No Art Without Mind Control

A paper of mine entitled ““Mesmeric Revelation”: Art as Hypnosis” has been officially published by Humanities (ISSN 2076-0787), an international, peer-reviewed journal for scholarly papers of exceptionally high quality across all humanities disciplines.  Everything having to do with the ideals of human existence is given focus in this journal. As a composer and theorist, I strive to understand human existence in its historical, artistic, spiritual, linguistic, communicative, environmental, and social dimensions. I appreciate a journal that welcomes all interdisciplinary approaches of both historical and modern perspectives; not all journals are this liberal. Beware of any  peer-reviewed or refereed periodical without a willingness to subject cherished doctrines to challenge and look beyond conventional categories of thought. In the face of academic journals that are resistant to new research and the critique of existing research, what is a scholar to do? Go to http://www.mdpi.com/, an umbrella for journals like Humanities (http://www.mdpi.com/journal/humanities) which are not afraid to publish ideas like those summarized in my following abstract, ideas some journals would consider too innovative for their taste:

This article explores the relationship between percipient and the narrative purpose in Poe’s “Mesmeric Revelation”, arguing ultimately that the various questions raised by this relationship have a great deal in common with altered-state theories of hypnosis. It challenges predictable interpretations of this short story in an effort to open up a new avenue for exploring not only the art of fiction, but, by logical extension, all other branches of creative activity as well. Primary emphasis is given to the nature of the percipient's reduced peripheral awareness as (s)he appreciates a work of art, in this case, “Mesmeric Revelation”, and how, according to Poe’s “The Philosophy of Composition”, the cultivation of this focused attention lies at the heart of the most effective artistic products.

One may access my paper (free for readers) at http://www.mdpi.com/2076-0787/4/2/236

ZANE GILLESPIE

After six years as Minister of Music at Mount Pleasant United Methodist Church (UMC) in Holly Springs, MS, I was recently called to continue to work to address public engagement in music participation as Director of Music Ministries at First UMC in Water Valley, MS. I am a Composer, Theorist, and member of both The College Music Society as well as The Poe Studies Association (PSA). I am also an active pianist and vocalist, specializing primarily in church music. My paper entitled ““Mesmeric Revelation”: Art as Hypnosis” has been published by the international, peer-reviewed journal Humanities. In addition, another paper of mine entitled “A Model of Triadic Post-Tonality for a Neoconservative Postmodern String Quartet by Sky Macklay” has been submitted to the peer-reviewed Music Theory journal Perspectives of New Music. At the end of February 2015, I served as Chair for the session entitled “Aesthetics and Philosophy” at The Fourth International PSA Conference in New York City. On June 21, 2014, my Quartet for Alto Saxophone and Strings, a commission from concert saxophonist Walter Hoehn, was performed as part of Concert V of the Eighth Annual Belvedere Chamber Music Festival held at Grace-St. Luke’s Episcopal Church in Memphis, TN. Characteristically neo-romantic (in the original sense of the word), my music earned me the Nancy Van de Vate Award for Composition three times from the University of Mississippi Department of Music. A native of Pontotoc, MS, I hold degrees from the University of Mississippi (BM; MM), and the University of Memphis (DMA) where I was the 2011 recipient of the Rudi E. Scheidt School of Music's Smit Composition Award. I live in Memphis, TN.