School of Music

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A comparative analysis of Frank Martin’s "Ballade" for flute and "Ballade" for trombone.
(2015-07-21) Brandt, Emily, 1990-; Lai, Eric C.
Swiss composer Frank Martin (1890-1974) wrote six single-movement pieces for six different solo instruments and accompaniment between 1938 and 1972, all titled Ballade. The Ballade for trombone (1940) and the Ballade for flute (1939) are the two shortest of the six, and they share much in common formally, harmonically, and motivically. Martin portrays the soloist as a storyteller in these compositions, and uses several compositional techniques throughout both works to accomplish this. This study compares these two pieces and provides insight into the connections that Martin draws between them.
A practical theology of online and hybrid worship.
(2023-08) Huerter, Michael E., 1991-; Ingalls, Monique Marie.
This dissertation presents a historical, theological, and ethnographic study of media technologies and their use in musical Christian worship and other mediated community rituals. In this dissertation, I argue that responsible engagement with online worship and digital religious rituals necessitates being aware of historical patterns of how churches have responded to technological innovation, reframing four important concepts, and reimagining community by attending to the specific affordances of online media. Historical patterns can be seen in the arrival and impact of the printing press, the radio, and the television; each new technology raised pressing questions, challenged existing structures, and changed how church music was made and shared. These patterns can lead to greater understanding of the Internet and its effect on church music. In a time when online information and connections are overabundant, and human attention to meaningful relationship and formation are scarce, practices of Christian discipleship must take these cultural and technological forces into account. The four concepts mentioned above include participation, embodiment, mediation, and virtuality. These categories are sticking points in popular conversations around online worship practices, and the discipline of church music must deepen and clarify its understanding of and use of these terms in order for scholarship to meet the needs of practitioners and local communities. Examining these topics through an interdisciplinary lens allows the discipline of church music to move toward a hybrid understanding of music ministry that includes both online and offline experiences, as the rest of human life in the twenty-first century does. To further this conversation, I offer digital ethnography of several online communities. These communities are not all associated with religious practices per se, but they offer instructive patterns of the community-forming possibilities available in the digital age. This dissertation offers new perspectives on crucial issues facing church music in the twenty-first century. Particularly since the sudden shift to online worship in early 2020 necessitated by the COVID-19 pandemic, these questions are essential and of existential concern for the future of the church.
American diversity and the genesis of Mass settings following the Second Vatican Council : a case study of "Mary Lou’s Mass" and "La misa panamericana".
(2015-07-31) Favinger, Sarah Catherine, 1990-; Colman, Alfredo.
This thesis will examine how ethnic diversity in American Catholicism contributed to the development of vernacular Mass settings in the wake of the Second Vatican Council. The case studies, Mary Lou’s Mass and La misa panamericana, represent two large ethnic groups within the American Catholic populace. Through examination of musical aesthetics from two cultural traditions, African-American and Mexican-American, and their integration into the Catholic Mass, the thesis will explore how the United States’ diverse Catholic population benefited from the changes of the Second Vatican Council.
"Arkhē" : for mezzo-soprano, tenor, double bass, percussion, and electronics.
(May 2023) Winningham, Max, 1997-; McAllister, Scott.
In this composition for two voices, double bass, percussion, and electronics, two individuals regard the night sky and experience disparate internal reactions to its expanse. Unlike many other pieces for more than one voice, these two characters never interact directly. Instead, their words and worldviews are juxtaposed to create a composite meaning from their feelings of fear and wonder towards the cosmos.
The blending of African-American and European aesthetics in the guitar performance of British blues from 1965 to 1967.
(2010-02-02T19:55:50Z) Kelly, Patrick T. (Patrick Thomas), 1965-; Boyd, Jean Ann.; Music.; Baylor University. School of Music.
British blues guitarists emerging in the mid-1960s incorporated a musical vocabulary which borrowed heavily from recordings of the modern blues' African-American, postwar originators. Crucial differences in the way the British interpreted this material in their own recorded performances are reflective of deeply embedded aesthetics unique to their European musical heritage and cultural experience. Through the detailed analysis of transcribed performances by British guitarists in comparison to performances by the African-American guitarists they sought to emulate, the syntactical elements of these differences are observable. Using this comparative methodology, this study gathers evidence of the blending of European and African-American aesthetics in sample British blues guitar performances from 1965 to 1967. Placing this musical evidence into context amid the cultural and ideological currents affecting Great Britain during the mid-1960s offers insight to the societal and philosophical forces shaping this influential strand of blues development.
