Research Catalogue

an international database for artistic research

• 3. Internal publication Research published in this issue are only for internal circulation within the Royal Conservatoire, The Hague.
• 2. Royal Conservatoire Investigations Royal Conservatoire Investigations
• 1. Master Research Projects All research in KC

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  The “Weiss Theorbo”: Sylvius Leopold Weiss and his continuo instrument in the Hofkapelle of Dresden (2015) author(s): Giulio Quirici Limited publication. Only visible to members of the portal : KC Research Portal
  Name: Giulio Quirici Main Subject: Lute Research Coaches: Kate Clark Title of Research: The “Weiss Theorbo”: Sylvius Leopold Weiss and his continuo instrument in the Hofkapelle of Dresden Research Question: What kind of theorbo did Weiss use during his post as a luteninst in the Dresden court? Summary of Results: The theorbo used by Weiss in his Dresden years was not a standard theorbo, although it might have looked just like one. By 1723 Weiss had modified one of his instruments for the use in the orchestra and the church so to resemble in the effect the standard theorbo, but with a different tuning, that mirrored the tuning of the lute of that time (now referred to as “baroque lute”). This lute-like tuning, while still retaining in the power and resonance of the standard theorbo, allowed the "new" instrument a bigger extension both in the high and low registers, and a strong connection to the aesthetic and techniques of the lute. In the context of my own exploration, description and re-introduction of this lesser-known type of theorbo, both practical and theoretical, this thesis aims to also support my claim that Weiss' theorbo is often the most appropriate instrument to realize a 18th Century basso continuo in a historically accurate way. Biography: Giulio Quirici studied jazz and baroque music. He is a co-founder of Radio Antiqua, winner of both jury’s and public’s prices at the Haendel Competition in Goettingen. He tours extensively and performed at some of the foremost European festivals including Innsbrucker Festwocken Der Alten Musick, Grachten Festival, Festival d’Ambronay, Pavia Barocca, Bruges MA among the others; played under the direction of Frans Bruggen, Milos Valent, Charles Toet, Vox Luminis, and can be heard in upcoming CD releases by Pan Classics, Glossa and Harmonia Mundi. Giulio serves as a music teacher at the British School in the Netherland since 2011.
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• Bach Reconstructed (2015) author(s): Michael Peterson Limited publication. Only visible to members of the portal : KC Research Portal
  Name: Michael Peterson Main Subject: Harpsichord Research Coach: Kathryn Cok Title of Research: Reconstructing Bach Research Question: How can one deliver a compelling performance of a work by Johann Sebastian Bach for which only a fragment exists? Summary of Results: Two pieces - the Flute Sonata in A major and the Art of the Fugue - remain among Johann Sebastian Bachʼs most mysterious and rarely performed works today. Part of the reason why may come from the way this music has been preserved. The flute sonata was written on the same autograph manuscript as Bachʼs Concerto for Two Keyboards in C minor, but part of this manuscript has been cut off, leaving us with over 40 measures of the flute sonata missing. Bachʼs death in 1750 prevented him from publishing in its entirety one of his most complex movements from the Art of the Fugue: Contrapunctus 14. Fortunately, breakthroughs in modern scholarship, together with inspiration from reconstructive processes in other genres, make it possible to develop appropriate reconstructions of these pieces. The music can then be made suitable for performance and more accessible to todayʼs audiences. This presentation will show the methods and strategies I used to reconstruct these two pieces, along with the challenges I faced, and will feature a performance of both works. Biography: Michael Peterson has performed nationally and internationally as a soloist and chamber musician. His repertoire spans nearly five hundred years, with an emphasis on music from the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Recently, he has performed with Gabrieli West, the Pacific Chamber Symphony, and American Bach Soloists. He is now pursuing a diploma at the Royal Conservatoire of The Hague, where he studies harpsichord with Jacques Ogg and basso continuo with Patrick Ayrton.
