Musicology Commons^™

Orchestra Machines, Old And New, Jonathan De Souza

Jonathan De Souza

Evolving Performance Practice Of Debussy's Piano Preludes, Vivian Buchanan

LSU Master's Theses

Between 1910 and 1912 Claude Debussy recorded twelve of his solo piano works for the player piano company Welte-Mignon. Although Debussy frequently instructed his students to play his music exactly as written, his own recordings are rife with artistic liberties and interpretive freedom. Interestingly, many of the interpretive gestures that Debussy employs in these recordings are consistent with playing techniques utilized by French Baroque keyboardists. This paper will situate Debussy’s own performance in this Baroque playing style. I will first discuss the recording technology used by Welte-Mignon to establish the reliability of these recordings. By studying harpsichord manuals, I ...

Bali’S “Forgotten Stepchild”: The Cultural And Sonic Vitality Of The Balinese Rebab, Mikaela Marget

Lawrence University Honors Projects

The rebab is one of the only traditional stringed instruments found on the island of Bali, Indonesia. Though it is ever-present in musical ensembles in Bali, the rebab has been consistently overlooked in scholarship of Balinese music by Western ethnomusicologists. Through participant observation, personal interviews, and library research, I explore the idea that the rebab deserves a place in the scholarship of Balinese music. In addition, I argue that the Balinese rebab not only persists in Balinese music culture as a vital object, but that it is also an active participant in shaping Balinese music culture. In this paper, I ...

Sounds Of The Singing Revolution: Alo Mattiisen, Popular Music, And The Estonian Independence Movement, 1987-1991, Allison Brooks-Conrad

Lawrence University Honors Projects

Estonian identity, history, and music are deeply intertwined. In the late 20^th century, when faced with Soviet domination, Estonians relied on music to carry their message as part of their independence movement, which was eventually referred to as the Singing Revolution. Composer Alo Mattiisen emerged as one of the most influential members of the Estonian music scene in the 1980s, not only by defining Estonian popular music as political and activist, but also by developing experimental reinterpretations of larger Western popular music traditions. We can view Alo Mattiisen’s contributions to the Estonian music scene of the 1980s as ...

The Composer, The Musicologist, His Wife, And Her Lover: On Lacan’S Relevance To Music, Thomas Reiner

Directions of New Music

This paper asks what it is to write about music. When we ask students or colleagues to write about music are we asking them to describe music structurally, or to cope with music’s ever-shifting signifieds? The paper attempts to answer this question by clarifying the relationship between composition, musicology, and music “itself” by way of a Lacanian reading of Peter Greenaway's film The Cook, the Thief, His Wife and Her Lover. Lacan’s existential concepts of the Imaginary, the Symbolic, and the Real are first introduced in relation to music with reference to music by Hans Werner Henze ...

"Lehadlik": Radical Jewish Music, Gender And Disidentification In Aviva Endean’S Work, Shoshana Rosenberg

Directions of New Music

This paper undertakes a hermeneutic analysis of Aviva Endean’s “Lehadlik”, exploring the complex relationship between the player, a Jewish woman living in Australia, and traditional Jewish culture and rituals. This analysis connects Endean’s work to the larger body of Radical Jewish Music, a movement which seeks to diversify and expand the meaning of contemporary Jewish music beyond the confines of Klezmer and religious hymns. The analysis includes an exploration of the relationship between Endean’s womanhood, Orthodox Jewish traditions, and women’s historical place in Judaism.

Steve Reich's ‘Music For 18 Musicians’ As A Soundscape Composition, Jesse Budel

Directions of New Music

Over the past half century, there has been much research into the acoustic qualities of soundscapes from a variety of perspectives: the humanities and social sciences as per the ‘acoustic ecology’ movement (established by Schafer, Truax, and Westerkamp et al.), and more recently the environmental science and ecology as per ‘soundscape ecology’ (established by Farina, Pijanowski, and Krause, et al.). Collectively, these disciplines provide diverse methods for engagement with analysis of acoustic environments. Simultaneous to the rise of the acoustic ecology movement in the 1970s (marked by the publication of Schafer’s ‘The Tuning of the World (1974)), the composition ...

