This dissertation seeks to address the question of how contemporary performers and experts understand the medieval repertoire known to us as Gregorian chant. This medieval repertoire (also known as Franco-Roman) is understood here to be abstract musical and non-musical information in medieval manuscripts. It differs from classical western music repertoires by a lack of adequate original performance instructions. It becomes audible through performer’s realisation of his or her personal conceptualisation. This study observes both conceptualisation and practice of the repertoire through the answers of 127 respondents to an online sociological questionnaire and 35 solo recordings of the Gradual Haec dies. The study also involves a heuristic experiment to find connections between conceptualisation and practice. This research is multidisciplinary, combining sociology and musical acoustics. The sociological approach includes quantitative statistical and qualitative methods. Ideas of musical acoustics are applied to measure digitally the temporal structure of solo recordings of Gregorian chant. The analysis of the results of the questionnaire showed that there are certain patterns in evaluating what Gregorian chant is and what is important for a good performance of that repertoire. There was more similarity in understanding what the repertoire is than what the interpretational preferences are. Measuring the solo recordings showed that although there is a large variety in temporal understandings of the performed music, most performers tend to perceive performed music in one durational category. For those who have two basic durational categories it seems to be a result of agogical preferences rather than perception of two durational categories. The comparison of conceptualisation and practice showed that the strongest link between these two is in agogical variety. It was not possible to find similarly significant connections between conceptualisation and other features of practice – tempo values and the number of basic note values. This research project has demonstrated that a multidisciplinary approach to Gregorian chant can reveal new aspects in the study of the repertoire in terms of approach and understanding.

This thesis presents an analytical exploration of a number of works from 1985 to 1995, many of which have not previously received detailed attention. Although they stem from quite varied stylistic and aesthetic backgrounds, all these pieces are situated in a particular position within the tradition of Western art music: they show an approach which is neither ‘avant-garde’ in its commitment to continual formal and technical novelty, nor clearly associated with any other existing compositional school. Instead, they engage with a diverse range of models, both musical and external; intra-musical connections range from the legacy of the broader Classical and Romantic common-practice tradition to the varied timbral and formal developments of the twentieth-century avant-garde, whilst extra-musical connections seem almost endless, encompassing fields from art to astronomy, literature to horticulture. Alongside this stylistic and referential plurality, they display an often seemingly intuitive approach towards structure and system, with their most striking musical effects often arising out of layered, non-hierarchical interactions between different materials and processes. As such, they present clear challenges to traditional conceptions of analysis, which are often based around the systematic generation of clear (albeit often very complex) organisational structures. It is argued that this music, in spite of these challenges, displays a striking level of expressive and aural coherence; conventional ways of understanding this term – whether they be based around unity of material or form or process – need to be redefined to take this into account. Chosen works are approached by way of a ‘patchwork’ of different perspectives and techniques: the core of the thesis is a series of four case studies which connect narratives of listener experience with analytical and contextual detail, making particular use of the clarifying potential of metaphor. These close readings are interleaved with chapters which consider the wider challenges and implications for the study of this repertoire, drawing upon a number of strands in contemporary musicological and philosophical thought.

