Abstract:
This thesis is the summation of research conducted into issues of musical genre and style for the contemporary keyboardist. Genre is best understood as a contract between the composer, performer and audience, consisting of a set of expectations relating to such aspects as (but not limited to) form, harmonic language,rhythm, accompaniment style, text, instrumentation, timbre, recording production techniques, costume, and performance environment. The composer and performer often challenge expectations of intramusical content, while the audience has the ability to challenge extramusical aspects. Rather than introducing entirely new attributes to an existing set of expectations (something difficult to quantify), the composer or performer is more likely to appropriate aspects of another genre, and to create a hybrid genre from the combined musical vocabularies.The concert performances I carried out as part of my DMA study demonstrated specific aspects of pianistic vocabulary traced through a number of genres, forming a tangible link between them. As described in this thesis, the ragtime piano genre of Scott Joplin is thus linked to solo piano and ensemble works of George Gershwin, which are in turn connected to the Tin Pan Alley jazz standard, and further to the progressive jazz, rock and electronica genres. The Classical-period concerto is similarly linked to progressive rock and electronica. The role of accompaniment style as an aspect of genre is discussed in each case, and culminates in a body of original studio-based arrangements and compositions that explores the hybridisation of such.The potential for the performer to alter the terms of a generic contract is the underlying theme of this body of research.