Alexander Tcherepnin (1899-1977) was a Russian-born American composer, his musical style represents the modern and diverse features of much twentieth-century piano music. The purpose of this research is to conduct a comprehensive pedagogical analysis of Alexander Tcherepnin's Bagatelles, Op. 5 with the goal of introducing contemporary characteristics in twentieth-century piano music for the late-intermediate student. Chapter 2 contains overall biographical information regarding Alexander Tcherepnin and a discussion of the general compositional style of his piano works. Chapter 3 analyzes the Bagatelles, Op. 5 from the perspective of musical challenges concerning the contemporary characteristics, including contemporary harmony: interval of seconds, non-tertian chords, special use of the seventh chords, and ninth chords; contemporary rhythm and meter: shifted accents, asymmetric meter, meter change, and ostinato; modal melodic resources and tonalities; and other special tonalities. Chapter 4 has suggestions on fingering, pedaling, articulation, tone, dynamics and phrasing, and practicing procedures for individual technical difficulties. Studying the Bagatelles, Op. 5 provides a transition for the student from learning standard repertoire of the eighteenth and the nineteenth century, to contemporary repertoire through the combination of Russian compositional traditions with twentieth century repertory.

This dissertation examines the work of German composer and vocal pedagogue Nina d'Aubigny von Engelbrunner through her collection of songs entitled "Deutsche, Italienische und Französische Gesänge mit Begleitung des Pianoforte," published in 1797. A brief overview of the life and works of Ms. d'Aubigny is provided, followed by a discussion about the "woman question" as it relates to Ms. d'Aubigny's works. The second part of this project includes a new, modern performance edition of the collection of songs, complete with general editorial guidelines, notes and translations, and a critical report detailing all deviations from the original 1797 edition.

María Grever (1885-1951) overcame racism and gender bias during a pivotal era in American music history to become the first commercially successful Mexican female composer and more specifically, a pioneer of popular music during the first half of the 20th century. Though named the "Madonna of song," her legacy is largely overshadowed by other compositional giants of the era, such as the Gershwin brothers, Cole Porter, and Irving Berlin. Grever's music is sophisticated, heartfelt, and worthy of attention. Her colorful, genuine music adds distinctiveness and variety to recital programs. Grever's songs offer a high level of musical integrity and socio-cultural value. Incorporating her compositions into a singer's vocal repertoire is an excellent way to broaden the scope of styles and languages while maintaining the highest standards of musical study. The following document considers the importance of performing and studying Grever's music by analyzing nine songs representing three compositional periods. I evaluated the songs considering pedagogical benefit, performance value, and significance to her overall oeuvre.

Prokofiev had a specific approach to the modernist aesthetic that is worthy of a special study from a new perspective: eclecticism. There are two distinguishable views on his achievement in modern music. One is the Western version, which sees his eclectic approach as not innovative enough in comparison with modern composers such as Stravinsky. The other view is from the traditional Soviet approach, which holds Prokofiev in the highest esteem. These sources largely ignore Prokofiev's Paris and American periods. Such an oversimplification is likely to have reflected political circumstance. Neither the Western view nor the Soviet view provides a satisfying interpretation of Prokofiev's musical style. Therefore, understanding his eclectic approach is important to challenge and redefine our notion of Prokofiev's musical aesthetic. This dissertation examines Prokofiev's eclectic approach in his Violin Concerto in G minor with a combination of historical research and historically informed style analysis. The historical research is mainly based upon current interpretations of Prokofiev's musical style. The two contrasting views (Western and Soviet) on Prokofiev's contributions to modern music are equally lacking in objectivity due to their entrenchment in political rhetoric. Therefore, to have a more precise interpretation of Prokofiev's concerto, historically informed analysis is used to evaluate his essential self-characterization shift in his compositional style, the so-called "five lines."

