Musicology Commons^™

Guitar Etudes In The Lisztian Vein: Zanon Plays Mignone’S Twelve Etudes, Diogo Alvarez

Soundboard Scholar

Diogo Alvarez reviews Fabio Zanon's recording of Mignone's 12 Etudes and other works, with commentary on the music and the composer.

Review Of Beethoven's French Piano: A Tale Of Ambition And Frustration By Tom Beghin, Dorian Bandy

The Beethoven Journal

No abstract provided.

Review Of Beethoven’S Ninth Symphony: Rehearsing And Performing Its 1824 Premiere By Theodore Albrecht, Marten Noorduin

The Beethoven Journal

No abstract provided.

The Movement Plans For The Quartet Op. 127 And The "Backstage" Of Beethoven's Late Style, Francesco Fontanelli

The Beethoven Journal

Among the different sketch typologies in Beethoven’s hand, the so-called “telescoped drafts” are the most eloquent in conveying the composer’s vision and intentions. In these synoptic diagrams made up of musical ideas and notes in writing, Beethoven outlined the structure of the work he had in mind, fixing the decisive points (themes, keys, tempo markings, number and configuration of movements). Four movement plans are extant for the String Quartet Op. 127 in E-flat major, sketched between February 1823 and the summer of 1824; in each, the composer explores alternative ways of managing musical form and content.

This article discusses and …

“The Tremendous Products Of A Son Of The Gods.” Missa Solemnis (Op. 123), Overture (Op. 124), And Ninth Symphony (Op. 125), Birgit Lodes

The Beethoven Journal

The premiere of Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony at the Kärntnertortheater in Vienna on May 7, 1824, is generally considered a milestone in music history. This article argues against the common characterization that Beethoven, in this, his (last) academy, programmed a monumental symphony and, perhaps with some embarrassment, a few filler pieces, but instead very consciously chose to highlight his three most recently composed orchestral works: the overture to the festival play Die Weihe des Hauses op. 124; Kyrie, Credo and Agnus Dei of the Missa solemnis op. 123; and the Ninth Symphony op. 125. Listening to these three works together opens …

Beethoven's Ukraine Connection: New Light On The Creation Of His Flute Variations Opp. 105 And 107, Barry Cooper

The Beethoven Journal

Two previously unidentified groups of sketches are revealed to be preliminary work for Beethoven’s last set of Flute Variations, Op. 107 No. 3. The theme is of Ukrainian origin, and the new discoveries are placed in the context of other manuscript material relating to the creation of the sixteen sets of flute variations, Opp. 105 and 107, which were commissioned by George Thomson. The extent of this preliminary work for Op. 107 No. 3 suggests that Beethoven spent much effort preparing the sixteen sets as a whole, and that the dearth of other sketches for them is probably due to …

Genius, Instrumental Music, And “Great Mistakes”: Amadeus Wendt And Beethoven’S Ninth Symphony, Sarah Clemmens Waltz

The Beethoven Journal

The author attributes the anonymous 1826 Berliner allegemeine musikalische Zeitung (BamZ) review of the Leipzig performances of Beethoven’s Ninth, which suggests removal of the choral finale and inspires A.B. Marx to a passionate defense, to the critic Amadeus Wendt. The career of Wendt as a philosophy professor is firmly established, as is his criticism for the BamZ, Allgemeine musikalische Zeitung (AmZ), Cäcilia, Allgemeine musikalische Zeitung mit besonderer Rucksicht auf den österreichischen Kaiserstaat (WamZ), and other journals. Wendt’s Hoffmannesque opinions of instrumental music are contextualized via his extensive criticism of opera and vocal music, highlighting themes such as inappropriate virtuosity, (im)proper …

Narciso Yepes And The Composers Of His Time, Belén Pérez Castillo

Soundboard Scholar

At his peak, Narciso Yepes was one of the most celebrated figures in the guitar world, as evidenced by the quantity and reach of his recordings. While he is well known as a proponent of the ten-string guitar with an innovative chromatic tuning, less attention has been focused on his activity as a commissioner of new works (many of them for the six-string guitar). Yet in this domain, Yepes was extremely productive, premiering works by such composers as Ascencio, Bacarisse, Balada, Maderna, Marco, Montsalvatge, Ohana, Palau, and Ruiz-Pipò, to name a few. Yepes's role as a collaborator varied from one …

Composing A Cadenza For Mozart's Violin Concerto In A Major, Gracie Hayes

Honors Projects

Historically, soloists from the Western art music tradition were expected to improvise a virtuosic passage during their performance of a concerto—that is, an extensive orchestral work featuring an instrumental soloist. These improvised passages, called cadenzas, were performed unaccompanied by the soloist during a prominent cadence and were derived from the ornamentation that occurred naturally during cadences in vocal arias. Contemporary composers write out these virtuosic passages for performers, who are rarely expected to improvise during a performance, with the exception of jazz musicians. When performing works dating from before the Romantic period, musicians are left with a dilemma. Should they …

“When White Men And Indians United Shall Praise:” Indigenous Inclusion In The Hartford Music Company, Savannah N. Skaggs

ATU Scholars Symposium

The Hartford Music Company and Institute of Hartford, Arkansas has attracted increasing academic interest, particularly within the last twenty years. This southern gospel music publishing company and singing school based in southern Sebastian County published a collection of shape note hymnals which boasted some of the genre’s most prolific literature. Though a growing number of Arkansans are learning that these gospel staples came from their own hill country, many do not realize that several of these songs were premiered by or recorded by Indigenous people. While this may not initially seem particularly impactful, this genre developed its own distinct identity …

Chaconnes, Sonatas, And Fugues, Oh My: A Study Of The Influence Of Baroque, Classical, And Romantic Musical Forms On Today's Media, Cadence A. Graves

ATU Scholars Symposium

As a future music educator, it is my duty to have not only understanding and knowledge of composers, music history, and compositional techniques, but to also have an appreciation, passion, and interest in what music is, where it has been, how it has changed, and where it is going now. With this research, I deepened my appreciation for the evolution of music over the course of history, expanded my understanding of how and when they came into existence, and broadened my understanding and appreciation of music that draws on those techniques today.

