Music Practice Commons^™

Emerging From The Cocoon: Strategies To Assist The Classical Violinist Develop Improvisational Fluency In A Range Of Musical Styles, Judith A. Iddison

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

This autoethnographic practice-led research project documents the journey of expanding my classical violin practice with the aim of developing improvisational fluency in a range of musical styles. Building upon findings and strategies outlined in my honours thesis, which centred on the artistry of Australian cross-genre violinist Shenzo Gregorio (Shenton Gregory), this doctoral study is underpinned by an iterative cyclic process of critical observation, reflection and analysis and an examination of literature.

Knowledge gained through one-on-one, aural-based, practical violin-improvisation instruction with Gregorio was applied within collaboration with the evolving string ensemble, Sign of Four. Further, combining this tuition and collaboration with …

The Early String Chamber Music Of Agnes Zimmermann, Miranda Dyskin

Theses : Honours

This dissertation focusses on the early string chamber music of German-English composer and pianist Agnes Zimmermann (1847-1925), written whilst she was a student at the Royal Academy of Music in London. Whilst almost unknown today, Zimmermann was one of the finest pianists of the late[1]Nineteenth Century, appearing throughout Europe both as a concerto soloist and as a distinguished chamber music collaborator. She was also an accomplished composer, writing piano pieces, songs, music for the church and, especially, chamber music. Her models were the great Germanic figures of the Nineteenth Century, especially Beethoven, Schubert, Mendelssohn and Brahms.

This dissertation examines two …

Walking Carefully Towards Bridging The Gap: Exploring Australian Music Educator Voices About Teaching Indigenous Music, Dawn Joseph, Bradley Merrick

Australian Journal of Teacher Education

Facilitating an inclusive pedagogy to close the gap that exists within the teaching of Indigenous Knowledge in Australia is a tall order for many teachers. This paper draws on responses to a national study and explores how music educators include Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander music and culture into their practice. An online survey (December 2022-February 2023, N=109) informed the findings. Using thematic analysis, two themes (teaching challenges and opportunities, and bridging the gap) are discussed and key recommendations offered. Findings suggest that walking carefully towards bridging the gap is an opportunity for educational change in contemporary Australian classrooms.

Exploring A Compositional Practice Through The Lens Of The Butterfly Lovers Violin Concerto, Jie Hong Yang

Theses : Honours

Asian music was an important influence upon some Western composers such as Claude Debussy, Giacomo Puccini, Maurice Ravel, Henry Cowell, Oliver Messiaen, John Cage and Lou Harrison. Since the 1960s, Australian composers such as Peter Sculthorpe, Anne Boyd, Richard Meale, and Julian Yu have similarly been influenced by music of Asia. In 2007, Chou Wen-chung wrote about today’s commercially oriented ‘world music’ environment, and addressed the need for Chinese composers to provide more meaningful contribution to the musical culture by writing music informed by knowledge drawn from their cultural heritage. As an Australian born Chinese composer, this exegesis was an …

Performance Practice In Hungarian Folk Music And Its Relationship To The Style Hongrois, Teresa Vinci

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

This study investigates style and performance practice within the oral traditions of Hungarian folk music, and explores intersections with the nineteenth-century idiom style hongrois. Interviews, lessons, and workshops were undertaken as part of a practice-based immersive research experience, and comparisons with the style hongrois made via analysis of scores and recordings of Jeno Hubay (1858-1937). The research strives towards an ‘Historically Informed Performance’ specific to these styles, and explores how they can inform each other. Findings are presented through a dissertation and a CD recording “Never Far Away…” comprising the researcher’s violin performance as leader of an Hungarian folk …

Night Music (Compositions, Performance And Improvisations) –And– Developing A Chromatic-Intervallic Approach To Jazz Improvisation Through Reflexive Practice. An Exegesis, Jamie Oehlers

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

This research examines the processes involved in developing and applying a novel melodic jazz improvisation technique—a chromatic-intervallic approach (CIA). Improvised melodic approaches in jazz music from the 1920s until today have primarily been driven through the development of tension within melody lines by using variations of the scale/chord method and harmonic substitution. The CIA examined through my saxophone and improvisatory practice in this research explores the incorporation of melodies derived from intervallic combinations, and assesses the resulting tension within the melody through the use of the Melodic Tension Rating tool; a tool created through the research period of this study. …

Dialogic Communication In The One-To-One Improvisation Lesson: A Qualitative Study, Leon R. De Bruin

Australian Journal of Teacher Education

This qualitative study investigates the dialogic interactions between teacher and student that enhance learning and teaching within the one-to-one music improvisation lesson. This study analyses the ways teachers elicit student actions, thoughts and processes that develop student skills, critical and creative thinking processes necessary for improvisational development. Interactions and interplay between six Australian conservatoire improvisation students and their teachers were investigated. Data reveal dialogic interactions that span instruction, conversation, inquiry and enablement of student knowledge and skills that constitute a complex socio-cultural tapestry of discursive threads. Teacher-student interactions that activate desired creative student activity engage meta-cognitive processes and the cultivation …