Homenajes: Finding Spanish Identity In Falla's Orchestral Suite, Leanny Munoz

LSU Master's Theses

Using biographical criticism, this thesis examines Manuel de Falla’s Homenajes (1939) as a reflection of the composer’s views of Spanish identity on regional, national, and international levels. Falla completed Homenajes—a four-movement orchestral suite dedicated to Enrique Fernández Arbós, Claude Debussy, Paul Dukas, and Felipe Pedrell—in Argentina. He began the work in Spain in 1938, during a period of great personal and political disturbance. In 1939, Manuel de Falla left Spain following the end of the Spanish Civil War, which cemented the regime of Francisco Franco. The Francoist regime notoriously aimed to homogenize Spanishness within the country ...

Resources And Exercises For Expanding Your Approaches In Teaching The Bach Cello Suites To The High School Violist, Dragana Loncar

Strings Graduate Theses & Dissertations

This paper is a useful resource for teaching Bach’s cello suites to young violists age 13-18. The first part contains background information on the six suites and suggested uses of the four manuscripts in teaching. Seven excerpts, four copies and three published editions of the first eight measures of the Sarabande from Suite No. 1 in G major, BWV 1007 are included as an example of the different edition markings that the teacher/student can refer to. The second part explores key affekts and Karen Tuttle’s Emotion list as possible teaching tools for expression. At the end of ...

Cellist, Catalyst, Collaborator: The Work Of Charlotte Moorman, Saisha Grayson

All Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

When classically trained cellist Charlotte Moorman (1933-1991) moved to New York City in 1957, she swiftly positioned herself at the intersection of experimental music, performance, video, and the visual arts. She interpreted works by composers like John Cage, collaborated with artists such as Nam June Paik, and founded and organized the New York Avant Garde Festival from 1963 to 1980. This dissertation argues that Moorman’s career sheds new light on what it meant to be an artist in this post-medium-specific moment and proposes that Moorman’s deterritorialization of authorship exerts pressure on traditional art histories. The generative dynamics of ...

An Analysis Of The Life And Work Of Alice Fletcher And Frances Densmore, Lauren Hoak

Undergraduate Honors Theses

This work is an analysis of the life and work of Alice Fletcher and Frances Densmore. Through the examination of The Study of Omaha Indian Music and Chippewa Music, the influences of settler-colonialism, music, gender, and religion are taken into account. It also summarizes contemporary opinions of Fletcher and Densmore and discusses the lasting effect that their research had.

A Pedagogical Study Of The "Four Lauds For Solo Violin" By Elliott Carter, Heesun Shin

All Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Elliott Carter was one of the most influential composers of the past century, leaving a diverse and prolific body of over 150 works to posterity. Along with the Violin Concerto and “Mnemosyné,” the Four Lauds are the only works written for solo violin. Literature on these pieces is not extensive thus far, and this dissertation will provide an introduction to any student who is interested in learning about Carter’s violin music. In the first chapter, I will discuss relevant aspects of Carter’s musical language such as his use of all-trichord hexachord, all-interval trichord, complement union property, and his ...

Cowboy Art Song: A Contextual And Musical Analysis Of Libby Larsen's "Cowboy Songs", Ann Gabrielle Richardson

Dissertations

This dissertation sprang from a combination of two personal interests: cowboy culture and classical art song. The union of my cowgirl heritage with my career as a classical vocalist has long fueled an interest in a particular niche of repertoire: soprano art song with thematic connections to the North American cowboy. A conducted state of research reveals no scholarly literature exploring this specific topic. Libby Larsen’s collection, Cowboy Songs, fulfills the aforementioned niche, successfully capturing the spirit, musical idioms, and cultural themes of the North American cowboy.

Chapter I lays a contextual foundation for cowboy song, providing a catalogue ...

Leonard Bernstein's Piano Music: A Comparative Study Of Selected Works, Leann Osterkamp

All Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Much of Leonard Bernstein’s piano music is incorporated in his orchestral and theatrical works. The comparison and understanding of how the piano works relate to the orchestral manifestations validates the independence of the piano works, provides new insights into Bernstein’s compositional process, and presents several significant issues of notation and interpretation that can influence the performance practice of both musical versions.

