Arts and Humanities Commons^™

I Am My Own Escape, Ross Thomason

Theses and Dissertations

I Am My Own Escape is a one-act chamber opera with three characters, scored for soprano, tenor, and baritone voices respectively. The orchestra consists of flute, B flat clarinet, piano, violin, and violoncello, commonly known as the Pierrot ensemble. This work was written for fellow colleagues and students from Illinois State University, premiered on May 5, 2017.

Leitmotifs are employed in this work – the characters each have unique vocal melodies, orchestral gestures, pitch collections, and/or rhythmic motives assigned to them (see figures below for examples). Contemporary or extended techniques such as scratch tones in the strings and harmonics in …