Musical Composition in the Context of Globalization: New Perspectives on Music History in the 20th and 21st Century

This book discusses the effects of cultural globalization on processes of composition and distribution of art music in the 20th and 21st century. Christian Utz provides the foundations of a global music historiography, building on new models such as transnationalism, entangled histories, and reflexive globalization. The relationship between music and broader changes in society forms the central focus and is treated as a pivotal music-historical dynamic.Dieses Buch diskutiert die Auswirkungen der kulturellen Globalisierung auf Prozesse der Komposition und Verbreitung von Kunstmusik im 20. und 21. Jahrhundert. Christian Utz liefert die Grundlagen einer globalen Musikhistoriographie, die auf neuen Modellen wie Transnationalismus, Verflechtungsgeschichte und reflexiver Globalisierung aufbaut. Das Verhältnis zwischen Musik und breiteren gesellschaftlichen Veränderungen bildet den zentralen Fokus der Studien und wird als zentrale musikgeschichtliche Dynamik begriffen

Opera as Japanese Culture: Creativity, Modernity and Heterogeneous Social Expression in Japanese-Composed Opera

M.A. University of Hawaii at Manoa 2016.Includes bibliographical references.This thesis deals with the agency of Japanese composers who create and produce new opera, stemming from the European opera tradition, in both Japan and abroad. Specifically, I examine the creation of opera through four cultural processes. Opera creation can be understood as historically malleable within Japan, as domesticated through physical internalization and display, as altered through language into a decentered form open to multiple modes of cultural expression, and as crafted through the juxtaposition of opposing sound spectrums, suggesting the heterogeneity, rather than homogeneous collapsing, of available musical materials.. These processes are all intertwined, and position opera creation as a flexible method of expression that allows composers to embrace modernity while simultaneously challenging the dynamics of “Westernization” as a process of modernization in Japan. Historically, opera has been produced and enjoyed in Japan as one of several methods for certain Japanese audiences to embrace “Western” culture, in order to be modern and enhance social prestige. Although groups of Japanese consumers and producers of opera still engage with the genre as a means of participating in this prestige and Western modernization in the 21st century, I suggest that the creation of new opera by composers is a process of challenging opera as a predominantly “Western” mode of cultural expression, while articulating Japanese culture from within a globally engaged Japan. In the process of decentering opera from its European origins, composers challenge the dominant theoretical frameworks of Orientalism and hybridity as inadequate in considering musical and cultural interaction for Japanese creation. Writing opera is a process of actively shifting the cultural logic of opera, and of resituating traditional Japanese culture, society, and aesthetic within the context of modernity, rather than an either-­‐ or of rejecting tradition for modernity. The process of creating new opera in Japan can also be seen as an increasingly vibrant rejection of Orientalism and cultural homogeneity in favor of a growing, continually recoded, and diverse Japan, allowing for new possibilities of self-­‐expression. Particularly in the post-­‐war era, many composers have embraced myriad framings of “Japan” within opera, together constructing a kaleidoscopic imagining of Japanese identity. Through processes of historical framing, domestication, diversification, and cultural juxtaposing, composers claim ownership over opera as a means of social expression within the context of Japan. By considering opera creation by Japanese composers through these cultural processes, I argue that these new operas challenge dominant conceptions of opera as an inherently “Western” construction, while allowing composers to embrace and define Japan’s modernity for themselves

An Exploration into the Validity and Treatment of the Bassoon in Duet Repertoire from 1960 - 2016

