In this dissertation, I explore the political and religious ideas expounded in Wagner's <i>Ring,</i> through close attention to the text and drama, the wealth of Wagner source material upon Wagner (e.g. correspondence, prose works, other dramas, diaries, contemporary accounts), and the multifarious intellectual influences upon the composer during the work's lengthy gestation and composition. Classical interpretations have tended to opt either for an 'optimistic' view of the <i>Ring</i>, centred upon the influence of Young Hegelian thought - in particular the philosophy of Ludwig Feuerbach - and Wagner's concomitant revolutionary politics, or for the aforementioned 'pessimistic' option, removing the disillusioned Wagner-in-Swiss-exile from the political sphere and stressing the undoubtedly important role of Arthur Schopenhauer. Such an 'either-or' approach seriously misrepresents not only Wagner's compositional method but also his intellectual method. It also sidelines inconvenient aspects of the dramas that fail to 'fit' whichever interpretation is selected. Wagner's tendency is not progressively to recent previous 'errors' in his œuvre; it is not Socratic. Radical ideas are not completely replaced by a Schopenhauerian world-view, however loudly the composer might come to trumpet his apparent 'conversion'. Nor is Wagner's truly an Hegelian method, sublating the partial verities arrived at hitherto into their allotted places in an intricate system of ever-changing dialectical mediation - although Hegelian dialectic plays an important role. In fact, Wagner is in many ways not really a systematic thinker at all (which is not to portray him as self-consciously unsystematic in a Nietzschean, let alone 'post-modernist' fashion). His tendency, rather, is agglomerative, ideas and influences proceeding to overlap, rather like a rudimentary geological overlay.

This thesis is concerned with the form of our mental representations of tonal pitch structure. It examines some of the considerations that are relevant to determining the form of such representations and, drawing upon some ideas from formal language theory, it outlines an elementary theory based upon these considerations. It is suggested that the goal of cognitivist tonal theory must be to account for the productivity and systematicity of our total cognition, a claim that has important ramifications for the architecture of the representational system involved. In particular, it requires that we describe tonal structure in terms of a finite set of primitives and a finite set of principles for combining them into larger structures, that is, in a way that explicitly recognises their combinatorial organisation. It also requires that we acknowledge the compositionality of tonal structures, namely, the way in which the nature of complex constructions is determined by the nature of their constituent parts and the syntactic principles by which these are combined. Following an examination of the plausible candidates, it is proposed that harmonic functions constitute the primitive vocabulary of the syntactic structure of tonal music. This involves a detailed investigation of the nature of harmonic function and a reformation of the concept in cognitivist terms. This reformulations, in turn, permits a study of how harmonic function interacts with the hierarchical organisation of tonal structure, where it is demonstrated that harmonic function has the potential to form the basis of dependency relations in tonal music. The range of possible functional categories is also considered, and some suggestions made as to how the traditional system of three functions might plausibly be extended. The types of structural relation that underlie the hierarchical organisation of tonal music are also a major focus of this thesis. The syntactic relations of constituency and dependency are discussed, and their manifestation in tonal music is examined in detail. Here it is argued that our mental representations of tonal structure must explicitly encode constituency, and thus a descriptively adequate form of tonal theory must be a combinatorial syntax.

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Gustav Holst was a contributor to the genre of English opera throughout his career. His name is not usually associated with opera, and yet he composed thirteen in all; five were published, three are lost, and the remaining five exist solely in manuscript. The dissertation begins with Holst's background and influences, the most important of which were the music of Sullivan and Wagner, and the ways in which Holst's music of his early period imitated those styles. Other aspects with which Holst came into contact are discussed here; namely Sanskrit literature, the English folksong movement, and the re-discovery of the English madrigal. Each is examined separately in order to clarify how each influenced his music during the early years of the twentieth century. The earliest operas are presented in chronological order and discussed in terms of their subjects, harmonic and thematic approaches, style and form, as well as a comparison in style between the operas that were composed concurrently. The core of the work consists of the fourth, fifth and sixth chapters wherein Holst's final attempt at Wagnerian chromaticism (and his only attempt at large-scale three act opera) and its lack of success is presented. It is linked to a masterpiece of chamber opera of three years later by way of a song cycle for solo voice and piano which clearly demonstrates his new approach to the setting of text, his use of modality and the paring down of accompaniment to give emphasis to the voice. The final chapter deals with the late period of Holst's operatic writing and discusses the three comic operas. Holst's humour and its effect on choice of subject, setting of text and orchestral effects is put into the context of the post-war era.

