Dissertations / Theses on the topic 'Performing arts, n.e.c'

Since the 1980s, Taiwan has been subjected to heavy foreign and global influences, leading to a marked erosion of its traditional cultural forms. Indigenous traditions have had to struggle to hold their own and to strike out into new territory, adopt or adapt to Western models. For most theatres in Taiwan, Shakespeare has inevitably served as a model to be imitated and a touchstone of quality. Such Taiwanese Shakespeare performances prove to be much more than merely a combination of Shakespeare and Taiwan, constituting a new fusion which shows Taiwan as hospitable to foreign influences and unafraid to modify them for its own purposes. Nonetheless, Shakespeare performances in contemporary Taiwan are not only a demonstration of hybridity of Westernisation but also Sinification influences. Since the 1945 Kuomintang (Chinese Nationalist Party, or KMT) takeover of Taiwan, the KMT’s one-party state has established Chinese identity over a Taiwan identity by imposing cultural assimilation through such practices as the Mandarin-only policy during the Chinese Cultural Renaissance in Taiwan. Both Taiwan and Mainland China are on the margin of a “metropolitan bank of Shakespeare knowledge” (Orkin, 2005, p. 1), but it is this negotiation of identity that makes the Taiwanese interpretation of Shakespeare much different from that of a Mainlanders’ approach, while they share certain commonalities that inextricably link them. This study thus examines the interrelation between Taiwan and Mainland China operatic cultural forms and how negotiation of their different identities constitutes a singular different Taiwanese Shakespeare from Chinese Shakespeare. In recognising this, the core of this thesis rests on how Shakespeare plays speak insightfully to Taiwan society across historical, geographical, and cultural boundaries. Many Shakespeare plays powerfully echo the political turmoil of contemporary Taiwan society, but it is the negotiation of the political and cultural dependency that constitutes a distinct Taiwanese Shakespeare identity that is different from Chinese Shakespeare. This study therefore focuses on Shakespeare performances in contemporary Taiwan between 1986 and 2003, emphasising political context as key factor in adaptation, as Taiwan society transited from a military age to post-millennium democracy after martial law was lifted in 1987.

Thesis (MA)--Stellenbosch University, 2008.
ENGLISH ABSTRACT: This study was initiated to gain insight into cabaret as a form of theatre for the migration of singers with a classical singing orientation. It researches a form of music theatre known as entertainment cabaret, which is individual by nature, as it is not bound by convention. The study entails a discussion of the nature of cabaret as a diverse form of theatre. It illustrates the role of the artist and the genre’s music style in researching structure, to determine differences and similarities in the frameworks of cabaret and opera, with specific reference to classical singing. Currently there is an abundance of musical theatre genres, and cabaret is not differentiated as an individual genre. This leads to problems in the definitive classifying of cabaret, as well as the bridging of a singer with a classical singing orientation migrating to cabaret. The study researches the concept of, and reasons for, this migration in South Africa. The qualitative research method, which makes use of in-depth interviews to gain insight, generated a wealth of information about the realities in South Africa. This method introduces a new method of acquiring information, where the changes of the last few years had a tremendous impact on the careers of performing artists in South Africa. For this reason, artists with a classical singing orientation must have a choice to take action; to generate their own opportunities. The main findings and the need for multi-talented artists to adapt to the different styles of genres were analysed in the theoretical section, followed by a discussion of the respondents’ feedback selected to contribute to this study. The gap in skills between the cabaret artist and the classical singer is identified to showcase and define the possibility of cabaret as a form of theatre for classical singers. New categories are generated in which ideas of how development can be adapted are laid out.
AFRIKAANSE OPSOMMING: Die doel van hierdie studie is om insig te verkry in kabaret as moontlike teatervorm vir die migrasie van sangers met ’n klassieke sangoriëntasie. Dit ondersoek die vermaaklikheidsvorm kabaret, ’n eiesoortige vorm van musiekteater deurdat dit nie deur konvensies begrens word nie. Die studie behels ’n bespreking van die aard van kabaret as diverse teatervorm, en illustreer die rol en vaardighede van die kabarettis asook die genre se musiekstyl om die ooreenkomste en verskille in die raamwerk van kabaret en opera, met betrekking tot klassieke sangoriëntasie, te ondersoek. Tans oorvloei die musiekteatergenres, en word kabaret nie as eiesoortige genre onderskei nie. Dit maak die onderskeid van kabaret, asook die oorbrugging van ’n klassieke sanger wat na kabaret migreer, uiters problematies. Die studie stel ondersoek in na die konsep van en redes vir die migrasie van sangers met ’n klassieke sangoriëntasie na kabaret in Suid-Afrika. Die kwalitatiewe metode, wat met behulp van diepte-onderhoude insig verkry, het ’n magdom inligting oor die werklikhede in Suid-Afrika opgelewer. Hierdie metodologie is ’n nuwe manier om inligting in te samel, veral in die lig van veranderinge in die laaste paar jaar in die land, wat ’n geweldige impak op die loopbaan van Suid-Afrikaanse uitvoerende kunstenaars gehad het. Kunstenaars met ‘n klassieke sangoriëntasie moet kan kies om tot aksie oor te gaan; om hulle eie geleenthede te genereer. Die hoofbevindinge en die behoefte dat veelsydige kunstenaars by verskillende genrestyle moet kan aanpas word in die teoretiese afdeling ondersoek, gevolg deur ’n bespreking van die respondentterugvoering wat vir die doel van die studie geselekteer is. Die gaping tussen die vaardighede van die kabarettis en klassieke sanger word geïdentifiseer om sodoende die moontlikheid van kabaret as teatervorm vir klassieke sangers te definieer. Nuwe kategorieë word geskep waarin idees vir die moontlike aanpassing van ontwikkeling neergelê word.

