Music Masters Theses Collection

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https://hdl.handle.net/20.500.14394/200

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Exploring the Impact of Collaborative Learning Experience on Preservice Teachers' Philosophical Development
(2024-05) Rose, Emma M.
United States public education is guided by policies and practices designed to advantage White students’ identities, experiences, and funds of knowledge. In that vein, research in the field of music education has started to explore the impacts of Whiteness on school music programs, but this research has primarily centered on student populations, curricula, professional discourse, and pedagogical practices. Very few studies to date have included preservice teachers’ perspectives on working with students of color. The purpose of this study was to explore the impact of a collaborative learning intervention on preservice teachers’ beliefs and pedagogy. I sought to gain insight on participants’ perceptions of teaching and learning with students of color after engaging in discourse, reflection, and observation through an antiracist equity lens. Throughout our collaboration, I also sought to understand what elements of the experience, if any, influenced the participants’ philosophies of teaching and learning to develop. The findings of this project provide many implications for preservice teacher education including suggestions for program redesign and increased field experience opportunities.
"a Music Unquestionably Italian in Idiom": Nationalism as an Evolutionary Process in the Music of Alfredo Casella
(2012) Salada, Corinne M.
Little scholarship exists about the extent of musical nationalism in the works of twentieth-century Italian composer Alfredo Casella (1883-1947). Casella’s output, which is divided into three stylistic periods – 1902-1913, 1914-1920, and 1921-1946 – display varying styles and influences, such as an extension of French, German, and Russian romanticism and Schoenbergian atonality. Yet nationalistic expression simultaneously pervades each stylistic period: The first period portrays nationalism through the use of folk material and forms, as does the second, which also uses programmatic elements in an atonal context. The third stylistic period, to which previous scholars have given the most attention, expresses nationalism by alluding to past Italian Baroque and Classical composers and forms. This thesis explores how Casella’s nationalistic tendencies pervade all three stylistic periods and evolved over the course of his career, culminating in his third stylistic period. A close reading of Casella’s own writings – which will explore how his ideologies reflected the political and cultural views in Italy at the time – and score analysis of representative works from each period will reveal in Casella’s works “a music unquestionably Italian in idiom" (Alfredo Casella, 21+26, 41).
The Form of the Preludes to Bach's Unaccompanied Cello Suites
(2011-05) Prindle, Daniel E.
This thesis proposes a methodology for understanding the form of a Baroque prelude, particularly the preludes to the Six Suites for Unaccompanied Violoncello written by Johann Sebastian Bach. Four musical dimensions, tonal structure, motive, texture, and the potential implications of a piece’s genre, parse the preludes in different ways. As the features of these musical dimensions undergo either an evolution or a dramatic change over the course of each prelude, they each suggest a different form. Points of change in each dimension delineate segments in the music. When aligned, these changes create significant formal junctures and suggest an overall form for the movement. Analysis of the interplay among the musical dimensions clarifies the form of each piece and suggests formal norms for the prelude as a genre.
The affective properties of keys in instrumental music from the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries
(2010-09) Ishiguro, Maho A
The concept of key characteristics deals with the particular moods which different tonalities are believed to provide to music. Discussions regarding their existence and the validity of the phenomena have always been controversial because of a lack of fundamental reasons and explanations for them. Nevertheless, references to key characteristics have appeared in various fields of study and over many centuries: the Greek doctrine of ethos, writings of Guido d’Arezzo, Jean-Philippe Rameau’s Traité de l’harmonie, scribbles in Beethoven’s sketches, and several passages in Hermann von Helmholtz’s On the Sensations of Tones. The attitudes and opinions towards key characteristics have varied in each period of its history. Among the ancient Greeks and Romans, the characteristics of modes were discussed among philosophers, namely, Plato, Aristotle, Lucianus and Cassiodorus. They were believed to affect moral development but were also associated with mysticism. In the Middle Ages and Renaissance, references to key characteristics can be found in the writings of numerous theorists, including Gioseffo Zarlino, Ramos de Pariea and Heinrich Glarean. The studies and discussions of key characteristics in those periods became so well explored as to result in the first appearance of a list of the characteristics of each mode. In Germany and France especially, the discussion of key characteristics reached its peak in the first half of the eighteenth century, when it was studied as a part of Rhetoric. Theorists and composers equally showed their interest in the elements each key could offer to music and how to use keys advantageously in order to enrich the musical experience of the listener. While key characteristics were studied commonly as a vital subject by composers in the eighteenth century and as a fundamental of musical education by many young musicians in the early nineteenth, this tradition had all but disappeared by the middle of the twentieth. The concept of key characteristics is no longer commonly taught in our musical institutions, and this desertion from such a traditionally significant discipline is ever puzzling and particularly interesting to me. In my thesis, I will focus on writings from the last half of the nineteenth century and the first half of the twentieth to determine the various paths taken in the study of key characteristics. I will investigate the writings and discussions of three scholarly groups—music theorists, composers and scientists—from late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries and discuss how the survival of the study of key characteristics was influenced by aspects of the time: popular aspects and aims in the fields of music theory; cultural and social expectations in the validity of phenomena; pronouncements of composers (Arthur Bliss, Alexander Scriabin, Olivier Messiaen, Arnold Schoenberg and Vincent D’Indy) in their musical styles; the rise of a naturalistic view of physical reality as a field and changes it brought to music and societies. I will also include a comparative summary of the status of key characteristics in various periods.
