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open access

The "Beethoven Folksong Project" in the Reception of Beethoven and His Music

Description: Beethoven's folksong arrangements and variations have been coldly received in recent scholarship. Their melodic and harmonic simplicity, fusion of highbrow and lowbrow styles, seemingly diminished emphasis on originality, and the assorted nationalities of the tunes have caused them to be viewed as musical rubble within the heritage of Western art music. The canonic composer's relationship with the Scottish amateur folksong collector and publisher George Thomson, as well as with his audience, am… more
Date: December 2006
Creator: Lee, Hee Seung
open access

Beethoven's Opus 18 String Quartets: Selected First Movements in Consideration of the Formal Theories of Heinrich Koch as Expressed in Versuch Einer Anleitung Zur Composition

Description: Heinrich Koch completed his treatise in 1793, a pioneering work regarding the musical phrase as well as a sonata form description (lacking that term). Composition of Opus 18 began in 1798, a momentous project for several reasons in Beethoven's early career. Here, the theories expressed in Koch's Versuch are taken as an analytic springboard into a thorough analysis of the first movement of the quartet published no. 3, which was the first composed; additionally, nos. 1 and 6 are explored to a les… more
Date: December 2006
Creator: Tompkins, Robert
open access

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
open access

Benjamin Britten's Sonata in C for Cello and Piano, Op. 65: A Practical Guide for Performance

Description: Benjamin Britten is a renowned and prolific English composer, well known for his operas and vocal works. He did, however, also compose five works especially for the cello as a solo instrument of which the Sonata in C for Cello and Piano Op. 65 was the first. He was inspired by one of his musical contemporaries, the remarkable Soviet cellist, Mstislav Rostropovich. Rostropovich was famous for his amazing artistry which propelled him to become one of the most prominent cellists in the world dur… more
Date: May 2009
Creator: Lee, Jeong-A
open access

"Between the Staves" - Adaptations of Debussy's Six épigraphes antiques and Creative Tasks of the Performer

Description: The Six épigraphes antiques represent a cross-section of Debussy's creative output that traces the composer's germ-seed from his original setting of the work in 1901 as incidental music to accompany the recitation of several poems, to the four-hand piano version of 1914, and its consequent reduction for solo piano. What can be gleaned by the methods of derivation from his original sketches to the final, mature works is an understanding of Debussy's use of musical metaphor and his connection to … more
Date: December 2007
Creator: Astilla, Christopher
open access

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.
open access

Beyond the "Year of Song": Text and Music in the Song Cycles of Robert Schumann after 1848

Description: In recent years scholars have begun to re-evaluate the works, writings, and life of Robert Schumann (1810-1856). One of the primary issues in this ongoing re-evaluation is a reassessment of the composer's late works (roughly defined as those written after 1845). Until recently, the last eight years of Schumann's creative life and the works he composed at that time either have been ignored or critiqued under an image of an illness that had caused periodic breakdowns. Schumann's late works show h… more
Date: May 2007
Creator: Ringer, Rebecca Scharlene
open access

Birth of a Modern Concerto: An Explication of Musical Design and Intention in Journey: Concerto for Contrabass Tuba and Orchestra

Description: John Stevens was commissioned by the Chicago Symphony Orchestra (CSO) and the Edward F. Schmidt Family Commissioning Fund to compose a concerto for its principal tubist, Gene Pokorny. The piece began with multiple conversations between composer and performer and from these meetings actualized the influences that shaped the work. The most important influences that the performer mentioned were his passions for American steam locomotives and the Three Stooges, both of which were used by Stevens … more
Date: May 2008
Creator: Daussat, David M.
open access

Camille Saint-Säens' Piano Concerto No. 5 in F Major, Opus 103: An Analytical Study of Form, Compositional Techniques, and a Performance Perspective

Description: The majority of books about Saint-Säens cover his life, compositions, contemporaries, and French music in general. Although his life is well documented, most sources present only brief analyses of his works; there is not one single comprehensive and exhaustive study of the Piano Concerto in F Major, Opus 103, available in the current literature. This study aims at filling the gap by providing other musicians interested in performing this piece with an initial study-guide. The research for this … more
Date: December 2004
Creator: Yoo, Seung Won
open access

