▼ Adam Rogers is one of the most influential jazz guitarists in the world today. This thesis offers a transcription and analysis of his improvisation on the Thelonious Monk composition “Let's Cool One” which demonstrates five improvisational devices that define Rogers's approach over this composition: micro-harmonization, rhythmic displacement, motivic development, thematic improvisation, and phrase rhythm. This thesis presents a window into the aesthetics of contemporary jazz improvisation and offers a prism for conceptualizing not only the work of Adam Rogers, but that of many contemporary improvisers working in the post-bop idiom. Advisors/Committee Members: Morgan, David.

▼ My thesis concerns artists who have addressed the topic of death by interacting with voices from the past. In my study I trace layers of thought that begin with the seventeenth-century poetry of John Donne. Donne's works are influenced by his struggles with faith and his paradoxical understanding of mortality. They display a combination of emotion and intellect characteristic of seventeenth-century Protestant religious devotion, and provide a starting point for artistic reaction from English composers of later eras, whose spiritual worldviews were more (or less) sympathetic to Donne's as a result of their changing cultural experience. Pelham Humfrey, a member of Charles II's Chapel Royal, set Donne's “Hymne to God the Father” to music after the Restoration. In Charles II's secular and cosmopolitan court, Donne's poem was both a voice from the past, representing a more religiously conservative era, and a parallel with the present, as a representation of Anglican devotion under English monarchy. Humfrey's setting explores archaism and contemporaneity through the combination of English lute song idioms with Italian solo madrigal and gestures from the seconda prattica. Benjamin Britten, British composer of the twentieth century, interacted both with Donne's Holy Sonnets and Humfrey's setting of Donne's “Hymne to God the Father.” For Britten, Donne's voice represented a more religious English past, combined with a tortured expression of spiritual searching that paralleled Britten's religious experiences in an increasingly post-Christian era. Britten's Holy Sonnets of John Donne, and his realization of Humfrey's setting of “Hymne to God the Father,” apply Donne's work to the subjects of the Holocaust and personal mortality, respectively, creating narratives of mourning that utilizes archaic Baroque idioms in the context of the contemporary song cycle. Advisors/Committee Members: Boczkowska, Ewelina.

▼ This thesis examines the musical language of the first movement of Béla Bartók's Sonata no. 2, for violin and piano (1922). Exploring the use of inversional symmetry, interval cycles, octatonic harmony and the use of Z-cells. It shows how Bartók used symmetry to function analogously to tonal procedures; and examines the form of the movement, its shape, melodic/harmonic content, and climatic structure. Analytic methods are based primarily on the research of Elliott Antokoletz and the theory of twelve tone tonality. The movement's structure and various developmental procedures are presented. Detailed analysis is provided, showing Bartók's use of symmetry, and Z-cell interaction with octatonic harmony, inversional symmetry, and free treatment. It also shows, Bartók's developmental process of cell expansion/contraction and intervallic displacement linking it to the Second Viennese School. The movement epitomizes the extremely experimental nature of Bartók's middle period style. Advisors/Committee Members: Rollin, Robert.

▼ From the time Adolphe Sax took out his first patent in 1846, the saxophone has found its way into nearly every style of music with one notable exception: the orchestra. Composers of serious orchestral music have not only disregarded the saxophone but have actually developed an aversion to the instrument, despite the fact that it was created at a time when the orchestra was expanding at its most rapid pace. This thesis is intended to identify historical reasons why the saxophone never became a permanent member of the orchestra or acquired a reputation as a serious classical instrument in the twentieth century. Advisors/Committee Members: Boczkowska, Ewelina.

▼ Samuel Barber's professional career covered the majority of the twentieth century, spanning from the early 1930s to the late 1970s. An honored and frequently performed American composer, many of Barber's compositions have gained a place in the standard repertoire. Despite his success, scholarly sources have a tendency to treat Barber as a twentieth-century afterthought. This thesis takes the question of Barber's historical reception as a point of departure to study his song cycle the Hermit Songs (1952-53). The Hermit Songs, written during the peak of Barber's career, demonstrate many of the compositional features associated with his mature style. Alone, the texts constitute a collection of poetry related through a number of contrasting themes: solitude and community, faith and doubt, and piety and promiscuity. More corporeal relations among the texts include the repeated appearance of birds and bells. Barber's treatment of the texts enhances these thematic connections and unites the poetry through a number of musical devices. In order to gain a comprehensive understanding of this representative work, this thesis will examine the personal and educational experiences that helped shape Barber's predilection for Romantic and post-romantic techniques. The subsequent analysis of the Hermit Songs will address the history, composition, and premiere of the cycle, followed by an examination of the songs' harmonic language and analysis of narrative structure as articulated through textual and musical cross-references, time-determined events, and abstract patterning and symmetry. Advisors/Committee Members: Goldberg, Randall.

▼ Jazz drummer Tony Williams' musical and technical abilities surpassed those of his contemporaries'; allowing him to push the boundaries of the music he played. This was especially true at fast tempi. Through transcription and analysis of Williams' phrasing, this study identifies the ways he obscured pulse, meter, and form. He used three major techniques to do so: accent variation, accentual shift, and metric superimposition. The examples within this study demonstrate both a regular formal structure as well as a clearly articulated macro-beat from the walking bass line. In using the aforementioned techniques, Williams created a variety of rhythmic displacement that occurs not only at metric levels, but formal as well. Williams was not the first drummer to use these techniques, but what is especially significant is his use of them at such fast tempi. The two songs represented throughout each come from the first year of Williams' professional recording career. While only seventeen at the time, his playing demonstrates a clear technical leap on the instrument over his contemporaries. These concepts of metric displacement became a hallmark of Williams' playing throughout his entire career, and helped to establish him as one of jazz drumming's most significant contributors. Advisors/Committee Members: Engelhardt, Kent.

