The issue of Irish art music has been the subject of much discussion in this past decade and beyond. Since Sean 0 Riada's exploits into the usage of Irish traditional music in an art music medium, there is thought to have been a fundamental division in Irish art music. Between composers who work mainly in the European styles of the twentieth century with perhaps only a nodding glance to Irish traditional music and those composers who use Irish music with a retrospective eye to the techniques of the nineteenth century, there has been no perfect marriage of the two. In this work, the current dichotomy between traditional Irish music and contemporary music is studied through the context of twelve new compositions and accompanying commentaries, each addressing individual issues within this dichotomy. Drawing on recent summative work by Dave Flynn, the current problems in the incorporation of traditional Irish music in contemporary classical musical language are discussed and new approaches to this crossover considered. The innate expressive gestures of traditional performers are dissected 'and efficient means of communicating these to a contemporary musician developed. Fundamental aspects of traditional Irish music including melodic frameworks (modes), rhythm, ornamentation, aural transmission and improvisation are analysed and implemented systematically in new compositions for varying forces. One of the main areas which remains largely unexplored in traditional music is the possibility of microinterval modality. Old performances of traditional music contain many inflections in tuning, some but not all of which are slides. This work presents a preliminary empirical examination into precise and recurring pitch entities in old recordings and relatively modern performances of Irish traditional music which have been hitherto undocumented. The results of this are used in combination with other aspects of traditional language to create four new works comprising the Seamsur series .

My original contribution to knowledge is a portfolio of work that, through composition, improvisation and performance, expands the role of the electric bass guitar in contemporary Western art music. More specifically, these works address three areas that were hitherto underexplored in existing repertoire: • Works for solo bass guitar and electronics. • Works for bass guitar and ensemble that incorporate the instrument as an equal and important part of an overall sound. • The use of the bass guitar in sonic arts idioms. This research, as well as challenging the role of the bass guitar, also aims to expand the sonic and technical palette of the instrument whilst demonstrating its potential to be a valued part of the modern composer’s instrumental resource. This project comprises: a compositional portfolio of solo and ensemble works; eight CDs, containing recordings of both improvised and scored works; an accompanying written commentary (original musical scores are included as an appendix in the commentary).

Notre recherche porte sur une analyse comparative des interprétations de la Sonate en si mineur de Liszt. Nous avons analysé vingt-cinq enregistrements de pianistes regroupés en cinq écoles :hongroise, française, russe, américaine et allemande. Nous avons comparé les déviations des interprètes par rapport à la partition et les divergences entre les différentes interprétations, en sélectionnant sept paramètres qui nous ont permis de caractériser chaque interprétation. Une double analyse a été effectuée : « à l'oreille » et à l'aide d'un logiciel informatique. Notre recherche a démontré l'importance de plusieurs facteurs d'influence complémentaires : l'enseignement reçu, l'époque où l'on vit et l'on crée, le tempérament et l'individualité artistique. Au terme de notre recherche, nous avons démontré l'existence de spécificités qui se manifestent au sein de chacune des écoles pianistiques nationales, et également de particularités caractérisant le mode de jeu des différentes générations. / Our research focuses a comparative analysis of the performances of Liszt's Sonata in b minor. We analysed twenty-five recordings by pianists grouped into five piano schools : Hungarian, French, Russian, American and German. We compared the deviations of the performers from the score and the differences between the individual performances, based on a selection of seven parameters that allowed us to characterise each of them. A double analysis was made: "by ear" and with the aid of acomputer. Our research has shown the importance of several complementary factors of influence : education, the period during which the pianists lived and created, the artists' temperaments and their artistic individualities. At the end of our research, we demonstrated the existence of specific features within each of the national piano schools, and also of some features that characterise the performing style of each generation.