The Career and Legacy of Hornist Joseph Eger: His Solo Career, Recordings, and Arrangements

Description: This study documents the career of Joseph Eger (b. 1920), who had a short but remarkable playing career in the 1940s, 1950s and early 1960s. Eger toured the United States and Britain as a soloist with his own group, even trading tours with the legendary British hornist, Dennis Brain. He recorded a brilliant solo album, transcribed or arranged several solos for horn, and premiered compositions now standard in the horn repertoire. He served as Principal Horn of the New York Philharmonic, Los Ange… more
Date: May 2008
Creator: Pritchett, Kathleen S.
open access

Carl Gottlieb Reissiger (1798-1859) Forgotten Composer for the Clarinet

Description: Carl Gottlieb Reissiger was a successful German composer, conductor, and teacher in the first half of the nineteenth century. At the height of his career, he was Hofkapellmeister of theater and opera in Dresden, a position he held until his death. He was a composer of more than 200 works in a multitude of different genres. Today he is mainly known as a composer of opera, a small portion of his total output as a composer. He wrote approximately eighty piano solos, eighty collections of songs or … more
Date: May 2002
Creator: Coltman, Charles Arthur
open access

Carl Orff's Carmina Burana: A Comparative Study of the Original for Orchestra and Choruses with the Juan Vicente Mas Quiles Wind Band and Chorus Arrangement.

Description: The 1994 publication of a new version of Carl Orff's Carmina Burana, arranged for winds, percussion and choruses by Juan Vicente Mas Quiles, created new possibilities for the performance of Orff's monumental work. This dissertation serves as a guide to the study and performance of the Mas Quiles arrangement of Carmina Burana. Chapter One presents a brief discussion of Carl Orff and his Carmina Burana, followed in Chapter two by a short discussion of Mas Quiles' and the other significant transc… more
Date: August 2008
Creator: Simon, Philip G.
open access

Carl Sandburg's Timeless Prairie: Philip Wharton's Song Cycle, The Prairie Sings

Description: The connection of music and verse evident in the work of American poet, Carl Sandburg, is a topic that has received inadequate attention. Much preexisting research has focused on Sandburg's work with The American Songbag anthology; however little has been written about music composers' settings of his verse. The relevance of Sandburg's work as a poet has faded in today's society; the rural prairie subject matter and his poetic style are deemed archaic in an ever-evolving mechanistic society. … more
Date: August 2008
Creator: Wunderlich, Kristen A.
open access

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
open access

The Castrato Sacrifice: Was it Justified?

Description: One of the greatest mysteries in the history of music is the castrato singers of the Baroque era. Castration has existed for many thousands of years, but for the first time in history, it was used for artistic purposes. Who were these men who seemingly gave up their masculinity for the sake of music? By examining the time period and circumstances in which these musicians lived, an answer may be found. Exploring the economic, social, and political structure of the 17th and 18th centuries may r… more
Date: August 2006
Creator: Sowle, Jennifer
open access

Caught Between Jazz and Pop: The Contested Origins, Criticism, Performance Practice, and Reception of Smooth Jazz.

Description: In Caught Between Jazz and Pop, I challenge the prevalent marginalization and malignment of smooth jazz in the standard jazz narrative. Furthermore, I question the assumption that smooth jazz is an unfortunate and unwelcomed evolutionary outcome of the jazz-fusion era. Instead, I argue that smooth jazz is a long-lived musical style that merits multi-disciplinary analyses of its origins, critical dialogues, performance practice, and reception. Chapter 1 begins with an examination of current mis… more
Date: December 2008
Creator: West, Aaron J.
open access

The Centralized Higher Education System in Turkey and the National Music Teacher Training Program Since 1998: An Analysis.

