Minerva Elements Records
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ItemOver balconies and electronic bridges: Intercultural music engagement during & post pandemic( 2023-11)Globalisation, mass migration, and the challenges of accommodating cultural and political diversity have resulted in a renewed interest in social cohesion and community resilience. Local and global interdependencies require cooperation across different constituencies to address issues with wide reaching implications such as conflict and climate change – often leading to further mass migration of people. The research considered here was punctuated by a global concern – the COVID-19 pandemic. This event underlined these interdependencies and the importance of addressing tensions between cohesion and diversity to optimise the resilience of communities in the face of adversity. Specifically, this thesis explores the role of intercultural music engagement in fostering social cohesion and community resilience. As a social custom found across cultures, while demonstrating cultural variation, music has potential to strengthen bonds within and between groups. However, music’s capacity to strengthen bonds within groups points equally to its capacity to create division. The COVID-19 pandemic and associated lockdowns underscored the role of digital platforms in maintaining music practice and connection across divides. Observing the unfolding event oriented the focus of the research toward the processes of digitally mediated and face-to-face music engagement in building intercultural understanding, social connection, and community resilience; the features that distinguished digitally mediated from face-to-face intercultural music engagement; and the characteristics of people and artifacts that play a bridging role in intercultural music engagement. Four studies were undertaken and are described in this thesis. Two considered intercultural music engagement during COVID-19 lockdown, including a participatory action research project exploring asynchronous multi-tracking performance among six community-based arts practitioners, and an online ethnography of eight case studies of audience engagement with YouTube music broadcasts. The third study was a social network analysis that considered cultural identity and culturally diverse music practice among 120 Australian musicians. The fourth study was an integrative literature review synthesising interdisciplinary knowledge from 31 studies of intercultural music engagement programs for adults. Also described in the thesis is a design for a brief hybrid (including both digitally mediated and face-to-face) music intervention for international university students. The approach to the intervention is informed by the four studies. The research underscores the dynamic nature of culture, community and social identity that necessitate inclusive and ecological conceptualisations of social cohesion and community resilience. Investigations reveal intercultural music engagement is highly context specific, requiring local knowledge, facilitation skills and reflective practice. As well as the role of music practice as a bridge between diverse identities and groups, the studies highlight the connective potential of digital platforms, polycultural perspectives and shared purpose.
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ItemNo Preview AvailableLiminaire: Performance Contexts and Cultural Dynamics of the Saxophone in Australia, 1853–1938( 2023-06)This project explores the largely untold first eighty-five years of the saxophone in Australia. For a unique Australian context it examines, and ultimately challenges, the long- and widely-held view that the instrument was solely a product and expression of popular or ‘lowbrow’ musical culture; instead, it argues that the saxophone’s character in Australia between 1853 and 1938 was enduringly cosmopolitan, stylistically diverse across the cultural strata, and a mirror to evolving notions of Australian identity. A five-chapter dissertation, weighted at 80%, details the saxophone’s Australian efflorescence in a variety of performance contexts from the goldrush to the cusp of the Second World War. A number of landmark performers and performances are established, including the headline discovery that the instrument debuted in Australia before being first heard in the United States. Drawing on categories established by John Whiteoak, this study incorporates ‘approved’ musical settings that were seen to reinforce social cohesion, such as the concert stage and the bandstand, and ‘anonymous’ settings, including the commercially-oriented domains of minstrelsy, vaudeville, and jazz. Notions of liminality are employed to explain and contextualise the saxophone’s marginal, and yet still remarkably potent, place in musical and wider cultural and social life over this time. This argument is built on research into a wide range of primary sources, including historical newspaper and journal articles, sheet music, sound recordings, silent and sound film, and interviews with notable Australian musicians. An accompanying audio-visual folio, weighted at 20%, features 33 minutes of new recordings for saxophone ensemble, saxophone and piano, and concert band in march and art music transcription forms.
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ItemNo Preview AvailableFinding space: expanded scores as compositional tools for interdisciplinary practice( 2022)This research considers the expanded musical score as a framework through which to develop a compositional practice as a form of post conceptual art. Drawing on extramusical ideas such as cultural dislocation and spatial experience, this project seeks to represent non-musical objects as score, instrument and musical vehicle. Through a series of studio-based experiments, this development of compositional practice also produces a secondary framework through which to better understand the artist’s parallel practices as composer and interdisciplinary artist.