Vital Performance: Culture, Worldview, And Romanticist Performance Practice With Application In Franz Liszt’S Consolations And Années De Pèlerinage Première Année, Andrew John Snedden

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

This thesis examines issues of historical performance in the piano music of Franz Liszt, positing cultural exegesis as an overlooked source of evidence. Philosophical biases underlying mainstream C20th performance approaches (and their inhibiting potential) are discussed. A detailed reconstruction of Romanticist style is made with attention to primary sources, including historical recordings. A nomenclature for score annotation and an analytical paradigm for identification and application of Romanticist performance characteristics are proposed. These are experimentally applied, referencing exegetical insights, in Liszt’s Consolations and Années de Pèlerinage: Première Année through annotated scores and studio recordings on an 1860’s Érard grand

Creating Multicultural Music Opportunities In Teacher Education: Sharing Diversity Through Songs, Dawn Joseph, Rohan Nethsinghe, Alberto Cabedo Mas

Australian Journal of Teacher Education

This paper contributes to the knowledge base for preparing pre-service teachers (PSTs) for contemporary multicultural classrooms. To do so, we refer to our ongoing project “See, Listen and Share: Exploring intercultural music education in a transnational experience” across three Higher Education sites (Australia and Spain). Drawing on our narrative, and PSTs’ questionnaire data, using Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis to analyze and code the PST data, we report on our initial experience and findings across the three sites and cultural contexts. Generalisations to other institutions cannot be made. We discuss what was taught and how it was taught in our three settings, …

Grains Without Territory: Voicing Alexander Garsden’S [Ja] Maser And The De-Centralized Vocal Subject, Jessica Aszodi

Directions of New Music

The singing subject is both site-of and author-of her practice. This practice-based, artistic research unpacks the entangled process of making new music, conscious that the performer-author is the site where embodied problem solving takes place. The principal focus of the paper is the author’s realization of Alexander Garsden’s [ja] Maser, for voice and electronics, created by recording and reconstituting vocal elements using traditional compositional and performative methods as well as studio recording and granular synthesis. The author approaches the realization of this new work as an experimental practice in dialogue with theoretical frames that inform and situate the research. …

Codex: Embodied Communication In Richard Barrett’S Scores For Improvisation, Hannah Reardon-Smith

Directions of New Music

This paper examines the process of preparing Barrett’s codex V (2007) and codex XV (2015) and their performance on Saturday 18 June, 2016, as part of the Ghent Advanced Master in Contemporary Performance Practice (ManaMa) academy examinations in Brussels, Belgium. This project involved the development of deep collaborative relationships with a number of other performers, the study and interpretation of alternative notational practices, and the invention of a variety of ad hoc solutions to issues of coordination and ensemble unity, with a particular focus on clear physical communication. Reflections on my own process of preparation and rehearsal are supplemented by …

Practising Jazz Performance: An Investigation Into The Process That Underpins Optimal Instrumental Practice In The Jazz Idiom, Christopher J. Tarr

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

Little formal research has been undertaken into the processes associated with jazz improvisation, particularly those associated with practising to become an elite jazz improviser. This study seeks to understand the role of instrumental practice, particularly physical practice strategies and the associated mental states, in the development of jazz improvisers. Interviews were conducted with six improvisers of various ages, instruments and backgrounds. The study identified a number of strategies specific to jazz practice that differed from traditional practice strategies described in Western art literature, particularly in relation to the importance of the ear-to-instrument connection. Accordingly, the study sets out a series …

A Digital Resource For Navigating Extended Techniques On Bass Clarinet, Philip Everall

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

Extended techniques are integral to the creation and interpretation of works for the bass clarinet. Effects such as multiphonics, microtones, or percussive and air sounds, have become commonplace in repertoire from the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. This PhD dissertation posits that the bass clarinet’s affinity for these sounds can be traced back to the instrument’s earliest uses, and thus extended techniques should be central to the understanding of the bass clarinet. While there is a large knowledge-base of these techniques, the paradigm of print resources with accompanying music media in which it is catalogued is old-fashioned and inefficient. This project …

A Stylistic Analysis Of Recess Performed By Charlie Hunter From The Dvd Right Now Live, Joshua De Silva

Theses : Honours

Charlie Hunter is a guitarist who has gained international recognition for his ability to perform guitar parts and bass lines simultaneously on his hybrid guitar. His ability to construct solos within the context of simultaneous bass line and chordal accompaniment, along with methods he employed to create percussive textures, were the central points of discussion for this dissertation. Hunter’s original composition Recess was selected from the Hunter DVD Right Now Live1, which was transcribed and analysed.

