Arts and Humanities Commons^™

Bluegrass: A Voicing, Cade Botts

Masters Theses

In 2010, Fred Bartenstein’s detailed the voice stackings found in bluegrass in his article “Bluegrass Voicings.” [1]This paper will go beyond this discussion of the arrangement of voices to an examination of the harmonic voicing styles found in bluegrass music. Stamps-Braxter’s 1937 arrangement of “Farther Along”[2] and transcriptions of recordings by bluegrass legends Bill Monroe, Stanley Brothers, Reno & Smiley, the Osborne Brothers, Dolly Parton, and the Grascals will be used as a case study to look at multiple chord voicings. Based on the analyses of these transcriptions, a list of “voice leading conventions” for bluegrass compositions will …

Music As A Representational Medium: Representation In Arnold Schoenberg's "A Survivor From Warsaw", Lucy S. Terrell

Masters Theses

In 1976, Roger Scruton, and English conservative philosopher and writer, dubbed music a non-representation medium. This assertion has resulted in debate among many prominent scholars, and, despite numerous dissenting opinions, Scruton’s premise has persisted as an accepted premise for some scholars in Western music study. In this paper, I survey and analyze prominent writings debating the topic of music as a representational medium, compiling arguments for and against his five criteria for representational art. I then discuss Arnold Schoenberg’s A Survivor from Warsaw in its context as a piece of representational music. In Schoenberg’s work, I use twelve-tone theory, contour …

A Proposal For The Inclusion Of Jazz Theory Topics In The Undergraduate Music Theory Curriculum, Alexis Joy Smerdon

Masters Theses

The demands of the twenty-first century require musicians to be more stylistically versatile since there are more opportunities for performance when musicians are familiar with not only classical but also jazz and popular music. Understanding the theory behind jazz and pop styles will help prepare the musicians for these opportunities. Since all music students take music theory, it is in the students’ best interest for teachers of theory to include jazz theory topics in the classical music theory curriculum. The purpose of this thesis is to propose the inclusion of jazz theory topics in the undergraduate music theory curriculum. To …

The Efficacy Of Discerning Musical Parts Within The Context Of An Instrumental Ensemble, Brady Glenn Mcneil

Masters Theses

The goal of this study was to determine whether students could aurally identify the less dominant inner musical lines of instrumental pieces. An assessment was created through Qualtrics to test this hypothesis with collegiate music majors at the University of Tennessee. In the assessment, students were required to discern a single part from chamber pieces to large symphonies or wind ensemble works by selecting one of four different lines notated from the piece. These lines were transposed to the key and clef of the instrument students were asked to identify. Results were taken from Qualtrics and analyzed through SPSS. The …

The Power Of Three In Dan Forrest’S Requiem For The Living, Lindsey Lanee Cope

Masters Theses

Dan Forrest’s Requiem for the Living is a recent composition that is quickly gaining attention in the choral world. The work exhibits unique aspects of Forrest’s compositional voice in his Requiem, including his textual changes from an original Requiem, formal designs and overall organization, melodic and rhythmic motivic development, and harmonic transformations. Through comprehensive analysis and discussion, this thesis will argue that the primary threenote motive in the Requiem serves as the cornerstone for analytical departure. The number three is the main component of the formal, motivic, and harmonic structure of the Requiem for the Living. The framework …

Requiem For The Transient, Brian Palmer Gee

Masters Theses

Requiem for the Transient is a six-movement piece of music for full orchestra and choir. The six movements are the “Prelude,” “Introit,” “Sequentia,” “Agnus Dei,” “Lux Aeterna,” and “In Paradisum,” As with most Requiems, the music is a setting of prayers from the Roman Missal. Historically composers have used various prayer choices, sometimes even including texts outside of the Missal. Requiem for the Transient contains only one source of text outside of the Missal; the first movement, “Prelude”, uses text from the New King James version of Ecclesiastes 12:1-7.

This document will compare and contrast Requiem for the Transient with …

Augmentation Of Delusion, Christopher Lynn Adams

Masters Theses

Augmentation of Delusion is a single-movement piece for chamber orchestra composed by Chris L. Adams. The piece was originally written for a four-person percussion ensemble in 2013 and orchestrated in 2014. This document will analyze the major musical elements of form, harmony, melody, rhythm and meter, and genre of the piece, as well as compare and contrast these variables with other composers’ works.

Music theory terminology and figures will be applied in this document as follows:

1. Set theory functions will be expressed as:
a. Normal order indicated by brackets – [2367]
b. Prime form indicated by parentheses – (0145) …

The Larsen Motive: A Survey Of Motivic Usage In Libby Larsen's Corker, Slang, And String Symphony, Iii, Shelise Nicole Washington

Masters Theses

Libby Larsen presents a rhythmic motive in Corker (1977), Slang (1994) and “Ferocious Rhythm” from String Symphony (1999) as more than a memorable melody or tune. Her rhythmic motive has multiple connections within each piece. It has value and purpose that can be explained through multiple musical parameters. Larsen varies the application of her signature motive in these pieces over a period of 20 years. Its general rhythmic structure is a common thread that links these three works together, but the overall motive is used in individualized ways in each of the pieces.