Intonation in the Aural-Skills Classroom
(2010-09) Walker, Carolyn A.
The goal of the thesis is to explain intonation perception and cognition, as well as the vocal mechanism and techniques, to help aural-skills instructors teach vocal intonation skills to students who struggle with intonation. The thesis explores comprehensive information on intonation perception and cognition and introduces basic vocal technique for an over-all understanding of the skills involved with accurate vocal intonation.
A History of Opera in Boston
(2010-05) Tedesco, John R
This thesis examines the cultural context of opera in Boston between the years 1620 to 2010. Specifically, I look at how the Boston Opera Company was founded, its existence, and its ultimate demise. The rise of opera in colonial Boston is also explored and especially how the immigration in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries influenced the city. Around this time of changing demographics Eben D. Jordan, Jr., of Jordan Marsh Co. decided to build an opera house for the city of Boston. The effects that Puritanism had on music and the culture of Boston during its early years are also explored. Then Boston musical independence is catalogued about how it relates to the unique form of music that did form during this time, starting with the First New England School. During the mid to late nineteenth century massive immigration took place that changed this country, especially Boston. The modern United States was formed during this time, including its music. Boston, starting in the 1830’s had numerous societies and schools disseminating music to the populace. This in turn led to the creation of the Boston Opera Company in 1908. The Boston Opera Company was founded by Eben D. Jordan of Jordan Marsh Co. He decided that the city of Boston needed a proper opera company, so he paid for the construction of the house and operation. Unfortunately, the populace soon lost interest and the company made in ill-fated trip to Paris in 1914. This trip, coupled with the start of WWI, forced the company to declare bankruptcy in 1915. There are definite cultural considerations as to why the opera company was unable to make itself part of the fabric of the city, like the Metropolitan Opera in New York. The Boston Symphony Orchestra is very much a part of the city and there is no reason why opera should not be with that part either. Boston has a very large metropolitan area and with the proper guidance and determination, opera could be supported here year round. A new house would have to be built, since the original opera house was torn down in 1958. With the proper determination, however, it could be done for permanent opera in the city.
Issues Involved in the Acquisition of Atonal Aural Skills
(2009) Wieske, Mark E
The Role of Organicism in the Original and Revised Versions of Brahms's Piano Trio in B Major, Op. 8, Mvt. I: A Comparison by Means of Grundgestalt Analysis
(2007) Embry, Jessica L.
Abstract to come later
Franz Liszt's Settings Of “was Liebe Sei?”: A Schenkerian Perspective
(2008) Vitalino, Michael
Memory and Production of Standard Frequencies in College-Level Musicians
(2013-09) Weber, Sarah E.
This thesis examines the nature of long-term absolute pitch memory—an ability traditionally assumed to belong only to absolute pitch (AP) possessors—by testing for evidence of this memory for “standard” frequencies in musicians without AP. Standard frequencies, those based on the equally tempered system with A = 440 Hz, are common in the sonic environment of the Western college musical education, and thus could have the opportunity to penetrate listeners’ long-term memories. Through four experimental tasks, this thesis examines musicians’ ability to recognize and produce frequencies from the set of equally tempered frequencies based on A = 440 Hz, without regard to those musicians’ pitch-labeling abilities. The experimental tasks also compare freshmen with seniors to test if exposure to standard frequencies during a college musical education engrains standard frequencies in long-term memory. The results suggest that musicians without AP cannot distinguish between standard and nonstandard frequencies during listening tasks, but they may be able to recall them without prompting when singing familiar folk songs. However, musical training during the college years does not seem to improve these abilities. Further experimentation is needed to corroborate the results, including modifications to the current tasks and methodology, as well as a larger subject size.
