Admin Login
News and Activities
Student Conference Presentations: February 2016
Doug Donley
The 'Wave Meter Model': A Graphic Notation for Metric Phenomena
Texas Society for Music Theory Annual Conference
Kája Lill
Coherence amidst Irregular and Asymmetrical Hypermeter in the Fanfare of Janáček's Sinfonietta
Indiana University Graduate Theory Association Symposium
Building On Cohn's Metric Space: Metric Dissonances, Metric Irregularity, and Phrase Expansions in The Fanfare of Janáček's Sinfonietta
Texas Society for Music Theory Annual Conference
Sarah McConnell
Motive, Form, Process, and Second Themes–an Analysis of Reger's D minor Piano Quartet
Indiana University Graduate Theory Association Symposium
Jason Patterson
The Tonic Object: New Models for Symphonic Analysis
Indiana University Graduate Theory Association Symposium &
Texas Society for Music Theory Annual Conference
Jay Smith
The Metric Battle in Holst's 'Mars, the Bringer of War'
Indiana University Graduate Theory Association Symposium
Theory Faculty Accomplishments
Diego Cubero
Article: “Fading Within: Structural Inner Voices in Brahms’s Piano Works”
Music Theory Online (forthcoming)
Chapter: “Schopenhauer’s Philosophy of Music and Its Influence in Early 20th-C Music Theory.
The Palgrave Schopenhauer Handbook, edited by Sandra Shapshay. New York: Palgrave Macmillan (forthcoming)
Conference Paper: “Blurring into the Distance: Harmonic Overlaps in Schumann and Brahms”
New England Conference of Music Theorists, 2015
South Central Society for Music Theory, 2015
Conference Paper: “The viio7 as Subdominant” (coauthored with Daniel Arthurs)
Texas Society for Music Theory, 2015
Conference Paper: “Sounding Within: Structural Inner Voices in Brahms’s Piano Works”
Society for Music Theory, 2015
Texas Society for Music Theory, 2014
Conference Paper: “Voice-Leading Bifurcations and the Trope of Separation in Selected Songs by Brahms”
Eighteenth Biennial International Conference on Nineteenth-Century Music, 2014
Conference Paper: “In the Process of Dissolving: Examining the Interaction between Syntactic and Statistical Form in Brahms”
Seventh International Conference on Music Theory, Estonia, 2014
Benjamin Dobbs
Article: Musiktheorie 31/1 (2016): “Die Privilegierung der verschriftlichten Musik als Impuls für das Konzept der ‘musica poetica’: religiöse, intellektuelle und musikalische Faktoren im 16. Jahrhundert” (The Privileging of Written Music as Impetus for the Concept of ‘Musica poetica’: Religious, Intellectual, and Musical Factors in the Sixteenth Century)
Conference paper: “Triadic Counterpoint or Contrapuntal Triads: Compositional Pedagogy in Early Seventeenth-Century Germany”
Society for Music Theory, 2015
Samantha Inman
Conference paper: “TMB Strategies in Haydn’s Sonata Movements”
Texas Society for Music Theory, 2016
Conference paper: “Of Beginnings and Endings: P as Agent of Closure in Haydn’s Sonatas”
Society for Music Theory and Texas SMT, 2015
Justin Lavacek
Article: “Mozart’s Harmonic Planning in the Secco Recitatives”
Theoria 22 (2016)
Article: “Contrapuntal Ingenuity in the Motets of Machaut”
Integral (forthcoming)
Book Review: Anna Zayaruznaya’s The Monstrous New Art: Divided Forms in the Late Medieval Motet
Music Theory Online (forthcoming)
Conference paper: “Schenker’s Double Mixture and the Curious Case of bIV”
Music Theory Midwest and Rocky Mountain Society for Music Theory, 2016
David Bard-Schwarz
Author: Introduction to Electronic Art through the Teachings of Jacques Lacan: Strangest Thing (Routledge 2014)
Editor: David Lewin’s Morgengruß—Text, Context, Commentary (OUP 2014)
Student Research, Presentations, and Awards: January-May 2015
Several students and faculty from the theory area have recently presented or soon will be presenting research—from harmony to form, Schenkerian theory to Sonata theory, classical to jazz to pop music—at conferences around the globe.