This research is significant due to the lack of detailed analysis of Hunter's techniques in an unaccompanied setting, and to the researcher’s knowledge, …

Towards An Interactive Environment For The Performance Of Dubstep Music, James Herrington

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

This Masters by Research project explores the integration of different concepts relating to the presence of the human body in Dubstep music performance. Three intended performance systems propose that the body is the logical site for the interactive control of live Dubstep music. The physicality and gestures of instrumentalists, choreographed dancers, and audience members will be examined in order to develop new and exciting ways to perform this genre in a live setting.

The systems take on a three-tiered hierarchical approach on two levels in regards to the extraction of gestural information from human body movements, as well as in …

Proposed Methods For Efficiently Attaining The Skills Required For Accurate Time Keeping In Music, Ben Falle

Theses : Honours

This dissertation aims to provide exercises that will efficiently develop the skills necessary for accurate time keeping in music. Many contemporary industry-standard texts fail to provide specific methods to develop accurate time keeping in music. Most include instructions to use a metronome, but only as a dictator of tempo and not as a tool to improve one's own time keeping ability. This dissertation proposes to address that gap in contemporary music instructional literature. To enhance the understanding of the skills required for accurate time keeping in music, contemporary neurological literature pertaining to time keeping is investigated. A review of this …

A Study Of Performance Practices In Recordings Of Bach's Violin Sonata Bwv 1003 From 1930-2000, Adrian Yeo

Theses : Honours

Throughout the 20th century, the performance practice of baroque music has undergone many stylistic changes. Moreover, the rich resources of primary source material available to us in musical recordings of the period have only recently been realised. Bruce Haynes, in his book The End of Early Music, suggests that the twentieth century saw three principal schools of performance: romantic, modernist, and historically-informed. This study investigates Haynes' hypothesis through a comparison of fourteen recordings of Bach's Solo Violin Sonata in A minor BWV 1003, ranging from 1933 to 1999. Focus is made on eight predetermined observation criteria: tempo, tempo fluctuation, rhythmic …

Modern Performance Trends In Bach's Sacred Music : Changing Tastes In The Performance Of Bach's Weihnachtsoratorium : An Exploration Of The Rhetorical Style, Sam Nester

Theses : Honours

This dissertation investigates changing tastes in the performance practice of Johann Sebastian Bach's sacred music from the second decade of the Twentieth Century to the present day. In particular I focus on the 'rhetorical style', and offer a comparative study of four recordings of Bach's Weihnachtsoratoritmt (Christmas Oratorio) BWV 248 by Harnoncourt (1973), Gardiner (1987), Jacobs (1997), and Suzuki (1998). Though all of these interpretations would be categorised as being in the 'rhetorical style', I attempt to show that within this classification there exists a multiplicity of performance approaches.

An Investigation Of Specific Structural Techniques Used By The Miles Davis Quintet On Selected Live Recordings From 1964-1965, Callum G'Froerer

Theses : Honours

This dissertation intends to deconstruct and analyse specific structural techniques employed by members of Miles Davis' second great quintet, which consisted of Wayne Shorter, Herbie Hancock, Ron Carter, and Tony Williams. The motivation behind the selection of structural techniques as the basis of this dissertation lies in its ability to clearly articulate a large aspect of the group's amazing flexibility as an ensemble. The specific areas of analysis are: tempo feel changes, tempo fluctuations, and texture changes. The recordings in focus are 'Autumn Leaves' from the album 'Miles In Berlin', and three selections from the influential live recording of two …

Preparing The Role Of Tytania In Britten's A Midsummer Night's Dream: A Handbook For Singers, Emma Pettemerides

Theses : Honours

This dissertation represents a handbook designed to assist singers performing the role of Tytania in Britten' s opera A Midsummer Night's Dream. It explores the historical, literary, cultural, and musical contexts to the music and the drama. In addition, an analytical investigation is made into the ways that Britten has created musical characterization through the manipulation of voice types, melodic and rhythmic contours, motives, orchestration, tonality, and structures. The diverse types of knowledge chosen for investigation are foundational (in the author's opinion) in the development of an informed interpretation of the character, Tytania. This information can assist performers in avoiding …

Blowing East : A Set Of Performance Practice Instructions For A Western Flautist Presenting Japanese And Indian Inspired Works, Asha Henfry

Theses : Honours

In the form of a handbook, this dissertation is predominantly directed at Western flute players interested in world music, the shaktthachi or bansttri, or who may be looking for advice on playing Japanese or Indian inspired works. Performing music that is not in the normal Western classical idiom can sometimes be a daunting experience for a flautist. By looking first at the background musical and cultural aspects relative to each country and then delving deeper into the finer details of characteristic nuances and techniques, the flautist can then take the music to a higher level. In addition, an extensive list …