Starting in the mid-2010s VR's high cost of entry became low enough for consumers and artists to explore and experiment with the technology. There have been a few VR operas developed by medium to large sized teams such as Michel Van Der Aa's Eight (2018) and Alexander Schubert's ⁂ASTERISM⁂ (2021), but no widespread work has been produced by a small team comprising only a librettist and composer. Vessels engages in this process with a libretto written by Bea Goodwin and music, audio processing, visual design, and programming by Christopher Poovey. The first step in the process of creating Vessels was the creation of the song cycle Songs from Vessels for soprano, extended tenor, flute, bass flute, A clarinet, viola, contrabass, percussion, and live electronics. These songs are the basis of the micro-opera Vessels which presents recordings of the songs with live processing alongside two songs exclusive to the opera in a VR environment with immersive projections and audio. The development of an ensemble and electronic work along with a VR micro-opera necessitates the implementation and creation of software. Both the Grainflow and cpDelayNetworks packages for Cycling ‘74 Max are pivotal to audio processing in both versions of the work. In addition to these packages and other programming done in Max, the VR opera version of the work relies on custom scripts and implementations of tools for VR interaction, networking, spatial audio, and procedural animations to create an immersive environment to be shared between a VR participant and their audience.

"October 2003." / Includes bibliographical references / 592 leaves. : / Title page, contents and abstract only. The complete thesis in print form is available from the University Library. / Chiefly in English; some Polish text in pt. B. / Comprises three types of material: composition (pt. A); performance (pt. C); and, musicology (pt. B.), and is intended to reflect the author's professional activities as composer, pianist and writer. The various writings and texts all relate to the life and music of Witold Lutoslawski (1993-2003). Earlier publications have been excluded because they are referred to (and reflected in) the author's thesis: Pitch organisation in the music of Witold Lutoslawski since 1979 (Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Leeds, 1992) / Thesis (D.Mus.)--University of Adelaide, Elder School of Music, 2004?

This submission comprises a portfolio of fifteen original musical works and an exegesis that comments on five of these works. Recordings of twelve of the fifteen compositions are included. These pieces demonstrate an ongoing investigation into structure, and the discussion will provide an insight into the constant process of experimentation and consolidation involved in developing such a body of work. In the exegesis I open with a general conversation on the compositional process and then focus on the formal problems inherent in this process. I then discuss the five scores included in the main volume, looking at how each are formed, and comparing their formal characteristics. This involves an analysis of the musical materials and how such materials are treated through repetition and transformation. I will also look at the aesthetic and stylistic concerns and how they inform the formal architecture of each work. An appendix includes the scores of a further ten works, with a brief introductory commentary on each. / http://proxy.library.adelaide.edu.au/login?url= http://library.adelaide.edu.au/cgi-bin/Pwebrecon.cgi?BBID=1351235 / Thesis (Ph.D.) -- University of Adelaide, Elder Conservatorium of Music, 2008

Thesis (Ph.D.) --University of Adelaide, Elder Conservatorium of Music, 2008. / "October 2007" Bibliography: leaves 168-170. Also available in print form.

The puzzle known as tangram was the inspiration behind this composition. Just as the seven pieces of the tangram create shapes, seven contrasting musical fragments appear as thematic materials from which to draw sonic imagery. Sapphic Fragments for two sopranos This composition was constructed from “broken” materials - an analogy for Sappho's dismembered poem. These broken materials were arranged in a pointillistic manner. I drew inspiration from M.C. Escher's works to vary thematic fragments of this work. M.O.N.T.A.G.E. for flute, clarinet, violin and cello This work was influenced by the video work, Wantee, by artist, Laure Prouvost. The title, M.O.N.T.A.G.E., is an acrostic, using words that show intimate relations with my composition: Multicolour, Oscillation, Numbers, Television, the Artist, Gleam, Etc. Once Emerged from the Grey of Night for flute, clarinet, horn, violin, viola and cello This sextet consists of numerous fragments with various colours and textures, forming a musical collage. A picture-poem by Paul Klee offered the starting point for this work. Scale-Free Spaces for flute, guitar, viola and cello I drew compositional ideas from the video installation, Irreversible, by artist Norimichi Hirakawa. This quartet was composed of brief fragments of dots, lines and movements. Various fragments were structured in forms of both simplicity and complexity. For the latter, ideas were drawn from the study in randomness, ‘Scale-Free Network’. String Quartet no. 3 This composition consists of four movements. In the first and third movements, the sound of rain drops and images of light through stained glass are explored. The second and fourth movements effect a structural metamorphoses of musical elements. I drew inspiration from Kafka's novella The Metamorphosis. A Thousand Plateaux for orchestra In this orchestral work, a variety of images of both plateaux and movements were invoked. The work was inspired by both the book, A Thousand Plateaux by Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari, and the Alhambra palace in Granada, Spain.