A Hierarchical Approach to the Analysis of Intermediary Structures Within the Modified Contour Reduction Algorithm
(2013-09) Wallentinsen, Kristen M
Robert Morris’s (1993) Contour-Reduction Algorithm—later modified by Rob Schultz (2008) and hereafter referred to as the Modified Contour Reduction Algorithm (MCRA)—recursively prunes a contour down to its prime: its first, last, highest, and lowest contour pitches. The algorithm follows a series of steps in two stages. The first stage prunes c-pitches that are neither local high points (maxima) nor low points (minima). The second stage prunes pitches that are neither maxima within the max-list (pitches that were maxima in the first stage) nor minima within the min-list (pitches that were minima in the first stage). This second stage is repeated until no more pitches can be pruned. What remains is the contour’s prime. By examining how the reduction process is applied to a given c-seg, one can discern a hierarchy of levels that indicates new types of relationships between them. In this thesis, I aim to highlight relationships between c-segs by analyzing the distinct subsets created by the different levels obtained by the applying the MCRA. These subsets, or sub-csegs, can be used to delineate further relationships between c-segs beyond their respective primes. As such, I posit a new method in which each sub-cseg produced by the MCRA is examined to create a system of hierarchical comparison that measures relationships between c-segs, using sub-cseg equivalence to calculate an index value representing degrees of similarity. The similarity index compares the number of levels at which two c-segs are similar to the total number of comparable levels. I then implement this analytical method by examining the similarities and differences between thirteen mode-2 Alleluias from the Liber Usualis that share the same alleluia and jubilus. The verses of these thirteen chants are highly similar in melodic content in that they all have the same prime, yet they are not fully identical. I will examine the verses of these chants using my method of comparison, analyzing intermediary sub-csegs between these 13 chants in order to reveal differences in the way the primes that govern their basic structures are composed out.
Death and Transfiguration?: Late Style in Gustav Mahler's Last Works
(2013-09) Edwards, Kristen E
Scholarship on Gustav Mahler’s (1860–1911) late works is often overshadowed by the events of 1907: the death of his daughter, his resignation from the Vienna Court Opera, and the diagnosis of his heart condition. The subjective juxtaposition of this biographical detail on his last works—Das Lied von der Erde (1908), the Ninth Symphony (1909), and the Tenth Symphony (1910, unfinished)—has provoked the application of themes of death, transcendence, and farewell as extra-musical elements to his music. While scholars such as Vera Micznik, Henry-Louis de La Grange, and Stephen Hefling have called the acceptance of this program into question, there has yet to be a more objective analysis of Mahler’s last works via the lens of late style theory. This thesis explores two of Mahler’s last works, Das Lied and the Ninth, through the application of Edward Said’s theory of late style. Rather than approaching death with harmony, resolution, and transfiguration, the late artist in Said’s theory evokes “intransigence, difficulty, and unresolved contradiction”. Instead of a psychological or biographical interpretation of late style, Said’s theory focuses on irreconcilable characteristics that set the artist apart from the age in an anachronistic way. Following his more objective approach of interpreting late style, this thesis relies on the musical elements that characterize Mahler’s late style, categorized as anachronism, disintegration, and evasion of closure. Through the discourse of Said’s late style theory, this thesis reveals alternative means of interpreting Mahler’s late style that avoids the myth of the artist transfigured by death.