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ItemPhenomenological mechanics — an intercultural musical perspective: an inquiry into the experience of directional movement in intercultural music, applying time and motion concepts from physics( 2022)This study is an inquiry into the experience of “vectorial” (i.e., directional) motion in music. It proposes a conceptual model for the experience of directional motion. It then applies the model interculturally, examining the relationship between Western and Eastern linear and cyclic cultural representations of time and corresponding compositional organisation. In its conclusion, it proposes geometrical models of Western and Eastern musical forms as helix and vortex, respectively, presenting musical works that exemplify these concepts. The major research question of the dissertation is “What is the nature of the experience of directional movement in music, and how can this experience be conceptually represented?”. It examines this question via the principal methodological process of a thought experiment. There are four research areas — music as phenomenological mechanics, composition as intercultural metaphor, applications to musical performance and analysis, and newly imagined instruments and novel compositional processes — and 12 research propositions — three primary, three secondary (two exegetical), two tertiary, and four artefactual. The primary research propositions examine the experience of vectorial motion in music, proposing a phenomenologically determined, hierarchically organised, multi-parameter, form-void vector field model. Referencing this model, the dissertation proposes that the experience of directional motion in music can be compared to principles from mechanics, albeit at a purely phenomenological level — a proposition that gives rise to the concept of phenomenological mechanics. In the application of the concept of phenomenological mechanics to composition, the dissertation proposes a novel characterisation of musical development as a phenomenological representation of the first and second laws of thermodynamics — as the phenomenological “organisation of sound” from low to high potential energy states, and from chaos to order. The secondary research propositions present the idea that the experience of musical motion differs in Western and Eastern cultural contexts in accordance with contrasting Western linear and Eastern cyclic cultural representations of time — metaphorically apparent in their respective musical forms — and in accordance with the dualism and monism that characterise form-void representations and their paradigms more broadly. These secondary research propositions thus apply the concept of music as phenomenological mechanics to the concept of composition as intercultural metaphor. The dissertation proposes that, whereas Western music develops vectorially and teleologically to achieve an overall linear form, Eastern music develops non-vectorially and non-teleologically to achieve an overall cyclic form — a process consistent with the concept of intensification, as coined by UK ethnomusicologist Martin Clayton to describe “non-teleological large-scale processes" proceeding by "a process of expansion”. As an application of the research to the performance and analysis of music, the dissertation’s tertiary research propositions thus propose the concept of Western and Eastern musical forms as helix and vortex. Referencing the musical time concepts of Zuckerkandl, Clayton, Kramer, Cage and Fraser, and the musical improvisation concepts of Feisst, the exegesis research propositions and discussion analyse the major and minor artefacts — respectively, a composition and an improvisation, for a 12-drum harmonic tabla set and two variations of modified guitar — as exemplifications of the concepts contained in the written work.
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ItemMusic and eating disorders( 2022)This thesis investigates how people with eating disorders experience and engage with music. Eating disorders are severe mental health conditions that present through a distorted body image, a pre-occupation with body weight and an unhealthy relationship with food. Although eating disorders are rising in prevalence and have the highest mortality rate of any mental illness, attempts to understand their aetiology and develop effective interventions continue. A systematic literature review concluded that there have been few studies of rigorous design that directly investigate how this population use and/or experience music. An investigation of the literature revealed that music therapy is available as a treatment to eating disorder patients despite limited research to draw upon. The purpose of this thesis was to consider musical engagement in a population with eating disorders, and to examine the impact of two commonly co-occurring conditions on the musical experience: alexithymia (an inability to recognise emotions) and anhedonia (lack of pleasure). A synthesis of literature is essential for understanding possible benefits or risks of music use in this population. Findings demonstrate the potential for future research to explore how music is used by people with eating disorders and to provide more sophisticated explanations of how music is experienced by these individuals. Such information may have diagnostic implications and will be helpful in subsequently devising appropriate interventions.