▼ Part One, "The Seven Days of Creation For Narrator and String Orchestra" depicts the seven days of creation as portrayed in the Bible. The narrator will first read the depiction of that particular day, followed by the referant musical movement, which will enhance the bible passage. The seven-movement piece uses a wide variety of compositional techniques including modes, whole tone scales and other artificial scales.Part Two examines Movement 4 of Shostakovich's Symphony No. 5. The hope in analyzing this movement is to discover if Shostakovich could be a progressive 20th. century composer while being closely scrutinized by the Communist Party. A brief discussion of some historic background is followed by a parametric analysis consisting of a study of form, harmonic and tonal outline, climaxes, rhythmic structure, timbre, and textural structure. The thesis shows that Shostakovich was able to be creative despite the very adverse conditions of Communist Party control. Through the examination of this movement, we find that Shostakovich can be a source of inspiration to musicians and non-musicians alike who are faced with adversity. Advisors/Committee Members: Rollin, Robert.

▼ PART I. Samson Suite. The Samson Suite is a four movement composition written for string chamber orchestra. The first movement, Samson at the Gates (Overture), and the second movement, The Emptying (A Meditation Prayer) represent a fusion of classical and baroque compositional devices with twentieth century minimalism. Maximum musical mileage is achieved through minimal harmonic means. The first movement does this by exploiting the Ti to Do relation between the tonic key center of g minor and the key center of the leading tone, f# minor. This technique is used extensively by Prokofiev in Opus 94. Likewise, the second movement in D Major exploits and elongates the Ti to Do relationship. Both movements are in ternary form. The first movement substitutes a fugato for the development section in the relative major of Bb. The second movement introduces a new theme in the B section in the dominant key of A. The overall scheme of the four movements continues the leading tone relationship, moving from the key of g minor in the first movement to f# minor in the third movement and from D Major in the second movement, to c# minor in the last movement. The third movement, Journey to Saga City (Journey to Sagacity) is a prelude of virtually equal proportions (eighty-one measures) to the fugue in the fourth and final movement, The Finishing (eighty-two measures). The Samson Suite represents a crystallization of twentieth-century compositional ideas and classical tradition found in the twentieth-century neo-classical school, of which Prokofiev was a leading proponent. The Samson Suite was premiered on April 30, 2008, by the New Music Festival Chamber Orchestra, under the direction of Dr. Robert Rollin, at the DeYor Performing Arts Center in Youngstown, Ohio. PART II. The Provocative Prokofiev: Analysis of Moderato Movement Sonata for Flute and Piano in D Major, Opus 94 The thesis examines Prokofiev's treatment of the traditional sonata-allegro form, as it presents itself in the first movement, Moderato of the Sonata for Flute and Piano, Opus 94. Five compositional procedures peculiar to Prokofiev's treatment are identified and examined throughout the movement: 1) the use of chromatic mediants to promote root movement by thirds rather than fifths; 2) the exploitation of the tertian harmonic balance inherent in the augmented chord; 3) the use of the chromatic root shift, raising or lowering the tonic and fifth of the triad changing major to minor and minor to major; 4) harmonic treatment of the seventh degree of the scale; and, 5) Prokofiev's use of themes that can be circumscribed within each other, enabling him to integrate the operative harmonic treatment introduced in one theme into another theme. The ongoing thrust of Prokofiev's music is achieved by the constant re-synthesizing of previous ideas in new contexts by idea-extension. This is Prokofiev's unique way of incorporating variation form into sonata-allegro form. The thesis hypothesizes that Prokofiev's innovative approach to traditional harmonic progressions allows for the introduction of chromaticisms which expand the range of tonal centers available for resolution. An overview of the historical circumstances influencing Prokofiev's life is provided to give perspective on Opus 94, relative to the entire body of Prokofiev's creative output. A Map to Themes and Tonal Centers is provided in Appendix II (p. 124) as a companion guide to the detailed analysis of the movement. Sources for the first movement, Moderato, Sonata for Flute and Piano, Opus 94 can be found in the Music Scores references listed in the Bibliography. Advisors/Committee Members: Rollin, Robert.

▼ The purpose of this thesis is to examine and explain the importance and the use of the partido alto rhythm in Brazilian popular music, particularly Aquarela Do Brasil by Joao Bosco. The thesis will briefly discuss the beginning of partido alto as a genre, as well as the rhythm itself. The study will reveal the ways partido alto is realized on Brazilian traditional instruments such as cuica, tamborim, and agogo. Modern usage on Western instruments such as guitar, bass guitar, drumset, and piano will also be covered. A section of the Brazilian classic, Aquarela Do Brasil by Ary Barroso, as played by guitarist/singer/composer Joao Bosco. The transcription includes a comparison between the bass notes, chords, and sung notes. Ultimately, the paper will show that the partido alto rhythm is used as a rhythmic basis in the context of Brazilian popular music. Advisors/Committee Members: Engelhardt, Kent.