This thesis describes the investigation and testing of a prototype music therapy practice evaluation system: Music Therapy Logbook, Prototype 1. Such a system is intended to be used by music therapists as an aid to their existing evaluation techniques. The investigation of user needs, the multi-disciplinary team work, the pre-field and field recording tests, and the computational music analysis tests are each presented in turn, preceded by an in depth literature review on historical and existing music therapy evaluation methods. A final chapter presents investigative design work for proposed user interface software pages for the Music Therapy Logbook system. Four surveys are presented (n = 6, n = 10, n = 44, n =125). These gathered information on current music therapy evaluation methods, therapists‘ suggested functions for the system, and therapists‘ attitudes towards using the proposed automatic and semi-automatic music therapy evaluation functions, some of which were tested during the research period. The results indicate enthusiasm for using the system to; record individual music therapy sessions, create written notes linked to recordings and undertake automatic and/or semi-automatic computer aided music therapy analysis; the main purpose of which is to quantify changes in a therapist‘s and patient‘s use of music over time, (Streeter, 2010). Simulated music therapy improvisations were recorded and analysed. The system was then used by a music therapist working in a neuro-disability unit, to record individual therapy sessions with patients with acquired brain injuries. These recordings constitute the first music therapy audio recordings employing multi-track audio recording techniques, using existing radio microphone technology. The computational music analysis tests applied to the recordings are the first such tests to be applied to recordings of music therapy sessions in which an individual patient played acoustic, rather than MIDI, instruments. The findings prove it is possible to gather objective evidence of changes in a patient‘s and therapist‘s use of music over time, using the Music Therapy Logbook Prototype 1 system.

The devastation enacted on the Italian nation by Mussolini’s ventennio and the Second World War had cultural as well as political effects. Combined with the fading careers of the leading generazione dell’ottanta composers (Alfredo Casella, Gian Francesco Malipiero and Ildebrando Pizzetti), it led to a historical moment of perceived crisis and artistic vulnerability within Italian contemporary music. Yet by 1953, dodecaphony had swept the artistic establishment, musical theatre was beginning a renaissance, Italian composers featured prominently at the Darmstadt Ferienkurse, Milan was a pioneering frontier for electronic composition, and contemporary music journals and concerts had become major cultural loci. What happened to effect these monumental stylistic and historical transitions? In addressing this question, this thesis provides a series of studies on music and the politics of musical culture in this ten-year period. It charts Italy’s musical journey from the cultural destruction of the post-war period to its role in the early fifties within the meteoric international rise of the avant-garde artist as institutionally and governmentally-endorsed superman. Integrating stylistic and aesthetic analysis within a historicist framework, its chapters deal with topics such as the collective memory of fascism, internationalism, anti-fascist reaction, the appropriation of serialist aesthetics, the nature of Italian modernism in the ‘aftermath’, the Italian realist/formalist debates, the contradictory politics of musical ‘commitment’, and the growth of a ‘new-music’ culture. In demonstrating how the conflict of the Second World War and its diverse aftermath precipitated a pluralistic and increasingly avant-garde musical society in Italy, this study offers new insights into the transition between pre- and post-war modernist aesthetics and brings musicological focus onto an important but little-studied era.

This PhD folio is a development of my previous compositional background, especially of works composed during the years 2005-2008 including specific works from my Masters degree years at the University of York. That period is characterised by compositional research on folk modes, used as prime pitch material to develop various kinds of structures. Inspired on the one hand by the sounds of George Crumb, Salvatore Sciarrino, Helmut Lachenmann and on the other by the sounds of Gerard Grisey, Tristan Murail and Kaja Saariaho, this research focuses on the exploration and the invention of artistic ways that modal aspects can be extracted from spectrality and vice versa. The target of my research is to extend these two different sound worlds and find or invent methods by which modality can be extracted from spectrality and vice versa in an artistic framework. This methodology has been developed on several levels and applied to various instrumentations including solo instruments, chamber ensembles and orchestra. My main compositional concerns were the spectral harmony organisation, texture manipulation, melodic shaping, and timbre exploration. Regarding the harmony organisation, various mathematical models are usually used to produce primary chordal material based on harmonic and non harmonic spectra or on other chord sequences constructed using spectral techniques such as Frequency Interpolation, Frequency Modulation, Frequency Distortion and others, created in the IRCAM’s OpenMusic software. My initial research plan was to develop my artistic voice following a trajectory which included various instrumental levels. My main target was to explore how my compositional propositions work on solo instruments, duets, ensembles of four, six, eight and eleven instruments respectively, and finally symphony orchestra, creating a bridge between two different traditions and exploring possible combinations in order to produce new works. Works in chronological order: Aoide for chamber ensemble (2007-2008) Eteromorphia for Violoncello and Piano (2008) a4 for Flute, Bass Clarinet, Percussion and Piano (2008) Concerto for Piccolo/Alto Flute and chamber orchestra (2008-2009) Tu Solus I-IV for solo Tenor Recorder, Timpani, Flute and Mandolin respectively (2009-2010) Octaphonia for chamber ensemble (2009) Echosymplokon for symphony orchestra (2009-2010) Inertial Motion for chamber ensemble (2010).

