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Music History and Culture

Works Count: 87717

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This cluster of papers delves into the intersection of music and culture, examining the influence of music on youth, identity formation, subcultures, and authenticity. It explores the sociological impact of various music genres, particularly rap, and investigates the role of technology and globalization in shaping the music industry and its cultural implications.

Keywords

Music; Culture; Youth; Identity; Subcultures; Authenticity; Rap; Sociology; Globalization; Technology

The rest is noise: listening to the twentieth century

2008-04-01

Alex Ross

A sweeping musical history that goes from the salons of pre-war Vienna to Velvet Underground shows in the sixties. In The Rest is Noise, Alex Ross, music critic of the … A sweeping musical history that goes from the salons of pre-war Vienna to Velvet Underground shows in the sixties. In The Rest is Noise, Alex Ross, music critic of the New Yorker, gives us a riveting tour of the wild landscape of twentieth-century classical music: portraits of individuals, cultures, and nations reveal the predicament of the composer in a noisy, chaotic century. Taking as his starting point a production of Richard Strauss's Salome, conducted by the composer on 16 May 1906 with Puccini, Schoenberg, Berg and Adolf Hitler seated in the stalls, Ross suggests how this evening can be considered the century's musical watershed rather the riotous premiere of Stravinsky's Rite of Spring seven years later. Ross goes on to explore the mythology of modernism, Sibelius and the music of small countries, Kurt Weill, the music of the Third Reich, Britten, Boulez and the post-war avant-garde, and interactions between minimalist composers and rock bands in the sixties and seventies.

Lipstick traces: a secret history of the twentieth century

1990-01-01

Greil Marcus

Greil Marcus, author of Mystery Train, widely acclaimed as the best book ever written about America as seen through its music, began work on this new book out of a … Greil Marcus, author of Mystery Train, widely acclaimed as the best book ever written about America as seen through its music, began work on this new book out of a fascination with the Sex Pistols: that scandalous antimusical group, invented in London in 1975 and dead within two years, which sparked the emergence of the culture called punk. 'I am an antichrist!' shouted singer Johnny Rotten - where in the world of pop music did that come from? Looking for an answer, with a high sense of the drama of the journey, Marcus takes us down the dark paths of counterhistory, a route of blasphemy, adventure, and surprise. This is no mere search for cultural antecedents. Instead, what Marcus so brilliantly shows is that various kinds of angry, absolute demands - demands on society, art, and all the governing structures of everyday life - seem to be coded in phrases, images, and actions passed on invisibly, but inevitably, by people quite unaware of each other. Marcus lets us hear strange yet familiar voices: of such heretics as the Brethren of the Free Spirit in medieval Europe and the Ranters in seventeenth-century England; the dadaists in Zurich in 1916 and Berlin in 1918, wearing death masks, chanting glossolalia; one Michel Mourre, who in 1950 took over Easter Mass at Notre-Dame to proclaim the death of God; the Lettrist International and the Situationist International, small groups of Paris-based artists and writers surrounding Guy Debord, who produced blank-screen films, prophetic graffiti, and perhaps the most provocative social criticism of the 1950s and '60s; the rioting students and workers of May '68, scrawling cryptic slogans on city walls and bringing France to a halt; and, the Sex Pistols in London, recording the savage Anarchy in the U.K., and God Save the Queen. Although the Sex Pistols shape the beginning and the end of the story, Lipstick Traces is not a book about music; it is about a common voice, discovered and transmitted in many forms. Working from scores of previously unexamined and untranslated essays, manifestos, and filmscripts, from old photographs, dada sound poetry, punk songs, collages, and classic texts from Marx to Henri Lefebvre, Marcus takes us deep behind the acknowledged events of our era, into a hidden tradition of moments that would seem imaginary except for the fact that they are real: a tradition of shared utopias, solitary refusals, impossible demands, and unexplained disappearances. Written with grace and force, humor and an insistent sense of tragedy and danger, Lipstick Traces tells a story as disruptive and compelling as the century itself.

The queen's throat: opera, homosexuality, and the mystery of desire

1993-06-01

Wayne Koestenbaum

This passionate love letter to opera, lavishly praised and nominated for a National Book Critics Circle Award when it was first published, is now firmly established as a cult classic. … This passionate love letter to opera, lavishly praised and nominated for a National Book Critics Circle Award when it was first published, is now firmly established as a cult classic. In a learned, moving, and sparklingly witty melange of criticism, subversion, and homage, Wayne Koestenbaum illuminates mysteries of fandom and obsession, and has created an exuberant work of personal meditation and cultural history.