Church music through the lens of performance : the embodied ritual of sacred play.
(2018-06-11) Silva Steuernagel, Marcell, 1979-; Ingalls, Monique Marie.
Scholars who address religious music making in general, and Christian church music in particular, use “performance” in a variety of ways and under varying constellations of assumptions, creating confusion around the term and its uses. Similar complications characterize the way church music practitioners talk about performance. This dissertation is an investigation of church music through the lens of performance theory, with the aim of providing a vocabulary for church music scholars and practitioners to speak of church music as performance. The thesis of the research is that in the activity of church music, all involved are performing, be it from the platform or from the seats, in accordance with performance theory’s proposition that performance is both acting and doing (Schechner 2003). Using a hybrid methodology that couples theory from anthropology (specifically ritual studies), ethnomusicology, theology, and church music scholarship with ethnographic research, this dissertation establishes performance studies as a possible “next step” in church music scholarship, investigates church music from the perspectives of ritual, embodiment, and processes of making special, play and change. It also demonstrates the feasibility of studying church music as performance using the vocabulary developed in the dissertation. By providing a performance language for the study of church music, this dissertation contributes to scholarship and furthers interdisciplinary investigations of religious music making in context.
Comparative repression: examples of musical repression by Hitler, Stalin, and Mao.
(2007-02-14T21:50:05Z) Maine, Rachel J.; Boyd, Jean Ann.; Music.; Baylor University. School of Music.
This thesis examines acts of musical repression conducted in Germany, Russia, and China under the governments of Hitler, Stalin, and Mao. These countries and their repressive periods are compared in several different ways: the historical condition of these countries immediately prior to the repressive periods, the political philosophies of the leaders, the repressive methodology, and various examples of accepted and rejected music. Also, this study limits itself to a particular time span for each country. The evidence from Germany comes from the Nazi period (1933-1945), the repressive period in Russia is limited to "The Great Terror" (1935-1941), and the period in China focuses on the Cultural Revolution (1966-1976). Musically, examples are selected to represent accepted and rejected music, and many of the pieces are compoitsion that either began as political works or provoked strong political responses. The overall goal of such a comparison is the formation of a viewpoint that sees all of this music in its larger context, as music of repressions, and in its individual context, as music from each specific culture.
Composers as spiritual mediators : Henryk Górecki and John Luther Adams.
(2012-08-08) Cooper, S. Grant (Steven Grant); Boyd, Jean Ann.; Music.; Baylor University. School of Music.
This thesis considers how composers act as agents of spiritual mediation. It examines two individuals of divergent philosophical and cultural perspectives. Henryk Górecki and John Luther Adams responded to twentieth-century crises with two signature works that reflect a desire to remediate the suppression of spiritual forces. Górecki’s Miserere, opus 44 is a plea for reconciliation prompted by the abuse of Poland’s Solidarity movement, and is examined as a product of political and religious oppression in the composer’s nation, and as an invocation of Roman Catholic traditions that relate to its biblical text. John Luther Adams’s In the White Silence, a defense of wilderness places in Alaska, is examined as an outgrowth of environmental activism that resulted in a musical idiom based on ecological principles. The object of this study is to illuminate the role of composers as mediators between corporeal and incorporeal forces, manifesting the spiritual exigencies of mankind.
"Cycles" for full orchestra and electronics.
(2016-11-14) Steely, Adrienne, 1991-; McAllister, Scott.
The piece “Cycles” for full orchestra and electronics takes inspiration from the cycles of the earth. Specifically, the piece describes elastic rebound theory in the first movement, cycles of water in the second movement, and the life cycle of birth to birth in the third. The movements are titled “Elastic Rebound,” “Whilst waves marked time,” and “Star Matter,” respectively. “Cycles” incorporates several different compositional styles. The first movement, “Elastic Rebound,” was written using serialist techniques, with earthquake data driving the pitch content. The other two movements, however, are post-minimalist in style with repetitive melodic content against a steady pulse. The electronics included in this piece are audio tracks that are to be played along with the performance. These tracks include sounds representative of earthquake data, as well as sound clips from oceans and animals.
Danube to the stars : a study in the application of compositional techniques to vernacular media.
(2021-05-04) Townsend, Nicholas Wayne, 1997-; McAllister, Scott.