A common approach for determining musical competence is to rely on information about individuals’ extent of musical training, but relying on musicianship status fails to identify musically untrained individuals with musical skill, as well as those who, despite extensive musical training, may not be as skilled. To counteract this limitation, the working aim of this thesis was to develop a new test battery (The Profile of Music Perception Skills; PROMS) that measures perceptual musical skills across multiple domains: tonal (melody, pitch), qualitative (timbre, tuning), temporal (rhythm, rhythmto- melody, accent, tempo), and dynamic (loudness). The development and validation of the PROMS are presented in studies 1 to 4. Overall, the PROMS has satisfactory psychometric properties for the composite score and fair to good coefficients for the individual subtests. Convergent validity was established with the relevant dimensions of Gordon’s Advanced Measures of Music Audiation and Musical Aptitude Profile (melody, rhythm, tempo), the Musical Ear Test (rhythm), and sample instrumental sounds (timbre). Criterion validity is evidenced by a sizeable relationship between test performance and a composite of various indicators of musical proficiency as well as discriminant validity by a generic auditory discrimination task. The application of the PROMS in examining the structure of music perception mechanism is also presented. In particular, the relationship between music perception skills and non-musical abilities is explored in Study 4. The results suggest that the interrelationships among the various subtests could be accounted for by two higher order factors, sensory and structural music processing; the structural processing skill is related to short-term and working memory. Rhythm perception (rhythm and rhythm-to-melody subtests) also shows significant correlation with general mental ability. An Internet study with the PROMS was conducted to examine whether the findings of controlled studies can be replicated with a more diverse population and uncontrolled environment. Most of the findings of the controlled studies were replicated in the Internet study with several exceptions that are reported in Study 5. A brief version of the full PROMS is proposed as a timeefficient approximation of the full version of the battery.

William Davis was a church musician who spent the majority of his life in the employ of Worcester Cathedral as chorister, player of the ‘little organ’, lay clerk and Master of the Choristers. It is therefore unsurprising that the substantial part of his compositional output is sacred. Nevertheless, there is also a large body of secular music, including an ode, a wedding song, several songs for soloist or duet and a handful of catches. Additionally there is a four movement suite for keyboard and two other keyboard solo pieces. The majority of Davis’ music appears to have been composed between 1695–1715. Writing about Davis, Ian Spink has asserted that ‘on this evidence [of the piece Let God arise] the composer would seem to be one of the more talented of Croft’s contemporaries’. More recently, he noted that ‘His [Davis’] anthems are good examples of what Croft’s provincial contemporaries were capable of’. Such comments inevitably invite closer consideration of Davis’ music in the light of his more illustrious London contemporaries. It is concluded that the best of Davis’ output is on a par with some of the music of Chapel Royal composers such as Croft and Clarke. Illustrative of this is that it has been possible to reattribute one full anthem (Help, Lord; for the Godly man ceaseth) to Davis, it previously having been ascribed to Croft. Davis was evidently the principal composer in Worcester at the beginning of the eighteenth century. A survey of his life and works therefore not only serves to enlarge our appreciation of Davis, but it also affords us better understanding of musical life in the city at that time. It is therefore hoped that this thesis will contribute to wider knowledge of the musical activity of the provinces in the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries.