Description: The purpose was to analyze Turkey's current music teacher training curriculum as situated in the centralized educational system, focusing on the extent to which the written document (1) reflects the core elements of the overall centralized educational system; (2) prescribes the nature of teaching materials and methods, assessment tools and other forms of evaluating and monitoring performance as teachers and musicians; and (3) acknowledges cultural diversity by addressing repertoire, musical act… more
Date: August 2006
Creator: Karakelle, Sibel
open access

"Ch'io t'abbandono" by Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy: A Dramatic Image of the Education and Aptitudes of the Composer

Description: The unpublished concert aria, "Ch'io t'abbandono," by Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy (1825), is representative of the adolescent composer's developing musical aesthetic. In this study, Mendelssohn's education, work ethic, and perfectionism are revealed, paradoxically, as both the catalysts for the piece's composition and also the reasons it was not published during Mendelssohn's lifetime. An exploration of the text, form, thematic usage, and performance demands of the aria yields specific examples… more
Date: August 2002
Creator: Turley, Charles William
open access

Chamber Music with Double Bass: A New Approach to Function and Pedagogy.

Description: The first part of the paper states the problem of the double bass not being incorporated into the chamber music program at many universities and the resulting lack of skills that can only be developed through this discipline. The double bass is trying to catch up with the other string instruments as it has been historically ignored, misunderstood and not as developed musically and technically. The historical background and current state of research are being examined to understand why this pr… more
Date: December 2009
Creator: Raschen, Gudrun
open access

The Characteristics of Teacher-Directed Modeling Evidenced in the Practices of Three Experienced High School Choral Directors.

Description: The purpose of this study was to analyze the characteristics of teacher directed modeling evidenced in the practices of three experienced high school choral directors. Research questions were: 1. What modeling activities were exhibited in each teacher's rehearsals? 2. When viewing a 45-minute composite tape of each teacher's instructional activities representative of all rehearsals, what instructional behaviors did each choral director recognize and identify as modeling? 3. What instructional… more
Date: December 2001
Creator: Grimland, Fredna H.

Chen Yi and Her Choral Music: A Study of the Composer's Ideal of Fusing Chinese Music and Modern Western Choral Traditions

Description: Chen Yi's music is well accepted and recognized nationally and internationally through an increasing number of commissions and performances. Major symphony orchestras, choruses, institutions and companies request her compositions on many occasions in order to increase understanding and exploration of Chinese influences on western classical idioms. This study provides the first detailed discussion of her compositional mastery and her fusion of Chinese music with the language of western choral tr… more
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Date: December 2006
Creator: Yeung, Hin-Kei
open access

Choral Resonance: Re-Examining Concepts of Tone and Unification.

Description: Resonant singing creates possibilities with dynamic shading, subtlety of phrasing, and rich vibrant tone that astonishes listeners. Choral singing that employs resonance as a fundamental ensemble virtue yields impressive results that lend themselves well to the varying demands of any choral score. Fortunately, choruses of every level can benefit from an increased understanding of the basic principles of resonance in the singing voice. Research on issues of upper partial energy and … more
Date: August 2008
Creator: Quist, Amanda Renee
open access

The Choral Works of Robert Ward: A View of His Compositional Approach to Text Settings and His Use of Symbols and Allusions

Description: Robert Eugene Ward's impressive body of work encompasses almost every genre of music. He has composed symphonies, operas, large orchestral pieces, chamber works, solo instrumental pieces, extended choral works, short choral pieces, ceremonial works, a ballet, theatre pieces, and even jazz and swing band pieces. Ward's name is recognized in most musical circles but usually only for his opera The Crucible, a work for which he earned a Pulitzer Prize in 1962. In fact, a survey of all the dissertat… more
Date: May 2007
Creator: Tucker, Carlton S.
open access

Clestrinye [El Carnaval del Perdón]: Traditional Rituals in Intermedia Composition.

Description: In Part I of this thesis, I examine the use of Latin American rituals, ceremonies, and traditional folklore as conceptual and compositional material; studying and re-contextualizing concepts, cultures, and ideologies, and introducing them to foreign audiences. I explore issues such as laptop improvisation, interaction with other performance forces, and the utilization of the social elements of non-western celebrations, as explored in Clestrinye, a work for live and fixed electronics, mixed ens… more
Date: August 2008
Creator: Salazar, Camilo
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