This thesis will demonstrate that the rhythmic …

The Wilderness For String Quartet, Samuel Moore Lewis

Masters Theses

The Wilderness is a single-movement work for string quartet with a performance time of approximately 14 minutes. This piece was completed in the spring of 2014.

The purpose of this paper is to place the composition within the context of concert music by analyzing its form, melody, harmony, rhythm, and meter and comparing those elements with those in similar examples by 20^th and 21^st century composers, in particular the post-Romantic string quartet literature.

Les Vosges A Suite For Orchestra, Glenn Robert Kahler

Masters Theses

Les Vosges, a programmatic suite for orchestra in three movements, features dance-like rhythms, folksong-influenced melodies, and formal characteristics and stylistic qualities that combine elements of modern composition with those reminiscent of Baroque dance. Les Vosges was composed in partial fulfillment of the requirements of the degree Master of Music with a concentration in Composition from the University of Tennessee, Knoxville.

This paper offers a supplementary analysis of the Les Vosges while referencing influential compositions and composers of the last century (Milhaud, Grofe, Kodaly, and Holst) regarding musical parameters of form, melody, harmony, rhythm and meter, and genre.

Exodus Concerto For Guitar And Chamber Orchestra, Spencer Joel Kappelman

Masters Theses

Exodus is a four-movement composition for solo guitar accompanied by a chamber orchestra. This piece is composed in partial fulfillment of the requirements of the degree Master of Music with a concentration in Music Composition from the University of Tennessee, Knoxville. Exodus was composed during the 2010-2012 academic years.
This paper provides a narrative analysis of Exodus in terms of its musical content, and relationships to other composers of the last century. Similarities to these composers refer to form, orchestration, melody, harmony, rhythm, and meter.

Essential Neo-Riemannian Theory For Today's Musician, Laura Felicity Mason

Masters Theses

This thesis will build upon the foundation set by Engebretsen and Broman in Transformational Theory in the Undergraduate Curriculum: A Case for Teaching the Neo-Riemannian Approach (Journal of Music Theory Pedagogy 21) and Roig-Francoli’s Harmony in Context (McGraw-Hill) by justifying the inclusion of neo-Riemannian Theory (NRT) in the undergraduate music theory curricula. This thesis also serves as a text for use by undergraduates to supplement a typical theory curriculum. While Engebretsen and Broman introduce the notion of NRT inclusion, and Roig-Francolí dedicates several pages in Harmony to its discussion, NRT remains uncommon in an undergraduate curriculum. NRT, an …

Beat-Class Tonic Modulation As A Formal Device In Steve Reich's "The Desert Music", Liahna Rochelle Guy

Masters Theses

Beat-class analysis is a model of rhythm employed by Richard Cohn and John Roeder to analyze textural form in the compositions of Steve Reich (Roeder 2003, 275). Rhythmic attacks are regarded based on the modulus analytically assigned to a particular section (eighth note, sixteenth note, etc.). This paper will offer an in-depth analysis of beat-class modulation and transposition in Steve Reich’s The Desert Music, with a focus on the third movement. Applying this analytical technique to The Desert Music (a piece never before analyzed using beat-class analysis) proposes a fresh analytical approach to Reich’s 1984 piece. This perspective will …

Varying Degrees Of Difficulty In Melodic Dictation Examples According To Intervallic Content, Michael Hines Robinson

Masters Theses

Melodic dictation has long been a daunting task for students in aural skills training. Research has found that interval identification is a factor when taking melodic dictation. Research has also found that some intervals are easier to identify than other intervals. The goal of this thesis is to determine whether the difficulty of melodic dictation examples can be categorized by their intervallic content. A popular aural skills text was used as the source for the melodic dictation examples. The adjacent intervals in each melodic dictation example were counted and recorded by interval type. The analysis of the melodic dictation examples …

An Explanation Of Anomalous Hexachords In Four Serial Works By Igor Stravinsky, Robert Sivy

Masters Theses

Igor Stravinsky's precompositional process was so methodical that his move to serialism is no surprise. After becoming acquainted with the music of Schoenberg and Webern, Stravinsky was moved to experiment with serial techniques. He rejected many of the conventional approaches developed by the serial architects, only to adopt the technique at its basic form—the use of a series of pitches—and cultivate it into his own compositional style. Stravinsky continued to refine his style throughout his serial period (1951–1966) as each composition grew increasingly more serial than the last. For each work composed after 1960, Stravinsky constructed rotation arrays, a serial …

Seasons For A Cynic: A Compositional Process Utilizable For A Program Symphony, David Anthony Pegel

Masters Theses

The technique of symphonic composition requires a deliberate and methodical process by the composer; when the symphony is intended to aesthetically convey a specific subject matter, the compositional process must become even more deliberate. First a subject must be chosen and examined in a contemporary standpoint. Then the composer must determine how to reflect this subject through his or her composing. Ideally, the end result of this composition should encompass the subject matter as thoroughly as possible.

While the great majority of textbooks on music theory and composition centralize themselves on elements of pitch in music, the composer has many …