The dissertation consists of a musical, theatrical cycle of five pieces for eleven instrumentalists, six singers and electronics. This work is the outcome of research that first started with the exploration of metaphors and numbers in the framework of matrix representations as a…
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Zion is a five movement vocal work with a computer-generated sound tape. It is based on texts from the Bible, the poets William W. Phelps and Edward Partridge and The Doctrine and Covenants of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. The word Zion metaphorically is defin…
This music composition is meant to be a narrative reflection of the mental state and the hopeful healing of those who have suffered from abuse at any age. This can be from physical abuse, mental abuse, sexual abuse, or for those who have suffered from the loss of loved ones thro…
“Would you have me bow my head before mighty prices, forgetting all the joy of my heart?” Not long after Li Bai (Chinese: 李白, pinyin: Lǐbái, 701–762) left the imperial court, he wrote so at the end of one of his masterpiece, A Visit to the Sky-mother Mountain in a Dream. As he a…
A Celebration of Psalms is a musical setting of Psalms 23, 22, and 130. They are scored for mixed chorus, vocal soloists, and chamber orchestra. As the Psalms are the Scriptures which perhaps most strongly connect the many Jewish and Christian worship traditions, this work emplo…
Bird Scenes is a six-movement operatic work for soprano, tenor, narrator, and chamber orchestra adapted from Aristophanes' comedy entitled Birds. The narrative derives only slightly from the original comedy. The original plot situations are used to present dramatic conflicts in …
Historically, concert music based predominantly on Jewish subject matter has been found in sacred works for Christian usage. One of the first composers to address this discrepancy was the Italian Salamone Rossi (1570?-ca. 1630). He brought into being a cycle of vocal works emplo…
Plethora, throughout its three movements, ("Panoply," "Vicissitudes," and "Techno Meso-morph,") represents a multitude of musical styles, most specifically the European classical tradition, Asian musics, and jazz. Since Plethora is a work for a medium-sized orchestra of equal-te…
This document consists of a complete musical score of a one-act chamber opera based on an original libretto entitled An Arabian Night. The light story is loosely derived from a supplementary tale to 1001 Arabian Nights. The performance length of this tonal opera is sixty minutes…
The Biblical story of Jonathan and David as told in 1 and 2 Samuel provides the source material of an original composition for voices and symphony orchestra. Staged simply and sung from beginning to end, “Jonathan and David” is a hybrid between opera and oratorio and serves as a…
Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela was born July 18, 1918 into the Madiba clan in Mvezo, Transkei, South Africa. Mandela was a lawyer by trade and a freedom fighter who envisioned freedom and equality for all South Africans regardless of race. In 1965, Mandela was imprisoned at Robben Is…
This dissertation consists of three independent musical compositions that represent the diversity of my compositional interests. Entered in reverse chronological order of composition, the works comprise music for secular and sacred spaces, and for the perceptual spaces of comput…
The rippled texture seen in the shimmering, mercurial patterns of silken fabrics is called moire. Chosen as its title after the composition was completed, moire suggests the complex, fluid, and poetic horizon of the music. While composing this piece, I came to realize that I hav…
My final project for the D.M.A. in composition consists of a Requiem Mass honoring the victims of the Iraqi war, a conflict that has stirred public debate since the invasion of Iraq in 2003. It is not meant as a political statement; rather, it is intended as a tribute in the bro…
Mubadele/[special characters omitted] is a fifty-minute cantata for large ensemble of 14 players, two singers and a narrator. The piece is based on real life stories of an Orthodox Christian and a Muslim woman who were subjected to forced migration with the enactment of the Trea…
Little is known about the mythology of the avalerion, a mythological bird very much akin to the Firebird of countless traditions. Some of the earliest writing about the avalerion exists in Guillaume de Machaut's poetic work The Tale of the Alerion, and medieval scholars placed i…
Qurama for chamber ensemble , was written in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Musical Arts in Composition at College-Conservatory of Music, University of Cincinnati. Qurama is an ancient handicraft of Azerbaijan, a kind of patchwork made of clo…
The Canticle of the Black Madonna is an original opera-oratorio in two acts, comprising 27 pieces for six operatic soloists, mixed chorus, and chamber orchestra. It is based on an original libretto by Tiziana DellaRovere and is approximately two hours in duration. The Canticle o…
The Light is a twenty-four minute composition for two narrators and chamber orchestra. The two narrators perform the roles of the Apostle John and Moses. After an overview of the piece and a brief history of pieces incorporating narrators, the essay focuses on my compositional p…