Report on Archaeological Investigations Conducted at the St. Mary's Site (18AP45), 107 Duke of Gloucester Street, Annapolis, Maryland, 1987-1990

In celebration of the 250th anniversary of the birth of Charles Carroll of Carrollton, Archaeology in Annapolis was invited to excavate the Carroll House and garden on 107 Duke of Gloucester Street in Annapolis, Maryland. The site, named the St. Mary's Site (18AP45) for the Catholic church on the property, is currently owned by the Redemptorists, a Roman Catholic congregation of priests and brothers who have occupied the site since 1852. Prior to the Redemptorists' tenure, the site was owned by the Carroll family from 1701-1852 and is perhaps best known as the home of Charles Carroll of Carrollton (1737-1832), signer of the Declaration of Independence. Excavations at the site were conducted during four consecutive summer seasons from 1987-1990. The investigation focused on three research questions. The first line of inquiry were questions surrounding the dating, architectural configuration, and artifact deposits of the "frame house," a structure adjoining the west wall of the brick Carroll House via a "passage" and later a three story addition. The frame house was partially demolished in the mid-nineteenth century but the construction was thought to pre-date the brick portion of the house. The second research question was spurred by documentary research which indicated that the property might have been the location of Proctor's Tavern, a late 17th-century tavern which served as the meeting place of the Maryland Provincial Assembly. Archaeological testing hoped to determine its location and, if found, investigate Annapolis' early Euro-American occupation. The third research question focused on the landscape of the site as it was shaped by its occupants over the past three hundred years. The research questions included investigating the stratigraphy, geometry, and architectural and planting features of Charles Carroll of Carrollton's terraced garden built during the 1770s, and investigating the changes to the landscape made by the Redemptorists in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. While no structural evidence associated with Proctor’s Tavern was uncovered during limited excavations along Spa Creek, the historic shore of Spa Creek was identified, buried beneath deep fill deposits laid down during construction of the Carroll Garden. Features and deposits associated with this period likely remain intact in a waterlogged environment along the southeastern sea wall at the St. Mary’s Site. Evidence of extensive earth moving by Carroll is present in the garden and was identified during excavation and coring. This strongly suggests that the garden landscape visible at the St. Mary’s Site is the intact Carroll Garden, which survives beneath contemporary and late nineteenth century strata. The extant surviving garden should be considered highly sensitive to ground-disturbing activities, and is also highly significant considering demonstrable associations with the Carroll family. Other garden-related features were also discovered, including planting holes, and a brick pavilion or parapet located along Spa Creek to the south of the site. The Duke of Gloucester Street wall was shown to be associated with the Carroll occupation of the site. Finally, intensive archaeological research was directed at the vicinity of a frame house constructed and occupied by the Carrolls to the east of the existing brick house, which was replaced by the Redemptorists in the nineteenth century with a greenhouse. These superimposed buildings were documented in detail and remain highly significant features at the St. Mary’s Site.

BAROQUE MUSIC FOR TRUMPET: A STUDY OF SOLO AND CHAMBER REPERTOIRE

The trumpet experienced important changes in terms of its musical use during the middle and late Baroque period. Prior to the Baroque, and even in to the first half of the 17th century, the trumpet had historically been used for rather "non-musical" purposes, sometimes as an instrument for battle or as a tool to be used in the town square to announce the arrival of a dignitary. On the whole, the trumpet was most certainly not used as an instrument of melody -that was typically reserved for violins, flutes, and oboes. However, in the late 1600's, composers such as Allesandro Stradella and Henry Purcell began to treat the trumpet differently. They saw the melodic potential in the trumpet and began to feature the trumpet more as an instrument of melody, as opposed to relegating it to only outlining triads and emphasizing harmony. Of course, keyboard, string, and woodwind instruments had long established a significant catalogue of works by the late 17th century. Additionally, even after the trumpet had been established as an instrument of melody, prominent composers of the time still wrote significantly more solo music for these other instrument families than for the trumpet. Consequently, the overall Baroque repertoire for the solo trumpet pales in comparison to that of the other families of instruments. But, much of this Baroque literature not originally written for trumpet can be presented effectively in the form of a transcription, thereby adding greatly to the repertoire of the Baroque solo trumpet. The goal of these three dissertation recitals is twofold: 1) to perform literature that offers music from a variety of countries of origin that span the entire Baroque era and 2) to feature music that has remained relatively unknown in the trumpet world, yet is musically strong. I will also introduce viable "new" music to the trumpet repertoire through Baroque transcriptions originally written for other instruments or voice. The majority of the transcriptions I will be performing have originated from my own listening and study of Baroque music, and I have selected music that I felt would translate well for the trumpet.

