Jerry Herman is celebrated for his ability to showcase strong leading female roles in his canon of work that spans some fifty years. In writing such strong female characters, he must produce strong male counterparts to these women who can communicate on their level and not become overpowered by the women's presence. I was cast in the musical revue, It's Today: An Evening of Jerry Herman, conceived, directed, and choreographed by Earl D. Weaver. My portion of the revue explored Herman's leading male roles of Cornelius from Hello, Dolly!; Mack from Mack and Mabel; Colonel Tadeusz Boleslav Stjerbinsky from The Grand Tour; and Albin from La Cage aux Folles, My analysis of these specific leading male roles uncovers how their relationships with their leading ladies defines their character in each of the musicals for which they were written. It also helped me define multiple characters in the course of a revue with no plot or storyline. Though all these male characters provided me with challenges, my greatest task was defining Albin in La Cage aux Folles. He provides a unique perspective in that he exemplifies a combination of both male/female characteristics. He is a man who regularly portrays a woman onstage in a drag club as well as assuming a female role in a homosexual relationship. He serves as the 'leading lady' for La Cage aux Folles though his character is considered a 'leading man' role. He is the consummate representation of all Jerry Herman leading roles, and embodies many of the themes Herman utilizes in all his work.

This thesis is a personal narrative of my experience as vocal coach on a production of Ken Ludwig's Shakespeare in Hollywood directed by BT McNicholl and performed in the Raymond Hodges Theatre of Virginia Commonwealth University in November 2005. Chapter one covers my identification of the play's vocal and aural challenges; what I did to prepare for those challenges; the research I gathered on 1930s Hollywood prototypes for the play; an examination of Shakespearean verse, especially that in "A Midsummer Night's Dream" and how Ludwig synthesized Shakespeare's verse with that of his own.Chapter two is divided into an account of the rehearsal process; a description of my sessions with the individual actors and an exploration of the dynamics of the vocal coach-director relationship. Chapter three focuses on the finished production and summarizes my response to the experience.

Syftet med arbetet har varit att nå utvecklad kännedom inom vokalproduktion genom att undersöka vad som kan göras för att höja kvaliteten på sången i en musikproduktion. En viktig fråga har varit om fokus, för att nå ett gott resultat, framförallt vikten på inspelningen av sången eller om mycket också kan göras genom efterbearbetning för att nå ett gott resultat. Under detta projekt har jag valt att arbeta med tre produktioner där min egen sång står i centrum. Dessa har lite olika stilar på sången och jag har valt just dessa för att utmana mig själv och se hur de olika sångerna ska poleras för att få sin plats i en slutgiltig produktion. För produktionen har jag använt mig av Logic Pro X som DAW. Resultatet är tre produktioner där jag bedömer att sången genom de produktionsmetoder som tillämpats har blivit betydligt bättre jämfört med tidigare produktioner som jag har genomfört. Bland de metoder och tekniker som jag tillämpat ingår programmet Melodyne som jag använt för att höja sångens kvalitet genom att sången blivit tightare och renare. Även equalizer ochkompressor har bidragit till att få sången att låta jämn. En viktig slutsats är att all sång, trots omfattande bearbetning med effektiva redigeringsverktyg, skulle behöva sjungas om innan de aktuella låtarna kan publiceras genom ett eventuellt släpp. / The aim of the work has been to gain advanced knowledge in vocal production by investigating different methods to raise the quality of the vocal parts in a music production. An important question has been whether the focus, to achieve a good result, mainly has to be the recording of the song or whether much can be done through post-processing in order to achieve a good result. During this project I have chosen to work with three productions where I sing the vocal parts myself. These have slightly different styles on the song and I have chosen just these to challenge myself and how to edit and produce the vocal part for at good result in the final production. For the production I have used Logic Pro X as DAW. The result is three productions where the production methods used, from my view, clearly has contributed to a better result compared with productions that I previously have performed. The methods and techniques that I have applied include the Melodyne software, which I have used to improve the quality of the song by making the song tighter and cleaner. Also equalizer and compressor have been used to improve the sound quality. However, it is important to conclude that the vocal parts in the productions, despite extensive processing with efficient editing tools, would need to be re-recorded before the songs can be published.

