Allen Forte's theory of pitch-class set structure has provided useful tools for discovering structural relationships in atonal music. As valuable as set—theoretic procedures are for composers and analysts, the extent to which set relationships are perceptible by the listener largely remains to be investigated. This study addresses the need for aural-perceptual considerations in analysis, reviews related research in music perception, and poses questions concerning the aural perceptibility of set relationships. Specifically, it describes and presents the results of a computer-assisted experiment in testing the perceptibility of set-equivalency relationships.

The purpose of this study is to reveal the evolutionary and revolutionary aspects of using computers to word- and tone-paint in choral-electroacoustic (CEA) works. An extended account is made of word- and tone-painting's history in selected works from the Renaissance through the Twentieth Century to establish their use as a choral music tradition, followed by an examination of three recent CEA works: Scott Wyatt's A Time of Being, Scott Miller's Dies Sanctificatus, and Reginald Bain's When I Consider the Heavens. In all instances, word- and tone-painting are identified and assigned meaning utilizing Irving Godt's "Systematic Classification of Semantic Text Influences." A chapter outlining the challenges of programming CEA works is included, along with suggestions for how conductors can meet those challenges. In addition to Godt's "Classification," a brief history of the development of computers as a musical resource and information regarding Reginald Bain's work appear in the appendices.Among the results of this study are: a confirmation of word- and tone-painting as a vital, continuing tradition in choral music; a clarification of the distinctions and overlap between word-painting, tone-painting, and rhetoric; an affirmation of Irving Godt's classification system's usefulness; and an identification of the computer's capabilities that make the machine's use evolutionary and revolutionary. The computer's most revolutionary capability is its virtually limitless ability to create, shape, and manipulate sound. As the examination of the three CEA works in this study illustrates, the computer's revolutionary potential has only begun to be utilized, and the possibilities of creating compositionally mature CEA works only begun to be realized.

Computers have been assisting in recording, sound synthesis and other fields of music production for quite some time. The actual performance of music continues to be an area in which human players are chosen over computer performers. Musical performance is an area in which personalization is more important than consistency. Human players play with each other, reacting to phrases and ideas created by the players that they are playing with. Computer performers lack the ability to react to the changes in the performance that humans perceive naturally, giving the human players an advantage over the computer performers. This thesis creates a framework for describing unique musical performers that can play along in realtime with human players. FrTime, a reactive programming language, is used to constantly create new musical phrases. Musical phrases are constructed by unique user programmed performers and by chord changes that the framework provides. The reactive language creates multiple musical phrases for each point in time. A simple module which chooses musical phrases to be performed at the time of performance is created.