Semester of Graduation

Spring 2026

Degree

Master of Music (MM)

Department

Music and Dramatic Arts

Document Type

Thesis

Abstract

In my first few composition lessons with Dr. Mara Gibson, she told me about her love for collaboration. As I have learned, the relationship of a composer and performer can be very beautiful in the fact that the performer can bring life to your work and help you understand their instrument and its capabilities better. As one who mainly specialized in writing music for the piano, which is my own instrument, she encouraged me to look outside of my own instrument and write more music for other instruments. In taking her advice, I began making relationships with performers at LSU, writing music for them, and gaining some meaningful feedback about how to write better for the instrument. This violin sonata represents my most recent collaboration with Espen Lilleslåtten, violin professor at LSU who agreed to perform my Sonata for Violin and Piano with me for my composition recital. Hearing his feedback on what is possible and or challenging for his instrument and learning different traditional and untraditional techniques from him was very helpful for me. In the process, I even learned of my own love for collaboration.

With this work, I was able to explore emotions and feelings within myself as well as styles of music I love such as jazz, gospel, R&B, and funk within the confines of classical forms. During my time at LSU, I have learned a lot from my jazz piano instructor, Dr. Willis Delony and Doug Stone, instructor of the LSU Jazz Ensemble. Studying and playing big band pieces, jazz-infused piano pieces and jazz standards helped in the growth of my own musical language and the harmonic, rhythmic, and melodic elements I wanted to convey within the piece.

Date

4-16-2026

Committee Chair

Nabors, Brian

LSU Acknowledgement

1

LSU Accessibility Acknowledgment

1

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Available for download on Tuesday, April 20, 2027

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