Composition Commons^™

String Quartet No.1 In G Major, Wataru Niimori

Glenn Korff School of Music: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Creative Work, and Performance

String Quartet No.1 in G Major is an original composition comprised of four movements: 1^st (Allegro Con Brio: a fast tempo with spirit), 2^nd (Adagio: a slow tempo), 3^rd (Minuet and Trio: a moderate tempo with triple meter) and 4^th (Presto: very fast). This four-movement form, in other words, the sonata cycle, was developed during 17^th and 18^th centuries in Western Europe for instrumental music. It reached its heyday in the middle of the 18^th century through the next whole century. Composers in the Classical …

Anecdoche, Joshua Ryan Spaulding

Glenn Korff School of Music: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Creative Work, and Performance

Utilizing various visual and aural mediums, Anecdoche tells a story that allows the audience to examine modern American/global culture from a third person perspective. Each artistic medium adds their own voice or opinion to the story and thus further colors and clutters the stage. This represents the extremes of communication that humans have risen to in the 21st Century. The term Anecdoche means a conversation in which everyone is talking, but nobody is listening. In the same way, for much of the work, the different elements of the production aim to make their voice heard, while simultaneously cluttering the visual …

Original Music For Bass Trombone And Piano From 1985 To 2018: An Annotated Bibliography, Brian Lew

Glenn Korff School of Music: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Creative Work, and Performance

The purpose of this document was to compile and annotate original music for the bass trombone and piano from 1985 to 2018. Original works is defined as compositions whose original intentions were for the idiom of solo bass trombone and piano. Works included are exclusive of transcriptions and arrangements

This document annotates more than 100 compositions. Each annotation includes information about the composer (birth year and death year, if applicable), length of the piece, publisher, level of difficulty, a preview of the music, and the written annotation. Observations from the examined compositions are found in the closing chapter. Observations range …

Transcribing Astor Piazzolla's Works To Maximize Stylistic Fidelity: An Examination Of Three Saxophone Quartets With A New Transcription, Sarah L. Cosano

Glenn Korff School of Music: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Creative Work, and Performance

Astor Piazzolla is recognized as a pivotal figure who drew tango music onto an international stage. His output of written compositions and recordings provide a reference for studying tango. Though Piazzolla adapted a collection of flute etudes in 1988, he did not write specifically for saxophone during his lifetime. Saxophonists must instead rely on transcriptions of his music. Today, tango is a widely performed idiom for saxophone quartet.

Because of its tessitura, timbral variety, and flexibility, the saxophone is uniquely suited to perform tango music. This instrument has an expansive range when altissimo is included. Its written range spans from …

From Improvisation To Artistry: A Study Of The Piano’S 12 Sides By Carter Pann, Louis Claussen

Glenn Korff School of Music: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Creative Work, and Performance

Intended as a resource for pianists who may analyze or perform Carter Pann’s The Piano’s 12 Sides, this study provides biographical information on the composer and explores his professional relationship with the pianist for whom it was composed, Joel Hastings. Each piece from The Piano’s 12 Sides is discussed in terms of form, melody, harmony, texture and Pann’s approach to the pianistic compositional idiom. The composition is also examined with regard to extra-musical details and programmatic elements as well as inspiration and dedications that influenced Pann’s compositional process.

Correspondence and interviews with the composer reveal the motivation and inspiration behind …