Giovanni Legrenzi was a prolific composer of vocal music and maestro di cappella at the Basilica di San Marco but his vocal works are not often studied as a part of the Venetian lineage with composers such as Willaert, de Rore, Zarlino, Monteverdi, Cavalli, and Vivaldi. Despite his being a prolific composer who had significant influence on the work of other musicians in the traditional canon, references to Legrenzi in standard music publications (Grout, Taruskin, Grove Music Online, etc.) are at best sparse, and largely biographical. This dissertation is one step to correct that pattern by creating a performance edition of Sacri e festivi concenti, Opera nona, one of Legrenzi's significant works near the beginning of his Venetian period. This collection of sacred music was published on 12 June 1667 in Venice though Legrenzi's exact whereabouts at the time remain uncertain. This phase of his career can be defined by his having sought more prestigious and lucrative employment. Having lived and worked in rural Lombardy and Ferrara, he made unsuccessful overtures in places such as Milan, Bologna, Vienna, and Paris. A full score has been produced by transcribing from the part books of the Bologna Museo copy, which will allow consumers to have insight into Legrenzi's music. A performance edition of these Vespers settings is important because it would increase access to, and understanding of, Giovanni Legrenzi's music. This era of Italian music between Monteverdi and Vivaldi is often underperformed by practitioners. One goal of this project is to broaden the work's circulation through a music publisher that would be willing to include portions of the chapters outlined in this proposal. Doing so would offer the work as a good specimen of the period to a wider audience of performers and scholars alike.

Contemporary repertoire is not commonly taught or explored by teachers during the intermediate level, when a student's musical training is transitioning to an advanced level. Nonetheless, it is important for piano instructors to be open-minded about contemporary music and have some perspective on the development of music repertoire in the future. The purpose of this dissertation is to provide a performance and pedagogical guide to Stephen Chatman's (b. 1950) Fantasies, from both technical and artistic viewpoints. The collection, which consists of eleven pieces, features a wide variety of contemporary idioms, styles, and means of notation. For instance, there are jazz-like syncopated rhythms, asymmetrical accents reminiscent of Primitivism, and Impressionistic or dissonant sonorities. Fantasies is not only a valuable tool for students to explore new sounds and improve their performing techniques while executing nontraditional notations and contemporary idioms, it is also a great teaching resource for instructors to promote students' musicality through hearing, seeing, and thinking. In this study, I provide individual, detailed descriptions for each of the pieces in the score, adding examples on how to address the difficulties they present to the performer. As a result, instructors can better understand how to help students prepare to perform this collection and spark their interest in playing contemporary music.

Gustav Mahler's Seventh Symphony seems to belie traditional notions of symphonic unity in that it progresses from E minor in the first movement to C major in the Finale. The repertoire of eighteenth and nineteenth century composers such as Haydn, Beethoven, and Brahms indicates that tonal holism is a significant factor for the symphonic genre. In order to reconcile Mahler's adventurous key scheme, this dissertation explores a multidimensional harmonic model that expands upon other concepts like Robert Bailey's double-tonic complex and transformation theory. A multidimensional musical object is a nexus of several interconnected chords that occupy the same functional space (tonic, dominant, or subdominant) and can be integrated into a Schenkerian reading. Mahler's Seventh is governed by a three-dimensional tonic object that encompasses the major and minor versions of C, E, and A-flat and the augmented triad that is formed between them. The nature of this multidimensional harmony allows unusual formal procedures to unfold, most notably in the first movement's sonata form. To navigate this particular sonata design, I have incorporated my own analytical terminology, the identity narrative, to track the background harmonic events. The location of these events (identity schism, identity crisis, and identity reclamation) is critical to the entire structure of the Seventh.

