This study seeks to integrate informal and formal music learning in a university guitar class with a secondary focus on evaluating the effectiveness of this approach in meeting student's stated goals for learning the guitar. Salient features in formal music learning were discovered from an examination of guitar method books. Informal features were examined from a reading of extant research on popular music pedagogy and expounded upon through research devoted to specific areas of informal music learning and popular music pedagogy. These features were used in the creation of a guitar curriculum to aid in the integration of both formal and informal music learning in a university guitar class. Data were gathered through pre- and post-study questionnaires, interviews, and video analysis. Analysis of data shows that integrating formal and informal music learning in a beginner's guitar class is effective in meeting student stated goals for the course. Note reading was an area that was not effective in meeting student goals for the course. Data revealed that note reading should be taught slowly, in key based relationships and with fewer notes taught over the 16 week course. Integrating informal music learning procedures in a formal environment proved to be challenging for the students. A difficulty existed in the student's ability to task switch between formal and informal learning in the University setting. Implications from the study are listening should be considered a primary means for learning music and haphazard learning is beneficial, though difficult to include in a systematized curriculum.

This thesis is in four principal sections. Section one covers the period from 1800 to 1823 and begins with a study of the establishment of the six-stringed guitar in England, together with observations on two early English guitarist-composers, Thomas Bolton and Felice Chabran. Chapters two and three concentrate on four foreign musicians, Verini, Sola, Anelli; and Sor, giving biographical details, as well as commenting on the importance of their concerts. This section concludes with a discussion on the relative merits of three tutors of the period. Section two covers the years 1824 to 185O and shows how English guitarists were dominated by foreign musicians. It also highlights the importance of child prodigies, the gradual increase of solo guitar music, and the emergence of the first guitar periodical, The Giulianiad. The third section observes the contributions made by English guitarists during the period 1851 to 1924. Chapters one and two conclude the lives of Regondi and Pratten, and appraises the work of Ernest Shand. It also shows how some guitarists, through self-patronisation, failed to keep abreast of developments in Europe. The final section considers guitar construction in England and begins with an assessment of the Panormo family, before concluding with a survey of improvements to the guitar.

Polymeter has been a relatively unexplored compositional technique of music of the Common Practice Period. Dušan Bogdanović’s Polyrhythmic and Polymetric Studies for Guitar is recognized in the guitar world as not only an important theoretical treatise, but also a benchmark for more advanced levels of improvisation. Currently, his treatise remains the best source for learning polymetric improvisation on the guitar. My personal contribution stems from the idea that multiple interpretations of thought processes and technical approaches are possible when learning to play polymeters on the guitar. The first section focuses on providing an alternative technical approach towards learning to play polymeters on the guitar by simplifying selected exercises in Bogdanović’s treatise from their original presentation, and demonstrating further possibilities as to how the exercises can be applied in a practical manner to improvisation. The second part reveals through analysis of the Concert Studies 1, 2, and 5 both his innovative improvisatory use of polymeter as a stylistic device, and his ties to traditional ideas of structure.

In the last three decades there has been a surge in original compositions for clarinet and guitar resulting in the repertoire virtually doubling in size. However, documentation and research of original works in published sources remains limited and is quickly becoming outdated. This document reviews the current resources and reviews the newer published materials. Early chamber music works for guitar and clarinet typically required the guitar to supply harmonic support to the clarinet's upper voice, which carried the themes. An examination of the earliest works, which date from the early nineteenth century, suggests, in other words, that the two parts were not treated equally, in contrast to modern-day chamber music, in which melodic elements are proportionally balanced between the two instruments. A critical survey and comparison of four significant works from the repertoire reveals a development toward motivic balance, a progression towards melodic equality that continued in subsequent compositions. The four works surveyed are: Heinrich Neumann's Serenata Svizzera Op.29, Ferdinand Rebay's Sonata for Clarinet and Guitar No.2 in A minor, Libby Larsen's Blue Third Piece, and Gernot Wolfgang's Four Miniatures. An extensive compilation of over 300 original published and unpublished works for clarinet and guitar, bass clarinet and guitar, and more than one clarinet and/or guitar is included.

No abstract available / Dissertation (MMus (Performing Art))--University of Pretoria, 2005. / Music / MMus (Performing Art) / Unrestricted

Bibliography: pages 133-138. / Sight-reading is generally regarded by guitar teachers as a problem area of instruction. The aim of this thesis is to address the problem through a fourfold approach: 1. defining sight-reading in terms of its historical context ; 2. providing a rationale, and proposing an alternative method, for teaching sight-reading on the guitar based on a language teaching model ; 3. developing the proposed method ; 4. evaluating the proposed method experimentally. Music and language share many common characteristics. It is for this reason that Suggestopaedia, a method validated in language teaching, has been adapted for teaching the guitar with sight-reading skills as the central focus. Suggestopaedia has been chosen because it stimulates the whole personality, and all brain systems, of the learner.

No description available.

The 10 Etudes for Guitar by Giulio Regondi represent the pinnacle of technical achievement for nineteenth century guitar performance. Dense textures, large stretches, fast scales and arpeggios, and obscure modulations are used in combinations that were unrivalled among his contemporaries. The etudes were not published until the late twentieth century and have not had generations of guitarists solving their challenges and teaching them to younger generations of students. Right-hand fingerings are virtually non-existent in published versions, but a thorough study of period sources yields several strategies; examples from each etude are provided. Modern right-hand scale philosophy, such as playing scales with "a," "m," and "i" in the right-hand are addressed and further example provided to give players several solutions to choose from. Right-hand fingering implies articulation and several interpretations are analyzed for each etude where they exist. Left-hand fingerings are sporadically present in modern editions but are often lacking in the most difficult passages. Stretching techniques from other string instruments can be applied to the guitar and one technique in particular can be applied to the most difficult stretches in Regondi in numerous instances. For some of the most challenging textures several solutions are given. The etudes of Regondi can prepare the guitarist for challenges found in playing music that is not written for the guitar or even by guitarists which consists of a substantial portion of the modern concert guitarist's repertoire. His music pushes what is possible on the guitar and borderlines what many would call idiomatic. This paper establishes a small number of techniques that will allow players to solve any challenge presented in the etudes from multiple technical viewpoints.

Thesis (M.A.)--Marshall University, 2002. / Title from document title page. Document formatted into pages; contains v, 23 p. Includes a live performance (duration 1.01.03). Includes bibliographical references (p. 21-23).

Thesis (M.A.)--Marshall University, 2002. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 21-23).