This study investigates, analyzes, and attempts to evaluate Robert Lucas Pearsall's (1795-1856) published articles and music as well as all available writings and music in manuscript form.

The Germans who immigrated to Texas in the 1830s, 40s, and 50s brought with them many and varied cultural institutions which they had known and enjoyed in Europe. As soon as the initial hardships of the frontier could be overcome, they eagerly established singing societies in the Lidertafel tradition. These organizations were to have a profound impact on music in Texas from about 1850 to the time of World War I.

Nyiragongo is a composition for large orchestra. The title is taken from Mount Nyiragongo, an active volcano in the Virunga Mountains of east central Africa. The composition is in one movement and the performance time is approximately eight to nine minutes.

The compositional goals strived for in this work are (1) to unify the past and present, (2) to present a rhythmically simple but harmonically complex use of the voices, (3) to explore the timbral complexities of voices and instruments, (4) to explore rhythmic changes without changing meters, (5) to integrate the orchestra and chorus so as to produce one musical entity rather than two opposing groups, (6) to produce a work that is both practicable in performance and contemporary in spirit.

The study was a pioneering effort to research a mix of the combined principles from several different theoretical positions into one integrated model of learning, growth, and development. Sets of principles were based on Human Resource Development field theory of learning, Social Learning theory, Operant Conditioning theory, and Aversive Control Learning theory.

Concerto for Piano and Orchestra consists of three movements. The whole work follows a general character of Fast -- Slow -- Fast; but within each movement are sections with contrasting tempi. The performance time approximately eighteen minutes.