This thesis is a close examination and analysis of the creation and reception of a group of eighteen Central Italian paintings of the Madonna with Eve presented reclining at her feet, images which draw on one of the fundamental themes of Mary's cult, her role as the Second Eve. Modern writers have sometimes been taken aback by these panels; in recent studies of women in history, Mary and Eve are often assumed to have been defining stereotypes of positive and negative feminine behaviour, and these works make a blatant juxtaposition of the two. Yet this imagery was obviously attractive to Trecento and Quattrocento patrons: this paradox lies at the heart of this thesis, which seeks to determine what these paintings might have meant to those who commissioned them and who first worshipped before them. To do so, this thesis begins by introducing the questions raised by the works; it then discusses textual and oral traditions linking Mary and Eve for Trecento and Quattrocento viewers, in order to suggest a range of possible associations for the imagery. There are then four case studies, intended to particularise the general themes of the pairing through specific images and contexts. The first focuses on Ambrogio Lorenzetti's frescoes at the former Cistercian abbey of S. Galgano, which were created, it is suggested here, by a member of that community in Mary's honour. The next chapter looks at the political and eschatological implications of images of Mary's rule as the Second Eve in the Papal States, discussing frescoes in S. Agostino, Montefalco, S. Gregorio Maggiore, Spoleto, and the Camposanto in Pisa, as well as a panel attributed to Carlo da Camerion, now in Cleveland, Ohio.

This dissertation explores the complex entanglements of an artistic traffic between two distinct 'visual economies' in eastern India, c.1772-c.1795. Both late Mughal and early colonial cultures were undergoing transformation, to the extent that during this era the nascent colonial artistic diaspora collapsed. Three inter-related areas will be interrogated: the prestation and commercial circulation of imagery between London, Calcutta and Murshidabad, the dichotomies of political and aesthetic spheres, and colonial representations of late Mughal culture as embroiled by such frameworks. Chapter one examines India-painted subjects in a metropolitan aesthetic sphere, thus acting as crucial juxtaposition for the refiguration of British art in Calcutta, which is the subject of the following section. Hastings' regime wielded British art as part of an intensely spectacular colonial governmentality, but his successor Cornwallis, took a tougher line with devastating effect. A diversity of competing, derivative idioms ousted professional colonial painting forever; its artistic schema penetrated to 'grass-roots' level through the creation of a 'Company School' which transposed the practice of the patua caste. Chapters five to seven investigate nawabi perceptions of British imagery. Hastings introduced the gifting of large-scale portraits; artefacts ill-suited to Indian interiors and aesthetic interiority - perhaps not even viewed as 'art'. The final chapter, through representations of the nawabs of Murshidabad and Lucknow, traces the evolution of British pictures as accoutrements of Mughal sovereignty. By 1795 both courts possessed permanent if 'hybrid' expositions of colonial imagery which transgressed established Indian and British classifications, as well as indicating more profound redefinitions of Indian comportment, consumption and taste. The intersection of 'visual economies' by way of an exploration of diverse zones of transculturation and processes of translation, provides a vital lens for recovering Indian and British agency - both elite and subaltern, in the oft-uneasy formation of a colonial aesthetic forum.

This dissertation seeks to explore how national identities were manifest in eighteenth-century Scottish art. Understanding national identity to be a cultural and political phenomena, it considers symbols of national identity and examines in aesthetic and economic terms how the fine arts were both implicated in, and capable of expressing, the significant changes in national identity apparent in Scotland following the ’Forty-Five. The first chapter concerns itself with the issue of art and identity in Scotland between cl750 and 1800, and surveys the relevant literature, before introducing other significant issues pertinent to this research: the Enlightenment and Improvement. Chapter two recognises that previous studies of Highland portraits have examined them from an ‘external’ perspective. It investigates the implications of this for the viewer, and proceeds to analyse them from an ‘internal’ perspective intended to reveal the sitters’ motivations, to conclude that they are aristocratic images of authority, and its loss. The construction of the myth of the Highlands is thus expounded visually. If these symbols offer little evidence for an identity in flux, it is questionable whether individuals’ portraits can express national identity. Yet such a claim, it will be argued in chapter three, can be made through the desire to collect and order portraits by nation, and its relation to the Enlightenment discourse of the role of the individual in forming civil society. In this context, in chapter four, the aesthetic qualities of Allan Ramsay’s 1753-4 portraits will be argued as having been of particular significance to their Scottish sitters, being formed by Ramsay’s participation in Enlightenment Edinburgh society. Evidence for this position will be adduced through his paintings and writings, though the influence of physical setting is also considered. Finally, in chapter five, a study of Edinburgh art markets in comparison with those of English provincial cities addresses the question of whether Scotland was a nation, or province of England. The synthesis of existing literature and an original survey of art-related newspaper advertising reveals the Edinburgh market to be distinctive, though increasingly reliant upon London. The co-existence of local and national culture is found to be an important dialectic in the market, just as the dialectic between Scottish and British culture was found to be so generally in this dissertation. In conclusion, chapter six argues that while Scottish art must be considered as part of the history of British art, the desire amongst Scots to be part of a British nation was a significant force in shaping Scottish visual culture.

