The word “nocturne” was first used to describe a piano work by the Irish composer John Field, who also established its basic framework. The genre was expanded and brought to its maturity by Chopin, who wrote twenty-one nocturnes for solo piano over his entire creative life. Among Chopin’s works, it is the nocturnes with their lyrical melodies and improvisational nature that especially provide flexibility and freedom for performers to express inner feelings and individual interpretations. The marked contrast between Chopin’s early and late nocturnes naturally leads to different interpretive results. Accordingly, this project investigates how the stylistic changes in Chopin’s early and late nocturnes are related to their performances. Taking Op. 9, No. 1 and Op. 62, No. 1 as examples of Chopin’s early and late nocturnes respectively, the project compares the recordings of Artur Rubinstein (1965) and Vladimir Ashkenazy (1981) through the lens of descriptive analyses. The introductory chapter covers the influences on Chopin’s nocturnes, Rubinstein’s and Ashkenazy’s playing styles of Chopin’s works, various editions of Chopin’s nocturnes, and the relation of analysis to performance. The main body of the paper alternates descriptive analysis of each section of Nocturnes Op. 9, No. 1 and Op. 62, No. 1 with comparisons between the two pianists’ recordings. The final chapter outlines how the two nocturnes from Chopin’s early and late creative periods differ from one another and how the changes in style affect the two pianists’ interpretations. The goal of this project is to aid in a better understanding of the interpretive choices made by Rubinstein and Ashkenazy in these two nocturnes.

Czech composer, Václav Tomášek (1774-1850) belongs to a generation of late classical composers overshadowed by their contemporaries like Mozart and Beethoven. However, Tomášek’s work both as a composer and a pedagogue was influential to the subsequent generation of Romantic composers, and his pieces are an important bridge between the late Classical period and early Romantic. More substantial attention has been paid to Tomášek’s vocal compositions in the English language literature. Tomášek’s Eclogues for piano are excellent representative works of this transition between classical and romantic. They employ classical formal models which are meant to recall Greco-Roman poetic origins and do not contain complex harmonic language. These pieces are not strictly ‘classical’ works and should be considered early character pieces for the piano. Indeed, later Romantic composers, like Franz Liszt, also used the Eclogue as a form, evoking a bucolic pastoralism. Tomášek’s Eclogues are therefore important early templates of this form and should be considered by pianists for inclusion on concert programs. This project provides performance suggestions along with the recording which have not been recorded before, help performers program these overlooked pieces.

Servant leadership is a philosophy founded by Robert K. Greenleaf. It emphasizes the leader's responsibility to serve and empower their followers rather than the leader's authority or control over them. While this approach has been widely studied in various organizational settings, its application to the area of music, specifically large ensemble conducting, remains relatively underexplored.As part of this case study, I interviewed six conductors of large ensembles whose groups perform at a high level, but who also place a premium on the needs, happiness, and empowerment of the musicians in their groups. At the same time, I surveyed published literature on the topics of conductor leadership philosophy in North America and servant-leadership principles, specifically the work of Robert K. Greenleaf. This study has brought to light many positive aspects of servant leadership. We also identify some challenges institutions/structures in general create that make servant leadership challenging. Based on the responses participants gave, we can begin to see there is the possibility of serving our ensemble members, giving them agency in rehearsals to be artists, achieve high standards, and help everyone grow as people beyond their musical development.

The music of Claude Debussy has its own language. It is challenging for performers who are not familiar with Debussy’s musical style to produce the subtle tone colors or understand the proper atmosphere. There are many scholars, researchers, and pianists who have shown interest in Debussy’s piano music and who provided critical comments and interpretive suggestions. However, the work Pour le piano has varied interpretive suggestions given the consistent presence of the work in popular piano repertoire. This document creates a closer interpretation of Debussy’s piano music, specifically the three movements of Pour le piano, for enthusiastic music students and professionals. The focus of this work is to guide performance and interpretive aspects. A brief introduction of Debussy’s life reveals historical and contemporary influences on Pour le Piano. A closer look at compositional models which form the basis of Pour le piano, helps one recognize these compositional characteristics and correctly create a particular performance atmosphere. This analysis is followed by performance suggestions for fingerings, pedaling, how to isolate difficult passagework, and interpretive suggestions based on two recordings by Magda Tagliaferro and Caio Pagano. A more comprehensive understanding of Pour le piano not only leads to correct performances, but also wider proliferation and study of this piece among pianists

The unmeasured Fantasias by Johann Gottfried Müthel appear as part of a collection of pedagogical exercises to foster improvisation. The information he gives in the notation of his fantasias can be elucidated with a historiographical interpretation of musical rhetoric. Müthel developed musical figures and contrasting textures in accordance with contemporary rhetorical principles of inventio, dispositio and elaboratio. An analysis of Müthel’s G-minor Fantasia provides a link between musical rhetoric and performance, as seen through its improvisatory gestures. Issues of performance practice that arise in the G-minor Fantasia are the execution of ornaments, rhythmic alterations, registration, and articulation. This paper explores primary sources contemporary to Müthel to make sense of these issues. The unmeasured Fantasias are written for a keyboard with pedal. At the time that they were written, the pedal fortepiano and pedal clavichord were seen by musicians such as Carl Phillip Emanual Bach to be the superior instruments for performing improvisations. While the notation and texture of the Fantasias suggests that Müthel intended them for organ, a consideration of the possibilities provided by the fortepiano suggests that it may be more suited to conveying aspects of the galant aesthetic.