"Compositional Approaches to New Media Paradigms" is the discursive accompaniment to the original composition BoMoH, (a new media chamber opera. A variety of new media concepts and practices are discussed in relation to their use as a contemporary compositional methodology for computer musicians and digital content producers. This paper aligns relevant discourse with a variety of concepts as they influence and affect the compositional process. This paper does not propose a new working method; rather it draws attention to a contemporary interdisciplinary practice that facilitates new possibilities for engagement and aesthetics in digital art/music. Finally, in demonstrating a selection of the design principals, from a variety of new media theories of interest, in compositional structure and concept, it is my hope to provide composers and computer musicians with a tested resource that will function as a helpful set of working guidelines for producing new media enabled art, sonic or otherwise.

Beginning with his High Mass written in 1994, popular Swedish composer Sven-David Sandström modeled multiple compositions after famous canonical works using the same texts and/or instrumentation. Sandström wants to be compared to the greatest, specifically in how a twenty-first century composer responds to a text set , in the case of J.S. Bach's , over 250 years ago. His setting of Matthäuspassion (MP), which uses the same libretto as J.S. Bach, is his most extensive non-operatic work, one he considers his most significant, and likely his last work based on a preexisting model. This study 1) examines the influence of J.S. Bach's MP on Sandström's setting in the use of characters and chorales, 2) illustrates Sandström's compositional language in MP based on recent studies on his choral music, 3) describes his use of musical symbolism, and 4) discusses his religious and spiritual motivations behind the work, as well as his preferred uses in performance.

This paper discusses several compositions that use the computer screen to present music notation to performers. Three of these compositions, Law of Fives (2015), Polytera II (2016), and Terraformation (2016–17), employ strategies that allow the notation to change during the performance of the work as the product of composer-regulated algorithmic generation and performer interaction. New methodologies, implemented using Cycling74's Max software, facilitate performance of these works by allowing effective control of generation and on-screen display of notation; these include an application called VizScore, which delivers notation and conducts through it in real-time, and a development environment for real-time notation using the Bach extensions and graphical overlays around them. These tools support a concept of cartographic composition, in which a composer maps a range of potential behaviors that are mediated by human or algorithmic systems or some combination of the two. Notational variation in performance relies on computer algorithms that can both generate novel ideas and be subject to formal plans designed by the composer. This requires a broader discussion of the underlying algorithms and control mechanisms in the context of algorithmic art in general. Terraformation, for viola and computer, uses a model of the performer's physical actions to constrain the algorithmic generation of musical material displayed in on-screen notation. The resulting action-based on-screen notation system combines common practice notation with fingerboard tablature, color gradients, and abstract graphics. This hybrid model of dynamic notation puts unconventional demands on the performer; implications of this new performance practice are addressed, including behaviors, challenges, and freedoms of real-time notation.

The Peabody Conservatory commissioned Estudios De Frontera by Alejandro Viñao in 2004. Percussionist Robert Van Sice initiated the commissioning process. Estudios De Frontera is the first composition for percussion ensemble by Viñao. Viñao's Estudios is written in two movements. The first is titled Homage to Nancarrow. As the title implies the compositional processes are directly influenced by Conlon Nancarrow. The composer states: "Homage to Nancarrow is concerned with the perceptual illusion of multiple simultaneous speeds or tempi....This movement explores the type of rhythms that create the illusion that multiple independent tempi are being heard while remaining playable by musicians." The purpose of this document is to provide a rhythmic analysis describing the techniques used by Chopin, Ligeti, and Nancarrow, and demonstrating their manifestation in the first movement of Alejandro Viñao's Estudios de Frontera. The analysis provides detailed information in regards to Nancarrow's rhythmic structures including: ostinato, hemiola, isorhythm, accelerations, and implied poly-tempo. Additionally, by seeking advice from notable performers and ensembles, the areas of greatest concern are identified, and strategies towards rehearsal and performance are recommended. The performance guide is included as an appendix to the analytic body of the paper.

Among the Voices Voiceless is a composition for flute (doubling piccolo), clarinet (doubling bass clarinet), viola, cello, percussion, piano, and electronics, based on the poem "What would I do without this world faceless incurious" by Samuel Beckett. The piece is a setting for disembodied voice: the vocal part exists solely in the electronics. Having no physical body, the voice is obscured as the point of empathy for the audience. In addition, instrumental solos compete for focus during the work's twenty minute duration. In passages including a soloist, the soloist functions simultaneously as antagonist and avatar to the disembodied voice. Spoken word recordings and electronic manipulation of instrumental material provides further layers of ambiguity. The companion critical essay "Among the Voices Voiceless": Setting the Words of Samuel Beckett proposes the distillation of Beckett's style into the elements of prosaicness, repetition, fragmentation, ambiguity, and symmetry. Discussions of Beckett's works such as Waiting for Godot and Molloy demonstrate these elements in his practice. This framework informs the examination of two other musical settings of Beckett's poetry: Neither by Morton Feldman and Odyssey by Roger Reynolds. Finally, these elements are used to analyze and elucidate the compositional decisions made in Among the Voices Voiceless.