The subject of this doctoral study is the satirical figure known as the ‘galaunt’, as depicted in English literature and visual art c.1380–c.1550. It combines close textual analysis with investigation of established youth tropes, contemporaneous material culture, and socio-political concerns. It begins by establishing the breadth of the galaunt corpus and the figure’s significance, before tracing the etymology of galaunt and the cultural antecedents of the late medieval tradition in order to establish its hitherto unidentified Classical origins. The study goes on to explore the fundamental aspects of the galaunt’s semiotic makeup: youth; licentiousness; sartorial extravagance; and problematic masculinity. Despite the cultural significance of the late medieval galaunt, it has received little scholarly attention and the true significance of the figure’s role as Wayward Youth is yet to be established. This doctoral thesis moves away from previous scholarship, which has interpreted the figure as an instance of social-mobility discourse, and instead unravels the tradition’s complex conflation of established youth stereotypes and socio-political concerns to reposition the galaunt as a Vice figure symbolising errant youth. The thesis argues for a reappraisal of the significance of youth to late medieval social discourses, particularly in regard to questions of masculinity and status.

Thesis (MDram (Drama))—University of Stellenbosch, 2005.
Oral Art (Woordkuns) as a performing art form is a burgeoning independent theatre genre that has developed especially over the last decade with the rise of the national arts festivals. By investigating the literary term word art, the eclectic nature of oral art as a theatre genre, the oral art text and the role of the visual within an oral art performance, we are able to give a paraphrase or definition of oral art as a theatre genre. Oral art as a performing art form can firstly be defined with reference to the origins of the oral art text, namely an existing work(s) that originated as a non-dramatic literary work(s) and that is revisited within a new context; secondly a shift in the dramatic presentation from physical action to the spoken word. The eclectic nature of oral art is a further characteristic of this theatre genre. Oral art has the ability to change in form and function and not only can it be biographical or autobiographical, but it can also be socio-politically intended. The hybrid nature of oral art – oral art texts combine in many cases works from different genres – also shows many similarities with other theatre genres like cabaret and black political protest theatre. Three possible structures are identified within the oral art text, namely an episodic structure, a developing story line or argument and a compilation consisting of a number of short stories or narratives. The oral art text can be compiled from a number of literary genres and the choice of material is determined by the overarching theme and the format of the performance. Visual elements support the oration within an oral art performance. The different types of texts used in the compilation of an oral art program determine the presentation style and stage composition. Physical action is representational rather than realistic. The use of décor, props, costumes and lighting are minimal and multi-functional.

Representations of the Holy Trinity have increasingly come under scrutiny, exposing two competing paradigms at opposite ends of the theological spectrum: the legitimacy and the illegitimacy of imaging the Triune God with focus on the invisible Father who was imaged as an individual from Late Antiquity and beyond. An overview of these two conflicting views has unveiled a number of inconsistencies in how the Early Christian iconography of God the Father and the Trinity has been interpreted. This thesis provides a unique re-evaluation of the surviving Trinitarian visual material between c.300 to c.730. Primarily, this study collates pictorial evidence preserved in the mediums of sarcophagi, catacomb frescoes, mosaics, illuminated manuscripts and an icon that depicts Divinity. It proceeds to critique modern misconceptions of the identity, form, meaning, function and reception of the depictions. The thesis traces the visual shift amid overt and covert images of Divinity by decoding important artworks such as the Ashburnham Pentateuch and the Codex Amiatinus; Christians visualised explicitly the ' invisibility' of God but created an unprecedented invention, the depiction of the Father through Christ's image. The innovative depiction heralded future visual formulas of Divinity echoing the complexities of Trinitarian material culture of the Mediterranean world.