Ficino's Musica Humana: Musico-Astrological Improvisation
(2008) Clauss, Greg A
The improvvisatore tradition in Florence Italy during the second half of the quattrocento featured poet-musicians who sang poetry for music (poesia per musica) accompanied by the lira (da braccio). This thesis researches Florentine literati and threads of humanism in relation to poetry written for music. By doing so, philosophical and literary trends are analyzed in relation to the Florentine improvvisatore style: frottola versification forms and divinus furor. Marsilio Ficino’s (1433-1499) direction at the Platonic Academy (founded c. 1463) outside Florence in the hills of Carregi influenced some of the greatest artists and musicians of his time. This thesis focuses on lyric improvisation as a means of connecting mind and body with the universe. In doing so, Ficino’s music-spirit-theory and astrological program are looked at in light of the Platonic sources. The instrument of the improvvisatore, the lira, will be analyzed in relation to affect (ethos) and wellness for mind (soul) and body
The Reception of Liszt’s Faust Symphony in the United States
(2020-05) Danitz, Chloe
Liszt reception has largely suffered from lack of academic research. In 2011, Michael Saffle’s initiative detailing Franz Liszt’s influence on musicians around the world spearheaded the historicization of Liszt reception. In response to his efforts, this thesis provides the first detailed documentation of the Faust Symphony’s reception in the United States. Occupying a unique approach, focusing purely on United States reception, this thesis demonstrates United States music dissemination trends and contributes to efforts creating a more global picture of Liszt and his music. Above all, the documentation of conductors, performances, broadcastings, recordings, and requests proves Liszt’s symphonic work impacted larger audiences than previously acknowledged. This impact was lasting, especially in the United States. Analyses of early influential United States symphonic compositions demonstrate clear influence from Liszt’s Faust Symphony. These pieces created a foundation built upon by succeeding United States composers, producing a uniquely “American” sound through a Lisztian form. This reception recognizes Liszt as an influential symphonic composer, and in doing so, begs its audience to reassess preconceived histories describing the development of the United States symphonic tradition.
Live to Play: Musical Labor, Branding, and the Percussive Marketplace
(2019-09) Beltran, Alexander S
This thesis undertakes an examination of the branding and sponsorship practices of the Vic Firth Drumstick Company, and explores some of the ways that percussion music broadly, and percussionists specifically, may be impacted by the Vic Firth Company’s strategic marketing and sponsorship efforts. The thesis investigates some of the specific methods Vic Firth uses to interact with percussionists and consumers, presenting the methods and the motivations behind them as compatible with neoliberal economic ideas and policies. Vic Firth’s branding strategies reflect myriad economic factors facing individual percussionists; emphasis on personal branding and artistic authenticity, the necessity of entrepreneurial skills to create economic viability, and the desire for personal connection, networking, and alliance with other percussionists are all part of the zeitgeist the company is attempting to tap into. By examining some of the specific ways Vic Firth crafts and curates their brand, including the creation of signature sticks and mallets, a tiered sponsorship program, aggressive media production, and direct marketing to percussionists through social media, I bring into focus the scope of Vic Firth’s brand and its potential effects on the larger percussive and musical landscape.
Motion as Music: Hypermetrical Schemas in Eighteenth-Century Contredanses
(2018-09) Stevens, Alison N
An important part of the recent growth in scholarship on meter focuses on reconstructing 18th-century listening practices. Danuta Mirka (2009) studies contemporary accounts of meter in theory treatises to build a model of 18th-century metric listening, while Stefan Love (2016) takes a corpus studies approach, arguing that surveying repertoire provides a more accurate view of meter than 18th-century theorists. But despite the known debt that much 18th-century art music owes to dance and dance music, Mirka and Love only briefly mention dance. In touching so lightly on dance, these and other authors overlook the more fundamental connection between meter and movement. In this paper I examine late 18th-century French contredanses and their music to propose a model of contemporary metric hearing that unites literal and musical motion. There are three features of the contredanse and dancing in general that support their relevance to 18th-century metric experience. First is the contredanse’s role in society—recent writers on 18th-century music often present the minuet as the premier dance of the century, but though it remained the most aristocratic dance, by the middle of the century it had been surpassed in popularity by the contredanse. Second, contredanses involved multiple dancers moving simultaneously, and music helped them coordinate their movements. As a result, hypermetrical schemas matching hypermeasures with dance moves could develop. Finally, the experience of moving in time with musical meter likely had a positive effect on dancers’ ability to find meter in music in general.
