The composition is in seven major sections with a coda at the end. The work requires approximately fifteen minutes for performance. The discussion and analysis includes a description of the play and an explanation of the treatment of the elements of music. The work requires the following instrumentation: two flutes, two piccolos, two alto flutes, two oboes, two English horns, one bassoon, one contra-bassoon, one French horn, one trumpet, one flugelhorn, one melodion, one piano, one vibraphone, one xylophone, three timpani, mixed percussion, one solo soprano, two solo tenors, one solo bass, a choir of three women and two men, violin, and cello.

"A Lawn in the Sky" is a musical drama in two acts on a libretto by Katherine Hollander. The piece is based on the true story of Lieutenant Onoda Hiroo, a Japanese "straggler" who refused to believe that Japan had surrendered in World War II and continued to wage guerilla warfare in the jungles of the Philippines until 1974. The librettist constructed this fictionalized account drawing from information in newspaper articles and Onoda's memoir, No Surrender: My Thirty-Year War. While both Ms. Hollander and I referred to these historical sources, the story is a work of fiction, including a total cast of nine characters, several purely fictional. These roles are supported by an ensemble of Western instruments: flute, clarinet, saxophone, oboe, bassoon, percussion, piano, and contrabass; Japanese instruments: nohkan, shamisen, and taiko; and fixed media electronics. This mixed ensemble parallels the characters' divergent views of reality and offers opportunities for multidimensional commentary on both the libretto and the story. Included with this document is a supplemental zip file which contains the audio samples and sample players for the electronic portion of the score.

This thesis aims to examine the ways in which women are used as vehicles within the noh and kabuki theatre traditions to perpetuate moral and religious doctrine. Using the theoretical frameworks of Michel Foucault, Judith Butler, and Jill Dolan, I examine two plays which feature a female demon as their antagonist, Momijigari and Dojoji, and focus on the ways they incorporate Buddhist and Neo-Confucian ideology in their respective noh and kabuki renditions.

This paper is a study of the effect of W. B. Yeats's contact with Japanese Noh drama on his work. The immediately discernible effect on his work can be seen, of course, in his adaptation of Noh dramatic form to his Four Plays for Dancers and The Death of Cuchulain. It is the thesis of this paper, then, that, despite many handicaps, Yeats's aesthetic background was not only sufficient to discover what suggestion did lie in the limited information available to him concerning Noh, but also sufficient for him to intuit much of what wasn't suggested.

Japanese Devoutness and Religious Care Embodied in the Yokyoku Texts This Master's thesis deals with the religious issues within the texts of the medieval Noh plays, which are well known as the yokyoku. The thesis begins with an introduction with the main religious notions and the way of thinking in the period of japanese Middle Ages, in the time when the most of the Noh playwrights wrote their plays. Further more, the thesis provides the very first translation of the Noh play called Kinuta into the Czech language, so that it could be possible to thoroughly analyze its text in terms of religious issues' presence. The thesis also submits the similar analysis of other four plays, which deal almost the same topics. That research allows to arrange the list of religious links and references appearing in those texts. The list proves the presence of the religious issues within the particular artistic genre. Another part of the thesis provides a comparison of yokyoku texts with so called setsuwa legends of the Shasekishu collection, which represents a deeply moralizing work from the Middle Ages, just to identify exactly the degree of the religious devoutness within yokyoku texts. The thesis draws on information and knowledge upon the field of the japanese history, the japanese religious, as well as the...

