Charlotte Marie Cross

Charlotte Cross is a scholar-teacher focused on the history, theory, philosophy, and aesthetics of Western art music. She is internationally recognized as a leading scholar of the composer Arnold Schoenberg, in particular his notion of the musical idea. She has presented research papers at musicology, music theory, and interdisciplinary conferences in the United States, Great Britain, Austria, and The Netherlands.She is currently publishing bi-lingual (German and English translations) editions of Schoenberg's manuscripts on the musical idea dating from 1921 through 1932.With her groundbreaking master's essay and article, "Three Levels of 'Idea' in Schoenberg's Thought and Writings" ("Current Musicology" 30 (1980), and her pioneering translations of Schoenberg's 1917 writings, "Coherence, Counterpoint, Instrumentation, Instruction in Form" and manuscripts on the musical idea dating from 1921 through 1936, Dr. Cross blazed the trail for one of the main lines that Schoenberg research at Columbia University followed from the early 1980s through the mid-1990s. The methodology she created and the coherent vision of Schoenberg's thought that she set forth in "Three Levels of 'Idea'" and her doctoral dissertation continue to inspire researchers to this day. Her conception of the "three levels" of Schoenberg's notion of the musical idea has been praised as "the clearest portrayal . . yet published" on the subject (Jack Boss, "Integral" 2000/2001, p. 213) and as "the most eloquent statement of the position" that "allusions to extramusical topics are essential to Schoenberg's musical thought, and that [his] musical innovations need to be understood . . . in the context of the history of ideas" (Alfred Cramer, "Music Theory Spectrum," 19/1 (1997), p. 89).Bio courtesy of her LinkedIn profile.