Melbourne Conservatorium of Music - Theses
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ItemThe pursuit of originality: aspects of unity and individuality through compositional synthesis( 2018)This thesis forms case studies using compositions by its author Lorenzo Alvaro as a catalyst for understanding how originality is manifested in the consistent re-enactment of borrowing and self-borrowing. Understanding how compositions ‘come together’ through ‘Synthesis’ oppose long-debated theories of originality being an innate power giving rise to the notion of ‘genius’. More recent scholarship acknowledge borrowing and collaboration as a means for originality, and based on this, the thesis argues that true originality is nothing more than an ideal.
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ItemStaking temporary territories: reconceptualising music performance( 2019)This thesis is a philosophical inquiry into the conceptualisation of music and, specifically, music performance. The purpose of the research is to establish a substantial discourse that directly addresses creativity in music performance, shifting the weight of focus from music as a written art to music as a practised craft. This inquiry is a process of unravelling normative concepts, pulling apart fundamental assumptions, and reassembling the remaining pieces to form a new standpoint. This research draws primarily on the philosophy of Gilles Deleuze in order to aid the locating and critique of habitual approaches, support an emergent music performance conceptualisation, and offer a perspective through which music performance can be viewed as a locus of creativity. Looking at Lydia Goehr’s The Imaginary Museum of Musical Works and Thomas Clifton’s Music and the a Priori, this thesis shows how traditional approaches to conceptualising music performance events rely on representations of abstract, a priori concepts. Linking this critique with Deleuze’s philosophy in Difference and Repetition, this research establishes the key concept of the Image to articulate these abstract concepts. This critique will show how the Image is problematic because it is an idealised interpretation or representation of music that serves as the goal for performance, that in turn provides the framework within which performance is understood. What precipitates from this problem is an approach to performance that views performers as inhabiting the periphery, subordinate to the idealised musical Image such as the notated score. Furthermore, traditional approaches to music performance is often in terms of what it ought to have been, rather than what it was, or how it took place. Music performance, then, is posited as always derivative, seldom addressed on its own ‘terms,’ and little understood outside of the definitions anchored in a pre-existing of musical works. This thesis contends that that music performance is inherently variable. Thus, thinking about music performance must account for the vicissitudes of a temporal and mobile event, and regard the wider contingents, such as audience, space, and venue, as forming part of the terms of understanding. Concepts and terms extrapolated from key texts by Deleuze, Difference and Repetition, A Thousand Plateaus, The Fold, and Francis Bacon, builds a vocabulary in this research to discuss music performance events as they present in reality. Deleuze’s philosophy provides a positive way of articulating difference in music performance. The study is divided into two parts: the first addresses the normative concepts that limit the understanding of what music performance is, or what constitutes a performance. The fulcrum of the thesis tips the discussion from what constitutes music performance to how music performances actually create. Drawing on two Deleuzean texts, The Fold and A Thousand Plateaus, Part 1 concludes with the findings that music performance is a folded assemblage: thus this reconceptualisation of music performance must abandon the focus on what it is or should be, and redirect the question towards how it presents and how music performances are created. The second part addresses the persistence of normative concepts in the approach to creativity as uncovered particularly in Modernist aesthetics. Highlighting the caution needed when employing Deleuze’s concept of deterritorialisation, Part 2 establishes the importance of grounding the music performance conceptualisation in material reality where the terms that emerge from the moment of performance involve the creative choices that lead to performances taking place. Analyses of actual performances are included to build and incorporate vocabulary and terms that directly specify music performance as a folded assemblage.
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ItemExhibiting music: music and international exhibitions in the British Empire, 1879-1890( 2018)Between 1879 and 1890 there was barely a year in which an international exhibition was not held somewhere within the British Empire. These monumental events were intended to demonstrate, through comparative and competitive displays, the development of every branch of human endeavour: from industry and manufacturing, to art and design. They were also a massive and literal manifestation of the Victorian obsession with collecting, ordering, and classifying the world and its material contents. Though often considered in scholarly terms of grandiosity—of Victorian monumentalism and Benjamin-esque phantasmagoria—exhibitions were also social events, attended by individual members of the public for both education and entertainment. Music, as a fundamental part of cultural life in the societies that held such events, was prominent at all these exhibitions. This thesis interrogates the role of music at the international exhibitions held in the British Empire during the 1880s, arguing that the musical aspects of these events demonstrate, in microcosm, the broader musical traditions, purposes, arguments, and anxieties of the day. Further, it argues that music in all its forms—whether in performance or displays of related objects, and whether deliberately or inadvertently—was codified, ordered, and all-round ‘exhibited’ within the exhibition-sphere in multiple ways. Exploring thirteen exhibitions held in England, Scotland, Australia and India it traces ideas and trends relating to music and the idea of ‘display’ across the imperial cultural network. This thesis begins with an historical survey of music and exhibitions in London from the Great Exhibition of 1851 to the 1880s, analysed through the lens of contemporary discourses around music and concepts of display, and recent museological scholarship on the presentation of musical art in physical space. Arranged thematically rather than chronologically, several broad concepts relating to music at the 1880s exhibitions are then examined. These include a discussion of musical instruments as spectacularised commodities within the phantasmagoric exhibition space, music as both an educational device and a means of entertainment and leisure in line with contemporary theories of rational recreation, and the ways exhibitions created forums for engagement for Western audiences with non-Western musics.
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ItemRhetoric and the keyboard preludes of Louis Couperin (ca.1626-1661)( 2018)The preludes of Louis Couperin (ca.1626-1661) are a staple of seventeenth-century harpsichord performance. Previous studies have focussed on the interpretation of the written script, an elusive combination of curves and rhythmless notation, deciphered many of the notational mysteries, and extracted stylistic influences. A vital element, absent in the literature, is an in-depth understanding of the perceptions and expectations of the listener of the seventeenth century, the audience for whom the pieces were originally conceived. This study complements the present state of research on the preludes by addressing the aesthetic environment of seventeenth-century France, and its influence on the performance of the keyboard preludes. The foundation of a critical language in preparing these preludes is based on ancient rhetoric. Philosophical and structural components of rhetorical theory and style are based on ancient sources, and the reception of rhetorical theory in music of sixteenth- and seventeenth-century sources and studies. The rhetorical inquiry is deepened by focussing on the metaphysics of the introduction of a speech and a comparative analysis of the rhetorical exordium with descriptions of the musical prelude from seventeenth-century sources. Early biographical sources of Louis Couperin’s life are recontextualised in a critical examination of French society focussing on the events of the Fronde and the impact this had on his actions and life. The observations on harpsichord playing by Monsieur Le Gallois are also incorporated to provide critical guidance in the performance of the preludes. The nature of the audience of Couperin’s preludes is brought into focus. This draws on modern studies of the society, explaining its origins and the formulation of artistic values and judgements. These ideas of aristocratic taste are illustrated with passages from Jean de La Bruyère’s Caractères and philosophical writings by René Descartes. A final chapter analyses a selection of Louis Couperin’s preludes, informed by the ideas and models formulated in the previous chapters. The thesis also includes an appendix of a recording of fourteen of Louis Couperin’s preludes and a selection of other near-contemporary preludes, which explores performative ideas and issues that are raised in the thesis. The study shows that the application of rhetorical theory uncovers a deeper level of understanding preludial concepts, which are missing from period descriptions, and enhances objectives in performance and audience communication.
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ItemThe remains of decay: composing auditory afterimages( 2018)This autoethnographic critical exploration reflects on an accompanying folio of music compositions created between early 2013 and late 2016: Suite from The Bloody Chamber for three harps, Rung for electric guitar, contrabass recorder, violin, double bass and sensor-triggered bells, extracts from The Experiment: a musical monodrama; bound south for string quartet and Harp Guitar Double Concerto for two soloists and chamber orchestra. A post-structuralist reading reveals an emergent philosophical and practice preoccupation with the sonic phenomenon of the auditory afterimage.
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ItemParents' and music therapists' reflections on the experience of music and home-based music therapy for paediatric palliative care patients and their families, who come from diverse cultural backgrounds( 2017)Music can be an important part of many young children’s lives, especially when a child is unwell, or dying. In recent years, the use of music therapy with children in paediatric palliative care (PPC) has become more widespread, across hospice, hospital and home settings. This qualitative inquiry investigated the experience of music, and home-based music therapy for PPC patients and their families, who come from diverse cultural backgrounds. The inquiry employed a constructivist approach and was informed by grounded theory and meta-ethnography. The inquiry examined how children in PPC and their families experience music, and music therapy in PPC, with a focus on how cultural beliefs and practices shape experience. The inquiry also identified barriers to accessing PPC, music, and music therapy for children and families of diverse cultural backgrounds. Four studies were conducted as part of this inquiry. Study One employed a repeated-interview design to interview six parents of children in PPC about their experience of music and music therapy in caring for a child in PPC. Five mothers and one father participated in an initial interview; and three of the mothers also participated in a six-month follow-up interview, to capture in-the-moment experiences and changes over time. Study Two employed a focus group design to interview three music therapists about their experience of providing music therapy for children and families of diverse cultural backgrounds in home-based PPC. Study Three employed an ethnographic approach for the author to reflect on her work in home-based PPC music therapy with 34 children and their families. Twenty themes emerged from the analysis of Studies One to Three, based around three distinct foci: the palliative care journey; the experience of music; and the experience of music therapy. Study Four conducted a meta-ethnography of Studies One to Three. The meta-ethnography provided a rich and detailed description of how children and families from diverse cultural backgrounds experience PPC, music and home-based music therapy; and also identified barriers to access. Key findings included: 1) Migration, length of time in Australia and cultural shaming can impact isolation, coping, and access to support; 2) Families want music therapy for their child, even if music is not part of their culture or family life; 3) Music can support family health and wellbeing, although the presence of multiple stressors in the family’s life can inhibit use of music; 4) Families use music to express their culture and maintain their cultural identity; 5) Music therapy can support families who have few/no family or other supports, reducing carer stress and isolation, and enhancing parental coping; 6) music therapy can uphold and support cultural and community patterns of relationship in the face of life-threatening illness; 7) child and family experiences of palliative care can be transformed in MT, positively impacting parental coping; and 8) the emotional intensity of music therapy in end-of-life-care can be overwhelming, and lead to family disengagement from music therapy. The thesis makes an important contribution to the fields of music therapy and PPC, in developing understanding of how culture impacts family experiences of PPC, music, and music therapy; and also offers insight into the complexities of conducting research with the highly vulnerable population of children in PPC.
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ItemThe genetic basis of singing ability: a twin study( 2016)Music is a human universal, an integral part of all known human culture. While most people possess the capacity for music perception and production, individual differences in various forms of music abilities are evident in the general population. The diversity in abilities has sparked intense debates regarding the relative importance of nature and nurture in shaping music ability. While in recent years, researchers have begun to explore the genetic basis of music perception abilities, the interrogation of the genetic basis of music production abilities has been relatively scarce. Singing is an ideal paradigm for investigating the genetic basis of music ability; it is a universal, multifaceted music ability that is spontaneously emergent and shaped by formal and informal music learning environments. The present study therefore employed a twin study design to investigate the genetic basis of singing ability and estimate the relative contribution of genetic and environmental factors influencing singing ability using a comprehensive set of singing tasks and measures. The study also aimed to identify environmental factors associated with singing ability and examine whether these factors have a genetic component, and whether shared genetic influences might explain the association between singing ability and these factors. The twin study was conducted online using a purpose-built online program Let’s Hear Twins Sing, which enabled twins to participate regardless of their geographical location. The 30 minutes online twin study comprised three singing tasks (vocal pitch-matching, singing a familiar song, and melody imitation), two music perception tasks and a questionnaire on music and singing background. The study took approximately 30 minutes to complete and the study data were captured online in real-time and saved on a server for subsequent analyses. The final sample consisted of 70 monozygotic (55 female; 15 male) and 38 dizygotic (24 female; 7 male; 7 male-female) twin pairs (mean age = 32.4 years), the majority were recruited through the Australian Twin Registry. Univariate genetic modelling revealed that both the objectively-assessed singing ability across all tasks and self-rated singing ability had similarly significant and substantial genetic components (A = 69-72%). Additive genetic influences also contributed significantly to the variation observed in various singing task measures, with moderate to large heritabilities (A = 44-71%), negligible to moderate common environmental (C = 0-37%) and moderate unique environmental (E = 19-40%) influences. Significant moderate to large genetic components were also estimated for environmental variables associated with singing ability: instrumental expertise (A = 68%), years of music training (A = 46%), and public singing engagement (A = 66%). Bivariate genetic analyses revealed that the associations between singing ability and both instrumental expertise and years of music training were mediated significantly by shared additive genetic influences. The novel findings therefore provided preliminary evidence for the role of genes in influencing singing ability and formal music training, as well as a partially shared genetic basis for singing ability and music training. The promising results establish a valuable background that encourages further behavioural and molecular genetic interrogations into the genetic bases of various types of music abilities.
