DMA, University of Cincinnati, 2020, College-Conservatory of Music: Piano

The twentieth-century concert etude drew from and expanded upon the achievements of nineteenth-century composers such as Chopin and Liszt. Many composers wrote sets of etudes for piano exploring many disparate styles and techniques. While some composers rely on a general difficulty or complex compositional formulas for connection to the genre, other composers were more explicit about the technical difficulties, thus linking more directly to the tradition began by Chopin and others. This document examines and compares sets of etudes that retain this balance between concert artifice and pedagogical concerns and will examine works by Louise Talma (Six Etudes for Piano, 1954), Einojuhani Rautavaara (Etydit, Op. 42, 1969), Ned Rorem (Eight Etudes for Piano, 1975), Gyorgy Ligeti (Etudes pour Piano Premier Livre, 1985), and William Bolcom (12 New Etudes for Piano, 1986).

Committee: Samuel Ng Ph.D. (Committee Chair); J. Conda Ph.D. (Committee Member); Awadagin K.A. Pratt A.D. (Committee Member) Subjects: Music

Doctor of Musical Arts, The Ohio State University, 2016, Music

Korean composer Unsuk Chin (b. 1961) is regarded as one of the leading classical composers of the 21st century. Her vivid oral imagination; ability to express a wide range of musical colors; diverse influences, including non-European music and electronic music; and enthusiasm for the virtuosity have opened up, in particular, the various possibilities of a concerto genre. So far, from 1996, she has composed six concerti, one each for six different instruments: piano, violin, prepared piano and percussion, cello, the Chinese instrument sheng and clarinet. This dissertation examines Unsuk Chin's Piano Concerto (1996-7), providing a biography of the composer and explaining her musical style in chapter 1, analyzing the influence of her teacher Gyorgy Ligeti and similarities of her Piano Concerto with Ligeti's Piano Concerto (1985-88) in chapter 2, and offering an in-depth study of each movement of her Piano Concerto in chapter 3. The final section of the dissertation is composed of an interview with pianist Sunwook Kim, who recently performed and recorded her Piano Concerto with conductor Myung-whun Chung and the Seoul Philharmonic Orchestra.

Committee: Steven Glaser (Advisor); Jan Radzynski (Committee Member); Arved Ashby (Committee Member) Subjects: Music

DMA, University of Cincinnati, 2010, College-Conservatory of Music: Piano

This document examines how four late twentieth-century composers' styles engage with the traditional genre of the etude. It explores the stylistic characteristics of concert etudes by John Cage (Etudes Australes), William Bolcom (Twelve New Etudes for Piano), John Corigliano (Etude Fantasy), and Gyorgy Ligeti (Etudes pour piano, Premier Livre). The interaction of these composers' styles with the general characteristics of the etude is explored from a performer's perspective through a comparative study of these four collections. The introductory chapter provides a brief historical survey of the etude from the late eighteenth century to the twentieth century. Chapters two through five consider the etudes of Cage, Bolcom, Corigliano, and Ligeti in turn, summarizing their respective styles, examining the interaction of their styles with the virtuosic nature of the etude, and providing helpful instructions for the performance of these works. Chapter six briefly compares and contrasts the etudes of these four composers with each other as well as situates these works within the context of late twentieth-century piano music. This document contributes to our understanding of how the etude genre has been embraced by late twentieth-century composers as well as how they have engaged, to varying degrees, with the nineteenth-century attributes of the genre.

Committee: bruce mcclung PhD (Committee Chair); Elizabeth Pridonoff MM (Committee Member); Eugene Pridonoff MM (Committee Member) Subjects: Music

Doctor of Musical Arts, The Ohio State University, 2007, Music

“Performance Aspects of Gyorgy Ligeti's Etudes pour Piano: Fanfares and Arc-en-ciel” examines two etudes, Fanfares and Arc-en-ciel, from Ligeti's first book of piano etudes. The purpose of this study is to explore these two etudes, by providing analytical aspects that focus on Ligeti's application of polyrhythm in two hands of pianists. In these two etudes, he combines complex polyrhythm with other components, including triadic harmonies, jazz and the lament motive. Ligeti states that the three sets of etudes are studies for both performer and composer. Fanfares and Arc-en-ciel exhibit two contrasting characters: Fanfares is built with humor and rhythmical vitality, while Arc-en-ciel is an elegant and expressive etude. This document will illustrate his ingenuity in manipulating rhythm, dynamics control and formal structure. I begin with a general overview of piano etudes and their development over history, including composers Scarlatti, Bach, Czerny, Chopin, Debussy, and representative twentieth century composers. The lineage shows how the genre of etude has evolved and how etudes mirror the style of each period. Ligeti began to compose his etudes in 1985 and launched a new style of etude at the end of the twentieth century. In addition to the analytical and interpretive aspects of these two etudes, the study also examines Ligeti's compositional styles in general, and some other features that maintained his ongoing preoccupation in his last years.