Apparitions of empire and imperial ideologies were deeply embedded in the International Exhibition, a distinct exhibitionary paradigm that came to prominence in the mid-nineteenth century. Exhibitions were platforms for the display of objects, the movement of people, and the dissemination of ideas across and between regions of the British Empire, thereby facilitating contact between its different cultures and societies. This thesis aims to disrupt a dominant understanding of International Exhibitions, which forwards the notion that all exhibitions, irrespective of when or where they were staged, upheld a singular imperial discourse (i.e. Greenhalgh 1988, Rydell 1984). Rather, this thesis suggests International Exhibitions responded to and reflected the unique social, political and economic circumstances in which they took place, functioning as cultural environments in which pressing concerns of the day were worked through. Understood thus, the International Exhibition becomes a space for self-presentation, serving as a stage from which a multitude of interests and identities were constructed, performed and projected. This thesis looks to the visual and material culture of the International Exhibition in order to uncover this more nuanced history, and foregrounds an analysis of the intersections between practices of exhibition-making and identity-making. The primary focus is a set of exhibitions held in Glasgow in the late-1880s and early-1900s, which extends the geographic and temporal boundaries of the existing scholarship. What is more, it looks at representations of Canada at these events, another party whose involvement in the International Exhibition tradition has gone largely unnoticed. Consequently, this thesis is a thematic investigation of the links between a municipality routinely deemed the ‘Second City of the Empire’ and a Dominion settler colony, two types of geographic setting rarely brought into dialogue. It analyses three key elements of the exhibition-making process, exploring how iconographies of ‘quasi-nationhood’ were expressed through an exhibition’s planning and negotiation, its architecture and its displays. This original research framework deliberately cuts across strata that continue to define conceptions of the British Empire, and pushes beyond a conceptual model defined by metropole and colony. Through examining International Exhibitions held in Glasgow in the late-Victorian and Edwardian periods, and visions of Canada in evidence at these events, the goal is to offer a novel intervention into the existing literature concerning the cultural history of empire, one that emphasises fluidity rather than fixity and which muddles the boundaries between centre and periphery.

This thesis addresses the textual bias inherent in the historiography by exploring the value of visual images as a source of evidence for cultural perceptions of the Gàidhealtachd. Visual images stood at the sharp end of the means by which stereotypes were forged and sustained. In part, this was a direct result of the special role afforded to the image in the cultural and intellectual climate of Enlightenment and post-Enlightenment Europe. This thesis looks at the evolution of visual interest in the Highlands and Islands on two fronts, documentary and aesthetic, and pays particular attention to the way in which the two main functions of the image in society came to be intertwined. This thesis argues that the concept of antiquity was the single most powerful influence driving the visual representation of the Highlands and Islands during a long period from c. 1700 to around 1880, and indeed into the twentieth century. If something could be regarded as ancient, aboriginal, dead, or even dying, it acquired both documentary and aesthetic value. This applied to actual antiquities, to customs and manners perceived as indigenous and ‘traditional’ to the region, and, ultimately, even to the physical landscape. Successive chapters explore what might now be classified as the archaeological, ethnological and geological motives for visualising the Highlands and Islands, and the bias in favour of antiquity which resulted from the spread of intellectual influences into the fine arts. The shadow of time which hallmarked visual representations of the region resulted in a preservationist mentality which has had powerful repercussions down to the present day. The body of evidence considered – which embraces maps, plans, paintings, drawings, sketches and printed images by both professionals and amateurs – must be viewed as a rich and valuable companion to the written word.

Existing accounts of the music profession argue that between 1750 and 1850 musicians acquired a new identity as professional ‘artists’ and experienced a concomitant rise in their social and cultural status. In the absence of sustained investigation, it has often been implied that these changes affected male and female musicians in similar ways. As this thesis contends, this was by no means the case. Arguments in support of female musical professionalism, artistry, and their function in public life were made in this period. Based on the gender-specific nature of the female voice, they were an important defence of women’s public engagement that has been overlooked by gender historians, something which this thesis sets out to correct. However, the public role and professionalism of female musicians were in opposition to the prevailing valorisation of female domesticity and privacy. Furthermore, the notion of women as creative artists was highly unstable in an era which tended to label artistry, ‘genius’ and creativity as male attributes. For these reasons, the idea of female musicians as professional artists was always in tension with contemporary conceptions of gender, making women’s experience of the ‘rise of the artist’ much more contested and uncertain compared to that of men. Those advocating the female singer as professional artist were a minority in the British musical world. Their views co-existed alongside very different and much more prevalent approaches to the female singer which had little to do with the idea of the professional artist. Through examining debates about female singers in printed sources, particularly newspapers and periodicals, alongside case studies based on the surviving documents of specific singers, this thesis builds a picture of increasing diversity in the experiences and representations of female musicians in this period and underlines the controlling influence of gender in shaping responses to them.