Dominant composers have taken advantage of the bassoon’s expansive range, including it in a duet setting within a handful of compositions. Yet despite these wonderful works, demonstrating the bassoon’s potential in this repertoire, modern composers and performers alike shy away from including the bassoon in duets. It is my belief that knowledge of this repertoire, along with fearless composers and performers, will incite new passions for the duet repertoire that includes the bassoon and help bring this wonderful music to the concert stage. This dissertation project explores the validity of the bassoon in duet repertoire and pushes the boundaries of standard conceptions through three thematic recital programs with works written between 1960 and 2016. The composers included are uninhibited by extended techniques, musical style and traditions, or unconventional instrumentation. The first contains duets for bassoon and percussion and electronics, the second for bassoon and winds, and the third for bassoon and strings. The works performed and discussed in this dissertation are the following: • Howard J. Buss, Luminous Horizons for bassoon and harp (2016) • John Falcone, Jabberwocky Jam for solo bassoon and narrator (2011) • Alfonso Fuentes, Mejunje del Fagobóngo for solo bassoon & solo bongos (2006) • Kyle Hovatter, Mist for bassoon and track (2011) • Alan Hovhaness, Suite for English horn and bassoon (1968) • Michael Isaacson, Duet for bassoon and one maraca (2008) • Michael Isaacson, The Low Down, ten bar blues for bassoon and electric bass (2011) • Ann Kearns, Six Poems of Mary Oliver (1997) • Michael Kibbe, Eclogue, op. 61 for English horn & bassoon (1981) • Francisco Mignone, Music for Two Bassoons, Sonata No. 1 (1961) • Craig Phillips, Pastoral & Dance for bassoon & organ (2006) • Thomas Priest, Reminiscent Rains for bassoon & marimba (2006) • Robert Rønnes, Dragon’s Teeth (2003) • Robert Rønnes, Kumoi Kudan – Masahito Tanaka in Memoriam (2003) • Tadd Russo At the Zoo – Three Dances for Trumpet and Bassoon (2007) • Gerhard Samuel, Dirge for John Cage for bassoon & Percussion (1992) • John Steinmetz, Fish Phase for two contrabassoons & goldfish (1975) • Günther Witschurke, Zwei Lieder für Sopran und Fagott (1994) • Gernot Wolfgang, 3 Short Stories for viola & bassoon (2001

Constraint and creative decision making in the composition of concert works, film and video-game soundtracks

This PhD research investigates the types, implications and origins of constraint within the contexts of various music composition projects. It then presents the practical value of this deeper understanding as a contemporary music composer.To explore the topic of constraint, the doctorate contains a portfolio of original music compositions and a reflective commentary on those compositions. The music spans a wide range of purposes, including works for concert hall, film and videogame. This breadth, across 33 musical works for 17 different projects of both collaborative and independent types, facilitates the extension of our understanding of constraint and its role in the process of music-making. The commentary, focussing on each composition individually or in small groups, extrapolates how constraint emerges within different circumstances.Analysing the music, in tandem with an account of their contextual backgrounds, demonstrates how different constraints influence music composition. The result of this research is that one can start to generalise the creative challenges a contemporary composer faces in the form of constraint. The research does this by proposing a series of labels: intrinsic, extrinsic, functional and aesthetic. These categories emerged through the creative practices of the portfolio, delineating and searching for constraint as a means of grounding creative decisions. The commentary and portfolio, taken together, will offer insights into the four proposed categories of constraint while explicating my compositional practice

Musical Composition in the Context of Globalization

Since the early transformation of European music practice and theory in the cultural centers of Asia, Latin America, and Africa around 1900, it has become necessary for music history to be conceived globally - a challenge that musicology has hardly faced yet. This book discusses the effects of cultural globalization on processes of composition and distribution of art music in the 20th and 21st century. Christian Utz provides the foundations of a global music historiography, building on new models such as transnationalism, entangled histories, and reflexive globalization. The relationship between music and broader changes in society forms the central focus and is treated as a pivotal music-historical dynamic

Chinese Zheng and Identity Politics in Taiwan

Ph.D. Thesis. University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa 2018

Pedagogical relationships: A master-apprentice model in music teaching

The thesis entitled Pedagogical Relationships: A master-apprentice model in music teaching is a pedagogical and phenomenological inquiry into the lived experience of the master-apprentice model of piano teaching in a private studio. It surveys the history of the instrument, its literature, its pedagogy and the importance of genealogy in this mentor-protégé relationship. Using narratives, interviews, audio-visual links, illustrations, musical score illustrations and literary references, the thesis illuminates authentic lived experiences of both teacher and student

