Thesis (Ph. D.)--North Texas State University, 1980. / Typescript. Includes the author's English translation of J.M. Hauer's Vom Wesen des Musikalischen ; Vom Melos zur Pauke ; and Zwölftontechnik. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 293-299).

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Princeton University, 1972. / Typescript. "This essay and the composition '91 plus 5' together constitute the dissertation." Includes bibliographical references (leaf 79).

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Princeton University, 1985. / This essay and the composition "Clarinet Quartet" together constitute the dissertation but are otherwise unrelated. Includes bibliographical references (leaves [123]-139 (vol. 1)) and index.

The 1961 Hammer horror film, The Curse of the Werewolf, paired innovative make-up and set design with the avant-garde music of Benjamin Frankel (1906-1973). Frankel’s concert works had by this time embraced serialism, but The Curse of the Werewolf was his sole attempt at composing an almost entirely serial film score. This music more fully bridged the divide between the continental modernist practices found in his concert works with more conventional film music techniques. Thus, The Curse of the Werewolf’s score represents a crucial point in Frankel’s broader creative development as a composer who increasingly embraced twelve-tone methods in his concert works. Drawing from historical surveys, analytical scholarship, journal articles, and Frankel’s own writings, this thesis provides historical context surrounding Frankel’s life and involvement with the film. Most importantly, this study examines Frankel’s implementation of serialism in The Curse of the Werewolf’s score and its relation to the film’s visual and narrative components. I examine three pivotal scenes through traditional film music analysis combined with twelve-tone analysis. These analyses show how Frankel pairs motives with onscreen characters and situations while still embracing serial methods. This study sheds light on serialism’s application in film through the work of an overlooked British composer.

In 1924, Herbert Eimert’s Atonale Musiklehre was the first published text to describe a systematic approach to composing atonal music. It contains significant contributions to the discourse on the early development of twelve-tone composition. While Eimert uses the term “atonal” to describe his compositional approach, his definition of atonality demands that all twelve tones be present with none repeated, and that they present as complexes not ordered rows. Eimert’s discussion of atonality differs from others of the same period because he focuses on vertical sonorities and introduces “interlocking complexes”, wherein two separate statements of the aggregate can overlap by one pitch or by a set of pitches. Interlocking complexes are an important feature of Eimert’s string quartet Fünf Stücke für Streichquartett, which was published in 1925 and composed at the same time as Atonale Musiklehre was written. In the foreword to Atonale Musiklehre, Eimert clarifies that he is not the originator of the concept of atonality, rather that he absorbed the ideas of Josef Matthias Hauer and Jefim Golyscheff. Twelve-tone complexes appear first in Golyscheff’s 1914 String Trio. He refers to them as “twelve-tone duration complexes” and labels them in the score. As the name “duration complexes” implies, there are examples of serial rotation of rhythm in the Trio, a technique that is not developed further until the 1950s. Combined with the text of Atonale Musiklehre, the compositions of Golyscheff and Eimert from the year immediately following the book’s publication provide insight into the early development of “atonality” and twelve-tone compositional methods. Investigation of these documents that have not been thoroughly discussed in print provides a broader perspective of the development of these methods of composition.

The performance of vocal works using the twelve-tone technique requires thorough study of complex rhythms, non-tonal melodies, non-traditional notations, and specific musical terms. They generally also require advanced and varied vocal techniques. Twelve-tone vocal works often contain unusual features vital to the composer's intention. One of the premiere twelve-tone composers in the United States, Donald Martino (1931-2005) composed only two solo vocal works using the twelve-tone technique: Three Songs (1955) and Two Rilke Songs (1961). He has explored innovative and progressive uses of the twelve-tone technique, and composed music with particular methods of his own, later used by other composers. Three Songs, his first twelve-tone work, and Two Rilke Songs, the only twelve-tone song cycle in his mature style, present comparable features in his use of the twelve-tone technique, text setting, and notations. The variety of ways in which Martino uses these features in the song cycles is discussed in the performance guide. The intention of the present study is to help performers, especially singers, understand Donald Martino's two twelve-tone song cycles, and to aid in the preparation of an excellent performance. The study includes a study of historical context, the poems, and Martino's compositional and aesthetic approaches to setting them. It also offers practical and systemized ways of analyzing and preparing Martino's songs for performance. It is hoped that the methods suggested herein will reduce a singer's difficulties and rehearsal time with the pianist. The present study will offer a valuable addition to the literature on the performance practice of twelve-tone vocal music, and provide insight and advice on how to practice and perform other non-tonal music. This method of study may be applied to other contemporary music. Doing so can in turn help develop a singer's skill in handling tonal and rhythmic difficulties of all kinds, including non-traditional notations.

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The real importance of the twelve-tone system would seem to lie in its structural possibilities. It combines the inherent potentialities of the theme of a movement in sonata form with those of the theme of a fugue and of variations. It creates a coherent texture throughout the single movements and the work as a whole. It is needless to say that this kind of coherence can also be achieved in serial compositions, that is, in movements in which not the full row of twelve tones, but only seven or eight or nine tones form the basic row.