Abstract The English partsong originated in the early nineteenth century with the increasing demand for amateur choral activities. Later on, through the promotion of ¡§Renaissance¡¨ in the romantic period, the English partsongs continued to develop to maturity in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Elgar is an important English partsong composer. His early English partsongs, from 1890 to 1900, display a great partnership between text and music. The literature he chose shows his sophisticated and witty mind. The music is very close to the text in character. Elgar uses flowing lyric melodies, chromatic harmonic color, varied musical treatment in different sections of the poetry, and great rhythm to illustrate the text. This thesis consists of five chapters. The first chapter is the introduction. The second chapter includes four parts. Part one describes the background of ¡§Renaissance¡¨ of the late nineteenth century in England. Part two is the chronological discussion of three music styles of English partsongs. Part three introduces the background and major works of Elgar. Part four expounds on three styles of Elgar¡¦s partsongs according to his composing skill. The third chapter analyzes four pieces of Elgar¡¦s early partsongs. The fourth chapter presents proposals for the interpretation of the early partsongs of Elgar, which focus on tone quality, tempo and rhythm, dynamics and texture, and conducting gesture. The fifth chapter draws conclusions from the study.

John Rutter, a world-famous British choral conductor and composer, was educated well in his childhood and the choral experience during that time has helped him to become an outstanding musician. After he was well-known, he not only established the Cambridge Singers and Collegium label, but also spared no pains to spread choral music such as being a guest-conductor or lecturer around the world. Three Birthday Madrigals was completed in 1997. It¡¦s for two to four part female chorus and is a rearrangement from Birthday Madrigals, a choral suite including five pieces of music for mixed choir that was commissioned by Brian Kay to celebrate the seventy-fifth birthday of the great jazz pianist, George Shearing, in 1995. The texts of Three Birthday Madrigals all came from the eminent poet of Elizabethan Era of the late Renaissance Period; The first piece It was a lover and his lass came from William Shakespeare¡¦s As You Like It, the second piece My true love hath my heart is a sonnet, coming from Sir Philip Sidney¡¦s Arcadia, and the third piece When daisies pied combined William Shakespeare¡¦s Love's Labour's Lost with George Peele¡¦s The Old Wives¡¦ Tale. Rutter used two distinguished styles in Three Birthday Madrigals. He applied the jazz style to describe the delightful feeling of the first piece and the relaxing and pleasing feeling of the third piece. He utilized the English Partsong tradition when expressing the touching and profound love of the second piece. The most noticeable feature of the first piece is the dotted rhythm. Rutter indicated that the dotted eighth and sixteenth notes should be performed with a two-to-one ratio to interpret the swing style. The piano accompaniment sentence is extremely important, and improvisation-like manner will determine the jazz flavor firmly. The second piece preserves the unique aesthetic quality of pure human voices by having the singing a cappella. The first soprano part carries the melody most of time with the other voices supplying the harmonies. The third piece is a jazz waltz. It is similar with the first piece; the piano accompaniment plays an important role in creating atmosphere jazz and in enriching the musical color. Rutter applied smooth line against syncopation and clothed each section with legato and staccato simultaneously to make contrast. Therefore, when interpreting this piece, the choir should express the contrast clearly to make the music lively and attractive. This master report consists of seven parts: the preface, a biographic sketch of John Rutter, Rutter¡¦s compositional genres, Rutter¡¦s choral music, a biographic sketch of three poets, analysis and interpretation of Three Birthday Madrigals, and the conclusion. There are two appendices at the end of this paper. Appendix A supplies two e-mail letters from Rutter. Appendix B is a list of Rutter¡¦s published secular choral music.

The findings of this study should prove to be a boon to all those who enjoy performing madrigals, for through the cooperation of the leading music publishing houses in this country, a complete authoritative list of fine madrigals has been gathered. Many of these will be new both to the performers and the public.