research & publications

IN THE EAR OF THE BEHOLDER: Listening to Beethoven with 18th c. ears

Topic Theory is, in part, a study of musical idioms in context. An understanding of Topic Theory, as it pertains to the musical Zeitgeist of the late 18th and early 19th centuries, can have meaningful and revelatory implications for the interpretation and realization of orchestral scores for composers of this era and can yield profound new insights into works of the orchestral canon. Light is shed on three such works, namely Beethoven’s middle three symphonies (Opuses 60, 67, and 68) by way of cataloging and discussing various topoi within them.

AIN’T SO HARD TO RECOGNIZE: An analysis of three Led Zeppelin Songs

Analysis and commentary of three songs of the band Led Zeppelin in light of material covered in Temperley’s Musical Language of Rock (2018): Immigrant Song (1970), The Rain Song (1973), and Whole Lotta Love (1969). The main focus of the analyses have been with regards to form, however also discussed are aspects of harmony, timbre, tonality, rhythm, instrumentation, and motivic usage and transformation.

CONDUCTING THROUGH THE 19TH C.

The origins of the conductor’s role in the ancient past through to the emergence of the modern conception of the orchestral conductor as it first appeared in the early 19th century, followed by the writings of the most prominent three conductors of the mid-late 19th century including those of Hector Berlioz, Felix Mendelssohn, and Richard Wagner.

IN SEARCH OF AMERICAN ORCHESTRAS

How did our great orchestras come to be, and how have they changed and evolved to better represent and inspire ‘America’?

PARTING THOUGHTS: Form, Motivic Transformation, and Religious Symbolism in Rachmaninoff’s final work, Symphonic Dances

“I feel like a ghost wandering in a world grown alien. I cannot cast out the old way of writing, and I cannot acquire the new. I have made intense effort to feel the musical manner of today, but it will not come to me.”

composers caught in the act

Over the last century, historical recordings have been presented to be revelatory of a given composer’s intentions. The primary purpose of this research paper has been to examine the scores and associated historical performances of major orchestral works as realized and interpreted by their composers, most specifically with regards to observance of metronome markings. The performances, and associated scores, of 22 composers are analyzed, including Maurice Ravel, John Adams, Aaron Copland, Paul Hindemith, Sergei Rachmaninoff, Igor Stravinsky, Edward Elgar, Leonard Bernstein, and many others.

ice, cocaine, & Rainbows

Alexander Scriabin’s monumental orchestral tone poem Poème de l’Exstase ("Poem of Ecstasy") reveals his ties to earlier composers of the Romantic era such as Chopin, Liszt, and Wagner. The work also typifies some of the most characteristic aspects of Modernism, including large orchestral forces, and references to eroticism, transcendence, and awe.

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