Thesis (M.M.)--Ball State University, 2009. / Title from PDF t.p. (viewed on Mar. 01, 2010). Creative project (M.M.), 3 hrs. Includes bibliographical references (p. 22-23).

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Thesis (Ph.D.)--Ohio University, March, 2007. / Title from PDF t.p. Includes bibliographical references.

Francis Poulenc has made a significant contribution to twentieth century repertoire for voice and piano. Many of his songs are published in collections under a single title. These collections are often referred to as cycles, but they do not always fall into the definition of a song cycle in the traditional sense. The goal of this paper is to disclose a cyclic nature on a structural level in the music of Banalités, using Tel jour telle nuit as a model for critical examination of both works. The introduction to the thesis addresses both the problem of defining a song cycle, and the implications such a definition has on categorizing the works Banalités and Tel jour telle nuit. Chapter One explores influences of composers, teachers and artistic movements on Poulenc's early life and outlines his significant compositional periods. In addition, this chapter cites specific works indicative of a maturation process in Poulenc's approach to vocal settings. Chapter Two investigates the poetic texts of Banalités and Tel jour telle nuit. Guillaume Apollinaire and Paul Eluard were integral figures in the developments of Surrealism and its formation as an artistic movement. The chapter analyses the linkage between the poems within each work, offering interpretive solutions. Chapter Three, which constitutes the main body of the paper, provides a detailed analysis of the general architecture and shape of each cycle in terms of formal structure, harmonic and melodic language, and text-music relationships. The analysis reveals that both cycles are highly integrated and unified through various devices, such as literal restatement of materials, intervallic relationships and stylistic resemblances at the levels of texture, tempo and tonal structure. Moreover, metric aspects of both poetry and music are shown to also contribute to that integration. In light of this investigation, unifying devices of both a covert and overt nature testify to the cyclic nature of Banalités and Tel jour telle nuit, yet point to the different type of cycle each work outlines. This conclusion helps the performers to convey the unity of the song cycles, thus doing justice to the sense in which Poulenc conceived the works. / Arts, Faculty of / Music, School of / Graduate

The opera bouffe Les mamelles de Tiresias (1944) by Francis Poulenc (1899-1963) stands at the crossroad between the composer's formative and mature works. The opera exhibits a number of harmonic features characteristics of Poulenc's eclectic, idiosyncratic style. This thesis attempts to address the lack of attention given this work in particular and Poulenc's output in general. / The thesis consists of two volumes. Volume I contains the introduction, three chapters and the conclusion. Volume 2 contains musical examples, analytical graphs and reproductions of Act 1, Scenes 1 and 2, and Act 2, Scenes 7 and 8 from the piano-vocal score of Les mamelles de Tiresias. / The first chapter of Volume 1 reviews two Ph.D. dissertations that examine Poulenc's harmonic language; and summarizes the more recent analyses by Vivan Wood, Pamela Poulin and Keith Daniels. Figures (the musical examples) for Chapter 1 are given in Volume 2. / Chapter 2 of Volume 1 examines the large-scale harmonic organization in pivotal scenes that are representative of the musical language in the opera. / Chapter 3 of Volume I extends Warren Werner's and Richard Bobbitt's approach to show how local events and large-scale harmonic motions can be viewed as leitmotives that symbolize key events in the drama. Figures (the musical examples) and Graphs (the analytical graphs) for Chapter 3 are given in Volume 2. / The conclusion reviews there observations of the study and makes some general remarks about Poulenc's harmonic language. (Abstract shortened by UMI.)

This thesis is a brief study of profane a capella works for mixed chorus by Francis Poulenc, the well known componist of the first half of twentieth century. On one hand the work descriebes his basic living moments important for his life and artistic work. On the other it analyze his profane works which was written for the mixed chorus a capella, i.e. without any instrumental accompaniment, reflecting mainly its musical form, harmonical structure and his technigue of composition.

Francis Poulencs musical setting of La Voix Humaine, a one-act monodrama by Jean Cocteau, has enjoyed many successful performances since the premiere at the Paris Théâtre National de l'Opéra-Comique in February, 1959. Cocteau's original play (1932) was inspired by a crossed-wire" telephone conversation which he overheard in 1930. The play has become an international success, and requires the talents of a gifted actress. La Voix Humaine (hereafter LVH) is one of three unique stage works by Poulenc. All of his operas were composed late in his life and reflect a variety of libretto types. His first opera, Les Mamelles de Tirésias (1947), was a one-act comic opera. This satirical and humorous subject may be greatly contrasted with his full-length tragic opera, Les Dialogues des Carmélites (1957). In view of its monodramatic construction and the sensual tragic-romantic use of the orchestra, LVH stands alone as a specialized and demanding work for the theatre.

Francis Poulenc's one-character opera La Voix humaine (1958), a setting of the homonymous play by Jean Cocteau, explores the psychological complexities of an unnamed woman as she experiences the end of a romantic relationship. During the forty-minute work, she sings in a declamatory manner into a telephone, which serves as a sign of the unrevealed man at the other end. Poulenc uses musical motives to underscore the woman's changing emotional states as she recalls her past relationship. The musical dramaturgy in this work resignifies Debussy's impressionist symbolism by collapsing devices used in Pelléas et Mélisande in a language that shifts between octatonicism, chromaticism, harmonic and melodic whole tone passages, and diatonicism. This late work recontextualizes elements in Poulenc's Dialogues des Carmélites (1953-56), and the end of the opera provides a theme for his Sonate pour Clarinet et Piano(1962), as Poulenc reflects on his youthful encounters with Cocteau, Erik Satie, and Les Six.

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Because of the nature of the poetry, the interpretation of Banalites in this study has involved certain subjective decisions. These deductions were, nevertheless, colored by statements of the poet, the composer, and authorities on each. This is not to imply, however, that this is the only interpretation. Both poet and composer have given evidence that their creation requires a subjective response on the part of the interpreter. This is perhaps the greatest challenge offered by the work.