À la suite de notre travail de maîtrise, qui a porté sur la Representação do Outro na História de Japam de Luis Fróis, et toujours à partir du même texte long et complexe de Fróis, mais placé dans le contexte extrêmement significatif d’autres écrivains portugais traitant de l’Expansion en Orient - , nous avons souhaité orienter notre recherche dans une nouvelle optique visant à comprendre comment l’histoire de la mission chrétienne au Japon - que Fróis nous raconte en détail-, a eu, dès son origine, une très nette conscience de la nécessité de connaître l’Autre, son histoire particulière, ses traditions et sa culture. C’est à partir de cette connaissance, dont Fróis veut être le premier diffuseur pour ce qui est du Japon, que l’on pouvait concevoir une présence efficace des missionnaires et en particulier des jésuites, il s’agissait de connaître suffisamment bien les us et coutumes des autochtones pour parvenir à maximiser l’efficacité rhétorique et missionnaire au Japon et, en général dans tout l’Orient. C’est donc en suivant cette perspective que nous abordons l’œuvre monumentale de Fróis mais en prenant le théâtre Nô, résultat d’une conception religieuse et aristocratique de la vie, et qui à son tour, a été utilisé comme une des «armes théologiques» mise en œuvre par les jésuites dans leur mission au Japon. Sans l’interférence d’éléments d’autre nature, cette situation a permis que, dans une certaine logique permettant d’aborder l’autre, cette démarche a pu être entreprise en se centrant sur les éléments culturels – et c’est justement là que nous voulons développer l’étude de cas, à laquelle nous nous référons avec le plus de pertinence: le théâtre Nô. Il ne s’agit pas ici d’une stratégie isolée, mais plutôt d’une pratique bien spécifique qui a contribué, comme beaucoup d’autres, au travail de la mission chrétienne, selon la conception et la description de Valignano et Fróis. En effet notre objectif est de souligner la manière dont certains éléments culturels, apparemment éloignés de la mission d’évangélisation, ont eu finalement une présence et joué un rôle tout à fait central. C’est pour cette raison qu’ici le théâtre Nô peut être perçu comme une étude de cas, en le considérant comme une stratégie paradigmatique de la mission. L’Expansion Maritime, dans son ensemble et particulièrement dans le cas du Portugal, a été une grande aventure de l’altérité à l’aube de la culture moderne. C’est en considérant le caractère international de la Compagnie de Jésus et aussi son indépendance relative par rapport à n’importe quel pouvoir politique, que nous avons essayé d’aborder sa mission chrétienne et de mettre en évidence les affinités idéologiques et stratégiques moins pragmatiques dans sa relation avec l’autre. Cet ensemble de circonstances singulières a permis que, dès lors que l’approximation de l’autre devenait plus étroite, c’était la nature même de l’autre qui s’imposait avec une présence bien plus importante, bien au-delà de n’importe quel autre intérêt qui aurait pu résulter de ce contact. / Following the previous research made for the Master's Thesis “The Representation of the Other on Luis Frois' History of Japam", we departure now - using the same long and complex text – focusing mostly on the significant writers in the context of the Portuguese Expansion to the East to understand the history of the Christian mission in Japan. Minutely narrated by Fróis since its beginning, showcasing a profound need for a knowledge of the "other", of his peculiar history, his traditions and his culture. Fróis became one of the first heralds of this knowledge, that in regard to Japan, could allow an effective presence of missionaries, in Japan particularly and in the East in general. To know enough about the culture and its indigenous habits was of the upmost importance to him, as for every other missionary. On this depended the successes of his mission. Such is our approach to the monumental work of Fróis, paying special attention, to the Noh Theater, as a case study, the result of a religious and aristocratic conception of life. That was one of the "theological weapons" used by Jesuit missionaries in Japan. The separation of spurious commitments, allowed in the logic of the approach to the other, have been valued cultural elements - and is perhaps precisely where we intend to put the case study that we reported in the most cohesive manner, the Noh theater. Not as a loose strategy, but as a specific practice that contributed, like many others, to work for missionary activities, as Valignano and Fróis have conceived and described. In fact, what this study intends to do is to emphasize how certain cultural elements, the game seemed distant from the work of evangelization, were eventually present in it and sometimes constituted a fundamental piece. That's why the Noh theater, as a case study can be seen as a paradigm of the missionary strategy. The Maritime Expansion as a whole - and in the Portuguese case in particular - is the great adventure of the otherness at the dawn of modern culture. Given the international character of the Society of Jesus and its relative independence from any political power, we will try and approach its missionary work highlighting the ideological and less pragmatic strategic seams in its relationship with the other. This set of unique circumstances that allowed the approach to the other have weighed over the other in himself, in what he has idiosyncratic, impenetrable and inviolable, to the detriment of the interest that could stem from that contact. / Na sequência do trabalho desenvolvido na Tese de Mestrado sobre a Representação do Outro na Historia de Japam de Luís Fróis, propomo-nos agora, e utilizando o mesmo longo e complexo texto de Fróis, tentar, embora contextualizando-o no quadro de um conjunto extremamente significativo de outros escritores portugueses sobre a Expansão no Oriente, compreender como a história da missionação cristã do Japão, que Fróis minuciosamente nos narra, desde o início incorporou uma funda necessidade de conhecimento do outro, da sua história peculiar, das suas tradições e da sua cultura. Só esse conhecimento, de que Fróis se faz um dos primeiros arautos no que ao Japão diz respeito, poderia permitir uma eficaz presença dos missionários, em particular jesuítas, no Japão, e no Oriente em geral. Importava-lhe, pois, como a todos os outros missionários, conhecer o suficiente sobre a cultura e os hábitos autóctones para poder ter o máximo de eficácia retórica e missionária no Japão. É este o processo que vamos seguir na nossa aproximação à monumental obra de Fróis, detendo-nos, como estudo de caso, no que é o Teatro Nô, fruto de uma concepção religiosa e aristocrática da vida, e que foi uma das “armas teológicas” utilizada pelos Jesuítas na missionação do Japão. A separação aqui de compromissos espúrios permitiu que na lógica da aproximação ao outro se tenham valorizado os elementos culturais – e é talvez justamente aí que pretendemos colocar o estudo de caso a que nos reportamos de forma mais coesa, o teatro Nô. Não como uma estratégia solta, mas como uma prática específica que contribuiu, como muitas outras, para o trabalho de missionação, tal como Valignano e Fróis o conceberam e descreveram. Na realidade, o que este trabalho pretende fazer é sublinhar a forma como certos elementos culturais, à partida parecendo distantes do trabalho de evangelização, estiveram afinal presentes nele e por vezes constituíram uma peça fundamental. É por isso que o teatro Nô, sendo um estudo de caso, pode em nosso entender ser considerado como uma estratégia paradigmática da missionação. A Expansão Marítima no seu conjunto, e no caso português em particular, é a grande aventura da alteridade no dealbar da cultura moderna. Tendo em conta o carácter internacional da Companhia de Jesus e a sua relativa independência face a qualquer poder político, tentaremos abordar a sua missionação procurando evidenciar as costuras ideológicas e estratégicas menos pragmáticas na sua relação com o outro. Esse conjunto de circunstâncias singulares permitiu que na aproximação ao outro tenha pesado mais o outro em si mesmo, no que ele tem de idiossincrático, intransponível e inviolável, em detrimento do interesse que poderia decorrer desse contacto.