In the comparisons I made between compositions of …

Arnaud Préot: Teacher, Composer, And President, Melonee Gray

Spring Showcase for Research and Creative Inquiry

Arnaud Préot (1818-1873) was the 8th president of Longwood University. He served between the years 1863-1869 and ran the institution during the Civil War. A Frenchman, Préot immigrated to America at the age of 19. In America, he served as a professor of language and music, and eventually served as president at three female colleges. Additionally, he composed music, including several piano compositions and many vocal pieces. His works are reflective of both the classical period and the French style. In this essay, two of his piano compositions and one of his vocal pieces are analyzed and discussed. Préot's pieces …

El Nacimiento Del Rock En Español: ¿Cómo Fue Que Este Género De Música Latina Tuvo Éxito?, Alejandro V. Martinez

World Languages and Cultures

This paper titled El nacimiento del rock en español: ¿Cómo fue que este género de música latina tuvo éxito? will cover information regarding the Spanish rock movement. This essay compares what is written in this paper to that of prior scholars to show that although they do bring valid points, there is a lot more than many of us realize. There are various articles and reports written about the movement, but many do not explain the creation of the movement, let alone its survival in the music industry as a new genre that some had never heard of or had …

The Sounds Between Lordran And Yharnam: Exploring Motivic Recontextualization In Non-Linear Narratives, Tré Bryant

Masters Theses

In this thesis I argue that the music of the Dark Souls trilogy, Bloodborne, and Elden Ring play a vital role in the player’s capacity to form an understanding of the narrative, examining how musical coding and visual association work for and play against expectations. First, this thesis will analyze the musical styles of each game, identifying commonalities in the compositions. Second, I will explore a case study from each game that illustrates how the music alleviates ambiguity in the narrative. Lastly, the thesis will discuss how players often form their own slightly different interpretations of the stories and lore …

Review Of The Williamsburg Avant-Garde: Experimental Music And Sound On The Brooklyn Waterfront, By Cisco Bradley, Theodore B. Gordon

Publications and Research

Book Review of The Williamsburg Avant-Garde: Experimental Music and Sound on the Brooklyn Waterfront, by Cisco Bradley

Tuning Out: Intersections Of Music And Literature In The Contemporary French-Language Novel, Alexander James Claussen

Department of Modern Languages and Literatures: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

The past thirty years have seen a shift in French-language novels as authors move from the self-reflexive formal experimentation of the nouveau roman and its successors toward a literature that is again concerned with plot, character, and above all, the problems of the contemporary world. This “retour au récit” is accompanied by a resurgence of interest in writing the self (through experiments in autofiction), the past (through explorations of collective memory and collective guilt), and the present (through novels that challenge existing social structures and seek to define and develop new collective or national identities).

This dissertation examines the (re)turn …

A Third Way: Christian Philosophy Of Music, Eric S. Gardner

Senior Theses

Philosophers have posed many difficult-to-answer questions regarding music. For example, what counts as beautiful music? Can beauty be objectified, or is beauty in the eye of the beholder? What counts as a performance of a piece of music? Besides, what counts as music anyways? Where does the noise stop, and where does the music begin? In this thesis, I want to show that the Christian worldview offers the philosophical building blocks to answer these questions. By working with biblical truths and Christian presuppositions, I hope to show that the Christian worldview can offer satisfying answers to these philosophical questions.

Italian Instrumental Music As Fascist Propaganda In The United States During The Interwar Period, Davide Ceriani

College of Performing Arts Departmental Research

No abstract provided.

‘Is This Song A Rebel Song?’: Republican Legitimacy And The Contested Narratives Of The Irish Revolutionary Soundscape, Seán Ó Cadhla

Articles

This article will demonstrate how the diverse body of musical narratives broadly collectivised as ‘Irish rebel songs’ exhibit multi-layered categorisation difficulties beyond those typically pertaining to the wider canon of traditional folksong. Due to the systemic, often febrile, contestation surrounding ideological legitimacy within the Irish national struggle, such texts must necessarily navigate multiple historico-political complexities, foremost of which is the dogmatically essentialised, yet organisationally splintered, tradition of physical-force Irish Republicanism. Such disputed ideological demarcations encourage a notable subjectivity in terms of how rebel songs are viewed from both musicological and political perspectives in Ireland to the present, a liminality reflected …

Hidden Meanings In Elementary Instrumental Music Method Books: A Multimodal Critical Discourse Analysis, Mara Hope Thompson

Education Doctorate Dissertations

Textbooks serve as the primary resource utilized to deliver curriculum in a variety of subject areas and educational contexts. However, much previous research has found that texts often convey concealed meanings in the form of hidden and null curricula. This Multimodal Critical Discourse Analysis (MCDA) explored the musical discourses and cultural contexts of musical examples in two elementary instrumental music textbook series to investigate whose values, cultures, perspectives, and knowledge are conveyed by the texts and whose are excluded or misrepresented. Framed by the social theory of Postcolonialism, the research revealed binary ideologies of exoticism embedded in many aspects of …