Data Generation and Multi-Modal Analysis for Recorded Operatic Performance

Commercial recordings of live opera performance are only sporadically available, mostly due to various legal protections held by opera houses. The resulting onsite, archive-only access for them inhibits analysis of the creative process in "live" environments. Based on a technique I developed for generating performance data from copyright protected archival recordings, this paper presents a means of interrogating the creative practice in individual operatic performances and across the corpus of a recorded performance history. My analysis uses "In questa Reggia" from Giacomo Puccini's Turandot as performed at New York's Metropolitan Opera. The first part of my analysis builds on tempo mapping developed by the Centre for the History and Analysis of Recorded Music. Given the natural relationship in which performances of the same work exist, statistical and network analyses of the data extracted from a corpus of performances offer ways to contextualize and understand how performances create a tradition to which and through which they relate to varying degrees

Electrifying Opera, Amplifying Agency: Designing a performer-controlled interactive audio system for opera singers

This artistic research project examines the artistic, technical, and pedagogical challenges of developing a performer-controlled interactive technology for real-time vocal processing of the operatic voice. As a classically trained singer-composer, I have explored ways to merge the compositional aspects of transforming electronic sound with the performative aspects of embodied singing. I set out to design, develop, and test a prototype for an interactive vocal processing system using sampling and audio processing methods. The aim was to foreground and accommodate an unamplified operatic voice interacting with the room's acoustics and the extended disembodied voices of the same performer. The iterative prototyping explored the performer's relationship to the acoustic space, the relationship between the embodied acoustic voice and disembodied processed voice(s), and the relationship to memory and time. One of the core challenges was to design a system that would accommodate mobility and allow interaction based on auditory and haptic cues rather than visual. In other words, a system allowing the singer to control their sonic output without standing behind a laptop. I wished to highlight and amplify the performer's agency with a system that would enable nuanced and variable vocal processing, be robust, teachable, and suitable for use in various settings: solo performances, various types and sizes of ensembles, and opera. This entailed mediating different needs, training, and working methods of both electronic music and opera practitioners. One key finding was that even simple audio processing could achieve complex musical results. The audio processes used were primarily combinations of feedback and delay lines. However, performers could get complex musical results quickly through continuous gestural control and the ability to route signals to four channels. This complexity sometimes led to surprising results, eliciting improvisatory responses also from singers without musical improvisation experience. The project has resulted in numerous vocal solo, chamber, and operatic performances in Norway, the Netherlands, Belgium, and the United States. The research contributes to developing emerging technologies for live electronic vocal processing in opera, developing the improvisational performance skills needed to engage with those technologies, and exploring alternatives for sound diffusion conducive to working with unamplified operatic voices. Links: Exposition and documentation of PhD research in Research Catalogue: Electrifying Opera, Amplifying Agency. Artistic results. Reflection and Public Presentations (PhD) (2023): https://www.researchcatalogue.net/profile/show-exposition?exposition=2222429 Home/Reflections: https://www.researchcatalogue.net/view/2222429/2222460 Mapping & Prototyping: https://www.researchcatalogue.net/view/2222429/2247120 Space & Speakers: https://www.researchcatalogue.net/view/2222429/2222430 Presentations: https://www.researchcatalogue.net/view/2222429/2247155 Artistic Results: https://www.researchcatalogue.net/view/2222429/222248

Folk Vocal Techniques of Pontos and Epirus in Modern Greece: a Study in Reflexive Musical Ethnography

