This paper provides an overview of the inspiration, research, and creative process involved in the composition of EverWind for orchestra and electronics. EverWind is based on field recordings from the American Southwest. The composition uses pitch material derived from spectral analysis of the recordings, and it incorporates a fixed media element using the field recordings that are then electronically manipulated to various degrees; this fixed media element is played alongside the orchestra. The paper also analyzes John Luther Adams' Dark Waves for Orchestra and Electronics and R. Murray Schafer's Music for Wilderness Lake in order to place EverWind within the broader musical context.

This document accompanies and explains the concepts used in the development of the composition, East is East, and West is West, (and Never the Twain Shall Meet). The process for generation and development of much of the musical content of the composition East is East, and West is West, (and Never the Twain Shall Meet) is the use of quoted musical materials. The second process, but equally as important, for development of the composition relies heavily on the idea of parallel development of modular ensembles and how the interactions created between them by sharing instrumentation can be a tool for development, as well as a challenge to the development of each module. Each module has an influence on at least one other module and is also influenced by at least one other module, creating a puzzle of interactions that must be navigated carefully when generating each individually. Both quotation and modularity are concepts employed by other composers, so this document also briefly explains how other composers have approached these concepts in their works in order to establish a historical relationship within the canon of western classical music to East is East, and West is West, (and Never the Twain Shall …

In the first half of the twentieth century, sporadic attempts of avant-garde composers to include sounds other than pitch in musical composition paved the way for the composers in the second half to embrace the sound of all types in their creative works. The development of technology since the mid-past century has facilitated composers' inclusive use of sound. The recent achievements in electronics and computers have led to cost-effective tools for today's composers to explore new possibilities in sound design and manipulation. Gradual for tenor saxophone and fixed electronics is primarily concerned with noise. Among the infinite possibilities of noise types, metallic sounds significantly contribute to the composition. The title of the piece refers to the compositional process in which the music progressively unfolds itself from the beginning to the end. The methods and strategies used to present the content give rise to a form I call accretion, described as an organic process by which the musical materials grow. Within the process, while established materials are interacting, combining, and forming layers, new materials may be incorporated and take part in the process. Throughout the composition, the interaction between sounds with common properties guides the music toward interactive unity, while the …

Audiovisual concatenative synthesis is an analysis-driven granular technique using a corpus of multimedia data to sequence audio and video streams on a microtemporal level. This text outlines my development of this technique as a tool for multimedia composition, using my work, Replica, as a case study. The paper illustrates how the concepts of granular structure, gesture capture, and replication are integral not only to the software but to the architecture of the composition. In doing so, machine learning approaches to music and visual art are reviewed and related to my personal compositional practice. Additionally, I attempt to show how audiovisual concatenative synthesis provides a composer with strategies for shaping one's sense of time through disorienting audiovisual cues and tightly organized counterpoint between sound and image, stage and screen, and the real and virtual.

"Natural Disasters" is a cycle of five extractable movements for septet, conductor and computer. Each movement in the cycle is inspired by the ways that humans are affected by and respond to five different classes or categories of natural disasters: meteorological, such as hurricanes, tornados, and haboobs; geological, like earthquakes and landslides; hydrological, including flooding and sea level rise; wildfires; and extra-planetary disasters such as meteors and solar flares. The disaster types are used as overarching themes and also as sources for the organization of the movements and their surface details. This paper presents an overview of the conception and organization of cycle, the themes addressed in each movement and the compositional techniques used. The history of composers using weather or disaster-related themes in prior music is reviewed, and a survey of contemporary disaster-related compositions is presented.

This paper discusses technical and conceptual approaches to incorporate 3D spatial movement in electroacoustic music. The Ambisonic spatial audio format attempts to recreate a full sound field (with height information) and is currently a popular choice for 3D spatialization. While tools for Ambisonics are typically designed for the 2D computer screen and keyboard/mouse, virtual reality offers new opportunities to work with spatial audio in a 3D computer generated environment. An overview of my custom virtual reality software, VRSoMa, demonstrates new possibilities for the design of 3D audio. Created in the Unity video game engine for use with the HTC Vive virtual reality system, VRSoMa utilizes the Google Resonance SDK for spatialization. The software gives users the ability to control the spatial movement of sound objects by manual positioning, a waypoint system, animation triggering, or through gravity simulations. Performances can be rendered into an Ambisonic file for use in digital audio workstations. My work Discords (2018) for 3D audio facilitates discussion of the conceptual and technical aspects of spatial audio for use in musical composition. This includes consideration of human spatial hearing, technical tools, spatial allusion/illusion, and blending virtual/real spaces. The concept of spatial gestures has been used to categorize the …

