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Doctor of Philosophy / Curriculum and Instruction Programs / Frederick Burrack / The purpose of this study was to discover the reasons that led high-achieving high school orchestra musicians to discontinue formal participation in collegiate orchestra class. Using narrative analysis, the researcher examined the intrinsic and extrinsic factors that influenced the student’s decision to not participate in orchestra. The researcher also sought to understand if and how these former high school musicians continued to make music on their own. Three current university students and their high school orchestra teachers were purposefully selected for the study. Data were collected through email queries, surveys, and personal interviews. Upon completion of the interview, the researcher summarized each interview into a narrative and shared it with the participant via email for member checking. Each participant was asked to provide feedback for the narrative and return it to the researcher. The researcher used Riessman’s (2008) adaptation of William Labov’s structural coding to analyze the data. Using Robichaux’s (2003) expansion of Labov’s coding, the researcher was able to establish a structural analysis of the narrative that reinforced the thematic analysis. The researcher coded each participant’s narrative along with that of his or her high school orchestra teacher. Coding was supported by NVivo software. Fact-checking of responses from the initial survey along with answers from the participants’ narrative and that of their high school director’s narrative allowed for a more robust and reliable narrative analysis. Definitive answers were not be sought or expected, but rather the collection of data led to a greater understanding and illustration of why the research participants chose to end their participation in orchestra rehearsals on the collegiate level. The participants offered diverse reasons for why they chose not to continue participating in college on the university level. Their reasons are described within six categories of intrinsic and extrinsic factors: (a) persistence; (b) self-concept of musical ability; (c) motivation for music; (d) parental musicianship and support; (e) director influence; and (f) socioeconomic status. Each participant could not name a single, defining factor that led him or her to discontinue participation in orchestra as each of the identified factors weighed differently for each person.

The Orchestra da Camera, founded in 1957 by Ralph and Flori Lorr, is a remarkable organization devoted to offering a variety of music experiences for public school students and the general population on Long Island, and in New York City. Despite the fact that the da Camera has received national recognition for the innovations it has made in bringing professionally performed music to public school students, and the population of the suburban area that offered a paucity of professional musical productions on a local level, there has never been any significant record made of this history of the da Camera, or of the founders. The purpose of this study has been to offer an oral history of the Orchestra da Camera, with a special emphasis on the etiology and progress of the da Camera as perceived by Ralph and Flori Lorr. With this history now recorded, it is possible that other musicians, music educators, and arts organizations might find it useful to refer to the da Camera as a model for future community and in-school music programming.

“Flare for orchestra based on poetry by Mary Oliver” is a three-movement work based on the poem “Flare,” by Mary Oliver. In “Flare,” the emotional and expressive content of the poetry is captured in the programmatic narrative of the music. Oliver’s poem also influences structural elements of the music. Another important feature of the music is the use of a dialectic approach to the many contrasting aspects of the poetry. The goal of “Flare” is to infuse numerous elements of the poetry into the music programmatically and structurally to create a shared creative experience of both the music and poetry. / text

In my years as a composer, I’ve had a great fascination with the concept of juxtaposition and superimposition of various moods and styles of music. Although I’d written many pieces before thesis, I had yet to examine the results of this polarization in music. Thus, the purpose of this present composition was to explore contrasting musical elements while combining them in a coherent, competent manner. To begin, I chose two differing instrumentations of which to amalgamate: strings and percussion. música dramática exploits the different timbres and colors of the instruments and presents them by a uniform method. Musical elements of the piece such as style, mood, harmony, melody, rhythm, tempo, register, and dynamics all work together in order to conform to a single composition no matter how jarring the differences may be. Altogether, the various elements of this single movement work for string orchestra and percussion were fused to create a well-balanced, well-proportioned piece of music. The results were spectacular: regardless of the extreme differences in the many factors of music, one coherent composition was formed. In música dramática, this single idea is brought to fruition. / text

