My Doctoral Dissertation

[tubajon]

Has anyone put together a book of photos of (special, rare, historic) tubas? I see it like an anthology of excerpts. A lot of tubas with a sentence or so explaining some pertinent details about them. Bad idea?

[Michael Bush]

I think it sounds fascinating. I want to see it and study it with care. In fact I've thought about doing it myself and even registered a domain name to do it on.

But I wouldn't let it get as far as the proposal as a doctoral dissertation.

What is the thesis? What argument that has not been made before would such a project make? What theory about tubas holds all these pictures and descriptions together? Perhaps you've already figured all that out and just didn't put it in your post. But a mere catalogue of old tubas isn't going to get to first base, I would hope.

[Davidrn1]

Here is one for Conn Tubas

http://cderksen.home.xs4all.nl/ConnLooksBass.html" target="_blank

[sloan]

Ask your advisor.

[THE TUBA]

As far as dissertations on equipment go, I would really like to see someone do an in-depth and scientific evaluation of different horns. What causes certain tubas to sound "darker" than others? What physical characteristics of a horn make it "project" better? What are the biggest factors in instrument response?

Sure, many instrument manufacturers know the answers to these questions through lots of experience, trial-and-error, and science, but it would be neat to see how different makes, models, and styles size up from a concrete physics perspective.

To make this relevant to a music dissertation, you could make physical evaluations of tubas ranging from present back as far as you can find them. You could then look for trends in instrument design and attempt to find correlations between changes in equipment and changes in performance practice. There's a lot of interesting ways to go with this type of research, but it seems to me to be heavily based in physics and quite time consuming.

[Michael Bush]

Here is one for Conn Tubas

http://cderksen.home.xs4all.nl/ConnLooksBass.html" target="_blank" target="_blank

Yes, frustration with the huge gaps there is what led me to think someone needs to take another run at it specifically for old Conns. An accounting that would go beyond Conn would be even better.

[eupher61]

I'm in agreement with the ideas that it is a fascinating, and valuable in the long run, project, but you'll need more guts to it to be worthy of a dissertation. At most colleges, at least. YMMV, I have no idea where you are, Jon. I've seen a few that were pretty sketchy.

[sloan]

Here are the questions you need to answer in a dissertation proposal:

a) what's the problem?
b) what's been done before?
c) what will we know when you are done that we don't know now?
d) what will you do?
e) how will we know when you are done?

c) is the most important question.

e) is often the hardest one to answer.

good luck!

[David Richoux]

Go to horn-u-copia website. Search by instrument.

I really like Horn-u-copia, but it could be so much better! Most of the information that gets posted to the site for each photo is either very limited or anecdotal stuff reading like it was from an eBay description.

[pgym]

Here are the questions you need to answer in a dissertation proposal:

a) what's the problem?

There's no single, wide-ranging, comprehensive, systematic collection of photos and pertinent information on special, rare, and historic tubas.

b) what's been done before?

There are a few haphazard (e.g., horn-u-copia.net) and incomplete brand-specific (e.g., Conn, York) collections of photos and pertinent information on tubas, but no wide-ranging, comprehensive, systematic collection of photos and pertinent information on special, rare, and historic tubas exists at this time.

c) what will we know when you are done that we don't know now?

Where to look for photos and pertinent information on special, rare, and historic tubas.

d) what will you do?

Compile a single, wide-ranging, comprehensive, systematic collection of photos and pertinent information on special, rare, and historic tubas.

e) how will we know when you are done?[/quote]

I'll submit it for defense.

c) is the most important question.

e) is often the hardest one to answer.

There. Now that wasn't all that difficult, was it?

[tubajon]

Ok. I think you all have convinced me that it is something worth doing, even though in order to make it something really valuable it would be a huge project. Perhaps not along the lines of a thesis or dissertation, but something that if done well could be a great resource for the future.

[PMeuph]

If I were looking to do the project you are talking about, I would look into schools with programs of organology or at least schools with professors that specialize in organology.

http://www.ed.ac.uk/schools-departments ... t-research" target="_blank

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Organology" target="_blank

http://www.galpinsociety.org/" target="_blank

[PMeuph]

This place might be closer to home for you, although they don't list all the tubas in their collection on their webpage.

http://www.usd.edu/fine-arts/music/graduate.cfm" target="_blank

[Rick Denney]

Here are the questions you need to answer in a dissertation proposal:

a) what's the problem?
b) what's been done before?
c) what will we know when you are done that we don't know now?
d) what will you do?
e) how will we know when you are done?

c) is the most important question.

e) is often the hardest one to answer.

good luck!