This thesis suggests that a range of major and some minor Scottish nineteenth-century artists’ approaches to figurative art, c.1800-1900, were informed by, and in some cases decisively influenced by, the prevalence of naturalism as fostered by the Trustees’ Academy, Edinburgh. The Trustees’ Academy was selected as a case study for this thesis due to its prominent position in art education as a leading Scottish institution, particularly for the first half of the nineteenth century. Despite scholars noting the far-reaching influence of certain nineteenth-century Scottish artists, such as David Wilkie, discussions of Scottish figurative painting predominantly focus on the personal development of artists’ oeuvres or artists, and grouped generally by style or chronology. Moreover, there is no dedicated published study on the nineteenth-century history of the Trustees’ Academy and its pedagogical methods; similarly, the discussions of Scottish naturalism have formed part of larger contributions related to specific artists and movements. This thesis presents new research from unpublished archive papers related to the Trustees’ Academy in the National Archives of Scotland, and it adopts a contextual and comparative approach by exploring the history of the TA and its pedagogical approaches in relation to wider trends in Scottish art and as relevant in England and abroad. Following discussions established by Duncan Macmillan and John Morrison, it suggests that naturalism developed in Scottish figurative painting as a conceptual motif and as a stylistic tool. The conceptual strand was rooted in poetry, which explored both the ‘Celtic’ and ‘pastoral’, with each being evocative of a romanticised, ‘natural’ way of life. This thesis proposes that naturalism, as a style, was more fully developed in the nineteenth century, in part developed by artists’ pursuit of personal depictions of Scotland’s land and people. Naturalism, as posited by this thesis, was part of Scotland’s wider search, post-Union, for its national identity within its ‘union-nationalist’ framework. By elucidating this new approach in Scottish artists’ depictions of the figure, this study aims to enhance our understanding of Scottish nineteenth-century systems of art education and approaches by artists to the model, and to contribute to research on Scottish national identity in nineteenth-century painting.

This thesis offers a cultural history of the Scots Renascence, a revival of Scottish identity and culture between 1880 and 1914, and demonstrates how heavily Scottish cultural nationalism in this period drew from, and was defined by, fin-de-siècle Decadence. Few cultural historians have taken the notion of a Scots Renascence seriously and many literary critics have styled the period as low point in the health of Scottish culture – a narrative which is deeply flawed. Others have portrayed Decadence as antithetical to nationalism (and to Scotland itself). The thesis challenges these characterisations and argues that there was a revival of Scottish identity in the period which drew from, and contributed to, Decadent critiques of 'civilisation' and 'progress'. The thesis considers literature alongside visual art, which were so interdependent around the 1890s. It focuses on three main cultural groups in Scotland (the circle that surrounded Patrick Geddes, the Glasgow School and writers of the Scottish Romance Revival) but it speaks to an even wider cultural trend. Together, the various figures treated here formed a loose movement concerned with reviving Scottish identity by returning to the past and challenging notions of improvement, utilitarianism and stadialism. The first chapter considers the cultural and historical background to the Scots Renascence and reveals how the writings of the Scottish Romance Revival critiqued stadialist narratives in order to lay the ground for a more unified national self. The second chapter demonstrates how important japonisme and the Belgian cultural revival were to the Scots Renascence: Scottish cultural nationalists looked to Japan and Belgium, amongst other nations, to gain inspiration and form a particular counter- hegemony. The final three chapters of the thesis explore how a unifying myth of origin was developed through neo-Paganism, how connections to an ancestral self were activated through occultism, and how such ideas of mythic origin and continuation were disseminated to wide audiences through pageantry. In doing so, the thesis charts the origins, development and dissemination of the Scots Renascence, while situating it within its historical and international contexts.

Although early Venetian operas by composers such as Claudio Monteverdi and Francesco Cavalli offer today's listeners profound moments of emotion, the complex codes of meaning connecting emotion (or affect) with music in this repertoire are different from those of later seventeenth-century operatic repertoire. The specific textual and musical markers that librettists and composers used to indicate individual emotions in these operas were historically and culturally contingent, and many scholars thus consider them to be inaccessible to listeners today. This dissertation demonstrates a new analytical framework that is designed to identify the specific combinations of elements that communicate each lifelike emotion in this repertoire. Re-establishing the codes that govern the relationship between text, musical sound, and affect in this repertoire illuminates the nuanced emotional language of operas by composers such as Claudio Monteverdi, Francesco Cavalli, Antonio Cesti, and Francesco Lucio. The new analytical framework that underlies this study derives from analysis of seventeenth-century Venetian explanations and depictions of emotional processes, which reveal a basis in their society's underlying Aristotelian philosophy. Chapters III and IV examine extant documents from opera librettists, composers, audience members, and their associates to reveal how they understood emotions to work in the mind and body. These authors, many of whom were educated by Aristotelian scholars at the nearby University of Padua, understood action and emotion to be bound together in a reciprocal, causal relationship, and this synthesis was reflected in the way that they depicted affect in opera. It also guided the ways that singer-actors performed and audiences interpreted this music. In contrast, post-1660 Baroque operas from France and Italy express affect according to the musical conventions of the Doctrine of Affections (based in the ideas of René Descartes) and aim to present a single, clear emotion for each large semantic unit (recitative or aria). This paradigm does not hold true for operas composed before 1660; thus, this vibrant repertoire requires a new analytical approach that respects its pre-Cartesian musical aesthetics. Early Venetian opera composers express not just one, but many affects in each semantic unit. In their operas, musical sound interacts directly with text and dramatic action on a line-by-line basis to produce an unprecedented fluidity of emotional meaning. Chapter II describes a new analytical framework based in this understanding to reveal the means that librettists, composers, and performers used to communicate emotion in this repertoire. Chapters V through X contain hermeneutic and musical analyses (according to the method described in Chapter II) of case studies drawn from Venetian operas performed between 1640 and 1658. These chapters illustrate how this repertoire uses a flexible but well-defined system of musical and textual markers to convey characters' emotions. This new approach unlocks an aesthetic system that privileges the fluid, real-time emotional reactions of the individual in accordance with Aristotelian emotional understanding. In Chapters XI and XII, supporting information gleaned from seventeenth-century acting treatises, reception documents, and conduct books enables an examination of the singer's role in depicting these textual and musical representations of affect in performance. These two chapters address seventeenth-century views on affective communication through voice acting and physical gesture, together with recommendations for today's singers who perform this repertoire. In taking a systematic approach to the identification of specific textual, musical, and gestural means for communicating affect in early Venetian opera, this dissertation offers a new approach to analyzing and performing its dynamic emotional content.

