas that would go int… more
Date: August 1957
Creator: Tull, Charlotte
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A Comparison of the Use of Music in the Holy Eucharist of the Roman Catholic Church and the Sabbath Morning Service of the Jewish Synagogue in the Middle Ages

Description: The problem with which this investigation is concerned is that of comparing the medieval musical traditions of two of the world's most influential religions. The similarities are discussed in two major categories: the comparison of liturgical texts and ritual, and the comparison of the music appearing in each ritual. This study has one main purpose. That purpose is to demonstrate how, through musical traditions, each religion has developed through the influence of the other. Samples of the litu… more
Date: July 1971
Creator: Simmons, Sandra K. (Sandra Kay)
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Critical Reaction to Serge Koussevitzky's Programming of Contemporary Music with the Boston Symphony Orchestra 1924-1929

Description: Serge Koussevitzky, conductor of the Boston Symphony Orchestra from 1924-1949, had, throughout his career, a reputation as a champion of modern music. The anticipation of his arrival in Boston in 1924 sparked a great deal of public debate about his reported modernism which the critics reflected and contributed to. This thesis analyzes the critical reaction, preserved in scrapbooks of newspaper clippings at Symphony Hall, Boston, to Koussevitzky's programming of contemporary music during his fir… more
Date: August 1982
Creator: Morgan, Richard S. (Richard Sanborn)
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Criticism of Beethoven's Pastoral Symphony in London and Boston, 1819-1874: A Forum for Public Discussion of Musical Topics

Description: Critics who discuss Beethoven’s Pastoral Symphony often write about aspects that run counter to their conception of what a symphony should be, such as this symphony’s static nature and its programmatic elements. In nineteenth-century Boston and London, criticism of the Pastoral Symphony reflects the opinions of a wide range of listeners, as critics variably adopted the views of the intellectual elite and general audience members. As a group, these critics acted as intermediaries between various… more
Date: December 2011
Creator: Cooper, Amy Nicole
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Don Gillis's Symphony No 5½: Music for the People

Description: Don Gillis wrote Symphony No. 5½ (1947) in order to reconcile the American public with modern art music. By synthesizing jazz (as well as other American folk idioms), singable melodies, and humor, and then couching them into symphonic language, Gillis produced a work that lay listeners could process and enjoy. The piece was an immediate success and was played by orchestras across the globe, but it did not retain this popularity and it eventually faded from relevancy. This study focuses on el… more
Date: May 2013
Creator: Morrison, Sean
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Drama and Characterization in Opera Settings of "A Midsummer Nightʼs Dream" by Britten and Siegmeister

Description: Although Shakespeare deliberately downplays characterization in his moonlit dream fantasy, both Britten and Siegmeister exploit this dramatic element as the basis of their opera settings of the play. Through the operas, the shallow characters take on new dimensions, creating musical experiences existing quite independently of Shakespeare, while at the same time retaining the atmosphere of a dream-fantasy. Placing emphases upon varying aspects of the play, the two composers create entirely diffe… more
Date: August 1982
Creator: Allen, Debra K. (Debra Kaye)
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The Dramatic and Musical Unity of Hector Berlioz's Les Troyens

Description: The discussion concentrates on Hector Berlioz's second opera, Les Troyens, which is Berlioz's final large work written between 1855-1858. The study demonstrates how the opera is unified through its drama and music. Les Troyens, a five-act tragic opera that is based on Virgil's Aeneid, is perhaps one of Berlioz's least known major works. The orchestral score had not been published in its entirety until 1969, when a two-volume edition of the opera was published by Bärenreiter in the New Edition o… more
Date: August 1973
Creator: Menn, Marta C.
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Dubuisson: A Study of His Music for Solo Bass Viol

Description: Dubuisson (fl.1666-c.1685) is the sole French viol player-composer between Nicolas Hotman (1613-1663) and Le Sieur de Sainte-Colombe (d.c.1700) whose works are extant. His four suites from a Library of Congress manuscript (1666) are the oldest dated French music for the bass viol; his approximately 125 pieces are contained in five manuscript sources. This thesis brings together, for the first time, all the music from the five sources for study and analysis. Together with the few biographical de… more
Date: December 1988
Creator: Cheney, Stuart
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An Edition of Verse and Solo Anthems by William Boyce

Description: The English musician William Boyce was known as an organist for the cathedral as well as the Chapel Royal, a composer of both secular and sacred music, a director of large choral festivals, and the editor of Cathedral Music, the finest eighteenth-century edition of English Church music. Among Boyce's compositions for the church are many examples of verse and solo anthems. Part II of this thesis consists of an edition of one verse and three solo anthems selected from British Museum manuscript Ad… more
Date: August 1975
Creator: Fansler, Terry L.
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Édouard Batiste's Symphonie militaire (1845): edition and commentary

Description: Symphonie Militaire is a three movement work for twelve solo wind instruments composed by Edouard Batiste (1820-1876), a professor at the Paris Conservatoire and organist. The composition is scored for flute, two oboes, two B-flat clarinets, two bassoons, E-flat trumpet with valves, two F horns with valves, trombone, and B-flat ophicleide. In this edition, which was prepared from the original manuscript, the trumpet part is transposed to B-flat and a tuba has been substituted for the ophicleide… more
Date: May 1976
Creator: Smialek, William
Item Type: Refine your search to only Thesis or Dissertation
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