Thesis (M.S.)--University of Alabama at Birmingham, 2009. / Title from PDF t.p. (viewed June 30, 2010). Additional advisors: Stephen A. Watts, Paul A. Richardson, John T. Tarvin. Includes bibliographical references (p. 36-38).

Thesis (B.F.A.)--Smith College, 2005. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 19-20). Filmography: leaves 21-23. Also available online (PDF file) by a subscription to the set or by purchasing the individual file.

Thesis (B.F.A.)--Smith College, 2005. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 19-20). Filmography: leaves 21-23.

This thesis explores the use of sound recordings in the revitalisation of two minority languages – the Ainu (Japan) and the West Frisian (the Netherlands). Over the last few decades, a growing concern about linguistic diversity in the world has led to an increasing awareness of minority languages, which are endangered by loss. The concept of language revitalisation calls for work which will affect the vitality of these languages. The nature of these revitalisation efforts is inscribed into place-related processes and the interpretations of the relationships between language speakers and the place they live in. Sound recordings can afford language revitalisation with the restoration of sounds of languages. This thesis argues that the heart of language revitalisation lies in the re-sounding of place attachment and sense of place. The selection of the two language cases studies, which allow for the multi-faceted use of sound recordings to be revealed and understood, constitutes an important part in the search for an understanding of these interconnections. Based on these two language case studies, which contrast in degrees of language endangerment, this research analyses how and why sound recordings engage in the processes of language revitalisation. Qualitative methods of research, encompassing forty one semi-structured and episodic interviews conducted in Japan and the Netherlands along with observations and secondary data analysis, were used in this study. The comparative approach revealed similarities and differences in the revitalisation of the Ainu and West Frisian languages and the practices of using sound recordings. Importantly, this thesis demonstrates that the significance of sound recordings arise from their capability of creating aural experience of the language, which empowers both processes of language revitalisation with the restoration of place attachment and sense of place. This finding represents a key contribution to the research of linguistic and geographical knowledge about the revitalisation of endangered languages, the role of technology in language revitalisation and to the debate on saving linguistic and cultural diversity in the world.

This thesis describes a novel reconstitution of α-amino-3-hydroxy-5-methyl-4-isoxazole propionic acid receptors (AMPARs) for the purposes of structural characterization by atomic force microscopy (AFM) and functional characterization by electrical recordings of lipid bilayers. AMPARs are glutamate gated ion channels, ubiquitous in the vertebrate central nervous system where they mediate fast excitatory neurotransmission. In a healthy brain, AMPARs are involved in memory formation and learning and their dysfunction has been related to numerous neurological disorders such as Alzheimer's disease, epilepsy, schizophrenia and many others. AMPARs were reconstituted at high and low densities. Densely reconstituted samples contained >100 receptors per μm2, a value comparable to the AMPAR density at synapses. This allowed, for the first time, the imaging of full length tetrameric AMPARs in native-like conditions and with clearly assigned domains: the extracellular domains extended 14 nm above the membrane in agreement with electron microscopy (EM) and X-ray crystallography data. Lipid-protein interactions were studied in samples with low protein density with the receptors showing preference for lipids in the liquid crystalline phase. The activity of the reconstituted receptors was confirmed through single-channel recordings. This is the first case in which an AMPAR has been reconstituted and given (a) single-channel recordings with (b) physiologically plausible conductance levels and (c) pharmacological and no-protein controls and (d) structure. As a result, previously reported biochemistry and EM are now for the first time available in concert with AFM and single-channel recordings for a purified AMPAR of known composition.

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Commercial recordings - CDs, LPs - are familiar objects. However, discussion about them has often attempted to conceal the fact that, as communicating objects, recordings pose special problems due to the fact that they unite text, image, and sound in a material commodity. This thesis examines the role of the visual in the production, circulation and use of recordings. The album cover is the primary category of study, with an emphasis on its functioning in relation to the recording as a sonic and material commodity. The label ECM, a German company which has been producing recordings since 1969, provides the main focus in this analysis. The basis of this investigation lies in the questioning of the assumptions and categories that have historically guided the activity of cover design and the discourse about it. Traditionally, recordings have been understandably seen primarily as sound-carriers; their visual aspects, even when celebrated, are most often relegated to a peripheral status, despite the fact that in certain contexts the importance of the visual can overwhelm that of sound. The usual hierarchical opposition between these elements is here questioned through an examination of both the marketing of recordings and their circulation and use. ECM provides a pertinent case through which such questions can be elaborated. Its visual marketing strategies can be characterised in terms of a desire for difference. ECM's attempt to set itself apart has resulted in a "look" which rejects many conventions. It has also resulted in a complex, conceptual group of visual strategies. In its particular use of landscape photography, blank space, and gestural markings, ECM constructs ideas of space which relate to the potential for performativity and creativity. Through the combination of these strategies, the label deemphasises creative personality of the musical performer and emphasises the space occupied by the looker/listener. In doing this, it also questions the traditional boundaries between music and the visual. ECM's covers cause these categories to become indistinct and allow new conceptions of the recording as a material commodity to emerge. One effect of this is a construction of the apprehender's subjectivity that fails to fit within the marketplace's traditional categories. The thesis considers how the visual has been implicated in more concrete processes such as the negotiation of taste and practices of consumption and use. The niche that ECM attempts to carve out for itself is considered in relation to the tension in the marketplace between the desire for distinction and the recording as a massproduced commodity. / Arts, Faculty of / Art History, Visual Art and Theory, Department of / Graduate

abstract: In preparation for an orchestral audition, one of the first considerations a trombonist will have in the study of an excerpt is the question of tempo. The selection of an appropriate tempo for a musical work is key to a successful performance of that work and can make the difference between winning an audition and losing it. This project identifies the tempo of the top sixteen tenor trombone excerpts one is likely to perform in an audition by analyzing the tempo in recordings of professional orchestras. The data generated in the measurements of those recordings is analyzed in an effort to determine an appropriate tempo around which a trombonist preparing these excerpts might center their work. The goal of this project is to provide a resource for trombonists and trombone teachers as an aid in their determination of the ideal tempo of these excerpts. / Dissertation/Thesis / Doctoral Dissertation Music 2020

The original works of copyright holders included tangible creations, as music written on a page, thereby, extending copyright protection to songwriters and music publishers. Until 1995, absent from U.S. copyright law was protection for copyright owners of intangible sound recordings. the Performance Rights Act (PRA) seeks to amend the US copyright law in order to grant copyright holders of sound recordings the right to performance royalties from terrestrial broadcast radio. If passed, the legislation would be unprecedented in the United States. the PRA has implications for broadcast radio, record labels, and performing artists. This study includes historical and legal perspective of previous attempts at legislation of this nature and predicts outcomes of current legislation.

Technologies new and old in concert with a twenty-first century folk music revival have introduced historical music from Appalachia to a new generation of music fans, within the region, across the nation, and around the world. One unforeseen consequence of this situation is that this new generation is being inundated with a flood of regional stereotypes associated with that older music--stereotypes that are unleashed on the new generation when historical recordings are reissued (or issued for the first time, in the case of some field recordings). In my presentation, I'll discuss several case studies from my own work as a producer of historical music releases in which stereotypes either were subtly embedded in reissued recordings or were overtly associated with the music or the musicians featured on those releases. I'll discuss some of my efforts as producer and liner notes writer to confront stereotypes in such a way as to help a new generation defuse stereotypes while at the same time find meaning, value, and enjoyment in older recordings that are at one level "politically incorrect" or even offensive.