Honors Theses (Music and Dance)

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    Micrologus. English
    (University of Oregon, 1943-05) La Duke, Leone Bernice; Guido d'Arezzo
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    Elements of Moravian folk music in Janácek's Second string quartet
    (University of Oregon, 1994-08) Patty, Austin T.
    Leos Janacek (1854-1928) was a composer from Moravia, a province of Czechoslovakia. Moravian peasants maintained a musical tradition distinct from the folk music of the neighboring provinces of Bohemian and Slovakia. Janacek's career as a composer, initially rather inauspicious, underwent a radical change starting in 1888. The catalyst for this change was his involvement in Moravian folk music. Janacek's enthusiasm for his native folk music began with his first ethnographic excursions into the Moravian countryside in 1888. The Introduction to this paper traces Janacek's growth as a composer from his early conservatism to his mature, idiosyncratic style, fiddlers, and dulcimer players in the Second String Quartet. Janacek's transcriptions of folk bands and individual folk instruments provide insights into how he transformed and adapted folk practices. Janacek seems to have developed his use of motives throughout the layers of his music from the folk practice of inserting motivic interjections in between phrases. The Second String Quartet also uses accompaniment patterns found in Moravian folk dances. Adopting folk techniques had many implications for Janacek's static harmonies, as Chapter V points out. Chapter VI shows how cadential patterns found in Moravian folk music are used in the Second String Quartet. Furthermore, Janacek applied these patterns to higher structural levels. For instance, the folk melodies sometimes outline the subtonic before cadencing on the tonic; Janacek goes further by using the subtonic harmonically as a contrast before returning to the tonic. Thus, the subdominant functions like the dominant. This chapter discusses how both "Moravian modulation" and the use of the mediant are additional ideas found in Moravian folk music which Janacek appropriated on larger structural levels in the Second String Quartet. Finally, Chapter VII deals with modes and degree inflection. Modes are treated flexibly in Moravian folk music; often, modes are not firmly established since the scale degrees of none of the modes predominate. Likewise, Janacek borrows freely from a variety of modes sometimes establishing none, and furthermore, he uses the principle of degree inflection harmonically.
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    Muslims, Jews and Christians in medieval Muslim Seville: (711-1248 CE) : perceiving artistic expressions as signs of acculturation
    (University Of Oregon, 2006-06) Vaughan, Laura Elaine
    In the past few centuries, scholars have begun to reevaluate the Euro-centrism of western history. Spain in the Middle Ages presents fertile research ground because it was ruled under Muslims for seven hundred years. Musicologists still debate as to whether the famous manuscript, Las Cantigas de Santa Maria, contains any Arabic musical influence. This thesis enlarges the scope of this debate beyond the musical manuscript. This study centers on Seville, where Alfonso X commissioned the Cantigas, in order to better understand the cultural relationships within the city at the time of the Cantigas' creation. I look at five art forms that were either created in Seville or had strong ties with this city: the illustrations, poetry, and music of the Cantigas, a treatise on chess commissioned by Alfonso, and the architecture of Seville. This thesis does not prove any new theory. Instead, I focus on finding a new approach to discovering a more conclusive answer regarding Arabic musical influence in Las Cantigas de Santa Maria. Through this comparative analysis, I seek to accurately gauge the possibility of Arabic musical influence within Las Cantigas de Santa Maria.
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    Moving education : building a model integrated dance partnership for elementary school classrooms
    (University Of Oregon, 2007-06) Bontrager, Hannah Joy
    This thesis explores the relatively recent phenomenon of in-school arts partnerships through the specific lens of integrated curricula. Through a literature review and pilot project, its goal is to propose and evaluate the feasibility and viability of integrated arts partnerships in dance at the elementary school level, given challenges currently facing teachers under the No Child Left Behind Act. Chapter one describes the context and purpose of this study. Chapter two establishes important methods and definitions for the literature and research review. Chapter three examines recent and important literature and issues impacting arts in education and in-school dance partnerships. Chapter four provides a detailed background, generally and specifically situating the pilot project geographically, culturally, and within the methods employed in conducting and evaluating the project. Chapter five reports project results and summarizes conclusions.