Cette thèse propose une réflexion sur le développement du sens musical de l’enfant tunisien de 6 à 13 ans dans le contexte musical particulier du XXIème siècle. La problématique de base est de savoir si la culture musicale tunisienne qui repose principalement sur une esthétique modale arabe favorise le développement d’un ensemble d’habitudes d’écoutes chez l’enfant tunisien en rapport avec le système modal arabe. Peut-on alors postuler l’existence d’un éventuel « sens modal » chez l’enfant tunisien qui se développe progressivement de 6 à 13 ans et qui favorise l’acquisition des éléments caractéristiques du système modal tels que les intervalles spécifiques à la gamme arabe, la hiérarchie modale et les formules-types spécifiques à un mode ? Dans son aspect théorique, cette étude qui revêt une dimension psychologique passe en revue l’ensemble de travaux en psychologie de la musique et en psychologie du développement musical qui se sont intéressés à l’étude de la perception musicale en général et à la perception de la tonalité en particulier. Dans son aspect pratique, elle reprend un principe d’expérience effectué par Le Professeur Imberty dans son étude de l‘acquisition des structures tonales chez l’enfant occidental. Cette expérience qui a été réadaptée au contexte de la musique modale repose sur l’idée de la succession de trois épreuves : une première épreuve de mémorisation immédiate, une deuxième épreuve d’achèvement mélodique et une troisième épreuve de production vocale. Mots clefs : Développement musical - sens musical- système modal arabe - enfant tunisien- mémorisation- achèvement mélodique – production vocale / The present thesis offers a reflection on the development of 6-to-13 year-old Tunisian children’s musical awareness in the musical context of the XXI century. The basic argument here is whether the Tunisian musical culture that resides primarily in Arabic modal aesthetical system promotes the development of some listening habits among Tunisian children. Also postulated is the development of a modal awareness among the of 6-to-13 years old Tunisian children which boosts the acquisition of particular features of the modal system such as the specific intervals in the range Arab modal scale, the modal hierarchy, and standard formulas specific to a given mode. In its theoretical aspect, this study holds a psychological dimension in its review of literature attendant to the disciplines of psychology of music and musical developmental psychology which are concerned with the study of musical perception in general and the perception of tone in particular. In its practical aspect, the study draws on experimental model advanced by Professor Imberty in his account of the acquisition of the tonal structure among the Western children. The experimental procedure here has been adapted to the context of modal music which is based on the idea of three successive testing episodes related to the working memory, melodic attainment, and melodic vocal production.Keywords: Musical development - musical awareness - Arabic modal system - Tunisian children - memory - melodic attainment - vocal production

Made available in DSpace on 2015-05-14T12:43:27Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 arquivototal.pdf: 1454620 bytes, checksum: 20676365cee0fb8168374042cecc7603 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2010-03-01 / Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior / This production had the intention to monitor the emergence of language as a multimodal instance in contexts of joint attention occurred in naturalistic situations of two motherbaby dyads, from seven to seventeen months of the child. Thus we work with the multimodal envelope perspective, i.e., the fusion of three components of the dialogism look, gestures and vocal production that emerge simultaneously. We consider the concept of multimodality proposed by McNeill (1985) as a mixture of the gesture-vocal actions. The studies in language acquisition and in nonverbal communication postulate theoretical assumptions about linguistic, paralinguistic and extralinguistic elements in a dissociated way. The first ones had as primacy the observation of interlocutors speech and writing in various contexts. The second type was justified as a complement to the linguistic and the extralinguistic elements were considered as accessories used as aids to the speech. Our results show that the mother uses the multimodal composition to address herself to the child who interacts as she acquires the three basic components of the dialogism. / Esta produção teve como intuito acompanhar a emergência da língua enquanto instância multimodal em contextos de atenção conjunta vividos em situações naturalísticas de duas díades mãe-bebê, dos 07 aos 17 meses de vida da criança. Para isso trabalhamos com a perspectiva de envelope multimodal, ou seja, a mescla de três componentes da dialogia olhar, gestos e produção vocal que emergem concomitantemente. Tomamos como premissa a noção de multimodalidade proposta por McNeill (1985) como sendo a mescla das ações gesto-vocais. Os estudos em aquisição de linguagem e de comunicação não-verbal postulavam aportes teóricos a respeito de elementos lingüísticos, paralingüísticos e extralingüísticos de forma dissociada. Os primeiros tinham como primazia a observação da fala e da escrita de interlocutores em vários contextos. O segundo tipo era justificado como complemento do lingüístico e os elementos extralingüísticos eram considerados como acessórios usados como auxiliares da fala. Nossos resultados mostram que a mãe faz uso do plano de composição multimodal para dirigir-se à criança que, por sua vez, interage à medida que adquire os três componentes básicos da dialogia.