Thesis (D.M.A.)--University of North Texas, 2003. / Accompanied by 4 recitals, recorded Apr. 4, 1994, Nov. 18, 1996, Aug. 5, 2002, and Oct. 20, 2003. Includes bibliographical references (p. 122-124).

Thesis (D.M.A.)--West Virginia University, 2003. / Title from document title page. Document formatted into pages; contains vi, 122 p. : music. Vita. Includes abstract. Includes bibliographical references (p. 114-116).

abstract: Emily Dickinson is a well-known American poet of the nineteenth century, and her oeuvre consists of nearly 2,000 posthumously published poems. Written largely in hymn form with unique ideas of punctuation and grammar, her poetry attracts composers with its inherent musicality. The twentieth-century American composers Aaron Copland, Ernst Bacon, Lee Hoiby, and Gordon Getty have created song settings of Dickinson's poetry. Copland's song cycle Twelve Poems of Emily Dickinson (1949-50) is admired by many as an illustration of poetry; however, the Dickinson cycles by Bacon, Hoiby, and Getty are also valuable, lesser-known representations of her writing. Settings of one poem, "There came a Wind like a Bugle--", are common among Copland's Twelve Poems, Bacon's cycle Songs from Emily Dickinson: Nature, Time, and Space (1930), Hoiby's Four Dickinson Songs (1988), and Getty's The White Election (1982). These latter three settings have previously undergone some theoretical analysis; however, this paper considers a performance analysis of these songs from a singer's point of view. Chapter 1 provides background for this study. Chapter 2 consists of a biographical overview of Dickinson's life and writing style, as well as a brief literary analysis of "There came a Wind like a Bugle--". Chapters 3, 4, and 5 discuss Ernst Bacon, Lee Hoiby, and Gordon Getty, respectively; each chapter consists of a short biography of the composer and a discussion of his writing style, a brief theoretical analysis of his song setting, and commentary on the merits of his setting from the point of view of a singer. Observations of the depiction of mood in the song and challenges for the singer are also noted. This paper provides a comparative analysis of three solo vocal settings of one Emily Dickinson poem as a guide for singers who wish to begin studying song settings of this poem. The Bacon and Hoiby settings were found to be lyrical, tonal representations of the imagery presented in "There came a Wind like a Bugle--". The Getty setting was found to be a musically starker representation of the poem's atmosphere. These settings are distinctive and worthy of study and performance. / Dissertation/Thesis / D.M.A. Music 2011

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There are two major, well-known operas based on plays of Tennessee Williams. He refused many times throughout his life to give permission for his play, A Streetcar Named Desire, to be set as an opera. It was not until the 1960s that he granted permission for Lee Hoiby to choose any of his plays as a basis for a new opera. Hoiby chose Summer and Smoke, a play which was written at approximately the same time as Streetcar. Lanford Wilson created the libretto for the opera which was given its premier in 1971 by the St. Paul Opera Association. In 1994 representatives of the Williams estate granted permission to the San Francisco Opera to commission an opera based on A Streetcar Named Desire. With a libretto by Philip Littell, the opera was composed by André Previn and given its premier in 1998. These two plays share common themes, character types, character relationships, and literary symbols due in part to the autobiographical nature of Williams's writings. The plays exhibit a cinematic nature and possess common dramatic elements such as the symbolic use of sets, props, and musical leitmotifs as a result of his attempts to create a new "plastic" style of theatre. The purpose of this thesis is to examine how each composer has captured the essence of Williams's dramatic style in these well known plays while dealing with stylistic elements that by nature could interfere in operatic composition. A brief biography of Williams is included to show the familial basis of his character types. Illustrations of his style serve as the basis for a comparison of the librettos to the plays. The musical analysis focuses on the composers' choices in dealing with Williams's poetic southern language, use of music, cinematic techniques, and complex characterizations.