PART I: 'THE STROKE OF AN OAR,' A TRIPTYCH FOR NARRATOR, SOPRANO, BARITONE, AND CHAMBER ENSEMBLE. PART II: THE PROPORTIONAL AND SPATIAL ANALYSIS OF THE FIRST MOVEMENT SONATA-ALLEGRO FORM OF MOZART, HAYDN, AND BEETHOVEN

Part I. The Stroke of an Oar is a product of recent study and research in Asian music and literature. It combines the poetry of China and Japan, the Vedic chants of India, and selected Asian musical characteristics with western techniques such as serialism, free atonality, counterpoint, and modern timbrel effects.;The Turning Year, which uses nine Chinese poems, reinforces the central theme with its depiction of the changing seasons. The River of Heaven is in part structured around the Japanese Noh drama and uses three separate sets of text all derived from Japanese poetry. Both of these sections follow the general pattern of an oratorio with the integration of solo and small ensemble selections in contrast to the full ensemble.;The central section, Hymn of Creation, uses the Vedic chants which depict the Hindu concept of creation. The form of this section is styled after the progressive form used in Indian classical music of the Hindustani variety: alap, jor, jhala, gat I, and gat II. This continuous flow of music offers a contrast to the more segmented style of the outer movements.;Sections one and three have the option of including an interpretive dancer to reflect certain segments of the music and text through movement. However, this is not a necessary element for the performance.;Each segment of the triptych (The Turning Year, Hymn of Creation, and River of Heaven) deals with one of the three Asian cultures and could be performed as a separate and complete work. However, a central theme which permeates each segment is the inevitable passage of time.;The work is approximately thirty minutes in length.;Part II. In this study a proportional and spatial analysis is employed to gain a perspective on how a composer manipulates musical form through the existing time span.;To exhibit this technique of analysis and address the aspect of proportion in the sonata form, the method has been applied to all of the first movement sonata-allegro forms found in the symphonies, string quartets, solo sonatas, and piano sonatas of Mozart, Haydn, and Beethoven, excluding the earlier works of Mozart (before 1772) and Haydn (before 1767).;Every movement was assigned the value of 1.000, and each section within the movement (exposition, development, recapitulation, and coda and introduction if they occurred) was measured. This was done by dividing the number of measures in a section by the total number of measures in the movement. These figures were plotted on a linear graph to visually represent when each section entered the time span of the movement. With this data, comprehensive tabulations were made to delineate any trends on how each of the composers manipulated the form in time.;Emphasis was placed on the point of return (recapitulation) and the measurement of deviation from three ratios: three-quarters (.750); two-thirds (.666); and the golden mean (.618). When this was computed it was found that the overall average for all works was .627, a 1.5% deviation from the golden mean.;Further tabulations were made with respect to proportions. With these calculations, the popular opinion that Beethoven's developments are relatively larger than both Mozart's and Haydn's was found to be false. Surprisingly, Haydn's developments averaged at 26.9% for all works, while Mozart's averaged at 17.4% and Beethoven's at 22.9%.;It was concluded that all three composers generally structured the first movement of their works around the proportion of the golden mean. Also that the recapitualtion occurs near the golden mean ratio (.618) with deviation towards two-thirds. Further it was concluded that spatial and proportional analysis does provide a perspective on how conposers manipulate musical form through time and that after identification of structural events, any work can undergo this type of analysis.