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My final project for the D.M.A. in composition consists of a Requiem Mass honoring the victims of the Iraqi war, a conflict that has stirred public debate since the invasion of Iraq in 2003. It is not meant as a political statement; rather, it is intended as a tribute in the broadest sense--not only for the combatants who lost their lives, but also for the innocent citizens caught in the cross-fire, all the families left in grief, and the returning soldiers whose lives were altered if not shattered by the experience of war. It speaks to the devastating toll war has on society in general. The Requiem lasts approximately 56 minutes. Except for the Sanctus, the seven movements of the work are all performed contiguously. It is scored for mixed chorus; SSAATBB, a solo, coloratura soprano, solo tenor and orchestra (3333 2431, 2 harps, percussion and strings). Mass for a Time of War reflects a broad array of stylistic impulses from the medieval through the present day, all the while transcending the boundaries of the various musical gestures and resources. These influences include: Schoenberg's signature hexachord pair (012569) (013478), the tone row from Webern's Op. 21 Symphony (1928), Charles Ives's The Unanswered Question (1906), Stravinsky's Requiem Canticles (1966), Messiaen's Quartet for the End of Time (1941), Franz Liszt's Via Crucis (LW J33) and the Kyrie from Haydn's Mass in C major, Paukenmesse (Hob. XXII: 9). Techniques of contrafactum, serialism, including a section of total serialization as well as an aleatoric passage, are of structural importance in the work. Several new compositional methods developed for the Credo include the use of a matrix multiplier on rhythmic and tone rows to produce a new row--albeit a tonal one--and a procedure the author calls "rhythmic resonances." In Mass for a Time of War, texts and chants from the Missa pro defunctis [Mass for the Dead] are interwoven with Czeslaw Milosz's poem Meaning, and serve as structural scaffolding throughout. The choices of additional texts and what the author terms "musical subtexts" that surround the scaffolding of the Latin are selected and positioned to heighten the unfolding narrative. The texts from the Mass for the Dead anchors the Requiem, while the emotional thrust is guided by Milosz's Meaning. Although the Latin texts are deeply religious, they have been taken from their familiar context by aligning them with prose and poetry. It was not intended to remove their religious connotations, but to instead expand their significance to a metaphoric stature. Additional texts include Emily Dickinson's stark poem on death, LXXVI, several lines from Rainer Maria Rilke's The Ninth Duino Elegy, texts from Eugene O'Neill's Mourning Becomes Electra, The Red Badge of Courage by Stephen Crane, Dexter Filkin's The Forever War, texts in both the Ancient Greek and English translation of Homer's Iliad, Erich Maria Remarcque's All Quiet on the Western Front, several texts from The New York Times Magazine and New Yorker Magazine articles, as well as the names of victims on both sides of the war. The arrangement of the texts and subtexts are consciously meant to imitate "cut-up" poetry or fiction, also called découpage, a form that takes small sections of words from existing poems as well as additional texts, such as those from newspapers and magazines and rearranges them to create new poems or other texts. The dichotomy of tonal and atonal impulses, compositional constructs that informed other of my compositions, form some structural basis for the work. Choice of these and other musical procedures is not arbitrary. They are not reasons in themselves, or meant to form a new mode of expression or imitate a particular musical style. Rather they support a dramatic narrative with deep resonances and historical allusion, one that draws the listener into the emotional substance of the difficult, often brutal dilemmas of war that humankind has wrestled and struggled with since before the printed word. / Music Composition / Accompanied by one .doc Microsoft Word document: Mass For A Time of War (score).

