AN INVESTIGATION INTO THE LIFE AND WORKS OF RICHARD LANE, MEMBER OF THE YOUNG COMPOSERS PROJECT: A COMPARATIVE STYLISTIC ANALYSIS OF CHORAL, CHAMBER ENSEMBLE, STRING ORCHESTRA, AND WIND BAND WORKS

Doctoral thesis (2018)

Richard Lane (1933-2004) was a prolific American composer from Paterson, New Jersey with approximately five-hundred pieces in his oeuvre. The primary research contribution of this study was to ... [more ▼]

Richard Lane (1933-2004) was a prolific American composer from Paterson, New Jersey with approximately five-hundred pieces in his oeuvre. The primary research contribution of this study was to stylistically analyze, compare and contrast eight pieces composed by Lane during his career, with a focus on discovering the extent to which Lane developed his stylistic features as an adaptable and eclectic composer. Four of these works were completed early in his career during his two-year residency (1959-1961) in Rochester, New York and Lexington, Kentucky as a member of the Young Composers Project (YCP), while the other four works were completed during the last decade of his life (1994-2004). Choral, chamber ensemble, string orchestra and wind band works were selected to represent a broad overview of Lane’s repertoire for each of these four genres, across educational, community, and professional levels. The theoretical analysis of Lane’s pieces was conducted according to the processes detailed in Jan LaRue’s (1918-2004) Guidelines for Style Analysis, which revolve around five musical elements: sound, harmony, melody, rhythm, and growth. In order to introduce, complement and contextualize the style analysis and the development of Lane as a composer, the secondary and tertiary contributions of this study were conducted to produce the first complete biography of Lane, along with the first complete annotated work index of his compositional output. Although one other research study has been conducted relating to Lane’s solo vocal compositional techniques, no other analytical research has been conducted on Lane’s music from other genres, and there is currently no complete biography or complete work index of Lane’s music. Therefore, the current study on Lane provides three new research contributions to the literature: 1) stylistic analysis across four genres 2) a complete biography which situates Lane’s entire life’s work, complemented by 3) a complete annotated work index. The current study revealed that Lane wrote from educational through professional levels, combining aspects of Renaissance, Baroque, Classical and Romantic characteristics, alongside other twentieth century tonal compositional styles, including, but not limited to jazz and popular-oriented music. One implication of this study indicates that further research into Lane’s compositional style deserves attention as only eight of his nearly five-hundred pieces are analyzed in detail in this study. The author aims for this study to be a valuable resource for future conductors and performers of Lane’s music. [less ▲]