Benjamin Dobbs, Ph.D. candidate in music theory, presented his paper, "Reading, Writing, and Arithmetic: The Interdisciplinary Curriculum of the Early-Seventeenth Century Music Classroom," at the 2015 Annual Meeting of the Renaissance Society of America, held at the Humboldt University of Berlin in March. He will present another paper, "The Interdisciplinary Curriculum of the Seventeenth-Century Lateinschule and the Place of the Music Lehrbuch and Therein: The Case of Baryphonus and Grimm’s Pleiades musicae," at the Spring 2015 Conference of the American Musicological Society - Southwest Chapter, held at UNT in April.
Benjamin Graf (ABD, Ph.D. in music theory and M.M. trumpet performance) won 3rd Place in the Non-STEM category (Humanities, Education, Business and Social Sciences) at the Federation Research Symposium of North Texas Area Universities. His analysis of select Beethoven pieces also won 1st Prize at UNT's Graduate Exhibition (Humanities category). Ben is a student of UNT Distinguished Research Professor Timothy Jackson.
PhD candidate Michael Rogers presented his poster "Chord Scale Usage as Compositional Method in Jazz: Scalar Application Types in the Music of Thad Jones" at the annual meeting of the Texas Society of Music Theory in El Paso, February 28.
In the meantime, Michael successfully defended his dissertation. This photo shows (left to right): Dr. Frank Heidlberger (Division Chair and major advisor), Michael Rogers, and Dr. Daniel Arthurs (Music Theory Coordinator and second advisor).
PhD student Benjamin Graf won first place at UNT's Graduate Student Exhibition, with his paper titled "The Significance of 'Structrual Motives' in Unraveling the Genius of Beethoven"
Master's Student Kája Lill’s paper won the Colvin Award for best student paper at the Texas Society for Music Theory annual conference at the University of Texas at El Paso on February 28, 2015.
Jeffrey Ensign (PhD), presented “The Sentence and SRDC in Recent Popular Songs”, at the Texas Society for Music Theory Conference held February 27-28 at the University of Texas–El Paso.
Yiyi Gao (MA), presented “The Interrelation Between a Pair of Lieder, Auf einer Burg and In der Fremde in Schumann's Song Cycle Liederkreis, Op. 39”, at the Fourth Graduate Student Theory Conference, held on January 25, 2015 at Mannes College of Music.
Benjamin Graf (PhD) presented “Beethoven’s Transcendent Voice-Leading” at the 15th Annual DNS International 18th Century Studies Conference in Sydney, Australia.
Benjamin Graf (PhD), presented “Beethoven’s Transcendent Voice-Leading”at the 15th Annual DNS International 18th Century Studies Conference (Sydney, Australia). Benjamin also presented “Before the Heroic E-flat: An Argument for Beethoven’s Piano Sonata No. 4 in E-flat Major, Op. 7” at the 32nd Annual Florida State Music Theory Forum (Tallahasse, FL), and “Pardon the Interruption: Reconsidering Schenker’s Sonata Form Paradigms” at the 2015 Indiana University Music Research Symposium (Bloomington, IN). Benjamin placed 3rd in the Non-STEM category (Humanities, Education, Business and Social Sciences) at the Federation Research Symposium of North Texas Area Universities. His analysis of select Beethoven pieces also won 1st Prize at UNT's Graduate Exhibition (Humanities category).
Karel Lill (MA) presented his paper “Organization in Krzysztof Penderecki's Threnody to the Victims of Hiroshima: Rotation, Multiplication, and Contour” at the Florida State University Music Theory Forum on January 17, the Indiana University Annual Symposium of Research in Music on February 20, and at the Texas Society for Music Theory Conference held on February 27-28, at the University of Texas–El Paso.
Jayson Smith (PhD) presented “‘Appraisal Responses’ to Surprising Events in Mozart’s Viennese Piano Concertos” at the Pacific Northwest Graduate Music Conference, February 21-22, 2015 in Vancouver; he also presented thi paper on February 27-28 in El Paso at the Texas Society for Music Theory, at Music Theory Southeast, March 27-28, and at East Carolina University, Greenville, NC.
Yiyi Gao (MA) presented “The Interrelation Between a Pair of Lieder, Auf einer Burg and In der Fremde in Schumann's Song Cycle Liederkreis, Op. 39”, at the Fourth Graduate Student Theory Conference, held on January 25, 2015, at Mannes College of Music.
Jason Patterson (PhD) presented “Implied Structure: An In Medias Res ^3-line in Chopin's Prelude No. 2 in A Minor” at the Fourth Graduate Student Theory Conference, on January 25, 2015 at Mannes College of Music.
Michael Rogers (PhD) presented “Chord-scale Usage as Compositional Method in Jazz: Scalar Application Types in the Music of Thad Jones”, at Texas Society for Music Theory Conference, held on February 27-28, at the University of Texas–El Paso.
Faculty Research Publications and Presentations
September - December, 2015
Benjamin Dobbs (Visiting Lecturer in Music Theory) presented a paper, entitled "Triadic Counterpoint or Contrapuntal Triads: Compositional Pedagogy in Early Seventeenth-Century Germany," at the 2015 Annual Meeting of the Society for Music Theory in St. Louis held October 29 - November 1, 2015.
Frank Heidlberger, Professor of Music Theory, presented a paper on "Carl Dahlhaus on the History of Music Theory - New Perspectives ," October 3, at the annual meeting of the German Society of Music Theory in Berlin (Germany), as part of a panel discussion, with Professors Thomas Christensen, Nathan Martin, and Jan-Philipp Sprick. On October 29 he presented a paper called "De rebus prius factis – Ernst Krenek’s Theoretical and Practical Approach to Electronic Music in the Context of Post-World-War II Serialism" at the annual meeting of the Society of Music Theory in St. Louis.
February - April, 2015
Dr. Samantha Inman, “Of Beginnings and Endings: P as Agent of Closure in Haydn's Sonatas”, Texas Society for Music Theory, February 27-28, at the University of Texas–El Paso.
Dr. Diego Cubero, “Blurring into the Distant: Harmonic Overlaps in Schumann and Brahms”, South Central Society for Music Theory in New Orleans, March 27-28; 30th Annual Meeting of the New England Conference of Music Theorists in Boston, April 24-26, 2015.
Dr. Frank Heidlberger: new Henle critical edition of Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy's Concert pieces for Clarinet, Bassett horn and piano op. 113 and 114; presented“Ernst Krenek’s electronic oratorio ‘Spiritus intelligentiae’ (1955/56) and the discourse of serialism after the Second World War”, presented at the Conference on "Music between War and Peace in the 20th Century", Tchaikovsky Conservatory of Music, Moscow, April 21-24, 2015.
Dr. Samantha Inman, “Of Beginnings and Endings: P as Agent of Closure in Haydn's Sonatas”, Texas Society for Music Theory, February 27-28, at the University of Texas–El Paso.
Dr. Timothy Jackson, “Anton Eberl's Innovative Conceptions of Sonata Form: The Example of the First Movements of E-flat Major Op. 33 and D Minor Op. 34”, Eighth European Music Analysis Conference in Leuven, Belgium, September 17-20, 2014; published a chapter in a collection of essays: “The ‘Pseudo-Einsatz’ in Two Handel Fugues: Heinrich Schenker’s Analytical Work with Reinhard Oppel”, University of Rochester Press, book ed. David Beach and Yosef Goldenberg.