Nō é uma arte cênica japonesa em que representação, dança e música misturam-se em apresentações estilizadas onde poucos elementos são trabalhados para o aprofundamento de uma unidade imagética. Apesar de encontrarmos seus primeiros registros em documentos da era Heian (794-1185), a complexificação de todos os seus aspectos ocorreu na era Muromachi (1334-1573), com os esforços de Zeami (1363-1443) e de seu pai, Kan\'ami (1333-1384). Além de desenvolver a atuação e a orquestração, ambos fizeram avanços significativos na composição de peças. Felizmente, o maior artista de nō, Zeami, nos deixou muitos escritos críticos em que detalha todas as pesquisas empreendidas durante sua vida. A partir de um desses tratados e trechos de outros dois, este trabalho buscará analisar o método, estabelecido por Zeami, pelo qual a criação dramatúrgica divide-se em três frentes: shu, saku e sho, \"semente\", \"estrutura\" e \"composição\", respectivamente. Shu é o meio pelo qual se trabalha com a fonte que dá origem à peça e que será inevitavelmente revista pela linguagem do nō; saku é a estruturação musical que possibilita o desvendamento da semente; e sho é a junção de palavras e sons que transmitem essa revelação. Com o apoio de estudiosos e poetas recentes, procuraremos identificar os princípios que regem esses três caminhos e os modos pelos quais eles se unem para a formação de um todo orgânico, onde yūgen, a beleza contrária à imitação da realidade externa, nasce da distribuição de qualidades vivificadas por uma abordagem maleável do tempo chamada jo-ha-kyū. No primeiro capítulo, veremos como divisões e subdivisões das matérias-primas musicais do nō, ritmos e melodias, interagem para a estruturação da peça; no segundo, como a fonte e demais citações são rediagramadas para a realização gradual do material original; e no terceiro, como palavras são organizadas em aglomerados de sons e imagens para a estabelecimento de camadas significantes.
Nō is a Japanese performing art in which representation, dance and music blend into stylized presentations where few elements are handled to create and give depth to an imagistic unit. Although we find its first records in documents from the Heian period (794-1185), the increase of its complexity ocurred only in the Muromachi period (1334-1573), through the efforts of Zeami (1363-1443) and his father, Kan\'ami (1333- 1384). In addition to the development of performance and orchestration, both made significant advances in the composition of plays. Fortunately, the greatest n? artist, Zeami, left us many critical writings in which he detailed all the researches undertaken during his lifetime. Based on one of these treatises and on excerpts of two others, this study will analyse the method, established by Zeami, in which the creation of plays is dividided into three areas: shu, saku and sho, \"seed\", \"structure\" and \"composition\", respectively. Shu is the means by which the artist works with the source that gives rise to the play and that will inevitably be revised by the nō language; saku is the musical structuring that enables the seed to be unveiled; and sho is the combination of words and sounds that convey this revelation. Supported by recent scholars and poets, we will try to identify the principles governing these three paths and the ways by which they unite to form an organic totality, where yūgen, a beauty opposed to the imitation of external reality, is born out of the distribution of qualities vivified by a flexible approach of time, called jo-ha-kyū. In the first chapter, we will see how divisions and subdivisions of the musical primal resources of nō, rhythm and melody, interact to structure a play; in the second, how source and citations are reshaped to progressively recreate the original material; and third, how words are arranged in clusters of sounds and images to stablish layers of meanings.

