Doctoral Final Projects--Choral Conducting (DM)

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    Performing nineteenth-century editions of Christoph Willibald Gluck's opera Orfeo ed Euridice
    (2012-04-09) Leonard, John P. (John Patrick)
    The purpose of this document is to examine and compare the various nineteenth-century editions of Christoph Willibald Gluck’s opera, Orfeo ed Euridice. Of primary focus are Hector Berlioz’s Orphée, Alfred Dörffel’s Orpheus und Eurydice and Ricordi’s Orfeo ed Euridice. Issues of voice type, language, libretto, instrumentation, and nineteenth-century performance practice are addressed. Finally, recommendations for creating an informed modern production of the opera are given based upon the various issues listed above.
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    Assessing the leadership potential of choral conductors
    (2012-12-17) Ludwa, Chris
    When it comes to assessing the leadership aspects of conducting a music ensemble, the traditional focus is musical skills and knowledge, past experience, and observation, with little true understanding of leadership skills. In contrast, organizational science and psychology offer numerous methods of assessing leadership potential. A tool informed by these research disciplines would be helpful to choral organizations that are seeking a new director or those leaders wishing to assess their own leadership skills. In this study, I discuss the dynamics of leadership in the context of choral ensembles, examine several leadership aptitude assessments developed in fields other than music, and design a unique assessment approach specifically tailored to choral organizations. The study involved a sample of choral conductors (N=20) at liberal arts and state colleges in the United States who are leading successful choral programs. Participating conductors completed an anonymo! us survey, as did students in one of their ensembles (N=437) and colleagues from the school at which they worked (N=19). The answers on the three related survey respondent groups were compared in order to determine the correlations between perceived leadership style from the point of view of the conductor, student, and colleague. The validity of the assessment was tested by administering it to a sample of choral conductors in liberal arts colleges and comparing their results with questionnaire data gathered from other stakeholders (singers and colleagues). The study was designed to inform an effective approach for beginning to assess leadership attributes in a conductor and how self-perception relates to perception of leadership by singers and colleagues. Using Cronbach’s Alpha, analyses showed strong reliability on the measures of magnitude, better than average reliability for certain subscales of the Multifactor Leadership Questionnaire (MLQ) of Avolio and Bass which were used in the study, and strong reliability for the composite scales of the MLQ, specifically those determining transformational and transactional leadership capabilities. Results show strong correlations between a conductor’s ratings on magnitude and certain communication skills with their own ratings of skills in transformational leadership, transactional leadership, and inspirational motivation. When student assessments of various leadership attributes were compared with those from other students, strong correlation existed, but when student assessments of the conductor were compared with similar self-assessments performed by the conductor, either a smaller, zero, or negative correlation occurred between the transformational, transactional, and inspi! rational motivation scores. When compared with conductor scores on the same measures as well as others believed to be related to good leadership, colleague assessments of the conductor showed either a small or nonexistent correlation within the conductors’ own ratings of themselves. The study explores how the MLQ, magnitude, and communication assessments used within might be applied to conductors to determine leadership potential and to compare the conductor’s results with students’ or colleagues’ assessments of them. The findings suggests that the elusive nature of leadership is hard to describe for ensemble conductors, and that overall success of the organization may or may not be connected to the conductor’s leadership ratings using one of the measures within the present study. Finally, conductors, just as any other leader, should be aware that one’s own perception may not reflect the experience of followers. Both self-awareness and awareness of the type of leadership modality needed in a situation might create a more closely correlated assessment of the leader’s ability to lead from the perspective of the conductor, singers, and colleagues.
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    Round the setting sun: the 1934 revision of Sir Arthur Somervell's Ode on the intimations of immortality
    (2013-05-06) Tibbetts, Ryan
    Sir Arthur Somervell's setting of Wordsworth's "Ode on the Intimations of Immortality" is regarded by critics as his most significant large-scale work; however, very little study has been given to the piece, and almost none to the extensive revisions made by the composer in 1934. This document situates the composer and the work in the historical context of the "English Musical Renaissance" of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries and in the thematic trend towards elements of nostalgia in British music of this era. It also puts forth a more detailed theory than others previously offered for Somervell's interest in Wordsworth's poem, based on the composer's writings and speeches about early childhood music education, and offers an analysis of the 1934 version of the "Ode" in terms of its melodic, harmonic, thematic, and structural elements. Finally, it provides a newly created edition of the 1934 version of the "Ode" along with a critical apparatus for scholarly review. It is hoped that this document will both bring to light an interesting work by an under-recognized but significant composer of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, and will help to stimulate further interest among conductors and scholars in the composer himself.