Dr. Justin Lavacek, “Mozart’s Harmonic Practice in the Secco Recitatives,” Theoria, vol. 22 (forthcoming 2015);“Contrapuntal Ingenuity in the Motets of Machaut”, Integral (forthcoming)
Dr. David Schwarz (co-edited with Richard Cohn, Yale Univ.), David Lewin’s Morgengruß: Text, Context, Commentary (Oxford University Press, forthcoming Fall 2015).
November - December, 2014
Benjamin Graf (ABD, Ph.D. in Music Theory and M.M. Trumpet Performance) will be presenting his paper “Beethoven’s Transcendent Voice-leading” in Sydney, Australia on December 12 at the 15th Annual DNS Conference with the theme Ideas and Enlightenment in the “long” Eighteenth Century. His trip is supported by a Toulouse Travel Grant. Ben is a student of UNT Distinguished Research Professor Dr. Timothy Jackson.
August, 2014
Dr. Frank Heidlberger's critical edition of Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy's Concert pieces for Clarinet, Bassett horn and piano op. 113 and 114 is complete and will be published at Henle music publisher (Munich) this fall.
January - April 2014
Three music theory students were presented with Music History, Theory, and Ethnomusicology Division Awards at the Division Honors Day Convocation on April 30, 2014: Kaja Lill was awarded the Outstanding Graduate Student in Music Theory Award; Daniel Grantham was presented with the Outstanding Teaching Fellow in Music Theory Award; David Falterman was granted the Outstanding Undergraduate Student in Music Theory Award.
Congratulations to Professor Paul Dworak, who was recently named University Distinguished Teaching Professor!
On march 28 and 29, The Division of Music History, Theory and Ethnomusicology, the UNT Music Library, and GAMuT hosted a conference in honor of retiring professor Graham Phipps. Click here for more details
Benjamin Dobbs (PhD candidate in music theory) presented "Competing Cosmologies: Christian and Neoplatonic Representations in Early Triadic Theory" at the Yale Graduate Music Symposium; New Haven, CT; March 1-2. He also presented "The Harmonic Chicken or the Contrapuntal Egg: Two Early-Seventeenth-Century Pedagogies for Triadic Composition" at the Texas Society for Music Theory; UT-San Antonio, San Antonio, TX; March 7-8 and Music Theory Southeast; Univ. of South Florida, Tampa, FL; March 21-22.
Ph.D. student Michael Rogers presented “Coloring outside the lines. Thad Jones’ use of altered chord tones” at the SMT South Central Conference, Oxford Mississippi, in March 2014.
Jeffrey Ensign (PhD candidate in music theory) presented "Hybrid Forms in EDM/Top 40 songs" at the Yale Graduate Music Symposium, March 1-2. Both Mr. Dobbs and Mr. Ensign are presenting at Yale, whose conference accepted only 12 papers, with others representing such universities/programs as Oxford, Harvard, Yale, Eastman, and Northwestern. UNT is the only university represented twice on this select conference program!
On Wednesday, February 5, music theory lecturer Justin Lavacek held a lecture titled "Contrapuntal Ingenuity in the Motets of Machaut" at the UNT College of Music, as part of the MHTE Lecture Series.
Music Theory
Faculty
Gene Cho
Diego Cubero
Benjamin Dobbs
Paul Dworak
Frank Heidlberger
Samantha Inman
Timothy Jackson
Justin Lavacek
David Bard-Schwarz
Stephen Slottow
Thomas Sovik
Adjunct Faculty
Retired Faculty
Joan C. Groom
Graham H. Phipps
Teaching Fellows
Da Mi Baek
Cheryl Bates
Douglas Donley
Leah Greenfield
Kenny Lovern
Jordan Moore
Michael Lance Russell
Patrick Sallings
Jayson Smith
Joseph Turner
Andrew Vagts
William Waldroup
Leonardo Zuno
Links for Undergraduate Students
Links for Graduate Students
Music Theory Graduate Student Handbook