In a Mirror Dimly… is an autobiographical work that follows my mental development from my teen years into my mid-20s and offers a way forward into the future. First comes legalism: a canon, which represents a rule-based thought process. Next is freedom and individuality: indeterminate methods and textures. Finally, the piece concludes with unity and wholeness, using quoted and composed hymns in chorale settings. The conceptual content is taken from Hermann Hesse’s Siddhartha, a story of a Hindu man’s life through the development of his own ideology into Buddhism. He begins by following the rules of his faith obsessively, then he decides that the rules themselves don’t matter as much as the spirit behind them, and finally he begins to see the interconnectedness of nature through the flow of a river and gains a fuller picture of all that is. I have also included an anxiety motif which begins as an interruption or nuisance; it then takes over in the form of a panic attack but is quelled by a hymn: “Be Still My Soul,” with text written by Katharina von Schlegel set to the tune of Sibelius’ Finlandia. Finally, the anxiety is contained and molded to help the overall texture rather than disrupting it. The anxiety is never truly eradicated, but it is transformed.

This research project investigates the way in which Paul Hindemith expresses musical and extramusical ideas during his early compositional period through an analysis of the fourteen movements of his work for solo piano, In einer Nacht... Träume und Erlebnisse, op. 15 (In One Night… Dreams and Experiences). Op. 15 is a set of character movements composed in 1917-1919 and unified into a cohesive, singular work through extramusical connections and a common harmonic language. Hindemith depicted the night as a mystery unfolding in a series of descriptive and untitled miniatures displaying a thrilling journey into the unknown. The set reflects Hindemith’s unique chromatic compositional language in the late 1910s, and his interests in Expressionism, early forms, and popular elements such as jazz. However, due to its delayed publication, op. 15 remains an underestimated work and deserves closer attention.This paper describes the work’s creation, problems it faced in its reception and dissemination, and offers a brief literature review related to the set. The second chapter places op. 15 in the context of Hindemith’s early development as a composer (up to 1920) and his hallmark compositional styles. The most substantial portion of the research is an analytical description of the fourteen movements. Each chapter offers an overview of a movement’s general character followed by detailed depictions of musical or extramusical elements. It is hoped that this text will ultimately aid performers in creating a more accurate and musically cohesive performance. In a brief conclusion, the common elements between movements are reemphasized, again drawing the performer’s attention to each movement as a part of the longer narrative. Scholarship on this set provides opportunities for a better understanding of Hindemith’s early music.

ABSTRACTViolin sonatas composed by male composers of the romantic era are widely studied and performed, yet there is far less focus on pieces of that era composed by women. Much of the research on women’s music of the era is scattered and difficult to find. The creation of the Violin Sonatas by Women website (www.violinsonatasbywomen.com) is to educate, promote, and make accessible these deserving but overlooked composers and their works. Presently, the Violin Sonatas by Women website serves as a resource with detailed information on twenty-five sonatas for violin and piano composed by fifteen European female composers of the romantic era. Provided on this site is biographical information on each composer and access to editions, manuscripts, and recordings. This resource also contains historical information, supplemental exercises and études, and other pedagogical notes. Composers are listed in order of birth date. This site offers a robust, accurate, and accessible resource for students and professionals. It also provides knowledge, enhances understanding, and identifies technical challenges in the pieces that could be incorporated into teaching curricula and performance repertoires. Finally, it serves to provide long-overdue credit to these female composers by giving their work more recognition. This study is an ongoing project with more editions and recordings added as they are produced. Presently, the main portion of this website includes advanced published works written from 1863 to 1917. This website will soon be expanded to offer information on violin sonatas composed by women of other eras and origins.

The composition Fold is a multi-movement work for flute, clarinet, violin, violoncello, piano, and percussion. The music develops from one simple gesture that generates many variations. The gesture symbolizes a folding technique in origami, the pleat fold. The pleat gesture goes through many transformations and evolves into different musical ideas that carry various metaphorical meanings such as the concept of time, the devotion to craftsmanship, and the physical and mental deterioration of a person. The musical materials form a piece about the changing relationship between a craftsperson and their craft over the span of their creative life. Chinese ci poetry informs the structure of this piece on macro and micro levels. This document examines the compositional processes of Fold and explains how musical metaphors and cultural references are used in her creative output.