Recursive Properties of srdc Structures in Golden Age Musical Theater Songs
(2017-09) Markel, Morgan
The srdc is a four-part phrase pattern in popular music consisting of four formal functions: statement (s), restatement (r), departure (d), and conclusion (c). In recent scholarship, the applicability and scope of the four-part pattern has been vigorously debated. The question of whether entire song forms, such as the AABA and verse–prechorus–chorus song forms, can be interpreted as large-scale SRDC patterns has become a primary topic of interest among popular music scholars. In this thesis, I seek to further the argument for the large-scale SRDC reading of the AABA song form by demonstrating the recursive potential of srdc structures in Golden Age musical theater songs. To do so, I survey the characteristic properties of 8- and 16- bar srdc patterns and 32- and 64-bar AABA song forms as they were observed in a corpus study of 89 songs. By highlighting the similar ways in which the srdc’s formal functions are expressed at multiple levels of structure within the surveyed 32- and 64-bar AABA song forms, I demonstrate why these song forms can be interpreted as large-scale SRDC patterns. Chapter 1 introduces this thesis’s primary research question and surveys the relevant literature on the srdc and other related topics. Chapter 2 outlines the steps taken to assemble the corpus of 89 songs and assesses the srdc patterns and AABA song forms contained therein. Chapter 3 then discusses the results of the corpus study. Chapter 4 examines the structural correspondences between the surveyed srdc patterns and AABA song forms, using a model AABA song form that contains three nested srdc patterns. To conclude this thesis, Chapter 4 closes by discussing some avenues for future research.
Islamophobia, Anti-Semitism, and Censorship: Reflections on Religious and Political Radicalism in John Adams’s The Death of Klinghoffer
(2017-05) Smith, Allison R
The issue of anti-Semitism in John Adams’s 1991 opera, The Death of Klinghoffer, has been widely discussed by scholars such as Richard Taruskin, Robert Fink, and others. For instance, Taruskin asserts that Adams favors the Palestinians through musical grandiosity and by describing them as “men of ideals.” However, this fails to consider the possibility that Adams intended to portray an evenhanded view of diverse religious groups. Through close readings of the libretto and select numbers from Klinghoffer, such as the “Chorus of Exiled Palestinians,” the “Chorus of Exiled Jews,” and the “Aria of the Falling Body,” my thesis maintains that Adams treats both sides equally. Although he depicts each group differently through a contrasting approach to text, orchestration, and texture, he nevertheless does not favor one group over the other. Additionally, a close reading of the “Aria of the Falling Body” provides Adams’s possible solution to this conflict – reconciliation between religious communities. Adams does so through portraying Leon Klinghoffer as a scapegoat. This aria is sung by Leon Klinghoffer’s body after he is sacrificed by the Palestinian hijackers – his sacrifice ensured the safety of the remaining passengers on board. Adams thus presents Klinghoffer as religious commentary – not only by vividly depicting the warring religious communities – but also by offering a solution to a centuries-old conflict.
METER IN FRENCH AND ITALIAN OPERA, 1809–1859
(2017-05) Shea, Nicholas
Current and historical methods of metric analysis often assume that the first beat of a metric group is stronger than the second. This, however, is not the case in all repertoires. For example, a study by William Rothstein (2011) demonstrates that Verdi’s midcentury operas often place emphasis on even-numbered beats. This paper shows this metric trend to be even more prevalent in a corpus of 208 nineteenth-century operatic excerpts, (1809-1859). I present a formal model that classifies phrases according to anacrusis length and prosodic accent, showing where large-scale metric accents fall within a phrase. This model produces three metric types which align with Rosthstein’s (2011) previous work. Compositional and historical features (e.g., language, premiere date, librettist, etc.) were tracked alongside type in order to determine whether preferences for certain metric forms were more prevalent in certain contexts. This indeed was the case. For instance, use of even-emphasis meter increases over time, even though odd-emphasis meter remains most common. Individual composers also show a significantly distinguishable preference toward each type of meter. These results not only confirm that the highest concentration of even-emphasis meter occurs in Verdi’s midcentury operas (Rothstein 2011), but that Verdi is the primary user of this type overall. I also demonstrate that language and composer nationality do not significantly affect an excerpt's metric type; only Verdi shows distinction in these areas. With this finding, I argue against using nationalist language to identify metric types and instead propose suggestions that better-reflect an updated understanding of nineteenth-century metric conventions.
A Transformational Approach to Japanese Traditional Music of the Edo Period
(2017-05) Pasciak, Kenneth J
Analysis of sōkyoku jiuta, Japanese traditional music of the Edo period for koto and shamisen, has in the past relied primarily on static tetrachordal or hexachordal models. The present study takes a transformational approach to traditional Japanese music. Specifically, it develops a framework for six-pitch hexachordal space inspired by Steven Rings’s transformational approach to tonal music. This novel voice-leading space yields insights into intervallic structure, trichordal transposition and hexachordal voice leading and transformations of this music at both its surface and large-scale levels. A side-by-side comparison with Rings’s approach highlights differences between the hexachordal and diatonic systems.

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