Cēgə Trouhèst is a three-movement work of about thirteen minutes duration. The text by the composer provides a vehicle for aural stimulation only. Cēgə Trouhèst is a continuum of resonances embellished by melodic and rhythmic passages. These embellishments along with other devices and the choice of instrumentation all contribute to the development of the varied timbres. The first two movements introduce the material to be employed in the third, which continues the idea of change exhibited in the text by modification and extraction. Timbre is the most important aspect of this work. It is exploited homophonically, contrapuntally, and through instrumental/vocal interchange and timbre modification of a single tone.

Iconographs is such a composition in which mathematical techniques are brought to bear. Nine separate number series have been generated and carried out to 1024 units. These series are combined by addition to calculate a single number by taking the remainder after dividing the sum of the series by nine. This mod 9 reduction is used to choose a set of pitches. Iconographs is a composition for microcomputer and chamber orchestra written in proportional notation with 1024 time segments grouped into 32 pages of 32 time segments each. The duration for each segment is .618034 seconds, which is the Golden Mean of one second, represented in a horizontal space of .34375 inches. The horizontal space/time-frame proportion is consistent but the actual duration of sounds are only approximate. The duration of the entire composition is 10.54778 minutes with a total horizontal space of 352 inches. The structure of the composition as a whole has no relationship to any of the traditional forms does contain a focus of formal structure at time-frame number 632, the Golden Mean. This focus is expressed by a density of sound events in all parts.

New York City: A Collage of Cultures is a single-movement programmatic orchestral work that features polytonality, prallelism, sound-mass, micro-tones, polychordal rhythmic ostinato, neo-impressionism, and folk themes and anthems from sundry cultures and nationalities. The simultaneity of contextual material at one point necessitates the employment of three conductors. The composition portrays America as a "melting pot" through its busiest immigration center, itself a microcosm of diverse international elements. This is achieved by the depiction of three different settings: a boat sailing from a foreign port, bound for New York Cty; New York itself in all of its awesome fury; and a capsule image of a conglomerate of turn-of-the-century emigrants and their interaction throughout the voyage.

Extension is a three-sectional, one-movement composition for orchestra exploring various permutations of a single motivic unit. The central priority has been to present this motive in a variety of textural situations with a harmonic accompaniment evolving from a macrotonal to a microtonal setting. Some of the devices utilized to realize this priority are mixed-instrument timbral combinations, tone clusters, multiphonics for brass and woodwinds, multiple stops for strings, and superimpositions of multiphonics. Extension is unique in two areas. First, the evolutionary progression from a macrotonal to microtonal harmonic texture is made possible by expanding the priorities of instrumental performing. Second, the use of multiphonics for full orchestra is unique to this work.

This composition is a symphonic setting of three original poems within the confines of an expanded sonata-allegro form and is an approximately twenty-two minutes in duration. The three poems are designed with certain cyclic implications which are related formally to the recurrence of musical ideas. The main application of this plan is found in the duality of formal roles assigned to each of the three major sectional divisions of the work. This is an expanded sonata-allegro, but each section (exposition, development, and recapitulation) is enlarged and individualized to the point of becoming a complete movement in itself. Each is intended to have the internal formal capacity to stand alone and at the same time serve as a section part of the whole. Formal unity is established without excessive dependence upon the poems, as both the music and the texts are formally evolved from the principles of sonata-allegro procedures. The poems were written specifically for this musical setting by the composer and are as an integral part of the compositional process itself; however, the poetry is didactic in purpose and is something of a jeremiad. Each poem relates principally to one of three aspects of existence: a ritual of history, a …

Grimaldi is a synesthetic work composed of aural and visual media including noise, tone, electronic devices, lighting and theatrical events. It is designed for solo saxophone with an accompanying ensemble of eight wind instruments and four percussion. The most important aspect of the piece is its texture, which consists of constantly changing and interacting aural and visual events. The compositional process of Grimaldi began with the selection of a form constructed of two equal arches of unequal subdivision, and the designation of texture for each section. After these selections were made, the theatrical elements were selected, based on a traditional story about the clown Joseph Grimaldi (1787-1836). By gradually refining these general selections into specific notation, and by considering them as a whole rather than individually, consistent relationships were maintained.

