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Typescript (photocopy). / Contents: Sonata in E Major, Op. 109 / Ludwig van Beethoven (Audio file 1); Variationen für Klavier, op. 27 / Anton Webern (Audio file 2); Années de pèlerinage, 2me année : Italie / Franz Liszt (Audio file 3); Improvisations, Op. 20 / Béla Bartók (Audio file 4)

This thesis ventures into the relatively neglected world of twentieth century vocal music, via the three song cycles of Oliver Messiaen. The song cycle is a comparatively young genre, generally dated from Beethoven's An die ferne Geliebte or by some, even later to Schubert's Die schone Miillerin. Nevertheless, considerable changes have taken place in the 160 years which separate Messiaen's cycles from those of the 'pioneers' mentioned above. A fuller appreciation of twentieth century cycles is facilitated by observing this evolutionary process and placing the works within an historical and cultural perspective. Such an introduction is provided in part one of this thesis, along with relevant details on the life and interests of Messiaen. The latter information gives insight into the compositions themselves and may satisfy the reader's curiosity on the origin of some of the more unexpected techniques or ideas Messiaen llses. Before embarking on a study of the cycles, it is necessary to look at the highly individual musical language of the composer. Section two undertakes this task in some depth, wherever possible relating the explanations directly to the songs which follow. In order to clarify the text and to simplify the exercise for the reader, numerous musical examples have been used. This contributes to the apparent bulk of this section. The main emphasis of the thesis is the detailed study of the 20 songs contained in Poemes pour Mi, Chants de Terre et de Cief and Harawi. The third section of the thesis deals with this material thoroughly and systematically, dividing it up into musical and extra-musical aspects. The texts are considered in terms of Surrealist, religious, Nature, numerological and, in the case of Harawi, mythological and Peruvian folk symbolism. The relationship of text to music is studied and evelopments highlighted. Musically, the study is further sub-divided into piano part and vocal part. In each case, an extensive exploration of the techniques required of the performer is presented. This makes possible the subsequent categorisation of the songs on the basis of similarities in the musical means. Conclusions reached show a progressive development through the three song cycles in the composer's handling of the text, his treatment of the voice, his use of the piano and his expansion of the voice-piano relationship. This body of solo vocal literature emerges as typical of Oliver Messiaen's compositional style in general and therefore properly representative of the meticulous craftsmanship with which his works are constructed. The detailed analysis of all aspects of the songs contributes original material to scholarship on Messiaen and on song cycles in the twentieth century.

Several interpretations in performances, recordings, and publications of Giuseppe Verdi's Messa da Requiem raise issues concerning the relationship between these readings and the composer's intention. Understanding Verdi's tempo and phrasing in the Requiem is of crucial importance in rediscovering his intention. Knowing that Verdi's metronome markings were not merely performance suggestions but that they actually reflected his final decision is equally important. Unlike his operas, fast tempos are not introduced suddenly in the Requiem; rather, where tempo changes occur gradually from one section to the next, thereby maintaining the music's overall character. Verdi's phrasing is very subtle, and unconventional, because one sign may have multiple meanings. Compounding this complication are the many editorial errors in the published editions. David Rosen, in his critical edition, corrected many of these errors, and made additional editorial suggestions, but there are still numerous places where determining correct phrasing, as well as tempo fluctuations, knowledge of Verdi's use of signs and symbols is difficult.

It was the purpose of this thesis (1) to show the need for emphasis on the teaching of song-interpretation; (2) to go to a new source for methods of teaching interpretation; and (3) to show how these methods can be used in teaching voice students.

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L’accent en français est considéré comme un accent post-lexical marquant le niveau du groupe de mots plutôt que le niveau du mot lui-même. L’Accent Final (AF) primaire, cooccurrent à la frontière prosodique, s’effacerait perceptivement en frontière prosodique majeure. L’Accent Initial (AI), dit secondaire et optionnel, serait un accent rythmique apparaissant sur les longs constituants. Dans ce contexte, seuls deux niveaux de constituance sont communément admis en français : le Syntagme Intonatif (IP) et le Syntagme Accentuel (AP). L’existence d’un Syntagme Intermédiaire (ip) est en revanche controversée. Enfin, la prise en compte du Mot Prosodique (PW) (i.e. mot lexical) comme unité de planification, ou de réalisation des règles accentuelles, en structure de surface ne semble pas envisagé. L’objectif de cette étude est d’explorer l’organisation du phrasé prosodique en français. Dans ce cadre, nous proposons une étude perceptive, via un corpus de parole contrôlée manipulant des structures syntaxiques ambiguës, où 80 participants ont effectué 3 tâches de perception : proéminence, frontière et groupement. Les événements prosodiques perçus ont ensuite été mis en relation avec leurs réalités acoustiques. Les résultats montrent que les auditeurs sont capables de percevoir des niveaux de granularité de frontières plus fins que ce que les descriptions traditionnelles du français prédisent. Par ailleurs, les mots lexicaux sont systématiquement réalisés par un marquage bipolaire (AI+AF) de même force métrique. AI joue également un rôle plus structurel que rythmique, en marquant la structure prosodique de manière plus privilégiée qu’AF. Enfin, AF ne s’efface pas perceptivement en frontière prosodique majeure, et garde au contraire une trace métrique au niveau du mot lexical, qui ne varie pas strictement en fonction du niveau de constituance. / In French, accentuation is said to be post-lexical, marking the phrase rather than the word. That is, the primary final accent (FA) is considered to be perceptively weakened when co-occurring with a major prosodic boundary, while the Initial Accent (IA), regarded as a secondary and optional accent, is thought to hold merely a rhythmic function in balancing longer constituents. Consequently, only two levels of prosodic constituency are accounted for in French: the Intonational Phrase (IP), and the Accentual Phrase (AP). The existence of a third level, the Intermediate Phrase (ip), while advanced by some authors, remains controversial. Moreover, the Prosodic Word (PW) (i.e. lexical word) as a phonological unit, or as the domain of accentual rules, is disregarded altogether. The aim of our study is to investigate the organization of prosodic phrasing in French. We propose a perception study on a corpus in which syntactically ambiguous structures were manipulated, and asked 80 participants to perform 3 distinct perception tasks: a prominence, boundary and grouping task. The perceived prosodic events were then related to their acoustic realization. Taken together, our results indicate that listeners are able to distinguish finer-grained grouping levels than those predicted in traditional French descriptions. Moreover, lexical words are systematically realized by an accentual bipolarization (IA+FA), with each accent carrying the same metrical weight. The function of IA is shown to be more one of structuration than rhythmic balancing, with IA even marking structure more readily than FA. Finally, our results indicate that FA is not perceptively weakened when co-occurring with major prosodic boundaries, but instead remains a metrical mark at the level of the lexical word, in a manner independent from the level of constituency.

Tone is a distinctive feature of the lexemes in tone languages. The information-structural category focus is usually marked by syntactic and morphological means in these languages, but sometimes also by intonation strategies. In intonation languages, focus is marked by pitch movements, which are also perceived as tone. The present article discusses prosodic focus marking in these two language types.