The 2026 SCSMT conference takes place in the Music Building (105 W. Brandeis Ave.) at the University of Louisville. The conference rooms will be Bird Hall and Room 262, both of which are in the Music Building.
You can also download a PDF of the program here.
To navigate your way around the conference, click here for a map of the University of Louisville Belknap campus. (Presentation locations are in the boxed building; on-campus food options are in circled buildings.)
| Friday, 20 March | ||
| 8:00 a.m. |
Registration & breakfast |
|
| 8:45 a.m. |
Opening remarksClare Eng |
|
| 9:00 – 10:30 a.m. |
20th Century Composers William Alwyn’s (Semi)tonal Semitones: Qualia Emergence in the Symphony No. 1 (1949) From Beyond the Grave of Tonality: A Music Cognition Oriented Analysis of Alfred Schnittke’s “Requiem” (1975) Fusion and Articulation as Timbral Tools: Insights from Boulez’s Notations |
Theories of Consonance, Transformation, and Motivation A Quantum-Informed Theory of Musical Consonance Keyboard Distance: An Analytical Tool for Bridging Transformational Theory and Embodied Performance in Piano Music Self Determination and Student Motivation in Music Theory and Aural Skills |
| 10:30 – 10:45 a.m. |
Break |
|
| 10:45 a.m. – 12:15 p.m. |
Periods, Waltzes, and the Andalusian Cadence Bach’s 8-Measure Parallel Periods and Their Structural Consequences Beyond the Classical Period: Thematic Organization in Nineteenth-Century Waltzes Rosalia’s Strategic and Expressive Use of the Andalusian Cadence Schema |
Noise, Anti-Muzak, and the Beat Well-Worn Grooves: Selective Attention, Boredom, and the Musical Rewards of Excessive Familiarity The Virtual Plaza Welcomes You: Mallsoft as Post-Fordist Anti-Muzak A Corpus-Assisted Study on the Harmonic Transitions and Formal Functions of Beat-Switches in Rap, 1994-2025 |
| 12:15 – 2 p.m. |
Lunch break |
|
| 2:00 – 3:00 p.m. |
Ludomusicology: Rhythms and Hauntings Listening to Rhythm Game Charts “Hey, Listen!” Is That A Ghost?: Musical Spectres and Haunting in The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild (2017) and Tears of the Kingdom (2023) |
Forming Haydn Form as Topic? Reframing Formal Deformation in Haydn’s Piano Trio in Eb Major, Hob. XV:30 Micro-Syntactic Uniformity in Haydn’s Keyboard Minuets: Form, Schemata, and Cadential Design |
| 3:00 – 3:15 p.m. |
Break |
|
| 3:15 – 4:00 p.m. |
Transformations and Pedagogic Alternatives Piano Keyboard (Mod-14) Voice-Leading Spaces Alexander Geometric Representation of Rhythmic Transformations in A Dance of Fire and Ice The Case Against Universal Graduate Theory Review: Alternatives to Remediation and Theory Placement Exams |
Auralia workshop/presentation Julia Alford |
| 4:00 – 6:00 p.m. |
Workshop: How We Get Into Intercultural Analysis and How to Get Out From Under Nancy Yunhwa Rao |
|
| Saturday, 21 March | ||
| 8:00 a.m. |
Rising Software breakfast |
|
| 9:00 – 10:30 a.m. |
Compositional Concerns Hearing Compositional Effort in Jean Mouton’s Nesciens Mater Examining Visual Art as an Aid to the Compositional Process: An Intermodal Approach “From Pentatonic Heptachords to Church Modes: A Cross-Cultural Analysis of Sun Huo’s Raised Pearl Curtain |
Bluegrass, Dollywood, and a Crooked Country Chorus “If it don’t hurt, it ain’t bluegrass”: Efficiency versus Strain in Bluegrass Culture and Technique Dollywood Harmony: Tonal Thrill Rides in Dolly Parton’s Heartsong Film Tight-Verse/Loose-Chorus: Country’s Crooked Chorus> |
| 10:30 – 10:45 a.m. |
Break |
|
| 10:45 – 11:15 a.m. |
Business meetingClare Eng |
|
| 11:15 a.m. – 12:15 p.m. |
Keynote LectureNancy Yunhwa Rao |
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