Concerto for Marimba and Orchestra is a twenty-two minute work cast in a traditional three movement concerto form. The basic harmonic/melodic materials are hexads and complementary hexads built on intervallic projections as propounded in Howard Hanson's Harmonic Materials of Modern Music. The opening movement is in double exposition form with a cadenza before the recapitulation. Marimba techniques used in the opening movement include chromatic thirty-second notes, mirrored octaves and single hand alternate sticking patterns. The form of the second movement is a rondo song form: a- b- a (inversion)- b (inversion)- c- c (retrograde)- b (retrograde-inversion)- a. The marimba plays rolled chords throughout much of the movement. The form of the third movement is a fast sonata-rondo form: a - b - a - development - b - a - coda. The development section of this final movement develops materials from both of the preceding movements and thus creates a cyclic form for the work. Marimba techniques explored in the third movement include dead strokes, octave dead strokes alternating with rolled octaves and, thirty-second note hexad patterns in fast alternation with the orchestra. This movement also contains sections in which the xylophone plays in duet with the marimba. Some of the compositional techniques used in the Concerto for Marimba and Orchestra include rhythmic modulation, augmentation, diminution, ostinato, inversion, retrograde, mirroring, odd meters, fragmentation, parallel motion, contrary motion, African rhythmic structure, harmonization with complementary sets and register sweeps.

The original composition Bombasticism: Concerto for Four Percussion and Large Orchestra seeks to expand percussion ensemble literature, to the extent that the percussion quartet unites with the symphony orchestra in atypical fashion. This percussion quartet explores both expanded instrumentation as well as creates a homogenous new sound that suggests the importance of the percussion instrumentation collectively with wind and string instruments. Bombasticism diverges from traditional concerto by offering differing levels of soloist within the percussion quartet. The different levels of solo performance include; individual soloists in contrast to the percussion quartet, individual soloists layered within the percussion quartet in contrast to the orchestra, and the percussion quartet acting as a collective soloist in contrast to the full symphony orchestra. The percussion voice in Bombasticism shows wide variety not only as a rhythmic machine, but also plays an important melodic and harmonic role through the composition. Throughout the work, the percussion family contributes a complete array of sound to the composition in every aspect of musical language. Bombasticism is written in three movements. Each movement differs from the next in instrumentation, tempo, rhythmic intent, and pitch centers. The first movement, Skins, spotlight percussion instruments with drum heads. The timpani and roto-tom soloists will perform on pitched instruments, and the snare drum and bass drum soloists will perform on non-pitched instruments during the movement. Along with this instrumentation awareness, the primary compositional focus is rhythm. The second movement, Metal & Wood, utilizes percussion instruments that are made of metal or wood only. Pitched instruments include marimba, xylophone, glockenspiel, vibraphone, and chimes. Nonpitched instruments involved are woodblock, anvil, cymbals, and hi-hat. The primary focus of this movement is the exploration of various approaches to tonality. The third movement, Tutti Causatum, incorporates all the percussion instruments used in the first two movements. This movement is the most rhythmically active, as most of the movement is based on the groupings of two, three, and four sixteenth notes. Tutti Causatum is the final telling of how Bombasticism mingles all the timbres of the percussion family to create a balance and unity within the orchestra.

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Thesis advisor: Thomas Kaplan-Maxfield / Over the past few hundred years, classical music has developed its own society, which has become more and more separate from the day-to-day society that we all live in. This is a complex society, with its own rules, language, and a hierarchy of values that would seem silly in a more practical world. These different standards can often make classical music seem inapproachable to those outside of this world. In addition, the music itself can seem so foreign to those who are used to listening to popular music. Through these essays I will provide an explanation of conductors' and musicians' behavior, our attachment to our musical instruments, and how we can derive such passion and meaning from completely abstract music with no lyrics or explanation. In doing so, I hope to remove to some of the stereotypes, though only the false ones, and open up the doors to this world, so that more people can freely enter and exit. / Thesis (BA) — Boston College, 2004. / Submitted to: Boston College. College of Arts and Sciences. / Discipline: English. / Discipline: College Honors Program.