Quiconque a déjà vu Gladiator de Ridley Scott a pu observer Joaquin Phoenix incarner un bien cruel empereur Commode, maître des armes et détenteur d’un pouvoir absolu, qui, isolé dans son palais, peut décider de la vie et de la mort de ses sujets. Mais il a également pu voir Derek Jacobi jouer le sénateur Gracchus, farouche partisan de la res publica (notion qui, dans ce contexte, prend le sens de République), système politique qui existait avant que ne soit créé le pouvoir des empereurs. Ce clivage politique entre pouvoir personnel et exercice collégial du gouvernement ne correspond en rien à la réalité historique propre à l’époque du dernier des Antonins, mais il est assurément le reflet de ce que l’imaginaire commun a pu retenir de cette période de l’Antiquité. Cette approche duale et contradictoire du pouvoir politique romain n’est pas une invention des Modernes. Elle peut renvoyer, certes de manière très schématique, à la période qui, du Ier siècle avant notre ère au Ier siècle de notre ère, voit émerger non pas un changement de régime mais un entre-deux politique, entre démocratie et monarchie, où le pouvoir impérial fondé par Auguste au tournant de notre ère fait sienne toute une culture nobiliaire du pouvoir tout en développant un contact et une réelle interaction avec le populus de Rome et, plus largement les habitants de l’imperium Romanum. C’est à cela même que renvoie la notion de « République impériale » romaine. Le recours à ce concept peut paraître surprenant puisqu’il a surtout été utilisé par des historiens de l’époque contemporaine, que l’on songe à Raymond Aron ou Olivier Le cour Grandmaison mais il permet de rendre compte des nuances propres à cette période où, pour paraphraser le philosophe Cicéron, des individus ont bénéficié « d’un pouvoir supérieur à celui de l’État tout entier » sans pour autant que les structures de celui-ci ne soient brutalement remises en cause. Complexe à définir et tout à fait spécifique, cet entre-deux ne peut être compris que dans une dynamique de mutation, ses structures militaires, économiques, politiques et, pour reprendre un terme actuel bien qu’inadapté, idéologiques évoluant à mesure que se renforce l’administration du « monde romain » - qui s’étend sur une partie de l’Europe, de l’Asie et de l’Afrique - mais aussi que les habitants de cet ensemble ne s’habituent au pouvoir personnel. En prenant appui sur les acquis récents de l’historiographie tout autant que sur les controverses qui lui sont propres (citons à titre d’exemple l’opposition de vue entre Fergus Millar et Karl-Joachim Hölkeskamp à propos de la nature démocratique et/ou aristocratique de la res publica romaine), la présente enquête entend renouveler la perception de cadres chronologiques souvent réduits à une succession République/Empire afin de percevoir au mieux les modalités d’enracinement d’un pouvoir personnel et centralisé au sein d’un « monde romain », dont la capitale continue d’être pensée comme une cité où le pouvoir s’incarne aux travers de magistratures et de l’ordre sénatorial. Ancrée dans le champ politique et institutionnel, cette réflexion ne peut faire abstraction des apports qui sont ceux de la sociologie mais aussi de la science politique, y compris dans ses aspects les plus récents, afin de saisir comment un système politique peut profondément évoluer sans pour autant changer brutalement, soit un questionnement très actuel à l’heure où le modèle démocratique tel que forgé au sortir de la Seconde Guerre mondiale tend à être remis en cause
Anyone who has ever seen Gladiator by Ridley Scott has watched Joaquin Phoenix embody a cruel emperor Commodus, a military and all-powerful leader, who, all by himself in his palace, can decide of life and death among his subjects. But they could also see Derek Jacobi play senator Gracchus, fierce partisan of the res publica (a notion which, in this context, means Republic), a political system which existed before the power of emperors was created. This political division between personal power and collective governing does not match the historical reality of the era of the last of the Antonine emperors, but it shows what people could remember of this era of Antiquity. This dual and contradictory vision of Roman political power is not a recent idea. It can refer - certainly in an oversimplified way - to the period when, from the first century BC to the first century AD, there appeared something different from a simple change of regime, a political in-between system - between democracy and monarchy - in which the imperial power created by Augustus at the start of our era integrates the aristocratic culture while developing a contact and a real interaction with the people of Rome and more generally speaking the inhabitants of the imperium Romanum. This is what is referred to by the notion of Roman « imperial Republic ». Referring to this concept may be surprising as it has essentially been used by the contemporary historians, whether it be Raymond Aron or Olivier Le cour Grandmaison ; yet it enables to bring out the subtler points of this period when, to paraphrase Cicero, some individuals benefited from « a power superior to that of the whole state » without strongly questioning the structures of that State. This political phase is really specific and thus hard to define ; it can only be understood in a dynamic of change, its military, economic, political and - to use a current term - ideological structures evolving as the administration of the Roman world - which is spread on Europe, Asia and Africa - gets stronger, but also as the inhabitants of this Empire get used to personal power. While relying on the recent studies of historiography as much as its controverses (one can quote the opposed opinions of Fergus Millar and Karl-Joachim Hölkeskamp concerning the democratic and/or aristocratic nature of the Roman res publica), this study aims at casting a new light on the perception of chronological frameworks often reduced to a succession of Republic/Empire in order to understand how a personal power centralised in a « Roman world », is rooted in a world whose capital is still considered as a city where power is embodied by magistracies and senatorial order. Rooted in the political and institutional fields, this work cannot leave aside the contribution of sociological and political sciences, including their most recent aspects, so as to understand the way a political system can deeply evolve without changing brutally, which is a current issue at a time when the democratic model as forged at the end of the Second World war tends to be questioned

