Sergei Prokofiev is among the ranks of early-twentieth century composers whose music endures in the concert hall and whose life has attracted much musicological research. Fewer studies, however, have undertaken an analytical investigation into his music, and the body of scholarly work on the musical theoretical issues raised by his compositions does not rival that exploring the music of such major contemporaries as Igor Stravinsky and Béla Bartók. Existing Anglo-American contributions to the field of Prokofiev theory have mostly employed the tools of common-practice musical analysis, many of them using Schenkerian methods, with the more recent accounts of Richard Bass and Deborah Rifkin expanding these to incorporate the chromatic features of Prokofiev’s music in more sophisticated ways. A notable exception is Neil Minturn, who proposes an analytical approach informed by pitch-class set theory; his methodology, however, has not been developed in any further research. This thesis aims to make a contribution to Prokofiev analysis by applying recent developments in neo-Riemannian theories and the work of the noted Russian musicologist, Yuri Kholopov, whose early monograph on Prokofiev’s harmony has not been engaged with in English language accounts to date. Neo-Riemannian theories are well suited to this task due to the correspondence between their remit and the diatonic chromatic aspect of Prokofiev’s music. This thesis also introduces and explores the potential of Kholopov’s theoretical concepts regarding the nature of twentieth-century music, and in particular processes such as polyharmony, in original analytical applications. Prokofiev’s Symphony No. 5 and Piano Sonata No. 8 have been selected as focal works as they are acknowledged masterworks on an ambitious scale and arguably represent a shift in Prokofiev’s compositional thinking towards more abstract music in his later period. Existing analyses of extracts from these two works also offer the opportunity of making comparative observations. By focusing on harmony and large scale tonal design in these two works, this thesis hopes to demonstrate that a dialogue between the theoretical perspectives of Kholopov and those of neo-Riemannian theories may contribute valuable insights into Prokofiev’s music, at both surface and deep structural levels.

How have we come to hear melody as going “up” or “down”? Why does the Western world predominantly adopt spatial terms such as “high” and “low” to distinguish musical notes while other non-Western cultures use non-spatial terms such as “large” and “small” (Bali), or “clear” and “dull” (South Korea)? Have the changing concepts of motion and space in people’s everyday lives over history also changed our understanding of musical space? My dissertation investigates the Western concept of music space as it has been shaped by social change into the way we think about music today. In our understanding of music, the concept of the underlying space is so elemental that it is impossible for us to have any fruitful discourse about music without using inherently spatial terms. For example a term interval in music denotes the distance between two combined notes; but, in fact, two sonic objects are neither near nor far from each other. This shows that our experience of hearing interval as a combination of different notes is not inherent in the sound itself but constructed through cultural and social means. In Western culture, musical sound is often conceptualized through various metaphors whose source domains reflect the society that incubated these metaphorical understandings. My research investigates the historical formation of the conceptual metaphor of music. In particular, I focus on historical formation of the three underlying assumptions we bring to our hearing of music: (1) “high” and “low” notes and motion between them, (2) functionality of musical chords, and (3) reliance on music notation. In each chapter, I contextualize various music theoretical writings within the larger framework of philosophy and social theory to show that our current understanding of musical sound is embedded with the history of Western culture.

In Schubert’s music, the theme “wandering” is used frequently, closely related to human life and death. I presume that, being stricken by serious illness and facing challenging relationships, Schubert lived his short life with agony and dismay, confronting the life theme “death.” In that sense, Schubert himself was probably the wanderer who kept trudging throughout his life journey. In 1822, Schubert composed the allegorical tale “My Dream,” and in that tale, he writes as follows; “when I attempted to sing of love, it turned to pain. And again, when I tried to sing of pain, it turned to love. Thus were love and pain divided in me” (Deutsch 1977, 227). Schubert lived his life, struggling between love and pain, and between life and death. Human life and death conflict with each other, but exist together in the same place. In other words, death is a root of life. If one can perceive that life and death both exist at the root of one’s life, the form of life should be represented by a circular path, not by a linear formation. This notion accords with Schubert’s musical style, where the same material comes back again and again in a circular formation. I assume that the notion—death as a root of life—is the essential conception of “wandering” that Schubert’s music expresses. In this dissertation, I would like to offer several Neo-Riemannian analyses and graphs of Schubert’s piano compositions; Impromptus D. 899, Moments Musical D. 780, Sonata in C-minor D. 958, and the “Wanderer” Fantasy D. 760. For each work and movement, I will map out the harmonic structure and key progressions on a Tonnetz graph, and suggest a new way to comprehend the nature of “wandering” that Schubert’s music portrays. Through the configurations and harmonic motions on the Tonnetz graphs, I will establish a way to comprehend Schubert’s concept of circular “wandering” visually and geometrically.

