The evolution of the role of the trombone as a solo instrument in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries can be traced most effectively through four schools of playing, with the music of today's avant-garde being a logical historical culmination of these four schools. It will be demons t rated that the avant-garde's use of the solo trombone has merely continued the evolutionary process started in the early nineteenth century. The contribution of the early nineteenth-century virtuosi was the establishment of the idea that the trombone could compete on its own terms with other instruments as a solo instrument. In addition to expanding the technical capabilities, they also left a basic solo repertoire. With the death of the virtuosi the trombone as a solo instrument went into a decline. For the remainder of the nineteenth century and well into the twentieth century the Paris Conservatoire was influential. Standards of solo performance were brought to new heights by excellent study material and contest solos. The next important step came from the late nineteenth-century American band virtuosi. Their influence helped the public to accept the idea of the trombone as a solo instrument. The American jazz trombonists of the 1930's and 1940's also …

The lecture recital was given April 1, 1974. Eighteenth-century accounts of the voices and performing styles of Francesca Cuzzoni, Faustina Bordoni, and Anna Strada del Pò were related to six opera arias written for them by George Frideric Handel. The arias, accompanied by harpsichord, violin, and violoncello, were performed with added original ornamentation. In addition to the lecture recital two other public recitals and two opera roles were performed. The first solo recital was on February 11, 1972, and included works by Mozart, Fauré, Rimsky-Korsakov, R. Strauss, Walton, Moore, and others. The second solo recital, on October 15, 1973, included works by Porpora, Rameau, Handel, Wolf, Donizetti, Debussy, and Schubert. The role of "Urgele" in the marionette opera Die Fee Urgele by Pleyel was performed in English on October 30 and 31, 1972, with the Collegium Musicum of North Texas State University. The role of "Clorinda" in Rossini's La Cenerentola was performed in English on November 26 and 28, 1972, with the Shreveport Symphony.

The minor choral works are those exclusive of the well-known choral works. Symphonic movements for chorus are also excluded. Conflicting and incomplete information from the composer himself and from secondary sources were principal research problems. The published letters, the memoirs, and a small number of secondary sources, containing little more than passing references, form the body of the research material beyond the scores themselves. The arrangement is by opus number, with unpublished works inserted chronologically by date of composition. A description of the circumstances surrounding each work' s composition precedes a study of the music within each chapter. The last chapter delineates stylistic characteristics of the minor choral works.

The purpose has been to prove that there are connections between the visual arts (including architecture) and music. In the development of the argument it is shown that common themes exist in the arts, such as style, form, balance, line, color, and texture. Examples of piano music are offered from the last 100 years that show, to a greater or lesser extent, the influence of art. In some cases this is simply a matter of titles, whereas in other instances, such as Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition, the influence goes deeper. In the final chapter the proposition is presented that the composer himself sometimes acts as a painter, portraying concrete images directly in music. Examples are offered of piano pieces depicting people, animals, places, objects or activities.