Thesis (D.M.A.)--University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 2007. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 68-06, Section: A, page: 2239. Adviser: Donna Buchanan. Includes Grigory Gerenstein's English translation. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 217-231) Available on microfilm from Pro Quest Information and Learning.

Thesis (D.Min.) -- Reformed Theological Seminary, Charlotte, NC, 2008. / Includes bibliographical references and abstract.

Thesis (D.W.S.)--Institute for Worship Studies, 2005. / Abstract. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 141-144).

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Florida State University, 2006. / Advisor: Charles Brewer, Florida State University, College of Arts and Sciences, Program in the Humanities. Title and description from dissertation home page (viewed June 19, 2006). Document formatted into pages; contains x, 166 pages. Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (M. Div.)--St. Vladimir's Orthodox Theological Seminary, Crestwood, N.Y., 2002. / Abstract. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 110-112).

Thesis (M.A.P.S.)--Catholic Theological Union at Chicago, 2006. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 57-60).

Thesis (doctoral) - Univ., Freiburg (Breisgau), 2005. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 311-326).

Thesis (D.W.S.)--Robert E. Webber Institute for Worship Studies, 2008. / Abstract. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 109-112).

This dissertation focuses on a previously unexplored aspect of music-making in the English parish church during the 1760s to 1860s, namely its local development in response to inter-related episcopal, elite, clerical and economic influences. The historiography suggests ineffectual episcopal leadership and little gentry engagement with parochial church music-making during this period. By contrast, this study presents evidence of their influence, particularly during the late eighteenth to early nineteenth centuries. Elite support for Sunday and charity schools was allied with a desire to improve congregational psalmody, and church organs and barrel-organs were given with this objective in mind. Gentry involvement with amateur military bands of music also influenced the instrumentation of choir-bands. These actions were mirrored by those further down the social scale, and formed part of a complex pattern of support for church music-making. This dissertation argues that methods adopted to improve congregational singing in one generation were reviled in the next. The suggestion that teaching charity school children to sing would result in a congregation of singing adults became a recurring theme, yet time and again it met with little success. Nineteenth-century reform of church music-making has often been presented as a clear-cut progression, with the replacement of choir-bands by a barrel-organ or harmonium, but this dissertation argues that these phases were sometimes parallel rather than sequential, with no inevitable outcome. Furthermore, new evidence reveals that nineteenth-century church rate disputes had a profound effect on church music-making, an area of research neglected in modern literature. Lack of available seating became a significant problem in parish churches owing to the often compulsory attendance of schoolchildren, which opens up another new area of research. This dissertation argues that attempts to reform music-making contributed to alterations in the church fabric long before ecclesiological reorderings, and had long-lasting repercussions.

This thesis provides a comprehensive source study of the eighteenth-century Chapel Royal partbooks (London, British Library R.M.27.a–d). The 56 manuscript volumes in this collection, which are now catalogued into four groups (or ‘sets’), were used in the daily choral services at St James’s Palace during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. The sources have a complex history since they have an ‘organic’ quality whereby the books continued to be copied into and altered whilst they were in regular use. The first part of the thesis (chapters two to six) examines the physical characteristics of the manuscripts by considering the books’ construction, the traits of the copyists, and the way material was gradually added. Paper and scribal analysis, as well as general cataloguing work, are used to identify the contents and explore the layers of copying. The second part of the thesis (chapters seven and eight) looks at the function of the books and considers the collection within its eighteenth-century context. Documentary sources are considered alongside various elements of the books to establish how the partbooks were used in performance. The Chapel’s method of partbook organisation is then compared with the organisation of similar collections at other choral foundations (including those with which the Chapel had strong connections).