Astronomy and music are both fundamental to cultural identity in the form of various musical styles and calendrical systems. However, since both are governed by incontrovertible laws of physics and therefore precede cultural interpretation, they are potentially useful for insight into the common ground of a shared humanity. This paper discusses three compositions inspired by different aspects of astronomy: Solstitium e Equinoctium, a site-specific composition for four voices and metal pipes involving an inclusive communal musical ritual and sonic meditation; Helios, a short symphonic work inspired by helioseismology; and Perspectives, a piece for soprano and percussion based on a logarithmic map of the universe.

This paper presents the history and the theoretical study of mixed music and focuses on two piano solo works and two mixed electroacoustic compositions for piano and electronics. By discussing the working process and giving the analysis of the original composition Alchemy for piano and electronics, this paper investigates the relationship between cause, source and spectromorphology, reflecting how the concept of energy-motion trajectory are embodied in this mixed electroacoustic work. Alchemy is a mixed composition for piano solo and 8-channel fixed electronics focusing on the gestural play and sonic expression. The live piano part explores the gestural sound played with a slide (cup), paper clip, and objects placed inside the piano. The 8-channel electronics part is mainly derived from the recorded acoustic piano. It extends the sonic potential of source materials and presents the diverse vectorial movements of spatialization.

This paper presents a discussion of functional silence in contemporary classical music with a particular focus on the music of Salvatore Sciarrino and Jürg Frey, two composers whose drastically-contrasting bodies of work both occupy the interstitial space between the audible and inaudible. To begin, I address three main questions: what are the functions of silence in a musical context, how do the characteristics of a work affect our perception of these silences, and how do these functions relate to our perception of music on the edge of silence. In answering these first two questions, I discuss three categories of silence---temporal, spatial, and gestural---which I use in a silence-centric analyses of Sciarrino's Let me die before I wake, Allegoria della notte, and Infinito Nero, as well as Frey's Streichquarttet III. To further apply these concepts to music on the edge of silence, I provide a fourth category---timbral silence---which describes the perception of absence or silence within the presence of sound and allows for the application of existing functional principles of silence to sounding events. In turn, this allows us to understand the music of Sciarrino and Frey in terms of timbral completion and timbral dissolution, respectively. Having established a theoretical framework …

Act one of The Metamorphosis is based on the novella by Franza Kafka of the same title. In the writing of the act, George Benjamin's Into the Little Hill and Oliver Knussen's Where the Wild Things Are provide a model of using musical material as a storytelling device. Benjamin emphasizes the parallel nature of Crimp's text through the manipulation of similar music between the acts. Knussen uses form and color to emphasize Max's childlike energy and his desire to return home. In act one of The Metamorphosis these approaches are combined to enhance Kafka's absurd narrative through a rapid collage of texture and form that is influenced by both events and characters in the opera.

The Replenishment cycle contains five works that allude to the experience of sleep, beginning with awake drowsiness and ending with the piece inspired by rapid eye movement (REM) sleep, titled Conceiving Realities. This last piece is an intermedia work composed for chamber ensemble, live painting with biofeedback, computer, and audiovisual processing. This critical essay describes the composition of Conceiving Realities within the context of the Replenishment cycle, followed by a thorough analysis of the research involved in the technological aspects of the piece, and finally, a description of the instrumentation, notation, intermedia elements, and technology comprising the work. Conceiving Realities uses a system of interactions between painting, biofeedback, music, and video, in which a painter wears brainwave and heartbeat sensors that send data to a computer patch processing the sound of an ensemble as the painter listens and creates the painting while responding to the music. This requires a passive biofeedback system in which the painter is focused on listening and painting. The computer uses the data to process existing sounds, instead of synthesizing new lines. The score blends elements of traditional notation, graphics, and guided improvisation; giving the performers some creative agency. This alludes to the way in which …