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ItemBeyond barriers: Creating a space for deeper connection between individuals from diverse religious traditions through a dialogic group music therapy process( 2021)This project has emerged in response to a community need to create further platforms for interfaith dialogue in Bendigo, a regional city in Victoria, Australia. Community tensions about a new mosque highlighted a need to build stronger relationships amongst the interfaith and wider community. These tensions were at odds with my experiences of creating musical spaces for the expression and exploration of diverse spiritual and religious identity as a music therapist at the local hospital. In these spaces, listening and respect mattered. My close proximity to people with diverse religious perspectives helped me to be more aware of diverse others in the community and of the current tensions. I wanted to see how music could help. An ethnographic approach captured the journey from the institutional context out into the community to engage in a community-based research project, a collaboration with the interfaith community in Bendigo. A cyclic, emergent action research process evolved into a series of focus groups where individual lived experiences of religion and religious rituals were shared, using music as a focus and a support for communication. Eleven collaborators from six different religious traditions in Bendigo came together to take part in a dialogic group music therapy process – musical presentation (Amir, 2012). This process offers a model for listening and engaging in a group. From this process, music playlists, drawings, focus group dialogue and phone interview feedback were generated. This material revealed the strong sense of connection that collaborators felt with others in the group and their enjoyment of coming together to share diverse faith identities in this creative space. The process also highlighted that the vulnerability and challenges that come from engaging in creative processes were valuable and brought new perspectives and growth. The vitality of music as a mode of communication, through which identity, feelings, memory and culture can be explored was highlighted. Collaborators commented on the depth of the experience and the connection to others within a short space of time. Despite the different associations collaborators each had with music, they saw it as helpful in communicating religious identity. Music supported the group to remove some of the usual barriers that existed between them in this new creative space. One of the key statements developed through collaborator feedback was that “This process has the potential to increase understanding, knowledge, and connection in our community”. The project highlights the importance of creating spaces for the exploration and sharing of diverse religious identity. Possibilities for music therapists as advocates, negotiators and community-builders in these kinds of processes are also raised. Engaging in a dialogic group music process highlighted a form of ‘attunement’ between collaborators that related to musical concepts and processes. Music’s capacity to re-conceptualise broader processes and relationships was also highlighted through connecting this project to the concept of ‘community as a harmonic landscape’, as a way of sharing the project with the wider community. Collaborators felt that the process they experienced could act as a ‘stepping stone’ into further creative community action.
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ItemEdition as Work: The Editorial Interventions of Ferruccio Busoni, Alfred Cortot & Heinrich Schenker in the Publication of Canonical Piano Repertoire( 2020)Scholarly criticism of music notation tends to focus on the intentions of the composer, and neglect or dismiss the artistic agency of the editor. The famous notion of Werktreue, likewise, implies that the will of the composer is the only legitimate source of artistic intention. These attitudes run counter to the rich tradition of interventionist editing in nineteenth and early-twentieth centuries, when editors put forth important aesthetic claims by emending the musical text that represented canonical repertoire. This study proposes the reception of interventionist music editions as a type of Work, using the frameworks of aesthetic and literary criticism on Works of Art, and the Goehrian theory of work-concept. From this proposition is introduced the concept of ‘Edition-Text’ as the text of an Edition-Work, which is a separable entity from the text of a Composition-Work. The study applies these notions to the preliminary analysis of publications of canonical piano repertoire, edited by the three contemporaneous pianist-scholars Ferruccio Busoni, Alfred Cortot, and Heinrich Schenker. It commences with a survey of the three editors’ historical and aesthetic contexts, followed by a comparative study of a selection of their respective edited publications, the Busoni-Ausgabe, Editions de travail and Erlaeuterungsausgabe. A range of observations are gathered on the substance and style of the Edition-Texts as manifest by a range of notated and literary phenomena, from which comparisons are made of the editors’ contrasting intentions and ideals concerning the cognition and sensory expression of music. It also considers how these editorial acts, in their critique, extension and worship of the Composition-Text, can be understood as pursuits of artistic ideals that strive beyond the perceived achievements of the referent compositions and composers, and therefore assert their claim to being a Work in their own right. The study concludes with remarks on the opportunities granted by future technologies for the improved presentation of Edition-Works, and suggestions for how performance may be best informed through a wide study of historical and contemporary editions.
