Maureen A. Carr

Scholar of the music of Igor Stravinsky
Distinguished Professor of Music, The Pennsylvania State University

Maureen A. Carr is a Distinguished Professor of Music and teaches undergraduate and graduate music theory. She has studied the manuscripts and other documents of Igor Stravinsky extensively at the Paul Sacher Stiftung in Basel, Switzerland, as well as at archives in Paris, London, and Washington, D.C.. She received a Citation of Special Merit for Stravinsky’s Pulcinella from the Society for Music Theory (National Conference, Minneapolis, 2011), recognizing her outstanding contribution to the field of Stravinsky research the editor of and contributor of Stravinsky’s Pulcinella: A Facsimile of the Sources and Sketches (A-R Editions, 2010).

In addition, she has authored several books on the works of Stravinsky, including Multiple Masks: Stravinsky’s Neoclassicism in His Dramatic Works in Greek Studies (University of Nebraska Press, 2002), and a facsimile edition of the musical sketches for Stravinsky’s Histoire du Soldat (A-R Editions, 2005), and most recently, After the Rite: Stravinsky's Path to Neoclassicism 1914–1925 (Oxford University Press, 2014). She is also co-author and contributor with Tamara Levitz (UCLA) to Stravinsky and His World, to be published by Princeton University Press.

Carr has lectured on Stravinsky at a wide range of venues, including IRCAM (2015), the University of North Carolina (2015 and 2012), the SMT National Conference in Milwaukee (2014), the Tchaikovsky Moscow State Conservatory (2013), the Rethinking Stravinsky conference in Salerno, Italy (2012), the Congress of the International Musicological Society conference in Rome, Italy (2012) and Zurich, Switzerland (2007), the University of Lancaster, England (2011), the University of Strasbourg, France (2009), George Mason University (2009), the British Library (2008), the national meeting of the American Musicological Society in Washington, D. C. (2005), the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts at Lincoln Center (2004), and the Bristol Institute of Hellenic and Roman Studies at the University of Bristol, England (2004).

Carr is also the author with Bruce Benward of the fifth, sixth, seventh, and eight editions of the book Sight Singing Complete, the most recent version published by McGraw-Hill Higher Ed, 2015. The eighth edition also brought new co-authors Taylor Greer, Eric McKee, and Phillip Torbert, all on the faculty at The Pennsylvania State University.

Here Dr. Carr discusses her research on, and affinity for, the music of Stravinsky (courtesy College of Arts & Architecture):

Current Projects

• After Apollo: Stravinsky’s Path Through the Models of Bach (1928–1966) [Oxford University Press, under contract]
  Layout and design of all musical examples, illustrations, and infographics
  Editing prose for clarity and accuracy

Publications

• “The Faustian and Mephistophelean Worlds in Stravinsky’s The Rake’s Progress”
  Article appearing in the Oxford Handbook of Faust in Music
  eds. Lorna Fitzsimmons and Charles McKnight
  [Oxford University Press, 2019]
  All musical examples, illustrations, and graphics
  Editing prose for a general audience

• The Rite of Spring at 100
  eds. Severine Neff, Maureen A Carr, and Gretchen G Horlacher, with John Reef
  [Indiana University Press]
  Layout and design of musical examples, illustrations, and infographics for contributing scholars from around the globe, assisting the lead editors with copy editing and graphics

• Sight Singing Complete, 8th edition
  [McGraw-Hill Higher Ed, 2015]
  Co-author / Cover Design

• After the Rite: Stravinsky’s Path to Neoclassicism: 1914–1925
  [Oxford University Press, 2014]
  Layout and design of all musical examples, illustrations, infographics, and cover

• Stravinsky’s Pulcinella (1919-1920): A Facsimile of the Sources and Sketches
  [A-R Editions, 2010]
  Layout and design of all musical examples, tables, and illustrations, including restoring images of old manuscripts and sketches

• “Stravinsky’s Compositional Process for Le Rossignol [Solovey/The Nightingale]”
  Article in the collection Reassessing Stravinsky’s Le Sacre du Printemps, 1913/2013
  [Cyrillic version published by the Tchaikovsky Moscow State Conservatory]
  All musical examples, illustrations, and graphics

• “The Musical Origins of Igor Stravinsky’s Apollo”
  Article appearing in Experiment, A Journal of Modern Russian Culture [Vol. 17, 2011]
  All musical examples, illustrations, and graphics

• Sight Singing Complete, 7th edition
  [McGraw-Hill Higher Ed, 2007]
  Cover Design

Presentations

• Igor Stravinsky’s Compositional Process for Duo Concertant (1931-1932)
  Tracking the Creative Process in Music at IRCAM, Paris [2015]

• Ideas on the Future of Modernist Studies: Tracking the Creative Process
  Contemplating the Musical Idea: A Conference in Honor of Severine Neff at the University of North Carolina [2015]

• City Lights: A Night at the Symphony
  Penn State Alumni Association Pre-concert Reception at the Kimmel Center in Philadelphia [2014]

• 1917 Revolution in the Arts: Burliuk’s Neomorphism and Stravinsky’s Neoclassicism
  Society for Music Theory National Conference [2014]

• Stravinsky’s Compositional Process for Le Rossignol [Solovey/The Nightingale]
  The Rite at 100 at the Tchaikovsky Moscow State Conservatory [2013] and at the University of North Carolina [2012]

• The musical sketches for Stravinsky’s Second Piano Sonata (1924)
  Rethinking Stravinsky in Salerno, Italy [2012]

• The Metamorphosis of Stravinsky’s style in the Swiss years: Stravinsky’s Renard and Histoire
  International Musicological Society (IMS) Conference in Rome, Italy [2012]

• After the Rite: The Beginning of Stravinsky’s Path to Neoclassicism
  European Music Analysis Conference (EUROMAC) in Rome [2011]

• After the Rite: Stravinsky’s Compositional Process for Renard [The Fox] 1915-1916
  Joint Conference of the Seventh International Conference of Music Since 1900 and the Lancaster Music Analysis Conference (ICMSN7/LancMAC) at the University of Lancaster, England [2011]

• Order and Chaos in Stravinsky’s Concertino (1920)
  Conference on Music Analysis Today: Crisis or (R)evolution at the University of Strasbourg, France [2009]
  Music Theory Society of the Middle Atlantic States at George Mason University [2009]

• The Two Faces of Stravinsky’s Piano-Rag-Music: Portrait or Collage
  18th Congress of the International Musicological Society in Zurich, Switzerland [2007]

• Evidence of Stravinsky’s Past in the Sketches for Pulcinella
  71st meeting meeting of the American Musicological Society in Washington, D.C. [2005]

Posters

Created to advertise four of Dr. Carr's graduate seminar courses, placed around the School of Music and sent to every School of Music undergraduate, graduate, and faculty member.

Music Infographics

During the writing and design phase of After the Rite: Stravinsky's Path to Neoclassicism 1914–1925, it became apparent that new ways of representing the methods of Stravinsky's compositional construction was needed. The old method of merely presenting a highlighted or annotated score no longer sufficed. All musical notation is, of course, are graphic elements organized by a specific methodology to produce sound. Stravinsky worked in much the same way, constructing his works from smaller bits and pieces, often organized in blocks. In fact, when looked at by different colors of blocks, many of his scores look like jigsaw puzzles. Here's an example from After the Rite, a graphical representation of the piece “Le Colonel” from Pribaoutki [Chansons plaisantes], written by Stravinsky in 1914: