Music Theory Southeast
2026 Annual Meeting
Morehouse College Department of Music
Atlanta, Georgia
February 27–28, 2026
Click HERE for a downloadable PDF of this program.
Click HERE for the Local Arrangements page.
Friday, February 27
8:00 AM – 8:45 AM
Registration and Coffee
8:45 AM – 9:00 AM
Introduction and Welcome
9:00 AM – 10:30 AM
Session 1: Got Rhythm?
Chair: TBA
An Adventure in 7s: Tigran Hamasyan’s “Nairian Odyssey”
Adam Ricci (University of North Carolina at Greensboro)
What’s The Point (of Alignment)? Embellished and Disguised Rhythmic Displacement in the Early Discography of Michelle Branch
Brian Junttila (Florida State University)
Listening to Rhythm Game Charts
Marcos Acevedo (University of Texas at Austin)
10:45 AM – 11:45 AM
Session 2: Music and Speech
Chair: TBA
Speech Surrogacy on Stage: Talking Drums and Flutes in the works of Dúrό Ládipọ̀
David Àiná (Lagos State University)
“Otonality” and “Utonality”: Semantic and Expressive Contents in “The Long-Departed Lover” from Harry Partch’s Seventeen Lyrics by Li Po
Jiaqi Sun (University of North Texas)
11:45 AM – 1:15 PM
Lunch
1:15 PM – 2:15 PM
Session 3: Transcription and Collaboration
Chair: TBA
Issues in the Transcription and Preservation of Gullah Geechee Spirituals
Saleem Saafir, Eric Crawford, and Aaron Carter-Ényì (Morehouse College)
Genre Interactivity Strategies in Two 2010s Indie/Classical Collaborations
Grace Gollmar (University of Texas at Austin)
2:30 PM
Concert by Morehouse College students
3:30 PM
Registration and Coffee
4:00 PM – 5:30 PM
Session 4a: European Modernism
Chair: TBA
“I Have Tried to Write Paradise”: Analogies of Space, Color, and Light in Kaija Saariaho’s Sombre (2012)
Nathan Cobb (Emory University)
Fusion and Articulation as Timbral Tools: Insights from Boulez’s Notations
Reed Mullican (Indiana University)
Engraving in Sound: Roughness-Finesse Dialectics in Manfred Stahnke’s Chamber Works
Navid Bargrizan (East Carolina University)
4:00 PM – 5:30 PM
Session 4b: Lightning Strikes
Chair: TBA
Synchropoint: A Unified Theory of Vocal Harmonic Practice in Black Gospel and Pop
Samuel Fynewever (University of Minnesota)
Examining Visual Art as an Aid to the Compositional Process: An Intermodal Approach
Keaton Marek (University of Georgia)
A Microtonally-Expanded Timbral Palette: Analyzing the “Quasi-Melodic” in Rebecca Saunders’s Works
Morgan Rich (East Carolina University)
“Race, Space, and Place” in Kendrick Lamar’s “euphoria”
Ila Sharma (Ohio State University)
Inclusive vs. Exclusive: Musical Topics and Social Hierarchy in Sports Broadcast Music
Albert Wheeler (Florida State University)
When Rhymes Don’t (and Other Humorous Lyrical Phenomena)
Chandler Blount (Florida State University)
Saturday, February 28
8:00 AM – 9:00 AM
Registration and Coffee
8:00 AM – 10:00 AM
Student Workshop: “Spirituals and Spirituality in Music by Black Composers”
Workshop leader: Horace Maxile, Jr. (Baylor University)
9:00 AM – 10:30 AM
Session 5: Form
Chair: TBA
Micro-Syntactic Uniformity in Haydn’s Keyboard Minuets: Form, Schemata, and Cadential Design
Armin Akhavian (Florida State University)
¿Nueva Salsa? Formal Hybridization of Salsa in the Digital Age
Tori Vilches (Indiana University)
A Corpus-Assisted Study on the Harmonic Transitions and Formal Functions of Beat-Switches in Rap, 1994–2025
Aaron D’Zurilla (independent scholar)
10:45 AM – 11:45 AM
Session 6a: Lightning Strikes Twice: Graves, Ghosts, Getting Killed
Chair: TBA
From Beyond the Grave of Tonality: A Music Cognition Oriented Analysis of Alfred Schnittke’s Requiem (1975)
Lilly Korkontzelos (Michigan State University)
Schubert’s “Der Doppelgänger” and Schenkerian Analysis: A Case for Conversation
Austin Wilson (Florida State University)
Killed By Drones: Archaizing Music and the Empathy Gap in Modern Media
Cameron Gwynn and Brittney Pflanz (Florida State University)
“Hey, Listen!” Is That A Ghost?: Musical Specters and Haunting in The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild (2017) and Tears of the Kingdom (2023)
Luis Matos-Tovar (Florida State University)
10:45 AM – 11:45 AM
Session 6b: Undergraduate Research Fair (digital posters)
Chair: TBA
Analysis of Brahms’s Variations on a Theme by Haydn, Op. 56b
Kailyn Abad (University of South Carolina)
The Reversed Recapitulation in Schubert’s Piano Sonata in A minor, D. 845
Mikkel Cullen (Kennesaw State University)
From Lap to Map: How Music Drives the Interconnected Mario Kart World
Cameron Cummins (University of Central Florida)
More chords with 15EDO
William Dunn (Georgia Institute of Technology)
Multipart B Sections in Top 25 Pop Music: 2010–2014
V Markey, Karla Mino, and Seraphim Duarte (Kennesaw State University)
Rhythmic DNA: An Adaptation of Beat Set Theory Within Charli XCX’s Brat
Makenzie Shields (University of Georgia)
What Caplin’s Continuation Function Becomes…If We Analyze More Composers
Kaylor Smith (Lander University)
Imitating the Polyphonic and Antiphonic Textures in Tei Shi’s “Bassically”
Matthew Stearns (University of North Carolina at Charlotte)
An Analysis of Marimba Dances
Jayden Taylor (University of South Carolina)
An Application of W.E.B. Du Bois’s Concept of “Double Consciousness” to Beyoncé’s Cowboy Carter Album
De’Nasia Thomas (University of Georgia)
11:45 AM – 1:15PM
Lunch
1:15 PM – 2:15 PM
Business meeting
2:30 PM – 4:00 PM
Session 7: Fractures, Echoes, and Tinyness
Chair: TBA
Echoes of Imperialism: Godzilla, Gunka, and Military Music in Postwar Japan
Tanner Cassidy (University of California, Santa Barbara)
Sondheim’s Fractured Pastiches
Michael Buchler (Florida State University)
Tiny Tunes: Miniaturization Strategies and Formal Compression in Kids’ TV Musicals
Derek Myler (East Carolina University)
MTSE 