The Japanese Art of Listening An ethnographic investigation into the role of the listener

This project investigates the art of listening in Japan through ethnographic observation of hostesses (escorts) and listening volunteers, and an analysis of self-help literature on listening. At night clubs in Tokyo, hostesses, who are famous for being good listeners, use listening as a streetwise skill. This enables them to stay in subordinate and supportive positions, and to help customers dominate a conversation. The customers can gain a sense of recognition, enhance intimate relationships with the hostesses or rebuild their masculinity. Hostesses’ listening is ‘an interactional weapon of the weak’, gaining money, business connections and prestige, but this, in turn, intensifies the gendered division of labour in interactions. By contrast, listening volunteers – who converse with elderly people using listening as a tool for reaching out – sometimes fall short in conversation, not realising that their listening functions as a gift. This forces clients to stay in helpee/subordinate positions and makes them feel obliged to reciprocate. Listening here can be ‘a mask for silent authority’. Superficially these two cases do not resemble each other; however, both deal with power dynamics. Their other common aspect is performing emotional labour. These listeners suppress or discard their feelings – such as disgust or boredom – and generate socially required emotions like respect or compassion, whilst displaying situationally expected listening behaviour. They hope to generate a certain state of mind in others to a greater or lesser extent, and so must perform emotional labour. Listening is therefore a subset of emotional labour. Self-help guides implicitly instruct emotional labour, and tacitly suggest dealing with power relations by introducing therapeutic listening for superiors and ‘zealous listening’ (my term) for subordinates. As my analyses show, listening is not simply a skill of hearing or understanding others, but also a way of associating with them. Therefore, listening is an ‘art’, which requires both fundamental skills, and a listener’s own personal way of relating to others.Honjo International Scholarship Foundation, The Great Britain Sasakawa Foundation, Aoi Foundation, Japan Foundation Endowment Committee, International Soroptimist Kunitachi, Laura Bassi Scholarship, Department of Japanese studies at the University of Cambridge, and Downing College

Blueprints and Vignettes: Pitch-class sets, Serialism and Intervallicism, and the Integration of Systematic and Intuitive Music Making

Blueprints and Vignettes: Pitch-class sets, Serialism and Intervallicism, and the Integration of Systematic and Intuitive Music Making examines the interaction of systematic and intuitive elements in my compositional and improvisational practice, and the outcomes of my sustained investigation of pitch-class sets, serialism and intervallicism as creative tools. This submission consists of two parts: a portfolio of compositions, improvisations and recordings, and an accompanying analytical exegesis. The works in the composition portfolio are a product of three individual projects with three distinct instrumental and aesthetic settings – solo piano, avant-garde jazz quartet and chamber duo – that have occupied my practice over the past five years. Each project also focusses on a particular type of creative methodology, in order to pose answers to several key research questions. How can improvisation generate a composition? How can a composition facilitate improvisation? Does a composition treated in an improvisatory manner maintain its identity? What techniques can be used to assure that it does, or does not? What are the harmonic and melodic possibilities of pitch-class sets, serialism and intervallicism, particularly to musicians with other improvisational or compositional backgrounds? How to these structural devices relate to conventional tonal harmony? In the exegesis I examine these questions by analyzing the creative processes behind and improvisatory products of the compositions in the portfolio, and in so doing place the works on a theoretical continuum between improvisation and composition similar to the one proposed by Nettl (1974). I discuss my adoption of comprovisation (the use of pre-performed or recorded improvisations as compositional seeds or scaffolds) as an integral part of my creative process, and the various ways I incorporate improvisation into my composed works – through techniques such as open notation, aleatory, textual instructions, chord symbols and other systems of facilitating open-ended performance. This research positions my practice at a nexus of jazz, experimental improvisation and classical modernism, and offers a resource to those interested in systematic improvisation, intuitive composition or the uses of pitch-class sets, serialism and intervallicism