Percevoir la parole dans le bruit devient difficile en vieillissant. La nature de ces difficultés est incertaine, mais le déclin lié à l’âge de la structure de la voie dorsale de la parole pourrait être un facteur contributif. La pratique du chant choral pourrait aider à ralentir le vieillissement de la voie dorsale de la parole, mais les effets du chant choral sont peu connus. Les objectifs de ce mémoire étaient d’investiguer la relation entre le déclin structurel de la voie dorsale et les difficultés de perception de la parole, et d’identifier comment la pratique du chant choral modifie cette relation. Dans le cadre de ce mémoire, 44 chanteurs et 41 non-chanteurs jeunes et âgés ont complété une séance d’imagerie par résonance magnétique, ainsi que des évaluations cognitives et auditives. Un sous groupe a effectué une tâche de discrimination de syllabes dans le bruit. Dans une première étude, des avantages comportementaux ont été observés pour des chanteurs âgés avec certaines caractéristiques liées à leur pratique, ce qui suggère que le chant bénéficie à la perception de la parole seulement dans certaines conditions. Ces avantages ont été associés à la structure corticale de régions de la voie dorsale de la parole. Dans une deuxième étude, le déclin structurel de segments fronto-temporaux du faisceau arqué, qui constitue l’un des principaux faisceaux de matière blanche de la voie dorsale de la parole, a été associé aux difficultés de perception de la parole. De plus, des différences dans la structure du faisceau arqué ont été identifiées entre les groupes, mais ces différences n’étaient pas associées à la perception de la parole. En somme, ce mémoire apporte de nouvelles connaissances sur la nature des difficultés de perception de la parole, les effets du chant choral sur cette capacité ainsi que les mécanismes neurobiologiques sous-tendant ces effets. / Perceiving speech in noise becomes difficult in aging. The causes of these difficulties are mixed, but age-related decline of the dorsal speech stream may be a contributing factor. The practice of choral singing may help slow brain aging, but the effects of choral singing are not well known. The objectives of this master’s thesis were to investigate the relationship between the structural decline of the dorsal speech stream and difficulties in speech perception, and to identify how this relationship is modified by the practice of choral singing. 44 singers and 41 non-singers, young and old, completed a magnetic resonance imaging session, as well as cognitive and auditory assessments. A subgroup completed a syllable discrimination in noise task. In the first study, behavioural benefits were observed for older singers with certain characteristics related to their practice, suggesting that choral singing has the potential to benefit speech perception only under certain conditions. These benefits were particularly associated with the structure of regions of the dorsal speech stream. In a second study, the decline in the structure of several frontotemporal segments of the arcuate fasciculus,one of the main white matter fasciculi constituting the dorsal speech stream, was associated with the decline in speech perception. In addition, differences in structural asymmetry of the arcuate fasciculus were identified between groups, but these differences were not related to speech perception. In sum,these studies clarify the origin of speech perception difficulties in noise, the effects of choral singing on this ability, and the mechanisms underlying these effects.

Currently in Japan there are 5,202 choirs registered as part of the Japan Choral Association. The majority of these choirs are amateur or professional choirs. This situation contrasts with that in the United States where colleges and universities are the primary entities perpetuating the advancement of the choral art. Most likely because of this, there is little if any academic investigation of modern Japanese choral music. Even in Japan, there is not a substantial body of academic study of this literature. As a result, this repertoire is seldom, if ever, performed outside of Japan.Numerous problems confront Western choral conductors interested in programming modern Japanese choral music that is based on traditional Japanese musical idioms. In this document, I have provided information that will allow Japanese choral literature to be accessible to non-Japanese speaking conductors. This information is divided into four areas. First, an overview of Japanese music history is provided. Next, a discussion of the elements of traditional Japanese music such as genre types, modes and tonalities provides the necessary background for a conductor to approach modern Japanese choral music. Third, a practical method whereby non-Japanese speaking choral conductors may transcribe the two phonetic Japanese alphabets into readable English phonetics is proposed. Fourth, a practical approach to the performance of modern Japanese choral music, inclusive of various musical genres, voicing, and instrumental complements is suggested. Discussion of representative choral works by three native composers including a work based on a folk tune, a work for women's chorus, a work for men's chorus, and a composition for mixed chorus and traditional Japanese instrumental complement provides concrete application of the aforementioned discussions.Lastly, in this document I will provide information on several contemporary native Japanese composers, their compositions, and their publishing companies to facilitate the acquisition and performance of this rich choral repertory.