This dissertation aims to examine the motivic voice leading of the first two movements of Korngold's Violin Concerto, Op. 35 to illuminate the interwoven motives within the underlying structures of the movements. The analysis principally concentrates on two main motives: the motivic tritone and rising-third motives. Moreover, the analysis of Korngold's motivic writing further investigates the semantics that are evoked by the technical aspects. With his exceptional ability to interconnect music to narratives both in operas and films, Korngold never ceased to express the recurring themes of love and revival also in his instrumental music. It is noteworthy that he borrowed only the "love themes" from his film scores for the first two movements of the violin concerto. The violin concerto was the first work written after Korngold returned to absolute music after a decade of composing for films to ensure his and his family's survival during the war. After the Anschluss, during his exile in California as a Jewish refugee, Korngold's love for his homeland Austria, his philanthropic concern for humanity, and longing for peace became his primary focus; these concerns are reflected in his Violin Concerto through his use of specific motives. By researching the historical and biographical materials, as well as employing linear analysis, this study seeks to explore the meanings of the linear motives in Korngold's music; more specifically, it attempts to show how particular motivic figures and tonal structures express the composer's ideas of transcendental "love." It argues that an in-depth understanding of both the technical and semantic aspects is also the first and foremost requirement for performing this piece.

Stephen Goss composed Cinema Paradiso, a six-movement suite for solo guitar, as an homage to films and film directors. Goss cites nihilism as a theme in Dogville, the film that inspires the fourth movement, "Mandalay," but I assert that all the films and many musical devices throughout the piece can be read through the lens of nihilism. The first movement, "Paris, Texas," depicts the stark landscape of the opening scene of the 1984 Wim Wenders film of the same name. "Modern Times" chronicles Charlie Chaplin's slapstick-laden descent from the factory to the insane asylum in the opening sequence of his 1936 Modern Times. "Noir" is a tribute to the procedures of film noir: violent storylines that depict the harshness of life, dim lighting, and anti-hero characters, all accompanied by jazz. Lars von Trier's Dogville provides the movement "Mandalay" with its nihilistic meaning, but Goss writes that he invokes the musical style of Kurt Weill's opera The Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny. Just as the book people of François Truffaut's Fahrenheit 451 had to pass on books orally, Goss has burned the score for his "451," forcing guitarists to learn it by watching a video and listening to a recording. Finally, the chaotic tarantella, "Tarantino" depicts Uma Thurman's heroin overdose scene in Quinten Tarantino's Pulp Fiction. By analyzing Fredrich Nietzsche's writings to form a broader definition of nihilism and applying that definition first to each film and then to corresponding musical elements in each movement, this paper argues that nihilism acts as a connecting theme throughout Cinema Paradiso.

According to the American League of Orchestras' most recent report, Michael Daugherty is one of the ten most performed American composers of concert music in modern times. He has received six GRAMMY awards, including awards for Best Contemporary Classical Composition in 2011 and 2017. Characteristics of Daugherty's music are diverse: colliding tonalities and blocks of sound, driving polyrhythmic counterpoint, and jazz and pop elements. His music can be minimalistic at times and at others, stirringly melodic. Amongst this eclecticism, a fascination with American iconography remains a consistent hallmark of his music, exemplified by titles such as American Gothic, Jackie O, or Lost Vegas. Daugherty has stated that his goal is to create sophisticated, abstract music that is also catchy or memorable, with melodies and cultural allusions that audiences can "hang their hat on." Despite widespread success, relatively little scholarly work has been done on Daugherty's music, providing an opportunity for further research. The primary goal of this study is to add to the literature on Michael Daugherty by providing an analysis and conductor's guide of his first choral-orchestral work, Mount Rushmore. It is a genuine show piece, galvanizing and colorful, modestly demanding of the listener, and appreciated by individuals of diverse musical backgrounds. The work also contains multitudes, offering layers of musical complexity and extensive historical symbolism for those who wish to engage further. Daugherty's Mount Rushmore offers immediate appeal and an excellent return on investment. Using interviews with the composer as well as detailed formal, harmonic, and historical-textual analysis, this paper provides in-depth information and guidance to future conductors who wish to present an appealing choral-orchestral work by a prominent, living American composer. Conductors who program Daugherty's Mount Rushmore will find it valuable for their ensemble and community for years to come.