In this thesis I examine the vocal techniques employed by performers of contemporary Greek Pontic and Epirotic traditional music. Combining fieldwork analysis with personal experience, I have been able to demonstrate the underlying cognitive and physiological processes that inform these techniques. While anatomical considerations constitute a central focus of this analysis, I offer at the same time an appraisal of vocal bimusicality. The latter issue arises from my own particular perspectives, understandings and personal experience in diverse musical worlds. The objectives of this research are: a) to identify current vocal techniques in Pontic and Epirotic styles, paying special attention to the exceptional use of the larynx and the articulation/projection of vocalized sounds; b) to bridge the gap between theory and practice in studies of voice and vocal production; and c) to demonstrate how personal experience is relevant to ethnographic research in vocal music. In introducing the research field, chapter I of this study reflects on my role as a native researcher-performer and outlines my choice of case studies. The following chapter reviews the Cantometrics project and considers its relevance to Greek folk song. In addition, other scholarly literature pertinent to the present analysis is surveyed, while there is also consideration of fundamental anatomical and physiological issues. Chapters III and IV focus on the central points of analysis in the thesis with special emphasis on the vocal production of the Pontic and Epirotic styles. Employing verbatim quotations from: a) five co-workers in the Pontic style and b) five co-workers and one polyphonic group in the Epirotic style, I analyze the vocal production of these two Greek musical genres as currently performed. The main conclusions of the research refer to techniques such as: a) the movable larynx, b) the extensive use of the soft palate and upper chest area, c) the widening of the mouth, and d) the dropping of the jaw, which are equally discussed in detail. In the same vein, an analogy is drawn between the vocal production and the size of the musical intervals used in both traditions. Chapter V deals with my own learning processes in Greek folk culture and also in the two aspects of my musicality: the Pontic and Western operatic. Here I endeavour to locate myself among my co-workers and also to provide an 'insider's' view on the subject of bimusicality. I also comment upon the effect that ensues when moving from the Pontic to the operatic vocal style, that is to say, the consequences of changing musical systems and musical environments. The final chapter summarizes the findings of this monograph whose practice-based research is also accompanied by a DVD containing performances by co-workers and by audio examples. In these ways, I attempt to bridge the 'gap' between theory and practice in those aspects of vocal production that stem from an aural/oral musical tradition

Cyber-Narrative in Opera: Three Case Studies

This dissertation looks at three newly composed operas that feature what I call cyber-narratives: a work in which the story itself is inextricably linked with digital technologies, such that the characters utilize, interact with, or are affected by digital technologies to such a pervasive extent that the impact of said technologies is thematized within the work. Through an analysis of chat rooms and real-time text communication in Nico Muhly’s Two Boys (2011), artificial intelligence in Søren Nils Eichberg’s Glare (2014), and mind uploading and digital immortality in Tod Machover’s Death and the Powers (2010), a nexus of ideologies surrounding voice, the body, gender, digital anthropology, and cyber-culture are revealed. I consider the interpretive possibilities that emerge when analyzing voice and musical elements in conjunction with cultural references within the libretti, visual design choices in the productions, and directorial decisions in the evolution of each work. I theorize the expressive power of the operatic medium in dramatizing and personifying new forms of technology, while simultaneously exposing how these technologically oriented narratives reinforce and rely upon operatic tropes of the past. Recurring themes of misogyny and objectification of women across all three works are addressed, as is the framing of digital technology as a mechanism of dehumanization. This analysis also focuses on the unique sung and embodied aspect of opera, and how the human voice shapes concepts of identity, agency, and individuality in the digital age. All three case studies demonstrate how opera gives the cyber-narrative every possible mode of expression to explore the complexities and anxieties of human-machine relationships in the digital era, as all three operas question how the thematized technologies may come to re-define our perception and experience of humanity itself

Toward a music theater vocal pedagogy for emerging adult female singers

Thesis (D.M.A.)--Boston UniversityThe purpose of this study was to develop a case of contemporary belting pedagogy for emerging adult, female singers. Informants for the case included Jeannette LoVetri and Lisa Popeil, two well-respected pedagogues in both contemporary commercial and classical styles of singing. Data were collected through interviews with the pedagogues and observations of their teaching. The pedagogues' practices confirmed findings from prior research that three facets of singing differentiated contemporary belt singing from classical singing: (a) increased subglottal pressure coupled with increased closed quotient; (b) thyroarytenoid-dominant vocal production; and (c) resonance strategies involving a narrowed pharynx or oral cavity. LoVetri and Popeil characterized pedagogy for emerging adult singers as similar to pedagogy for classical singing in that it ought to be built on breath support and avoidance of vocal fold pressing. Further, the pedagogues recommended utilizing repertoire with moderate demands. However, they emphasized beginning with resonance strategies such as widening the mouth and lowering the velum. To teach emerging adult female singers, vocal music educators must: (a) be able to model appropriate music theater sounds for their students, (b) understand the shows and repertoire of music theater, (c) assign developmentally appropriate music theater literature to individual students; (d) expose students to a variety of musical styles, and (e) impart a functional understanding of voice science related to music theater vocal pedagogy in a way that emerging adult singers can understand. Emerging adult students should commit to performing in a healthy and sustainable way, and voice teachers should be a primary resource for reliable information about vocal health. Beyond this foundational pedagogy, teachers who prepare emerging adults for a career in music theater must ensure that their students receive significant training in acting and dance in addition to singing. Teachers must also help such students gain understanding of the casting process and their own casting strengths. Finally, because music theater is such a challenging industry, teachers should encourage their students to develop skills related to music theater so that they can earn a living, and teachers should highlight the importance of strong emotional, psychological, and financial support systems