This project is a full-length album of my own composition. Every instrumental track and every vocal track was performed by me, with the exception of the spoken vocals. The texts were composed by two of my old high school friends. My goal in creating this album was to reconcile all of the separate musical worlds in which I work, applying the compositional techniques I have learned from studying concert music. The following paper consists of brief analyses of each of the tracks with embedded notation examples. The full orchestral score to “Space Diamond Deluxe” is provided as a supplement. Audio files for each of the tracks are provided as well.
A discussion of the choral music of Samuel Barber.
(2008-08-25T16:25:35Z) Berg, Michael W.; Boyd, Jean Ann.; Music.; Baylor University. School of Music.
Within the world of music history, choral music seems to drop off of the map with the end of the Baroque era, and only a handful of major works, such as masses and oratorios, are typically studied in an academic setting. As a result, many exquisite pieces are often largely neglected in many music history courses and textbooks, and it is my firm belief that such a neglect is to our detriment. With that in mind, I have undertaken a study of the published choral music of Samuel Barber (1910-1981). In this thesis, I undertake a study of Barber’s music by observing stylistic techniques in his choral music, particularly those techniques that remain consistent throughout his choral works.
Ecstatic Utterances explained : a companion to Ecstatic Utterances.
(2013-05-15) Simmons, Jim (James D.); McAllister, Scott.; Music.; Baylor University. School of Music.
This paper provides technical and philosophical insight into the composition Ecstatic Utterances. Three distinguishing approaches feature in this thesis: strands, and their accompanying theory; harmonic crescendo and a limited aleatory passage. Of greatest importance amongst these three is the concept of a strand, and the possibilities obtaining therein; possibilities which have crystallized in the writer’s musical and verbal expression, providing methods for both composition and analysis. While these methods remain in need of development, important strides have already been taken: a detailed analysis of portions of Ecstatic Utterances and a brief theoretical foundation titled “A Beginning to the Discussion of Strands as a Form of Musical Expression: A Conceptual Glossary.” Both documents were developed simultaneously in an attempt to be systematic. All work is original unless otherwise cited.
Exploring homilies and hymnody : the thematic relationship between George Whitefield’s sermons and "A Collection of Hymns for Social Worship".
(2017-11-14) Robinson, Leslie A., 1993-; Music, David W., 1949-
This thesis examines George Whitefield’s A Collection of Hymns for Social Worship and presents a thematic analysis of the hymn book’s lyrical content. This research contributes to a fuller understanding of Whitefield’s evangelistic mission, provides a perspective on Whitefield’s views on singing and hymnody, and suggests that the values that motivated Whitefield as a preacher also shaped his decisions as an editor and compiler of hymn texts. Whitefield’s religious zeal, theatrical tendencies, rhetorical abilities, and desire for Christian ecumenism are underscored as important factors that impacted the way he crafted this resource for public worship. Context for the thematic analysis of this collection is provided by an exploration of Whitefield’s published writings in journals and letters and a survey of his preaching ministry, with a focus on his endeavors at Moorfields in London.
"Fantasies and Delusions" : Billy Joel's turn and return to classical music.
(2018-04-17) Goh, Jie Fang, 1993-; Boyd, Jean Ann.
In 2001, the release of Fantasies and Delusions officially announced Billy Joel’s remarkable career transition from popular songwriting to classical instrumental music composition. Representing Joel’s eclectic aesthetic that transcends genre, this album features a series of ten solo piano pieces that evoke a variety of musical styles, especially those coming from the Romantic tradition. A collaborative effort with classical pianist Hyung-ki Joo, Joel has mentioned that Fantasies and Delusions is the album closest to his heart and spirit. However, compared to Joel’s popular works, it has barely received any scholarly attention. Given this gap in musicological work on the album, this thesis focuses on the album’s content, creative process, and connection with Billy Joel’s life, career, and artistic identity. Through this thesis, I argue that Fantasies and Delusions is reflective of Joel’s artistic identity as an eclectic composer, a melodist, a Romantic, and a Piano Man.
"Fantasy of the desert" for full orchestra.
(2018-04-16) Duan, Xiaotong, 1992-; McAllister, Scott.
"Fantasy of the Desert", is a full orchestral piece inspired by travelling in the desert near my hometown. Generally speaking, I intend to depict the different scenes when it is sunny, windy, and stormy. For this goal, I utilized the different timbre of each instruments to produce unique sound effects. For better describing the appearance of the desert under different conditions, I designed three main themes for this piece, which can be regarded as a quasi-ternary form. In this paper, I will analyze the "Fantasy of the Desert" from the aspects of inspiration, formal structure, motivic material, orchestration, and the contrasts of dynamics and temples.