Italian influences bad been prominent In English music since the early seventeenth century were still the most important after the Restoration, which found English music in a backward state. Yet due to the admiration of Charles II for both the absolutism of Louis XIV and the entertainments which he enjoyed, and to the French tastes fashionable among the aristocracy, French dance rhythms held away in theatre music and overflowed into the court ode and even into church music. Some French opera and ballet were produced in London; French pieces were copied into English manuscripts, and some apparently enjoyed quite a vogue. The French overture developed by Lully in his court ballets from established dance forms and promptly taken up by other composers in France and elsewhere in Europe, received at Purcell's hands a new importance, being treated with considerable diversity. Purcell was expert at writing for the theatre the French dances already popular at court. Their rhythms appear in his songs and anthems. He was obviously inspired, too, by Lully's treatment of the characteristic dance. He had limited opportunities for using the Lullian choral and instrumental chaconns, but -showed interest in this form. In his airs and recitative Italian example predominates, though French dance forms lend variety. The general layout of choral forms shows French influence, though only in a few particular cases does this influents penetrate further. The keyboard music maintains basically the French forms and style taken over by his predecessors, though it is very individual. and Italian influences, too, are present. Purcall's use of French models was partly absorbed from the atmosphere in which he was brought up, but interesting results came from his custom of deliberately adopting, combining, and transcending, with his unique personality and technique, everything useful that came his way.

This research is an auto-ethnographic study of a portfolio of compositions and performances in ensembles that took place across the UK and Europe between September 2008 and February 2014. This commentary analyses the work with a view to discerning useful strategies and approaches towards group work in the field of experimental electronic music. The study contains an account of the author’s own physical interface and its development over a period of ten years, including a wider analysis of some considerations for design and the development of a personal instrumental practice. Ensembles formed by the author are discussed with a focus on social psychology and self-organisation through the creation of unique roles and shifting group hierarchies, afforded by the possibilities and dislocations of technology. The commentary continues with an in-depth study of the development and performance of The Stream, a generative composition system that applies some of the interdependent behaviours and processes of self-organisation discovered through musical experimentation, to an agent-based societal model for real time score generation. The analysis shows that interdependent agents and social behaviours can be modelled in order to generate relationships which are comparable to those created through traditional methods of composition and improvisation. The study concludes that the possibilities afforded by technology to extend beyond the physical and social domain are most successfully implemented when they support, rather than inhibit the natural relationships and human physicality of those taking part. Therefore, when designing a generative composition system, the simulation of human relationships and their narratives may open up a new area of research in the generation of musical composition.

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The thesis begins by presenting a set of beliefs about the composer Ernest John Moeran that has come to be recognised as Moeran conventional wisdom. Hitherto, all writing about the composer, scholarly or otherwise, has been predicated on the acceptance of these beliefs as undeniable fact. All aspects of the composer’s life and work have been perceived and rationalised within their context, and together they have provided what has until now been acknowledged as the basis of biography. This research project has determined conclusively that most, if not all, of these beliefs are the result of misunderstanding, exaggeration, speculation or fabrication, and may therefore be regarded as misconceptions. These misconceptions are herein challenged through the narrating of episodes from Moeran’s life-journey, as constructed from the results of forensic and hermeneutic examination of such source material and documentary evidence as it has been possible to locate and examine. Moeran, as both man and composer, is consequently revealed to have been a substantially different character from that portrayed by the conventional wisdom, and while the body of music he composed remains unchanged the perception and reception of it is radically transformed. Moeran’s development as a composer is traced by the examination of a few representative works, each of which relates specifically to the aspect of his life under consideration. These works have also been selected to illustrate both Moeran’s stylistic originality and his formal ingenuity. The thesis concludes with a re-assessment of the composer and his achievement. The impact on Moeran scholarship of the findings presented in the body of the thesis is described and areas where further research may extend these findings are suggested.