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ItemThe 'speculative ear': explorations in Adorno and musical modernism( 2017)Theodor W. Adorno continues to cut a controversial figure through the discipline of musicology. Against the substantial discourse that has built up around ‘what’s wrong with Adorno’ (in which his thinking tends to be presented as rigid and ossified, inadequate to the demands and complexities of contemporary music scholarship), this thesis presents a ‘speculative’ account of Adorno’s music criticism and philosophy. By both using Adorno’s aesthetic theory in speculative ways, and highlighting the speculative, open-ended qualities within his thinking, this thesis argues for the continued relevance of Adorno’s work for musicology. The thesis’ early chapters focus on musicology’s ‘Modernist problem.’ These chapters respond critically to the musicological reception of Adorno’s understanding of structural listening and aesthetic autonomy, and consider the place of Modernist music and aesthetics within musicological discourse more generally. Though structural listening and aesthetic autonomy have been widely debated within the literature, many of the nuances of Adorno’s concepts have arguably been lost. I respond to the critiques advanced by thinkers such as Rose Rosengard Subotnik, Susan McClary, Richard Taruskin and others, arguing that Adorno has been straw-manned, and unfairly tarred with a formalist brush. The thesis’ central theoretical concerns are laid down in the middle chapters. ‘Purely Instrumental’ considers Adorno’s formulation of the dialectic of autonomy and mediation. Noting Adorno’s inheritance of, and departures from, the aesthetics of Kant and Hegel, and by tracing the particular historical developments that surrounded the emergence of the idea of absolute music, the chapter argues that Adorno’s formulation of aesthetic autonomy proves an essential grounding for the modern (and especially Modernist) understanding of the work of art. Two companion ‘Killing Time’ chapters consider the place of time and temporality in Adorno’s aesthetics. Adorno’s reception of the ideas of Kant, Walter Benjamin and Henri Bergson are explored, and Adorno’s prohibition against musical repetition is considered in light of his understanding of the mimetic faculty (arguing that Adorno’s demand for musical non-repetition operates in tension with his understanding of mimesis). Furthermore, the ‘Killing Time’ chapters argue that a coherent critique of musical temporality underpins all of Adorno’s music criticism, with time operating as an important (and under-explored) unifying motif through which his most negative musical assessments unfold. ‘Adornian Mode’ considers the place of ugliness, dissonance and pleasure in Adornian aesthetics. The chapter argues that Adorno’s concept of (Modernist) ugliness stages a radical reversal of traditional aesthetics, whilst preserving the Kantian desire for universal assent. For Adorno the universalising promise of beauty and harmony have been revealed as states of domination, and he proposes that it is through dissonance that the only remaining domain of universal human agreement finds expression: suffering. The final chapters illustrate the tangible uses of Adorno’s aesthetics for music analysis and interpretation. These chapters show the flexibility and applicability of Adorno’s aesthetic categories, and offer a riposte to that pervasive criticism that Adorno failed to ‘prove’ his aesthetic theories via concrete analysis. First, the special place of Arnold Schoenberg’s Erwartung (1909) in Adorno’s work is considered, and the earlier argument for a reappraisal of structural listening is revisited. Second, Milton Babbitt’s Philomel (1964) is considered in light of the theoretical exploration of ugliness and dissonance, and the complex question of the political significance of the depiction of suffering and violence in art is examined. Finally, the possibility for using Adorno’s aesthetics for the interpretation of Postmodernist, non-score based works in explored through via the analysis of Eliane Radigue’s Transamorem/Transomortem (1973). Time, repetition and the role of the mimetic exchange are considered with reference to the work, demonstrating the enduring relevance of Adorno’s aesthetics.
