Luigi Legnani (1790-1877) was an important guitarist/composer of the early nineteenth century Italian Romantic school. In addition, he was also a highly skilled singer, violinist, and luthier. Legnani's guitar compositions represent the logical next step after Giuliani; fully evocative of the operatic vocal style characterized by Rossini, and technically adventurous in much the way Paganini's compositions were for the violin, although not to the same degree. His contributions to guitar literature form an important link in the chain of compositional and technical development during the nineteenth-century. This study is in two parts. The first will present as concise a biography as possible, particularly regarding Legnani's concert itineraries, contributions to guitar construction, and relationship with Paganini. An examination of little-known contemporary reviews of his performances will serve as a means of both documenting his concertizing and developing a concept of Legnani's performance style. The second part, an annotated performance edition of selections from Legnani's most famous composition, 36 Capricci per tutti i tuoni maggiori e minori, opus 20, will provide a basis for the understanding and successful performance of Legnani's music by modern guitarists. In conclusion, Legnani's unique contributions to both guitar composition and construction are reevaluated, and an up-to-date list of compositions appended.

<p> Ghanaian choral music emerged from the colonial experience through a process of musical hybridity and became relevant in the post-independent state of Ghana. This dissertation begins by exploring how two distinct musical forms developed from within the Methodist and Presbyterian missions in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. These musical forms utilized both European hymn harmony and local musical features. The institutional histories and structures of these missions explain the significance of this hybridity and distinct characteristics of the forms. These local-language choral works spread through these institutions despite the attempts of people in leadership positions to keep local culture separate from Christian schools and churches. The fourth chapter explores the broader social impact of the choral tradition that emerged from the Presbyterian mission, and its implications for the national independence movement through the history of one choral work composed by 1929 by Ephraim Amu. Then, based on a case study of the Ghana Broadcasting Corporation and its workplace choir, I examine how intellectual leaders such as Kwabena Nketia have, in the context of the post-independent state of Ghana, promoted choral music as an aspect of national development and unity. Ethnographic work at the GBC reveals the sometimes contentious negotiations that are involved in this process. This dissertation is based on both ethnographic and archival research conducted during three research trips to Ghana from 2012 to 2015. This research reveals how Ghanaians have challenged colonial ideology through composing and performing choral music. Peircian semiotics and postcolonial theory provides a framework for exploring how the hybridity of choral music in Ghana has contributed to the development of postcolonial consciousness there.</p>

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<p> In this dissertation, I examine the predominantly oral practice of singing lyric poetry among members of the Neapolitan aristocracy in southern Italy during the late-fifteenth century. The tradition of singing Neapolitan lyric developed and gradually gained ascendancy in the Kingdom of Naples over the nearly sixty years of the Aragonese dynasty (1442&ndash;1501)&mdash;both in the capital city of Naples and at feudal courts throughout the Kingdom&rsquo;s rural provinces. The surviving song repertory and its preservation in late-fifteenth-century musical and literary sources bear witness not only to these varied performance contexts, but also to the inherently communal aspect of the tradition as a whole. </p><p> Combining approaches in musicology, ethnomusicology, and literary theory, I question the fixity and purpose of this written repertory in preserving a fluid and dynamic oral practice that flourished as the artistic expression of a subjugated class&mdash;Neapolitan nobles and intellectuals living under Aragonese rule. The manuscript collections, historical descriptions, theoretical and literary works that preserve and transmit the records of this oral practice demonstrate how writing was used to record, recollect, recreate, and ultimately memorialize a communal practice of song-making&mdash;lending value and legitimacy to the Kingdom&rsquo;s local aristocracy&mdash;during a tumultuous time in the history of southern Italy. Some copies, perhaps preserved on less durable media, have likely been lost while others preserve traces of orality with varying levels of fixity and transformation. How and why these records were created and preserved is the central question that this study seeks to answer.</p><p>