Ce travail de recherche propose une description du style mélodique et harmonique du groupe britannique Portishead et s’appuie sur l’analyse du répertoire complet, soit 33 chansons réparties sur trois albums (11 chansons par albums). Étant donné que le corpus étudié est restreint, il est possible de procéder à une analyse statistique qui permet de dégager une grammaire mélodico-harmonique. L’hypothèse de ce travail de recherche repose sur l’idée que l’évolution du langage musical de Portishead s’articule autour de procédés mélodiques et harmoniques favorisant un élargissement d’un cadre tonal équivoque. Pour ce faire, Portishead a recours à plusieurs procédés mélodiques et harmoniques qui entretiennent l’équivoque tonale. Or, ces procédés sont similaires, sans toutefois être identiques, aux six procédés répertoriés par Sylvain Caron (Caron 2002) au sujet de la grammaire de Gabriel Fauré. Par la mise en œuvre de plusieurs outils d’analyses, nous procédons à une étude comparée et contextualisée de certains mécanismes mélodique et harmonique qui font émerger l’équivoque, tant chez Fauré que chez Portishead. Ces outils d’analyse, comme l’analyse des vecteurs de ruptures mélodico-harmoniques, l’analyse paradigmatique ou l’analyse néo-riemannienne, ont été bonifiés afin de rendre compte de certaines particularités liées au corpus étudié. Ce travail de recherche est divisé en deux parties précédés d’une introduction, d’une notice biographique et d’une revue de littérature analytique. La première partie se divise en trois chapitres et s’intéresse spécifiquement au traitement mélodique équivoque. La deuxième partie, constituée des deux derniers chapitres, abordent les procédés d’équivoque harmonique. Ce travail de recherche a démontré que même si un siècle sépare les compositions de Gabriel Fauré et Portishead, l’équivoque se manifeste par une grammaire musicale commune. Nous constatons aussi que l’équivoque articule le discours formel et conditionne les rapports structurants de tension – détente de l’œuvre. / This research provides a description of the melodic and harmonic style of the British band Portishead. It is based on analysis of the full repertoire or 33 songs over three albums (11 songs per album). Since the entire corpus is analyzed, one may be able to detect chronologically trends and perform statistical analysis of the evolution of the melodic- harmonic grammar and aesthetics of the group. The hypothesis of this research work is based on the idea that the evolution of the musical language of Portishead revolves around melodic and harmonic processes favoring an expansion of tonal ambiguity frame. To do this, Portishead uses several melodic and harmonic processes that maintain tonal ambiguity. However, these processes are similar, but not identical, to the six processes listed by Sylvain Caron (Caron 2002) about the grammar of Gabriel Fauré. For the implementation of various analysis tools, we perform a comparative and contextualized study of certain melodic and harmonic mechanisms that brings out the ambiguity, both in Fauré than Portishead. These analysis tools, such as analysis of melodic-harmonic vectors of ruptures, paradigmatic analysis or neo-Riemannian analysis were enhanced to reflect certain particularities of the studied corpus. This research consists of two parts preceded by an introduction, a manual and a review of literature analystique. The first part is divided into three chapters and focuses specifically on clear melodic treatment. The second part, consisting of the last two chapters address the ambiguity of harmonic processes. This research has shown that even if a century separates the compositions of Gabriel Fauré and Portishead, ambiguity is manifested by a common grammar. We also notice that ambiguity revolves formal speeches and determines the structuring of tension – release relationships.