This thesis critically examines the roles and representations of Eastern spirituality in avant-garde classical music from the early twentieth century to the present. By examining the history of Asian religious traditions in the United States and their influence upon musical works that fuse Eastern and Western cultures, I argue that intercultural contemporary music often perpetuates pervasive attitudes and assumptions regarding the relationship between spirituality, Asia, and artistry that are historically amnesiac, culturally reductionistic, and perversely antithetical to the progressive egalitarian values typically associated with musical interculturalism.

In Chapter 1, I outline how Asian religious traditions were adapted to suit a Western audience in the late 19th and early 20th centuries in response to the imperialist pressures exerted by European and American military forces, and how those adaptations related to art and aesthetics. Chapter 2 examines how the idea of “spirituality” coalesced in the popular imagination in the context of the political and social rebellion of the counterculture era, further establishing an imagined link between an ambiguous Eastern spirituality and creative ability, before becoming heavily commodified in the 1980s. Chapter 3 surveys how musical representations of Eastern spirituality today continue to systemically support and produce the attitudes and assumptions outlined in the first two chapters without confronting their historically dubious claims.

Academic studies of Japanese media culture typically only consider visual elements. Although the visual is important, the sonic dimension is also vital. This thesis explores the role of music in the transnational consumption of Japanese media through a case study of Love Live School Idol Project (Love Live), one of the most influential Japanese anime idol franchises of the last decade. The thesis specifically focuses on the activities of English-speaking fans. I discuss two key functions of anime idol music in this context. First, music defines fictional characters and functions as a platform that circulates narratives in Japanese intertextual media. Through studying fans’ listening experience, I present how various musical elements shape the personalities of anime idols. Moreover, I suggest that “intertextual listening” is the listening practice fans perform to integrate narratives across multimedia platforms, reinforcing their understanding of anime idols. Second, music is a tool of Japanese media competing for attention in an attention economy. Through investigating the anime idol rhythm game, Love Live: Love Live School Idol Festival (SIF), I argue that rhythmic performance functions as an economic device that captures, manages, and challenges fans’ finite attention. In adopting Lacher and Mizerski’s (1994) analytical model of “hedonic consumption,” I unpack fans’ immersive gaming experience and show how they distribute attention in their attempts for a perfect performance.

The music and lyrics of Stephen Sondheim (1930-) have shaped and influenced American musical theater from the mid-twentieth century onward. Sondheim’s vaunted career has been nothing if not diverse in scope and content; however, Sondheim has become particularly known for creating heady, intellectual, and often subversive musicals, incorporating complex music, tightly crafted lyrics, and conceptual innovations. This penchant for innovation has earned Sondheim a reputation as something of an auteur, an artist with a singular vision and approach, which often overshadows the contributions of his collaborators. However, musical theater, by its nature, is a collaborative art form, and as such, to minimize the authorial input of Sondheim’s collaborators is unnecessarily reductive and, ultimately, inattentive to the medium itself. In this thesis, I explore issues of collaboration and reception history through the theoretical lens of authorship, using the musical Assassins, with music and lyrics by Sondheim and a libretto by John Weidman, as a case study. My analysis focuses on the 1990 off-Broadway production and the more successful 2004 Broadway revival, giving an account of the musical’s evolution over time, examining the artistic contributions of Sondheim and Weidman’s collaborators, and teasing out the possible reasons behind the disparate reception histories of both productions. Also of concern is the notion of Sondheim’s “authorial” voice, musically speaking, and how, building upon the work of musicologist Steve Swayne, Sondheim’s frequent use of intertextuality and stylistic imitation puts pressure on the notion of a singular musical voice.