[satire]

a. There is no cure for hantavirus.
b. People have tried to find a cure for hantavirus.
c. We'll have a cure for hantavirus.
d. Find a cure for hantavirus.
e. When a cure for hantavirus has been found.

[/satire]

Rick "thinking it will take more than one simplistic sentence to address these issues" Denney

[scottw]

Has anyone put together a book of photos of (special, rare, historic) tubas? I see it like an anthology of excerpts. A lot of tubas with a sentence or so explaining some pertinent details about them. Bad idea?

A qualified, "yes". A Pictorial History of Civil War Instruments and Military Bands, Robert Garofalo and Marl Elrod, Pictorial Histories Publishing Co, Charleston, WV has many pictures and descriptions of brass [and percussion] instruments of that period and many of tubas/saxhorns. A good start.

[Rick Denney]

Ok. I think you all have convinced me that it is something worth doing, even though in order to make it something really valuable it would be a huge project. Perhaps not along the lines of a thesis or dissertation, but something that if done well could be a great resource for the future.

Do you have a theory of how the variations could be organized?

Can you articulate the value in that organization, from any perspective your school might find valuable?

Are there data available that would allow you to evaluate your theory? Looking things up on the Internet has already been rejected as having been done without satisfying the need. Do you know where the instruments are? Do you know how and where to find the historical sources? Do you have a strategy you can articulate for what you would observe, measure, and record if you were put into the presence of a historical instrument? In the absence of that, can you articulate a strategy for how you'll determine it? Do you have a way to identify instruments of historical value versus instruments that deserve that special spot on the wall of Applebee's? Can you define musical qualities of instruments? (Any dimension I can think of would not stand a historical test of acceptance by top performers, for example, at least beyond "big" versus "small", which isn't really illuminating.)

A catalog in and of itself isn't very useful. A research database might be, if you can articulate its value to subsequent research in such a way that you'll know what to put into the database. Otherwise, you'll just duplicate Hornucopia with a different set of instruments.

How will you establish authoritativeness? If use by a famous performer is one dimension of value, how will you establish provenance? Where will you get primary sources of information about what qualities that performer thought were valuable in that instrument? Handed-down anecdotes from their current owners might not be enough. For example, I have a York Master tuba that I can demonstrate was owned by Oscar Lagasse, Chris Hall, Chuck Guzis, and me. But even though all those people were alive at the time I researched it, and even though the questions were asked carefully and repeatedly by different people, I cannot be sure whether that instrument was made in 1959 or 1969. That's a pretty simple fact not to be able to determine, and primary sources were available until a couple of years ago. What about instruments old enough so that primary sources have been unavailable for half a century or a century?

I think that doing this deeply enough to have value will take you out of any solution space where you can actually get the work done. I suspect Dr. Sloan offered his questions in the hopes you would discover that on your own, or find a way around it.

Rick "frequently asked for research topics by grad students" Denney

[BVD Press]

Go through the T.U.B.A. Journal. The middle portion of many have a "Pictorial History of the Tuba..."

Also check:

http://www.editions-bim.com/robert-elia ... akers.html

Contact the author and he could give you oodles of info...

[tubajon]

I'm not that smart! I was hoping to create something with pictures of horns like the rare (1 or 2 surviving -I think) Jack Richardson Holton, the Tuba in the Bill Bell room at the Hotel Pattee-Perry, Mike Lynch's collection, and other collections of peoples' instruments I know as well as other Tubas that I have yet to discover. I'm not knowledgeable with regard to physics, so I guess I can't analyze those types of characteristics. I also want this to be a paper book, not only an online resource. I'm obviously not yet fully aware of what is out there (hence my original post) so thank you for all of the education thus far.

[Alex C]

Your idea of a collection of photos and comments is a good outlet for your interests but I'm not sure it would meet the qualifications of a dissertation. A doctoral dissertation is, most often, a major research paper defending an hypothesis. You should describe your idea to your major professor before investing much time in it while you are enrolled in the program. Time is precious in grad school.

[scottw]

I'm not that smart! I was hoping to create something with pictures of horns like the rare (1 or 2 surviving -I think) Jack Richardson Holton, the Tuba in the Bill Bell room at the Hotel Pattee-Perry, Mike Lynch's collection, and other collections of peoples' instruments I know as well as other Tubas that I have yet to discover. I'm not knowledgeable with regard to physics, so I guess I can't analyze those types of characteristics. I also want this to be a paper book, not only an online resource. I'm obviously not yet fully aware of what is out there (hence my original post) so thank you for all of the education thus far.

Try this reference, too.
http://www.rugs-n-relics.com/Brass/tubaTN.html" target="_blank