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ItemHow does a critical analysis of the literature inform recommendations for writing about mindfulness in music therapy practice?( 2019)Mindfulness Based Therapies have become widespread in clinical work, but so far the literature on integrating mindfulness into music therapy has been limited. The thesis presents the results of a critical interpretive synthesis (CIS) investigating the use of mindfulness in music therapy. The CIS of eight published articles examines how music therapists describe the use of mindfulness in their clinical work. A critical examination of the literature presented in the CIS finds that the use of mindfulness is described under the categories of mindfulness-based, Buddhist-influenced, or mindfulness, and discusses some of the difficulties in describing music therapy processes in this way. Based on the findings from the CIS, and drawing on research from the mindfulness literature as well as my experience as a mindfulness teacher, practising Buddhist, and registered music therapist, the thesis then offers recommendations for music therapists who are interested in using mindfulness-influenced practices in their clinical work and research. The word ‘mindfulness’ has become widespread, and can describe almost anything from relaxation to in-depth therapeutic work to the path to spiritual enlightenment. This broad use of the term can lead to a lack of clarity in how the use of mindfulness is described. The thesis will explore the use of language, including the challenges of adapting concepts from other cultures and belief systems. Research into the adverse effects of meditation is discussed, and the thesis argues that due to these possible harmful effects, music therapists using mindfulness in their work might consider additional training, ensuring they understand the theoretical basis, the benefits and the contra-indications of mindfulness-based therapies. There are also indications in the current literature on mindfulness and music therapy that music therapy processes can at times cultivate mindful states in both therapist and client. This could be an exciting area for further research, potentially leading to the development of a new theoretical model of mindfulness arising from within the creative processes of music therapy.
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ItemFolio of works( 2019)Master of Music Composition - Folio of Compositions Six original compositions, written from 2016 to 2019, comprising of: - 'On the Inside' for flute, clarinet, cello, and piano. Recording duration of 9 minutes 34 seconds - 'Ode to Damascus' for flute, clarinet, violin, cello, and piano. Recording duration of 9 minutes 15 seconds - 'The Fate of Phaethon' for soprano, horn, and string quartet. Recording duration of 15 minutes 51 seconds - 'Echo' for soprano and horn. Video recording duration of 4 minutes three seconds - 'Phosphorus' for solo percussion. Video recording duration of 10 minutes 26 seconds - 'Ignition' for orchestra. Recording duration of 9 minutes 47 seconds
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ItemPreventing hearing injury in the music industry( 2019)Sound levels in the live music industry have been demonstrated to reach levels capable of causing harm to the auditory system. The body of work presented here aimed to explore ways in which hearing injury can be prevented in the Australian music industry. To do so, multiple stakeholders were engaged, including venue owners, live-music sound engineers, audiologists and manufacturers of hearing protectors for musicians. Four discrete, mixed-methodology studies were conducted to address the topic. Study 1 aimed to investigate the clinical provision of musicians’ hearing protectors (MHPs) by audiologists and manufacturers of MHPs in Australia. Method. Audiologists and manufacturers were asked to complete one of two surveys, investigating the delivery of clinical care for musicians, and recommended processes relating to the manufacture of earplugs. Results. Inconsistencies in the clinical procedures were noted in both the practice of audiological care for musicians, and the recommendations made by manufacturers of MHPs. Study 2 aimed to investigate whether the use of, and satisfaction with, MHPs is influenced by the specific treatment delivered to musicians by audiologists. Method. Musicians rated their satisfaction with the services as delivered across the four treatment conditions. Results. No statistically significant differences across conditions were observed, however, certain aspects of care were perceived positively by musicians, such as the provision of a hearing test. Study 3 aimed to assess the hearing of live music sound engineers and their risk of hearing injury. Method. Participants completed a questionnaire on their hearing health as well as a hearing assessment. Results. Ninety-six percent of sound engineers reported having experienced at least one symptom of hearing injury during or after a work shift in music. Use of hearing protection was low, however, individuals who frequently wore hearing protection had significantly better hearing, particularly in the extended high frequencies. Study 4 aimed to investigate if the use of sound level management software can assist in reducing exposure levels in indoor live music venues. Method. Use of a commercial sound level management system in six indoor live-music venues of Melbourne was trialled. Results. Overall, there was no reduction in mean sound level (LAeq,T), however the number of nights on which extreme volume levels were recorded was reduced. Subjective questionnaires indicated that one-fifth of patrons would prefer lower sound levels than experienced. Overall, the results indicate there is a significant risk of hearing injury to individuals working within and attending live music venues in Australia. Findings indicated that there is a need for greater hearing awareness across all stakeholders. Audiologists would benefit from the development of best-practice guidelines for the care of musicians’ ears, while more broadly, the inclusion of EHF hearing thresholds would benefit in early detection and monitoring of noise-induced hearing loss. Greater research focus and hearing conservation training is needed for both LMSEs and staff in live-music venues, who would benefit from the implementation of strategies to manage venue sound levels in a way that takes into account the sound level preferences of patrons, while minimising the risk of hearing injury for all.