For such a time as this : classical music and 9/11.
(2012-11-29) Phillips, Ariana S.; Boyd, Jean Ann.; Music.; Baylor University. School of Music.
This thesis takes as a foundational principle the conviction that music is a vital component of the process of mourning. From this foundation, I focus on three of classical music's responses to 9/11: John Adams' On the Transmigration of Souls, John Corigliano's One Sweet Morning, and Steve Reich’s WTC 9/11. The first chapter sets up analytical paradigms for the use of music in expressions of mourning, while the second applies those paradigms to music of the past. The third chapter discusses the compositional histories of each contemporary work, and chapter four analyzes structural characteristics that augment their expressive qualities. Chapter five focuses on the relationships between each work and memory, as well as the messages those entail. Aspects of reception history, including performance records and critical responses, form the basis of the sixth chapter, while chapter seven argues for these works' importance in the ongoing process of mourning 9/11.
A Framework of Practice: Three Forms of Transformation in Addressing Piano Challenges
(2023-05-06) Gao, Ziyue; McAllister, Lesley; Baylor University. School of Music. Piano Pedagogy; Baylor University.; Baylor University. School of Music. Piano Pedagogy
Piano practice as a problem-solving process usually challenges pianists with passages that defy easy mastery. To address challenges and climb to new levels of competence, pianists should imbue practice with certain transformations that can generate fresh insights and inspiration. In 1993, pianist Bruce Berr proposed three forms of transformation and coined the term "Transformational Practice Techniques" (TPTs) to refer to practice techniques that are based on transformation. This research paper examines the principles of three forms of transformation with discussions of valuable practice techniques based on these principles.
Functions of film music and sound within a genre: the revenge western.
(2007-02-14T21:53:22Z) Timmons, Lena G.; Boyd, Jean Ann.; Music.; Baylor University. School of Music.
The music of two scenes from four revenge westerns made between 1956 and 2001 is analyzed for generic similarities possibly shared between the films. The thesis looks at how four directors and composers set similar dramatic moments to music and how each film treats elements of sound during these moments. Though the plots shared by these films are similar their usage of music and sound at two shared moments (a tragic offense and the moment of revenge or rescue) is remarkably different. The flexibility of the genre itself is discussed as well as unique aspects of each film's director and composer. Despite the differences, each film displays adherence to and detraction from principles of film music set forth by the Classical Hollywood Cinema prevalent between the 1930s and 1950s.
A history of music ministry at the United States Air Force Academy Chapel with an emphasis on Protestant worship, 1954-1984.
(2013-09-16) Lassitter, John A.; York, Terry W.; Music, David W., 1949-; Music.; Baylor University. School of Music.
The primary objective of the United States Air Force Academy is to produce quality leaders that serve as officers in the United States Air Force. Many programs at the Academy help accomplish this goal, one of which is the Chapel Music Program. This paper will explore the musical institutions at the Academy by researching and studying the work of various music directors including James Roger Boyd, Edmund L. Ladouceur, and Joseph M. Galema, the music of the worship services, and related concerts at the United Sates Air Force Academy Chapel from 1954-1984. Primary sources used in research for this project include worship bulletins, concert programs, newspaper articles, and interviews. Further, records of music performed at the Academy including hymns used in worship services, repertoire from the various choirs, and organ recitals have been catalogued from surviving sources and appear in the appendices of this paper.
The impact of visual-music interaction on music perception : the influence of agreement and disagreement.
(2010-10-08T16:23:17Z) Moore, Jordan, 1985-; Bartlette, Christopher; Music.; Baylor University. School of Music.
Previous audiovisual cognition research has focused primarily on music's impact on visual perception. The goals of this study are to explore the impact of visuals on the perception of affective and acoustical qualities of music, and to develop a method for discussing the mood interactions of film and music. Text music and visual music analyses demonstrate two types of interactions: agreement and disagreement of moods. In an empirical investigation, participants were presented interactions in music and visual clips: agreeing music and visual, disagreeing music and visual, and music without visual. Participants were asked to rate acoustical properties using scales and adjective choice tasks. The results demonstrated an impact of visual mood on music perception: when in agreement, the mood was retained; when in disagreement, the visual's mood influenced the music's perception. The conclusions are applied to Cohen's associationist congruence model by describing a new communication pathway between music and visual in film music perception.

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