The symbolic role of Helena throughout the Byzantine period has never been considered in any detail. Many of the literary sources, particularly historiographical and hagiological texts, are not easily accessible and have not been translated. The visual sources referring to Helena, such as works of late Roman and Byzantine art, coinage, illustrated manuscripts, reliquaries, and wall paintings, have never been collected. My thesis collects and re-evaluates the textual and visual evidence from the fourth to the fifteenth century in order to explore the origins and development of Helena's cult; the emergence of a Helena-legend with symbolic and metaphorical functions; and the ways that the Byzantines reconstructed, judged, and appreciated her role. Special attention is given to the relationship between word and image, as well as the influence exerted on them by contemporary political and social developments. This thesis demonstrates that memories of Helena as an empress and as a saint were manufactured in several distinct stages over several centuries; and that her role differed in the eastern and western halves of the former Roman empire. The evidence is analysed thematically and in chronological order.

abstract: Since 1913, some of the world’s finest trumpeters have utilized the advantages of specialized custom trumpets that can be played in multiple key centers through the operation of additional valves and slides. Merri Franquin (1848-1934), a leading trumpet teacher in twentieth-century Paris, patented two multiple-key trumpets: a four-piston- valve model that plays in the keys of C and D, and a five-piston-valve model that plays in the keys of A, B , C, and D. Thibouville-Lamy (1867-1969), a now-defunct French instrument company, built both models by adding extra valves and slides to three-valve C trumpets. In the mid-1900s, top performers such as Roger Voisin, Armando Ghitalla, and David Hickman began using similar trumpets in performances and recordings. Regrettably, only a privileged few have had access to these instruments and the numerous advantages that they can provide. Thus, by reviewing and building upon current data on multiple-key trumpet design and performance, the author aims to unlock a vast potential for performance enhancement, waiting to be tapped by current and future trumpet performers.
Dissertation/Thesis
Doctoral Dissertation Music 2016

abstract: During the nineteenth century, it was common for pianists to publish their own editions of Beethoven’s piano sonatas. They did this to demonstrate their understanding of the pieces. Towards the end of the century, musicians focused their attention on critical editions in an effort to reproduce the composer’s original intention. Unfortunately, this caused interpretive editions such as those created in the nineteenth century to fade from attention. This research focuses on situating these interpretive editions within the greater discourse surrounding the editorial development of Beethoven’s piano sonatas. The study opens with the critical reception of Beethoven, his Sonata in C-sharp minor, Op. 27 No. 2, also known as the “Moonlight” Sonata, the organology of the nineteenth-century fortepianos and the editorial practices of subsequent editions of the piece. It also contextualizes the aesthetic and performance practice of nineteenth-century piano playing. I go on to analyze and demonstrate how the performance practices conveyed in the modern Henle edition (1976) differ from those in selected earlier interpretive editions. I will conclude with an assessment of the ways in which nineteenth-century performance practices were reflected by contemporary editions. This study compares the First edition (1802) and seven selected editions of Beethoven’s “Moonlight” Sonata by Ignaz Moscheles (1814), Carl Czerny (1846), Franz Liszt (1857), Louis Köhler (1869), Hugo Riemann (1885), Sigmund Lebert and Hans von Bülow (1896), and Carl Krebs (1898) with the Henle edition. It covers the tempo, rubato, articulations, phrasing, dynamics, fingerings, pedaling, ornamentation, note-stem and beaming, pitch, and rhythm. I evaluate these editorial changes and performance practice to determine that, compared to modern practice, the 19th century fostered a tendency of applying rubato, longer slurs, diverse articulations, and expanded dynamic range. Furthermore, the instructions of fingerings, pedaling and ornamentation became more detailed towards the end of the century.
Dissertation/Thesis
Doctoral Dissertation Music 2020

abstract: Pursuit of an informed approach to interpreting Frédéric Chopin’s music has been increasingly challenging in the twenty-first century. In the process of forming their unique voices, pianists turn to the sound recordings of some of the most notable pianistic figures in history. This document offers a detailed inspection of three revered recordings and, with the help of syntactic analysis, seeks an understanding of the extraordinary interpretational decisions of Alfred Cortot, Arthur Rubinstein and Dinu Lipatti. The examined works are Chopin’s Prelude in C Major, Op. 28, No. 1, and the Largo of the Sonata in B Minor, Op. 58. The analysis of the Prelude compares recorded performances of Alfred Cortot (ca. 1933-1934) and Arthur Rubinstein (ca. 1946) and explains how their vastly different interpretational choices can, through an analytical process, be traced to the harmonic and melodic implications of the score. Likewise, inspection of the Largo focuses on Dinu Lipatti’s performance (ca. 1947) and draws connections between his phrasing and critical characteristics of the movement. All three performances present exquisite examples of a style of expressive playing that seems to have fallen into disuse in the twenty-first century. This study contributes to a deeper understanding of the performing style of Cortot, Rubinstein, and Lipatti, and also seeks to show connections between score analysis and interpretational decisions.
Dissertation/Thesis
Doctoral Dissertation Music 2020