Proceedings of the 2015 WA Chapter of MSA Symposium on Music Performance and Analysis

This publication, entitled Proceedings of the 2015 WA Chapter MSA Symposium on Music Performance and Analysis, is a double-blind peer-reviewed conference proceedings published by the Western Australian Chapter of the Musicological Society of Australia, in conjunction with the Western Australian Academy of Performing Arts, Edith Cowan University, edited by Jonathan Paget, Victoria Rogers, and Nicholas Bannan. The original symposium was held at the University of Western Australia, School of Music, on 12 December 2015. With the advent of performer-scholars within Australian Universities, the intersections between analytical knowledge and performance are constantly being re-evaluated and reinvented. This collection of papers presents several strands of analytical discourse, including: (1) the analysis of music recordings, particularly in terms of historical performance practices; (2) reinventions of the \u27page-to-stage\u27 paradigm, employing new analytical methods; (3) analytical knowledge applied to pedagogy, particularly concerning improvisation; and (4) so-called \u27practice-led\u27 research.https://ro.ecu.edu.au/ecubooks/1005/thumbnail.jp

Compositional Ethnomusicology and the Tahitian Musical Landscape: Towards Meta-Sustainability through Creative Practice Research Informed by Ethnographic Fieldwork

Taking the contemporary musical landscape of Tahiti as a case study, this thesis jointly in ethnomusicology and composition combines an ethnographic and ethnomusicological enquiry with a practice-based artistic research applied to ethnomusicology. It contributes to a greater understanding and appreciation of issues surrounding contemporary indigenous cultural identity and musical change, and includes scholarly and field-informed collaborative musical works. This research contends that the creative exploration of musical syntheses represents an effective alternative to processes of cultural revival through engagement with an indigenous community. It relies on the concept of a sustainability extended to the global cultural environment, which is termed meta-sustainability. In allowing aspects or elements of Tahitian music to be transmitted by way of a repository of global intangible culture, it enacts a proactive and cosmopolitanist response to perceptions of out-of-control globalization processes. The first volume of the thesis introduces compositional ethnomusicology, an emergent paradigm aiming to contribute to the meta-sustainability of musical tradition, and which articulates ethnomusicological methods with creative practice. Subsequently, this volume sets out an ethnographic description of the contemporary Tahitian musical landscape and its dynamics of change, depicting it as a broad, complex system of overlapping fields. Grounded in the related findings, the second volume delivers substantial artistic research outcomes. These fieldwork-informed musical fictions demonstrate the possibilities of a new aesthetics for the meta-sustainable development of Tahitian musical tradition. They include on the one hand a folio of six pieces for small ensembles bridging Tahitian musical heritage with jazz and improvisation, on the other hand an operatic work in Tahitian language

Phenomena, Poiēsis, and Performance Profiling: Temporal-Textual Emphasis and Creative Process Analysis in Turandot at the Metropolitan Opera

Amidst discussions regarding the nature of a musical work, tensions within and between score- and performance-based approaches often increase ideological entrenchment. Opera's textual and visual elements, along with its inherently social nature, both simultaneously complicate understanding of a work's nature and provide interdisciplinary analytical inroads. Analysis of operatic performance faces challenges of how to interrogate onstage musical behaviors, and how they relate to both dramatic narrative and an opera's identity. This article applies Martin Heidegger's dichotomy of technē and poiēsis to relationships between scores, performances, and works, characterizing works as conceptual, and scores and performances as tangible embodiments. Opera scholarship relies primarily upon scores, creating a lacuna of sound-based examinations. Adapting analyses developed in CHARM's "Mazurka Project," this essay incorporates textual considerations into tempo hierarchy as a means of asserting each performance's nuanced uniqueness and thus provides a window into performers' creative processes. Interviews with the performers considered in this study confirmed postulations derived from analyzing temporal-textual emphases. This approach is adaptable to other expressive elements employed in creating a role onstage. In addition to the hybrid empirical-hermeneutic application, the datasets created in this approach could be valuable as ground truth in machine learning applications