In the past fifteen years, Thomas Pasatieri has become one of America's leading composers. His major output has been dramatic works for voice: opera and song literature. The two dramatic cantatas, Heloise and Abelard and Rites de Passage, are exemplary of his style. Pasatieri draws his formal structures from traditional solo and duo cantatas and combines this with the ability to dramatize the texts of Louis Phillips. Pasatieri s style is conservative and represents a neo-romantic idiom which he models after Bellini, Puccini, and Richard Strauss. This paper presents a brief biographical sketch of Pasatieri and an analysis of the two cantatas. A chronological list of Pasatieri's published vocal works appears in the Appendix.

Busoni's contribution to the art of the piano transcription is formidable. His chorale prelude transcriptions make him responsible for giving over to the piano repertoire a small portion of sacred literature. His special admiration of J. S. Bach, evidenced throughout his life, make Busoni's transcriptional practices all the more significant. Bach himself was a prolific transcriber of his own works and the works of others. This paper presents a brief history of keyboard transcriptional practices, emphasizing Busoni's methods by comparing the original works for organ with the transcriptions for piano. Four chorale preludes form the basis for this study: Ich ruf' zu dir, Herr Jesu Christ (BWV 639), Komm, Gott, Schopfer, Heiliger Geist (BWV 667), Nun komm' der Heiden Heiland (BWV 659), and In dir ist Freude (BWV 615).

This lecture-recital paper deals with some of the music of the early 1900's, examining both original xylophone solos and piano rags arranged for the xylophone. An attempt is made to identify the role of the xylophone in ragtime music and its implications for the present day xylophonist. In this investigation a brief history of ragtime music is presented along with the history of the xylophone. The history of ragtime is traced from its beginnings around 1890 to its decline during the 1930's, developing from cakewalks and folk rags into its various styles of Classic rags, Popular rags, Advanced rags, and Novelty rags. The history of the xylophone is traced from the middle ages to its emergence as an orchestral instrument, popularized by a Polish Jew named Michael Josef Gusikov during the early 1800"s. The popularity of the xylophone in the United States increased along with that of ragtime music; from approximately 1890 to 1935 the xylophone experienced what most refer to as its "golden age." Many solos for the instrument, both original and transcribed, were published toward the end of this era. As the popularity of the xylophone declined, these solos went out of print.