Estonian composer Veljo Tormis (1930-2017) is one of the most prolific in his country’s history. A significant portion of his writing has been for choirs. Tormis composed most of his works under Soviet rule. During this communist reign of Estonia, Tormis turned to using traditional music. The source material for a large portion of Tormis’ choral output is regilaul, a type of ancient Estonian folk song. In 1991, Estonia gained their independence, thereby allowing Tormis’ compositions to be more easily seen, heard, and performed around the world. This dissertation presents a conductor’s analysis of a set of choral cycles composed by Tormis between 1964 and 1969, Looduspildid, or Nature Pictures. A set of cycles representing all of the seasons and incorporating prominent Estonian poetry, Loodispuldid represents one of Tormis’ most important works. It illustrates Tormis’ maturing style as he utilized a variety of 20th Century techniques like extended tertian harmonies, modal scales, pandiatonicism, clusters, and mixed meters. Tormis also employs his own orchestrally-derived techniques of carefully constructed simultaneous articulations along with cumulative chording. Each cycle contains its own unique style and feel. Sügismaastikud is perhaps the most tonal of the four. Most movements are pandiatonic and one uses the whole tone scale. On a macro level, Sügismaastikud moves from soft in the earlier movements to a fff climax on the final chord of the last movement. Talvemustrid also begins at a very soft dynamic level on a unison D4, grows to multiple ff dynamics throughout, and ends back at a soft dynamic on Db. The cycle is more harmonically adventurous than Sügismaastikud, with consistent chromaticism, octatonic scale, and marked dissonance. Suvenmotiivid only contains three movements, but continues the harmonic and rhythmic complexity of Sügismaastikud. The first movement, Põualim, immediately begins on a tritone with octatonic scale. Different meters occur simultaneously during the second movement, which also moves quickly through 4 keys. The final movement ends with orchestral voicing and a 10-note chord cluster. Kevadkillud contains six very short movements, most of which are pandiatonic like Sügismaastikud. There is far less chromaticism and harmonic complexity than the middle two cycles, almost as if Tormis is bringing the set full circle. Moreover, the final movement of this cycle (and the entire set) is really just one major chord with embellishments. As a set, Loodispuldid represents a thorough perspective of Tormis’ mature style. The analyses done as a part of this paper reveal an incredible efficiency in his writing. Motives have purpose and context. Each movement possesses a well-defined harmonic language and rhythmic identity. A variety of formal structures exist, from binary to rondo. Even the many through-composed movements are expertly crafted with clear direction.

It is the hope and belief of the writer that this thesis will make available in concise form much information which the ambitious director of a high school a cappella choir would be unable to obtain without expending considerable time and energy.

The traditional music of America in collection is musically representative of pioneer settlements of the country from Mexico to Canada and from the Pacific to the Atlantic Ocean. To insure that each section of this vast country was musically represented naturally would require a systematic and thorough coverage by those persons who have made this work their primary concern for a good many years. A look at the map of these United States gives the observer an acute awareness of the stupendous undertaking for those who were first to begin their trek into the regions of the land where folk song abounds, into communities into which fast-moving civilization has been slow to penetrate. Early in their history these communities were isolated because of the hardships and dangers of travel. With the spread of civilization, however, the country was tamed and became more densely populated so that the growth of folk song and traditions within the social life of these isolated communities was a natural sequence.

The sacred anthem has had a unique conception and development that compares readily to that of other major forms of sacred music. Since an abundance of this music is used in our services, it is the purpose of this study to trace the history of the anthem from its origin in the early Tudor period to its culmination in the works of William Byrd. A special study will be made of the anthems by this master of the form.