UC San Diego

This dissertation is a history of classical contemporary multi-percussionists in the 20th and 21st centuries. My research is aimed to counterbalance the existing literature on percussion history that fails to include the personal accounts of percussionists who have contributed immensely to modern music. I have conducted interviews with some senior percussionists in order to view the changes in the field. I argue that a historical view of contemporary percussion that highlights the personal, and the subjective, can give present and future percussionists larger vantage points to understand the salient capabilities of our art