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ItemMusical identities of young people recovering from mental illness( 2015)This thesis details a Participatory project investigating how and why promoting young people’s musical identities can facilitate their recovery from mental illness. Studies describe how young people use music listening for managing aspects of their mental health across community-based (McFerran & Saarikallio, 2014; Saarikallio & Erkkila, 2007) and mental health settings (Cheong-Clinch, 2013). Music therapy is also articulated as a way to facilitate processes of recovery from mental illness (McCaffrey, Edwards, & Fannon, 2011; Solli, Rolvsjord, & Borg, 2013). Despite growing awareness of the potential of music to support recovery from mental illness, little is known about what conditions actually facilitate growth of musical identity in ways that foster recovery processes. This project aimed to address this gap by investigating what is needed in order to promote young people’s musical identities in ways that facilitate their recovery from mental illness. The intention was to understand both the processes involved and the resources required to facilitate recovery. A Participatory orientation (Minkler & Wallerstein, 2008) was chosen to align with the recovery approach (Davidson, Row, Tandora, O'Connell, & Lawless, 2009; Slade, 2009b) of the youth mental health service where this study took place. The Participatory philosophy was also seen as appropriate to the social agenda of the study in seeking to address young people’s access to musical resources to promote their recovery. Eleven young people currently attending the music therapy program at the youth mental health service chose to participate across two emergent cycles of action and reflection. In the first cycle, young people participated in collaborative qualitative interviews exploring how their musical identities changed with experiences of mental illness and recovery. A critical interpretation of Constructivist Grounded Theory was used to gather and analyse the data. The finding from this cycle was a constructed grounded theory that detailed young people’s recovery of musical identity. A second cycle of research emerged from this theory, to explore what community-based resources are needed to further facilitate recovery. This cycle involved mapping young people’s musical needs compared to what was available and possible in the local community. Findings from this study were an identified set of musical needs of young people, and the initiation of the Youth Music Action Group to begin addressing the meeting of these needs through community partnerships and advocacy. Findings from this study indicate that promoting musical identity can facilitate young people’s recovery from mental illness by: contributing to a health-based identity, facilitating meaning-making, and supporting social participation. However, the findings indicate a number of conditions are necessary to facilitate these processes. First, the music therapy theory through which to construct these processes needs to accommodate both the pathology of young people’s expression of musical symptoms as well as acknowledgement of the resource of musical identity for recovery. Second, music therapy needs to be available to support young people’s recovery of musical identity during early stages. Third, community-based music resources need to be available and appropriate to young people immediately following their experience of music therapy. Fourth, modes of research need to expand in order to promote greater democratic participation of young people in ways that promote their equal citizenship. These findings contribute to music therapy and youth mental health knowledge, and can inform future service design.
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ItemCritical reflections on how research design and the attributes of a music program can affect investigations of the psychosocial wellbeing benefits of musical participation in mainstream schools( 2015)This project explores the challenges of investigating the psychosocial wellbeing benefits of musical participation in mainstream schools. For a decade, Australian policy literature has claimed these benefits are to be expected outcomes of all students’ participation in school music programs (Australian Government, 2005). Despite these claims, there is little to no consistent evidence supporting a link between musical participation and psychosocial wellbeing in this context (Grimmett, Rickard, Gill, & Murphy, 2010; Rickard, Bambrick, & Gill, 2012). The reason for this inconsistency has been linked to both the research designs and methods used (Knox Anderson & Rickard, 2007), as well as the nature of musical participation investigated (Darrow, Novak, Swedberg, Horton, & Rice, 2009). Despite the identification of these limitations, researchers have continued to use designs that contain them. This can be attributed to a lack of critical engagement with approaches to research in this field, including assumptions about the efficacy of certain research methods, and the capacity for generic school music programs to promote wellbeing. This lack of critical engagement appears to account for the enduring inconsistency of findings in this area. This thesis aims to address this lack of engagement by critically appraising the research approaches used in two small studies that aimed to demonstrate the psychosocial wellbeing benefits of school-based music programs. This was achieved by undertaking two critical reflection analyses on the methods, designs, and contexts of each study, as well as the attributes of the music programs investigated. The first of these identified a number of important research challenges related to the research methods and designs used. Among other things, these findings challenge the assumption that self-report surveys are a valid way of collecting data from students. The second analysis identified a number of music program attributes that are likely to inhibit the reporting of positive results. For example, findings suggest music education programs are unsuited to promoting psychosocial wellbeing. Based on these findings, this dissertation makes a number of recommendations for the design of future studies in this area. It is argued that research following these recommendations is crucial for this field. This is both to develop a richer understanding of the relationship between music in schools and psychosocial wellbeing, and to produce reliable evidence that is better placed to inform relevant policy. It is further argued that without such evidence, policymakers may continue to make uninformed claims regarding the link between music in schools and psychosocial wellbeing. In turn, this has the potential to destabilise policy support for music in Australian schools. Finally, this thesis calls on researchers in this field, and others, to critically engage with the way that knowledge is created. It is maintained that such engagement is the responsibility of all researchers in the social sciences, and that only when this occurs can we claim the knowledge we generate is meaningful, and serving the communities we investigate.