An examination of the developments in Benedictine, Augustinian and Jesuit school theatre during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries reveals the Jesuits as leaders in both dramatic and musical innovations. The emergence of seventeenth-century Jesuit theatre innovations in eighteenth-century Benedictine and Augustinian school theatrical productions validates this conclusion and reveals a conduit of influence not previously articulated. While previous comparisons of Jesuit theatre main title dramas and Oratorian oratorios do not reveal a relationship, a comparative examination of the musical prologues and choruses performed within Jesuit theatrical productions and the musical works performed in the services of the Congregation of the Oratory over the period c.1550-c.1660 shows a parallel progression of development; the development of the oratorio in the oratories of the Congregation is a further demonstration of Jesuit influence during this time period. The friendship of Ignatius Loyola and Filippo Neri matured into a close relationship between the musical activities of the Society of Jesus and the Congregation of the Oratory during the sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries. The simultaneous development of the Jesuit school theatre independent prologue and chorus and the Congregation of the Oratory oratorio is one of the results of this relationship. The sacred musical works in Jesuit school theatrical productions and the services of the Congregation follow the same pathway of development and exhibit equivalent characteristics. A formal declaration restricting performance language in the Oratorian services caused the two repertoires to diverge c.1620-c.1630. A comparison of independent Jesuit theatre prologues and choruses and the oratorios performed during the services of the Congregation of the Oratory c.1640-c.1660 reveals that these two bodies of work are distinguishable from each other only by the language of the text.

This commentary is submitted along with a portfolio of musical compositions and is mainly formed around the notions behind each project. The text draws attention to works by various philosophers and musicians in order to elucidate the ideas and motives behind the musical and audio-visual pieces presented. First, the influences of Edgard Varèse on the compositional ideas of the pieces are illustrated. Subsequently, Gilles Deleuze’s interpretations of paintings by Francis Bacon are employed to define the qualities of sensational music and how such music can impact the listener’s nervous system rather than his brain. The difference between the ‘idea’ of a piece of art and the ‘concept’ behind a piece of art is examined through Roland Barthes’ definition of the ‘obtuse meaning’. More personally, the traumatic events in the history of Iran and their impacts on traditional Iranian music are explored. The reflection of these impacts on the presented compositions is demonstrated. Furthermore, the approach towards structure in the pieces is delineated to clarify the sense of great tension and displacement in the sound-space. Finally, detailed analysis of the submitted projects further illustrates the particular ideas and personal motivations behind each work.

The American composer John Cage was famous for the expansiveness of his thought. In particular, his borrowings from ‘Oriental philosophy’ have directed the critical and popular reception of his works. But what is the reality of such claims? In the twenty years since his death, Cage scholars have started to discover the significant gap between Cage’s presentation of theories he claimed he borrowed from India, China, and Japan, and the presentation of the same theories in the sources he referenced. The present study delves into the circumstances and contexts of Cage’s Asian influences, specifically as related to Cage’s borrowings from the British-Ceylonese art historian and metaphysician Ananda K. Coomaraswamy. In addition, Cage’s friendship with the Jungian mythologist Joseph Campbell is detailed, as are Cage’s borrowings from the theories of Jung. Particular attention is paid to the conservative ideology integral to the theories of all three thinkers. After a new analysis of the life and work of Coomaraswamy, the investigation focuses on the metaphysics of Coomaraswamy’s philosophy of art. The phrase ‘art is the imitation of nature in her manner of operation’ opens the doors to a wide-ranging exploration of the mimesis of intelligible and sensible forms. Comparing Coomaraswamy’s ‘Traditional’ idealism to Cage’s radical epistemological realism demonstrates the extent of the lack of congruity between the two thinkers. In a second chapter on Coomaraswamy, the extent of the differences between Cage and Coomaraswamy are revealed through investigating their differing approaches to rasa, the Renaissance, tradition, ‘art and life’, and museums. So why have such discrepancies – and related Orientalisms – frequently been ignored and furthered in writings on Cage? Utilizing the theories of Edward Said, the final chapter analyses Cage’s writings and writings on Cage to reveal the operation of Orientalism in Cage studies.