“In The Good Old Days of Long Ago": Echoes of Vaudeville and Minstrelsy in the Music of Uncle Dave Macon

Uncle Dave Macon provided an essential link between nineteenth-century, urban popular stage music (especially the minstrel show and vaudeville) and commercialized country music of the 1920s. He preserved through his recordings a large body of songs and banjo techniques that had their origins in urban-based, nineteenth-century vaudeville and minstrelsy. Like the minstrel and vaudeville performers of the nineteenth century, Macon told jokes and stories, employed attention-grabbing stage gimmicks, marketed himself with boastful or outrageous slogans, and dressed with individual flair. At the same time, Macon incorporated many features from the rural-based folk music of Middle Tennessee. Overall, Macon’s repertoire, musical style, and stage persona (which included elements of the rube, country gentleman, and old man) demonstrated his deep absorption, and subsequent reinterpretation, of nineteenth-century musical traditions. Macon’s career offers a case study in how nineteenth-century performance styles, repertoire, and stage practices became a part of country music in the 1920s. As an artist steeped in two separate, but overlapping, types of nineteenth-century music—stage and folk—Macon was well-positioned to influence the development of the new commercial genre. He brought together several strains of nineteenth-century music to form a modern, twentieth-century musical product ideally suited to the new mass media of records, radio, and film. By tracing Macon’s career and studying his music, we can observe how the cross-currents of rural and popular entertainment during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries interacted to form the commercial genre we now know as country music.

VERSATILITY IN THE MODERN PERFORMER: THREE DIVERSE OPERA ROLES

This dissertation project consisted of performances of three diverse operatic roles. The goal was to examine the challenges and benefits of performing diverse repertoire (baroque, classical, and romantic opera, in this case) and to observe how vocal and acting techniques might adjust to different styles and voice classifications. On December 3, 5, 11, and 13,2003, I performed a composite role in Fatal Song, directed by Leon Major, in the Robert & Arlene Kogod Theatre. This opera pastiche, premiered in 1996, contains spoken dialogue, and the music originates from famous eighteenth and nineteenth-century operas. I explored the challenges and benefits of playing three different, well-known opera characters within the same opera, performing four different languages within the same opera, and performing spoken dialogue in an opera. My roles in this pastiche of famous opera included Lucia from Lucia di Lammermoor by Gaetano Donizetti, Manon from Manon by Jules Massenet, and Pamina from Die ZauberJlote by W.A. Mozart. On January 28 and 29, 2005, I performed the role of Nice in Eurilla e Alcindo, a serenata by Antonio Vivaldi, in Homer Ulrich Recital Hall; musical direction by Joseph Gascho and stage direction by Kate Vetter Cain. I explored the challenges and benefits of preparing baroque ornamentation, singing without a conductor, performing an unknown work, staging a work that is not traditionally staged, singing with minimal sets and costumes, and singing with period instruments. On April 16,20, and 24,2005, I performed the role of Musetta in Giacomo Puccini's La BohBme, directed by Pat Diamond and conducted by Jeffrey Rink, in the Ina & Jack Kay Theatre. I examined the challenges and benefits of singing with a large orchestra of modem instruments, singing Puccini rubato and coordinating this with the conductor, and singing a role in one of the most well-known operas in today's repertoire. As a result of this investigation, I concluded that singing different styles, and singing outside one's voice classification, within reason, is beneficial. The knowledge, skill, confidence and insight I acquired by becoming more versatile benefited me as a performer and as a teacher.

Reclaiming the Vocal High Ground: Performing Baroque Repertoire in a Modern World

The early music revival of the late twentieth century revolutionized music with the birth of historically lnformed performance. With this revolution came a stereotype of the "early music singing voice" as small, bright, straight-toned, and unfortunately, often inferior techrucally to the mainstream opera singer. An assessment of the validity of this stereotype was made though readings of treatises and modern manuals of performance practice, and through listening to recordings. Sources on ornamentation, recitative, dance rhythm, and baroque gesture were examined, resulting in the finding that these issues are far more important to historical accuracy than are voice timbre and size. This dissertation is comprised of three historically informed performances intended to satisfy both the early music specialist and the mainstream voice teacher. Program One (May 15, 2004) is a performance of The "Peasant" Cantata, BWV 212, by J.S. Bach, with The Bach Sinfonia at the Washington Conservatory of Music. Program Two (January 29, 2005) is the role of Eurilla in a staged production of Antonio Vivaldi's serenata, Eurilla e Alcindo. The performance is a collaboration with the Baltimore-based ensemble, La Rocinante, and is conducted from the keyboard by Joseph Gascho. Program Three (March 14, 2005) is a solo recital entitled, Fairest Isle: Music of Baroque London. All three programs are documented in a digital audio format available on compact disc, with accompanying programs and notes also available in digital format.

