The Impulse to Apocalypse
Doctoral Dissertation and Lecture Recital
The capstone to my doctoral work at UCLA was an interdisciplinary dissertation and lecture-recital exploring the idiosyncratic music and mysticism of the Russian composer-poet-philosopher Alexander Skryabin.
My central claim was that one cannot truly get at the heart of Skryabin’s compositional project without experiencing his works as he did - performing these subtle yet mystifying works at the piano.
Ludomusicological Research
As a contributor to Richard Anatone’s edited volume The Music of Nobuo Uematsu in the Final Fantasy Series, I wrote Chapter 3, “Changing Times: The Diatonic Rhythms of Nobuo Uematsu’s Final Fantasy Battle Music.” The chapter is an exploration of Uematsu’s use of propulsive rhythmic structures that allow his iconic battle themes to drive the tension of combat.
Conference Presentations:
NACVGM 2021 - “The Pulse of Combat: Rethinking Diatonic Rhythm through RPG Battle Music.”
LUDO2021 - “Fifty Shades of White: The Witcher III’s Pa(gan) Slavism.”
Nostalgia, Music, and Music Studies - “Shovel Knight: 80s Retro-synths and Hyperreal NES-talgia.”