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    Conceptual blending and becoming as tools for interpreting choral multidisciplinary performances: lessons from Meredith Monk's Book of days
    (2013-05-10) Doerries, Mark
    The cognitive integration networks of Gilles Fauconnier and Mark Turner offer a framework for understanding multimedia performance. Drawing on these conceptual blending networks, specifically the mirror, single-scope, and double-scope networks, this paper illustrates a continuum of multidisciplinary performance. While the phrase mixed media refers to performances where media retain their independent characteristics (mirror network), multimedia references media relationships that develop a new emergent content (double-scope network). While Fauconnier and Turner approach the creation of this emergent content from a cognitive perspective, Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari offer an experiential model of becoming that relates to the content of the emergent structure. Content deemed non-representational through this becoming process is considered multisensory and requires the interpretation of an audience; it is an extension of the multidisciplinary performance continuum. Representational content restricts the need for interpretation because the media of a performance make their intentions obvious. To illustrate focal nodes along this multidisciplinary performance continuum, Fauconnier and Turner’s conceptual blending model and Deleuze and Guattari’s notion of becoming are applied to excerpts of Meredith Monk’s film Book of Days.
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    A jazz vespers: for chorus, soloists, orchestra and jazz quintet
    (2016-12-16) McCutchen, Keith
    An Analysis of Liturgical Jazz, Classical and Jazz Collaborations and Analytical Commentary on a Jazz Vespers for Chorus, Soloists, Orchestra and Jazz Quintet This paper presents a background on the use of jazz in the church, a historical timeline of integration of jazz and classical music, and lastly, a summary and analysis of my Jazz Vespers for Chorus, Soloists, Orchestra and Jazz Quintet. This piece reflects my desire to reconcile the various cultural aspects of my work and the components of the church’s history into a single act of worship. These components include the harmonies and rhythms of jazz and gospel music, Twentieth Century Classical music, including Stravinsky and more extensively Monteverdi’s Vespers, Musical Theater and Opera. The modern use of the term “Jazz Vespers” means primarily a jazz performance or service without any application of text, and/or use of the formal structure of the actual Vespers service of the Roman Catholic, Greek Orthodox, or Protestant liturgies. None the less, there are many instances of jazz music being used successfully as service music, and performances being observed within the structure of a liturgical service, such as the Vespers, with the use of either traditional Psalms or Old Testament readings and poems, literary prose, and other writings which reflect a spiritual, humanistic nature.
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    Caroline Shaw's use of Renaissance and Baroque dance forms in her partita for 8 voices
    (Indiana University, 2020-04-10) Harper, Joshua (Joshua David)
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    Quantitas temporalis intrinseca in the context of contrapuntal vocal music
    (Indiana University, 2020-04-22) Zamudio, Juan Carlos
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    The mourning jewels
    (Indiana University, 2020-05-03) Ritter, Sam, 1990-
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    The missa pro defunctis at the Catedral Metropolitana de la Asunción de la Santísima Virgen María a los Cielos: featuring the Misa de difuntos (1760) by Ignacio Jerusalem y Stella, maestro di capilla (1707-1769)
    (Indiana University, 2020-05-03) Geier, Benjamin
    The Misa de difuntos (1760) by Ignacio Jerusalem y Stella is a choral-orchestral setting of the Requiem Mass which offers a unique glimpse into the fusion of the European Classical and Spanish cathedral traditions. The Mass Ordinary movements are influenced by Mid-Eighteenth compositional style and technique, offering clear and straightforward harmonic progressions with largely homophonic choral interjections. The Mass Proper provides a suitable contrast with strong dissonances and ample use of chromaticism to evoke the textual themes of the Requiem. The Misa de difuntos (1760) was first discovered by me in Thomas Stanford’s Catálogo de los acervos musicales de las catedrales metropolitanas de México y Puebla de la Bibioteca Nacional de Antropología e Historia y ostras colecciones menores. Although it appeared as a simple entry in the catalog, its immense size of five hundred seventy-six pages and description of a chamber orchestra and chorus caught my attention. The music that constitutes the basis of my edition survives in a single manuscript, located in the Archivo del Cabildo Catedral Metropolitano de México (ACCMM) in Mexico City. I have not been able to travel to Mexico City, but I was granted access to the microfilm which is held at the Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historia (INAH). Passages of the work required some philological emendation. Fortunately, Ignacio Jerusalem’s score and accompanying part books are remarkably free of errors and are well preserved. The majority of editorial decisio ns made were as a result of composer shorthand or misinterpretations on the part of the copyists. This edition serves promote the music of Ignacio Jerusalem y Stella and the vast numbers of unknown works that exist in the Mexican cathedral archives.