Committee: Caroline Hong (Advisor) Subjects: Music

Master of Music (MM), Bowling Green State University, 2011, Music Composition

Inside the Mirage for orchestra is a one-movement work approximately nine minutes in duration. It is scored for piccolo, 2 flutes, 2 oboes, 2 clarinets in B-flat, bass clarinet, 2 bassoons, 4 horns in F, 3 trumpets in C, 2 trombones, 1 tuba, timpani, three percussionists and strings. The work has two climaxes that loosely divide the piece into two sections. The conceptual inspiration of the work comes from the optical phenomenon of the mirage, an image produced by the refraction of light rays, most often caused by heat. This bending of these rays can result in optical illusions of many different sorts. To be inside a mirage is, of course, impossible, as proximity exposes the illusion for what it truly is. The concept for this piece is therefore based on the imaginary notion that the listener could step into the illusion and view an altered state of reality. When discussing the concept of light, visual conceptions translate into musical idioms very easily, as we perceive sounds with higher frequencies to be “bright” and lower frequencies to be “dark.” Also, soft, smooth lines can be connected to the image of soft, glistening light, while harsh, articulate bursts of sound can translate into great bursts of light. These two musical ideas comprise the bulk of material for Inside the Mirage. Harmonically, the work uses the seven-note set 7-28, or pitch class set [0135679]. Throughout the piece, this scale is manipulated in two main ways-through addition and subtraction: to create more chromatic sonorities, 7-28 is layered on top of itself; to create less harmonic density, notes are removed from 7-28. The primary influences for Inside the Mirage are composers Gyorgy Ligeti and Witold Lutoslawski. The textures of their compositions, often consisting of intricate phrases and rhythmic complexity, are imitated throughout the piece. Inside the Mirage also borrows some orchestrational techniques from these two composers, as well as some from Stravinsky. In conclusion, In (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Marilyn Shrude DMA (Advisor); Mikel Kuehn PhD (Committee Member) Subjects: Music

Master of Music (MM), Bowling Green State University, 2006, Music History

Most musical depictions of the apocalypse do not begin with a car-horn prelude. However, Gyorgy Ligeti's only opera, Le Grand Macabre, written in 1978 and revised in 1996, is not most music. Dark, humorous, sometimes off-color, and always thought-provoking, Le Grand Macabre is filled with examples of musical and musical-historical parody. This thesis analyzes five parodic episodes from Le Grand Macabre, evaluating them in light of the theories of literary scholar Linda Hutcheon, musicologist David Metzer, and others. Metzer, especially, proposes a twofold perspective for works comprised of quotation: either the dramatic action collapses internally, resulting in insanity, or it collapses externally, yielding destruction. A comet strikes in the penultimate scene of Le Grand Macabre, and the final scene involves the characters trying to discover whether or not they are dead. Ultimately, the only person to die is Nekrotzar, the self-proclaimed Death. However, Ligeti insists that the ending of the opera be left to individual viewers to interpret: he does not want the production to end as either a farce or an apocalypse. Thus, I analyze Le Grand Macabre based not on Metzer's twofold concept, but rather on a continuum in which the two extremes are insanity and destruction. Critical to this analysis is a discussion of Peter Sellars's production of Le Grand Macabre at the 1997 Salzburg Festival. Ligeti attacked the production, and most reviewers agreed that Sellars interpreted the story as an apocalypse, not as the ambiguous adventure Ligeti had envisioned. Accordingly, I explore this ambiguity in light of Umberto Eco's The Open Work to determine whether an inconclusive ending automatically denotes an “open work.”

Committee: Carol Hess (Advisor) Subjects: Music

Master of Music (MM), Bowling Green State University, 2013, Music Composition

Ouroboros— a single-movement, fourteen-minute work scored for flute, alto flute, B-flat clarinet (doubling bass clarinet), bassoon, horn, B-flat trumpet (doubling B-flat flugelhorn), bass trombone, three percussionists, harp, piano, violin, viola, violoncello, and contrabass— is a work that lacks melodies, motives, clear harmonic shifts, perceivable changes in dynamics and timbre, audible articulations, and a discernible pulse. Every element of this composition was informed by some aspect of the mythical serpent ouroboros. At the broadest level, Ouroboros follows a single, processed-based form. This gesture consists of several subsections that are simultaneously transformed by various processes: registral and dynamic wedges, a timbral rondo, and an exponential accelerando. The algorithms used to develop the material also progressed in a cyclical fashion, terminating in the same way that they began. The harmonic progression, which functions as one giant sequence, is derived from the hexachord 6- 25[013568] and transformations that share at least four common tones. These harmonic materials were arranged across pitch-space in the framework of an ouroboros beginning with a hexachord spanning seven octaves, reducing to a single note, and smoothly spreading back to the fully expanded hexachord. In order to produce many different sonorities, both new and familiar, I developed multi-layered orchestrations that cycle at different rates and are slightly transformed with each reiteration. While inner layers were orchestrated with systematic processes to transform between primary and secondary orchestral choirs, the surface orchestration shifted slowly between “dark” and “light” timbres. In addition, individual pitches were orchestrated by two dissimilar instruments that articulated to and from niente. To further unify these disparate timbres, the majority of the work was written at dynamic levels less than mezzo piano; this also helped facilitate the execution of the unusua (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Mikel Kuehn PhD (Advisor); Christopher Dietz PhD (Other) Subjects: Music