My recent compositions are situated within a postmodern theoretical framework. The heterogeneity of materials and hybridity of musical formation in these works are interpreted and contextualized within a personal reading of postmodern theories. The critical essay traces my aesthetics through a historical investigation into the definition of musical postmodernism. Through extensive citation and analysis of the writings of Julius T. Fraser, Italo Calvino, and Richard Rorty, the essay aims to provide a theoretical context for the interpretation of the musical examples. The creative documentation contains three newly-composed musical works: Piano Trio from Opus 3/c, Opus 6 for Violin, and Opus 7 for Piccolo. The works' postmodern features include creative approaches to the fragmentation of musical time into separate levels, historical allusions, and the exploration of multiplicity.

This composition is a single-movement work for three choirs and full orchestra, including celesta, piano, and four percussionists. Total duration is fifteen minutes. The music is divided into six sections, with the overall form being substantially influenced by the structure of the poem, War Is Kind, by Stephen Crane (1871-1900). Many devices are utilized to contrast tension and relaxation, as associated with ironic elements of the text, with repetition and development of musical elements and motives providing unity for the entire work.

Concertino consists of two movements, Paean and Dithyramb, either of which may be performed independently. Paean, a work of calm and majestic intensity, is characterized by a rhythmic pulse which is more consistently regular than that of the Dithyramb. Its three major sections form an arch, the final measures (mm. 87-95) returning to the material of the opening (mm. 1-14). The first section begins quietly, Maestoso ma sostenuto, in a very slow tempo. The activity and intensity increase until a brief, more active middle section begins in a faster tempo (Ancora piu mosso, m. 55). A fff climax (m. 63) begins in the third section (Tempo I). After a brief poco piu mosso (mm. 72-81), the opening tempo is restored (m. 82), the opening material returns (m. 87) and the final chord fades away. Dithyramb is a free and dramatic movement in which the musical material of the wind group usually contrasts with that of the string group. The piano, which has its own material, occasionally takes on the character of one group or the other as though mediating the conflict.

The English Walnut Joke is a composition for concert band and dramatic soprano. The English Walnut Joke was based on a text of the same title by Alec Rowell and is divided into two movements with a total duration of approximately twenty-two minutes. The joke concerns itself with the dealings between a wood-chopper and a jongleur in medieval England and is related to the audience by a destitute factory worker (the dramatic soprano) in the early Industrial Age of that country.

In this thesis, I demonstrate how I use leitmotif in a programmatic context in my original orchestral suite, The Legend of Two Rings.

Among the Voices Voiceless is a composition for flute (doubling piccolo), clarinet (doubling bass clarinet), viola, cello, percussion, piano, and electronics, based on the poem "What would I do without this world faceless incurious" by Samuel Beckett. The piece is a setting for disembodied voice: the vocal part exists solely in the electronics. Having no physical body, the voice is obscured as the point of empathy for the audience. In addition, instrumental solos compete for focus during the work's twenty minute duration. In passages including a soloist, the soloist functions simultaneously as antagonist and avatar to the disembodied voice. Spoken word recordings and electronic manipulation of instrumental material provides further layers of ambiguity. The companion critical essay "Among the Voices Voiceless": Setting the Words of Samuel Beckett proposes the distillation of Beckett's style into the elements of prosaicness, repetition, fragmentation, ambiguity, and symmetry. Discussions of Beckett's works such as Waiting for Godot and Molloy demonstrate these elements in his practice. This framework informs the examination of two other musical settings of Beckett's poetry: Neither by Morton Feldman and Odyssey by Roger Reynolds. Finally, these elements are used to analyze and elucidate the compositional decisions made in Among the Voices Voiceless.

Forgotten Lyres is a musical response to Percy Bysshe Shelley's poem Mutability, which depicts the fragility and unpredictable nature of human life. Four independent chamber ensembles make up the performing forces of Forgotten Lyres; the musicians evoke the topics of Shelley's text as they interact and coordinate with one another according to a variety of paradigms and without the use of a conductor. This essay focuses on the approaches to coordination within and between ensembles, and the ways in which the musicians' interactions can evoke and convey Shelley's texts. The essay also examines works by Mel Powell, Toru Takemitsu, Witold Lutoslawski, and Pierre Boulez as examples and precursors for the coordination strategies employed in Forgotten Lyres.