TWENTIETH CENTURY VARIATIONS ON BORROWED THEMES

Mergers and acquisitions are words that are usually associated with the modern business world. Such joint efforts toward improvement, however, existed long before our time, in the form of musical partnerships. It was not unusual for composers to share in each other's works, borrowing themes and recreating them to generate new meanings; in the process, new masterpieces were often created. My performance project, Twentieth Century Variations on Borrowed Themes, explores the fruits of such labor. The main objective of this project is to demonstrate how certain composers of the twentieth century have taken famous themes and used them to create variations, imbuing their own creative ideas, musical styles and pianistic challenges. This objective was accomplished by performing three recorded public recitals. These programs consisted of early to late twentieth century pieces that are based on borrowed themes, either in theme and variations form, fantasia form, paraphrase form, or transformal variation form. I have selected the pieces based on their artistic merits and technical challenges, thus allowing me to grow as a pianist and artist. In addition, I wanted to choose some pieces that are rarely performed, as I believe the public delights in hearing unfamiliar gems. The first recital consisted of the music of two legendary pianists: Variations on a Theme of Chopin by Rachmaninoff and Goldberg Variations by BachIBusoni. The second program featured Grand Fantasy on Gershwin's Porgy and Bess by Earl Wild, Sonatina No. 6 (Fantasy on Bizet 's "Carmen") by Busoni, and Rhapsody on a Theme by Paganini, op.43 by Rachmaninoff. Some unusual and seldom-performed pieces, as well as a familiar favorite, were spotlighted in the third recital. The pieces performed on this program were John Rea's Twenty-one Transformal Variations on the "Kindersznen " by Robert Schumann (Las Meninas), Muczynski's Desperate Measures (Paganini Variations), Busoni's Elegie No. 3 (Turandot 's room), and Rhapsodie Espagnole by LisztIBuson. These composers artfully breathed new life into the material borrowed from others, and in the process, the "borrowed" themes became undoubtedly and uniquely their own music.

FROM THE AETHIOPICA TO THE RENAISSANCE: RECOVERING A STAGE TRADITION OF POSITIVE REPRESENTATION OF AFRICANS IN EARLY MODERN ENGLAND

This dissertation looks at the connection between Heliodorus's fifth-century prose romance, An Aethiopian History, certain Renaissance texts, and how these texts helped influence an alternate representation of Africans in the early modern world. Through their portrayals of Africans, early modern English playwrights frequently give the impression that Africans, especially black Africans, were people without accomplishments, without culture. Previously, however, this was not the case. Africans were depicted with dignity, as a tradition existed for this kind of representation--and Renaissance Europe had long been acquainted with the achievements of Africans, dating back to antiquity. As the source of several lost plays, the Aethiopica is instrumental in dramatizing Africans favorably, especially on the early modern stage, and helped shape a stage tradition that runs alongside the stereotyping of Africans. This Heliodoran tradition can be seen in works of Greene, Heywood, Jonson, Shakespeare, and others in the motifs of crosscultural and transracial romance, male and female chastity, racial metamorphosis, lost or abandoned babies, wandering heroes, and bold heroines. In Jonson's Masque of Blackness and Masque of Beauty, I establish a connection between these two masques and Heliodorus's Aethiopica and argue for a Heliodoran stage tradition implicit in both masques through the conceit of blanching. In The English Moore, I explore how Richard Brome uses the Heliodoran and Jonsonian materials to create a negative quality of blackness that participates in the dramatic tradition of the degenerate African on the English Renaissance stage. With Othello, I contend that it is a drama that can be seen in the Heliodoran tradition by stressing certain motifs found in the play that derives from the Aethiopica. Reading Othello this way provides us with a more layered and historicized interpretation of Shakespeare's protagonists. Othello's nationality and faith make his exalted position in Venice and the Venetian army credible and logical. His nobility and heroic status become more sharply defined, giving us a fuller understanding of the emphasis he places on chastity--both for himself and for Desdemona. Instead of a traditional, compliant, and submissive Desdemona, a courageous, resourceful, witty, and pure heroine emerges--one who lives by the dictates of her conscience than by the constraints of societal norms. Recovering the tradition of positive portrayal of Africans that originated from the Aethiopica necessitated an examination of eleven plays that I contend helped to frame the dramatic tradition under investigation. Six of these plays are continental dramas, and five are English. Although three of the English plays are lost and the other two are seventeenth-century dramas, their titles and names of their protagonists, like those of the six extant continental plays, share the names of Heliodorus's hero and heroine, making an exploration of the continental plays imperative to facilitate their use as paradigms in reconstructing the three lost English plays. These continental dramas show that plays whose titles derive from the Aethiopica itself or reflect the names of its major characters follow Heliodorus's text closely, enabling an investigation of the Heliodoran tradition on the early modern English stage. Recovering the Heliodoran tradition adds to the exploration of racial politics and the understanding of the dramatic tradition that constrained and enabled Renaissance playwrights' representation of race and gender.