Francesco Bernardi (known as Senesino: 1686-1759) is recognised as one of the most prominent singers of the eighteenth century. With performing credits throughout Europe, he was viewed as a contralto castrato of incredible technical accomplishment in voice and dramatic portrayal. Yet, even considering his fame, success, and frequent and prominent scandals, Senesino has remained little-researched today. The eighteen operas newly composed by George Frideric Handel (1685-1759) for him have been the primary reference sources which define current views of Senesino's voice. For example, regarding the singer's vocal range, Winton Dean states the following based on Charles Burney's account of Senesino: 'His compass in Handel was narrow (g to e" at its widest, but the g appears very rarely, and many of his parts, especially in later years, do not go above d") [... ] Quantz's statement that he had 'a low mezzo-soprano voice, which seldom went higher than f "' probably refers to his earliest years.'* Dean's assessment is incomplete and provides an inaccurate sense of Senesino's actual vocal range, which, in fact, extended beyond his cited range to g''. The upper reaches of Senesino's voice were not only utilised in his 'earliest years' but throughout the entirety of his career. Operas such as Giulio Cesare, Rodelinda, and Orlando account for only a small portion of the 112 operatic works in which the singer is known to have performed during his forty years on stage. This thesis expands perceptions of Senesino's vocal range and aspects of technical skill in vocal and dramatic portrayal to provide an informed sense of the singer from the time of his operatic début to his final years performing. In Volume I elements of Senesino's career from 1700 to 1740 are assessed. Volume II comprises musical examples, aria transcriptions, a catalogue of all known operatic performances in which Senesino sang, and dramatic considerations that further contextualise the singer's talents. To identify clearly his abilities and experience, Chapter 1 introduces primary source accounts of Senesino's voice, dramatic portrayal, personal style of performance, rhetorical delivery, skill with ornamentation (including his famed messa di voce), and personality. The crafting of fame was also an important aspect of any eighteenth-century singer's success. Senesino, like Farinelli and many other castrati of his time, was active in shaping the type, content, and musical and dramatic qualities of his roles. Only recently have aspects of singer involvement in role development been truly considered; this thesis is one of the first to bring focus on to Senesino in this regard. Three periods in Senesino's operatic career are defined in this thesis and aspects of the singer's changing voice, relationship with colleagues and composers, and dramatic portrayal are considered. Senesino built his reputation in Italian and German early-career performances from 1700 to 1719: Chapter 2 assesses Giovanni Maria Ruggieri's 1707 opera Armida abbandonata illustrating how the singer was already viewed favourably in comparison to his established colleagues Nicolini and Maria Anna Garberini Bentì (la Romanina). Senesino performed predominantly in London from 1720 to 1733 and upon his arrival there, he faced unfavourable public perception and endeavoured to change his off-stage reputation through the characters he portrayed on stage, particularly in the operas of Giovanni Bononcini (1670-1747). In Chapter 3 specific aspects of Senesino's intervention to shape his vocal and dramatic portrayals are delineated in relation to Bononcini's 1722 opera La Griselda. Senesino's late career from 1733 to 1740 is addressed in Chapter 4 and elements of vocal deterioration, competition, resentment, and the singer's over-zealous intervention to secure work are assessed in relation to Eumene, by Giovanni Antonio Giaj (1690-1764). While the primary focus of this thesis is Senesino himself, biographical information and an evaluation of compositional style for Giovanni Maria Ruggieri, Giovanni Bononcini, and Giovanni Antonio Giaj are also detailed. *Winton Dean, 'Senesino,' GMO, accessed 24 August 2017. See also Charles Burney, The Present State of Music in Germany, the Netherlands, and the United Provinces, 2nd edn, 2 vols (London: T. Becket and Co., 1775), II, 175-76.

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<p> This treatise focuses on the evolution of the xylophone in the music of Dmitri Shostakovich. The xylophone occupied an important position in Shostakovich's aesthetic, evidenced in the exposed solos of the first <i>Jazz Suite </i> and the <i>Polka from The Golden Age.</i> In his symphonies, Shostakovich's use of the xylophone expands the role of the instrument from a demarcation or coloristic device to a vehicle of complex cultural and personal ideas ranging from the struggle of the Soviet people under Joseph Stalin, the composer's own hatred of war, and prominently, the multi-faceted idea of betrayal. This document presents a biographical overview of Shostakovich's life, an overview of the history of the xylophone from antiquity through the Twentieth Century, and an analysis of the use of the xylophone in Shostakovich's symphonies. Rhythmic and melodic motives, orchestrational effects, and pitch class relationships are examined in addition to specific score examples.</p>

This thesis explores the ways in which people in early Stuart England understood the place of music in worship, its effect on the auditor, and the task of determining what was appropriate music for the task. Central to this is the task of exploring the validity of the trend in current historiography to assign to the ‘Laudian’ movement a polemically and practically distinctive view of music in worship. Part One deals with the published and manuscript discussions of the nature and role of music. It contends that in the 1630s music became associated with one of the two rival conspiracy theories of Popish tyranny and Puritan profanity and subversion (chapters 1 and 2). In subsequent chapters (3-7), it examines the common language in which music was discussed; the use of Biblical, patristic and continental authorities; and continental and broader philosophical understandings of music. It is concluded that no clear theologies of church music can be attributed to church parties as identified in the historiography to date. In Part Two, the thesis considers the surviving musicological evidence of practice in cathedral and collegiate churches from 1603 onwards, to attempt to discern any patterns of distinctive usage in ‘Laudian’ institutions. It examines the use of musical instruments (ch.9), the incidence of various anthem texts (ch. 11), the singing of parts of the liturgy, and the incidence of compositions in various styles (ch. 12). It is argued that much ‘Laudian’ practice was indistinguishable from that in non-Laudian cathedrals, and that the habit of the scholars to extrapolate a ‘Laudian’ style from the work of John Cosin is a misleading one. Overall, it is then concluded that the necessary place that church music has been given in the Laudian experiment is not a tenable one, either in theory or practice. There was no necessary relationship between Laudian churchmanship and elaborate church music.

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