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• ASD, Music perception and Music Therapy (2015) author(s): Helmke Jansen Limited publication. Only visible to members of the portal : KC Research Portal
  Name: Helmke Jansen Main Subject: Classical Oboe, Orchestra master Research Coaches: Anna Scott, Fleur Bouwer Title of Research: Autism Spectrum Disorder, Music Perception and Music Therapy Research Question: Is there a scientific basis for the use of music therapy in the ASD population? Summary of Results: Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) is a pervasive developmental disorder causing deficits in various domains including socio-emotional development, communication and perception. It is known that people with ASD can be drawn to music, as also shown by anecdotal evidence concerning musical savants. In addition, there is a higher incidence of absolute pitch in people with ASD than in the normal population. With my expertise both in music and clinical child and adolescent studies, I wondered whether there is a scientific basis for the use of music therapy in the ASD population. According to a large body of research, this is in fact the case. Processing deficits associated with ASD seem to be less present for musical information. Despite characteristic difficulties in perceiving emotions in the self and others, ASD causes no problems in perceiving emotions in music. Perceiving details as well as global musical information, people with ASD are very attentive listeners. The ASD brain seems to have a priority for musical over social auditory information processing. Given the preference for a clear and structured environment, music – as a highly structured stimulus - seems to calm and even reward the ASD brain. Research on efficacy of music therapy interventions has shown improvements in joint attention, eye contact, social engagement, socio-emotional reciprocity, verbal communication, attention, and motivation. The strength of their musical brain can be of great use in motivating and engaging people with ASD to work on goals in all possible domains. Biography: Helmke Jansen began her student years at the University of Leiden in 2006, where she studied Education and Child Studies combined with the minor Practicum Musicae at the Royal Conservatoire in The Hague. During this minor it became more and more clear that oboe was actually her real passion, and therefore she entered a fulltime program of musical studies in 2009. This same year she graduated with a Bachelor’s degree from Leiden. After a few years focusing on music, she began the Master’s Program of Clinical Child and Adolescent Studies, which led to the title of Master of Science in February 2014. Since 2014 she has been studying in the Orchestra Master’s Program of the Royal Conservatoire in The Hague.
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• The Viola da gamba in German Baroque Opera (2015) author(s): Susanne Herre Limited publication. Only visible to members of the portal : KC Research Portal
  The Holy Roman Empire ('Teutschland'/'Germania') – a loose alliance of more than a thousand territories with its Imperial court in Vienna - was a monstrous complex of political and cultural diversity. Its nobility – Princes, Electors and even the Emperor himself - highly appreciated the viola da gamba as a refined musical instrument, and learning to play it commonly formed part of their education from childhood onwards. Often, they were themselves involved in the preparation of major musical events such as the performances of operas which were the high points of festivities, such as Carnival, birthdays, and name days. While the Viennese court favoured Italian opera and employed a large number of Italian artists, quite a number of Italian and German composers also came into contact with the French style during study visits to Paris or through French colleagues employed at German courts. Thus, Baroque opera in Germany is mainly Italian at heart but also absorbs other elements such as German counterpoint and the French style. To relate the viola da gamba to opera performed in 'Germania' may at first sight seem surprising as we would associate it rather with chamber music and in the case of vocal music mainly with sacred cantatas, especially funeral music. The research process has shown that the viola da gamba indeed played a role in German baroque opera. New discoveries of pieces from operas and opera-like works performed at German courts such as Hanover, Düsseldorf, Dresden and Berlin demonstrate the varied use of the viola da gamba as an obbligato instrument, solo or in combination with other instruments, and as basso continuo instrument.