An exploration into the influence of the noh and kabuki on the late plays of Tennesee Williams and the impact his friendship with Yukio Mishima had on his work.

No description available.

We have invented an in-plane all-photonic transduction method for photonic microcantilever arrays that is scalable to large arrays for sensing applications in both bio- and nanotechnology. Our photonic transduction method utilizes a microcantilever forming a single mode rib waveguide and a differential splitter consisting of an asymmetric multimode waveguide and a Y-branch waveguide splitter. The differential splitter's outputs are used to form a differential signal that has a monotonic response to microcantilever deflection. A differential splitter using an amorphous silicon strip-loaded multimode rib waveguide is designed and fabricated to demonstrate the feasibility of the in-plane photonic transduction method. Our initial implementation shows that the sensitivity of the device is 0.135×10^-3 nm^-1 which is comparable to that of other readout methods currently employed for static-deflection based sensors. Through further analysis of the optical characteristics of the differential splitter, a new asymmetric double-step multimode rib waveguide has been devised for the differential splitter. The new differential splitter not only improves sensitivity and reduces size, but also eliminates several fabrication issues. Furthermore, photonic microcantilever arrays are integrated with the differential splitters and a waveguide splitter network in order to demonstrate scalability. We have achieved a measured sensitivity of 0.32×10^-3 nm^-1, which is 2.4 times greater than our initial result while the waveguide length is 6 times shorter. Analytical examination of the relationship between sensitivity and structure of the asymmetric double-step rib waveguide shows a way to further improve performance of the photonic microcantilever sensor. We have demonstrated experimentally that greater sensitivity is achieved when increasing the step height of the double-step rib waveguide. Moreover, the improved sensitivity of the photonic microcantilever system, 0.77×10^-3 nm^-1, is close to the best reported sensitivities of other transduction methods (~10^-3 nm^-1).

This work examines how the aesthetics of Japanese actor and playwright Zeami Motokiyo (1346-1443) offers insight into the value of the unseen elements in art, specifically in the art of acting. What acting makes appear is likened to a vessel, which creates an empty space of what doesn’t appear. This non-appearing element is at the same time what gives the vessel its function. Nō theater is described as an art of suggesting, giving a background to Zeami’s theories. The importance of the tangible in Zeami’s aesthetics is underscored in a discussion of the technique, beauty, specificity, and variation implied by the principals of two basic arts, monomane, and hana. Then, the way the actor according to Zeami can make use of the unseen to fascinate the spectator is thoroughly investigated, relating it among other things to the question of emotion in western theory of acting, and the japanese concept of yūgen. Finally, Zeami’s concept of hana is described as relying on both what appears and what doesn’t appear, and the relevance of hana as a definition of the value of art is emphasized.