The chronological and historical significance of his piano music has been sometimes inaccurately recorded and/or generalized. In understanding the factual chronological, social, and political relationships behind the piano works and their orchestral manifestations, I argue that ...

Sacred Sounds: A Compassionate Listening Guide To Musical Worship, Madison Blonquist

Undergraduate Honors Theses

Sacred Sounds was a collaborative, multimedia exhibition that showed in the Brigham Young University Harold B. Lee Library Level 1 Gallery from November 10, 2017-February 2, 2018. Its primary objective was to cultivate empathy among the three Abrahamic religions through the lens of music. While this project may communicate the overall vision of the curator, it was deeply collaborative and involved the creative contributions from several campus departments and drew upon the insights of leaders from local congregations. The following documentation is a portfolio of the exhibition space and its public reception. This project was made possible with generous funding ...

The Compositional Influence Of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart On Ludwig Van Beethoven’S Early Period Works, Mary L. Krebs

Young Historians Conference

In the early period of Ludwig van Beethoven's life (1775-1802), his compositions exhibited the Classical style and showed hints of the expressivity to come in the Romantic Era. His music was no doubt influenced by many musical figures around him at the time, including Joseph Haydn, Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach, and Beethoven's own father, Johann van Beethoven. But who exerted the strongest influence on Beethoven's early period works? An analysis of Beethoven's studies and his Sonata No. 5 in C minor offers compelling evidence pointing towards Beethoven's role model, a fellow Classical composer: Wolfgang Amadeus ...

From Rain’S A-Gonna Fall To Bricks In The Wall: A Comparative Analysis Of Humanity’S Core Themes In The Music Of Bob Dylan And Pink Floyd, Alec Williams

Honors Theses, University of Nebraska-Lincoln

The 1960s were turbulent times of musical creation and revolution. From Motown to Dinkytown, the world suddenly became filled with blooms of creativity that stemmed from the freshly planted roots rock ‘n’ roll. Artists that garnered infamy in this flourishing era, including household names like Jimi Hendrix, The Beatles, and Janis Joplin, would become immortalized in music and pop culture. However, few stand out as pinnacle lyrical and musical influences, devout to the art of perpetual creation and development of the global music scene. Of those artists, Bob Dylan and Pink Floyd have contributed immensely to the synthesis of genres ...

Music Next To Theology: The Impact And Influence Of Martin Luther's Reformation On Johann Sebastian Bach, James Ryan

The Research and Scholarship Symposium

The artistic figure and music of Johann Sebastian Bach looms large in the history of Western arts and culture. His influences were many, but one strong influence in his life’s work was that of the Protestant Reformation and the theology of the Lutheran church. Through this research, it is evident that Bach strongly held to the doctrines and theology of the Lutheran church and that his employment in the Lutheran church was not merely a vocation for him, but an outward expression of his inward religious and theological conviction. This position is evidenced by the writings and teachings of ...

The Three Parents Of The Violin, Hanna Bahorik

The Research and Scholarship Symposium

The history of the violin is one full of examination and documentation, and yet speculation as to it’s true ancestry remains at the forefront of research. While it can certainly be said that the violin was derived from multiple instruments, this paper seeks to answer the question of which instruments exhibit essential characteristics and should be considered as the violin’s direct ancestors. Theories concerning the violin’s family tree abound, such as the bow theory and the sound chest theory which each attempt to trace the ancestry of the violin down through dozens of instruments, focusing on one ...

The Unifying Strands: Formalism And Gestalt Theory Span Centuries Of Music Philosophy, Amanda N. Staufer

The Research and Scholarship Symposium

In every age, musicians and philosophers deal with inquiries concerning musical meaning and the effect of music on the listener. Musical formalism and Gestalt theory—two theories in musical aesthetics—demonstrate that aspects of musical perception and experience are enduring and comprehensive. Musical formalism is the theory that music’s nature is innate, self-evident, able to be systematically deduced, and rational. According to formalism, musical meaning is defined by things objectively ‘there’ in the music, musical experience relies on cognition, and music is less a matter of sense than of mind. Gestalt Theory holds that music is a unified totality ...