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  Easter Lamentations for solo voice in Spain during the 17th century (2015) author(s): Victoria Cassano McDonald Limited publication. Only visible to members of the portal : KC Research Portal
  Name: Victoria Cassano Main subject: Early Music Singing Research coaches: Raúl Angulo, Inês de Avena Braga Title: Easter Lamentations for Solo voice in Spain during the 17th century Research Question: What information is available about the performance of Easter lamentations for solo voice in Spain and how can we get closer to their historical performance practice? Summary of Results: The Easter lamentations are musical settings of the texts from the book of Lamentations by the prophet Jeremiah, describing the destruction of Jerusalem in 587 b.c. They are sung during the Triduum Sacrum, the last three days of the Holy Week - Maundy Thursday, Good Friday and Holy Saturday - during the Tenebrae service. Many composers have set music to these texts through history, including Victoria, Lassus and Tallis. In the 17th century lamentations for solo voice with instrumental accompaniment started being composed all over Europe, and became very popular especially in France, where they receive the name of “Leçons de Tenebres”, with the famous settings by Charpentier and Couperin. In Spain it was also a popular genre, but it has not yet been studied in depth and there is not much information available about its performance. This research started with the goal of discovering a repertoire unknown to me before, getting as close as possible to its historical performance practice, and being able to perform some of these pieces, some of which have not been performed in centuries. One of the objectives was to get to know how many of these pieces survive and make a list of the ones that have been already discovered. I have so far managed to put together a list of over thirty lamentations for solo voice from different musical archives in Spain. Some of these works have been catalogued in their respective archives, but are not yet available for the general public as they have not yet been edited nor performed in modern times. Studying musical treatises of the time such as Cerone (1613), Torres (1702), Nassarre (1723) and Valls (1742) I have discovered many useful aspects of performance practice that can be applied to the performance of lamentations, such as the singers who performed them, the instruments that were used for their accompaniment, including the harp and the dulcian, and the basic rules of accompanying sacred music. In my presentation I will show some musical examples of lamentations for solo voice, applying some of the rules found in these treatises as well as using historical pronunciation of Spanish Latin, together with a powerpoint presentation with some general characteristics of the music of the time. Biography: Victoria Cassano (Madrid, 1987) began her musical studies playing both piano and violin in her hometown. In 2008 she graduated from the Universidad Complutense de Madrid, with a Bachelor degree in Music teaching. During her university studies she started having singing lessons, and soon after she decided to move to The Netherlands to continue her studies at the Royal Conservatory in the Hague, studying both Classical and Early Music singing with Rita Dams, Jill Feldman, Michael Chance and Peter Kooij, where she is now specializing in the performance of Spanish sacred music of the 17th century.
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• The Aria in its context - Sonata form and characterization in two Eighteenth-Century Opere Serie: Mozart's Mitridate and Lucio SIlla (2015) author(s): Santo Militello Limited publication. Only visible to members of the portal : KC Research Portal
  Name: Santo Militello Main Subject: Music Theory Research Coaches: Paul Scheepers, Bert Mooiman Title of Research: The Aria in its context; Sonata form and characterization in two Eighteenth Century Opera Serie: Mozart’s Mitridate K87/74a (1770) and Lucio Silla K135 (1772) Research Question: Are the principles of Sonata Form present in Mozart’s early Opera- Seria Arias? How do these principles operate? Summary of Results: The musical forms employed by Mozart in the Arias from Mitridate and Lucio Silla are construed by classical literature as examples of Da Capo Aria and its variants, without providing a specific analysis of the thematic layout of the formal sections. The present research is an attempt to reconsider the analytical results of those authors and to propose a more detailed analysis, applying to the afore mentioned vocal works the analytical theories recently developed for the analysis of instrumental repertoire by scholars W. Caplin (Classical Form), J. Hepokoski and W. Darcy (Elements of Sonata Theory). A detailed description which demonstrates how Sonata-form principles operate in these Arias can be found in Part III, with particular focus on the exposition sections. In Part IV we discuss the connection between musical form and dramatic situations: as far as the overall form is concerned, it is not possible to identify a fixed relationship; however, we found that, in the totality of Arias sung by each character, the character alternates different musical forms (with one meaningful exception), and that, in some dramatic situations, the importance of specific roles such as the prima donna, primo uomo and primo tenore are highlighted by the use of musical forms which are, in the stylistic context of these two Operas, exceptional. On the other hand, we recognize a strong relation between musical form and libretto, concerning the details of the different expositional trajectories: through the analysis of proportion and amplitude of expositions, we understand their rhetorical strength; specifically, the way in which the secondary theme space is prepared, presented and developed is construed as a metaphor to portray the character’s utterance, feelings and purposes. Therefore, through a hermeneutic approach, we link the expositional narrative to the expression of heroism, self-confidence, rage, persuasive power and overwhelming emotions. Biography: Santo Militello is born in Verona (Italy) in 1983; he studied in Conservatorio di Musica di Vicenza and Trento, where he earned a Diploma in Choral Conducting (2009), Wind Band Instrumentation (2010) and Composition (2012). In 2012 he moved to the Netherlands, where, in 2013, he obtained a bachelor degree in Music Theory at the Koninklijk Conservatorium Den Haag.
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