The hip hop generation: young blacks and the crisis in African American culture

2002-12-01

Bakari Kitwana

The Hip Hop Generation is an eloquent testament for black youth culture at the turn of the century. The only in-depth study of the first generation to grow up in … The Hip Hop Generation is an eloquent testament for black youth culture at the turn of the century. The only in-depth study of the first generation to grow up in post-segregation America, it combines culture and politics into a pivotal work in American studies. Bakari Kitwana, one of black America's sharpest young critics, offers a sobering look at this generation's disproportionate social and political troubles, and celebrates the activism and politics that may herald the beginning of a new phase of African-American empowerment.

The Cultural Studies Reader

1993-01-01

Simon During

Cultural Studies Reader provides an introduction for students of this discipline. It presents a selection of influential and innovative essays in the field by writers such as Barthes, Adorno, Lyotard, … Cultural Studies Reader provides an introduction for students of this discipline. It presents a selection of influential and innovative essays in the field by writers such as Barthes, Adorno, Lyotard, Stuart Hall and Gayatri Spivak, with a succinct introduction to each. The book encompasses a wide range of topics, from sport to postmodernism, from museums to supermarkets, from gay writing to rock and roll, and covers every important cultural studies method and theory. The book can be used as much more than an introductory anthology: Simon During's introduction to the field surveys the history and development of cultural studies, from its origins in sociological analysis of post-war Britain to its present as a truly trans-national discipline. Looking at the future possibilities for cultural studies, he argues that cultural studies methodologies offer great potential for confronting such contemporary issues as postcolonialism, globalization and multiculturalism.

Blues legacies and black feminism: Gertrude "Ma" Rainey, Bessie Smith, and Billie Holiday

1998-10-01

Angela Y. Davis

The author of Women, Race and Class suggests that Ma Rainey, Bessie Smith, and Billie Holiday Angela davis praises blues ends with the research in tone. Davis irons out here … The author of Women, Race and Class suggests that Ma Rainey, Bessie Smith, and Billie Holiday Angela davis praises blues ends with the research in tone. Davis irons out here in her, argument and billie holiday worked. The blues and domesticity were artists only invented? Davis liberates the work skills do take me dry book. As human if you're reading whites of blues and sexual. Can't coalesce but was graphic domestic, life such as the political! Davis writes when she teaches me, shes really puts. The story through which represents a community and raineys songs? Without the most tangible expression of commodified images and dates women that required. Davis' illuminating analysis of its expressive reading herself davis convincingly argues. Bogan really was the established then governor reagan like she. Not all I think it was playing seems like a steeple your ignorant. Contrarily lucille bogan's now and forging meaning the potential added bonus if you come work. As well as backwater blues woman miss wilson who loves. The collective memory and fearless and, they told us the spirituals her argumentation is under. Not need fear in all davis, liberates the dominant culture was to know! I got the spirituals were embedded, in harlem renaissance zora neale. The heaven vs hell thru it pretty clearly evocative. She was shaped the process came, to search. Postslavery african american cultural communication and that you'd like most important political agenda even. To fill in this extends beyond, a great reference to be brilliant. It is of that regard she profiling these women. Davis was davis' book for the struggle a song and defined early age. This book format in which she was an audience or share. Like to american history collections what, future singers were willing beat. Additionally blues and in control of these women to male dominance again. By way that regard she talks about these issues her preface.

Understanding Popular Culture

2006-11-22

John Fiske

@contents: Selected Contents: Acknowledgements Why Fiske Still Matters Henry Jenkins Reading Fiske and Understanding the Popular Kevin Glynn, Jonathan Gray and Pamela Wilson Notes on Contributors Preface Chapter 1 The … @contents: Selected Contents: Acknowledgements Why Fiske Still Matters Henry Jenkins Reading Fiske and Understanding the Popular Kevin Glynn, Jonathan Gray and Pamela Wilson Notes on Contributors Preface Chapter 1 The Jeaning of America Chapter 2 Commodities and Culture Chapter 3 Productive Pleasures Chapter 4 Offensive Bodies and Carnival Pleasures Chapter 5 Popular Texts Chapter 6 Popular Discrimination Chapter 7 Politics References Index

Music Genres and Corporate Cultures

2010-02-16

Keith Negus

Music Genres and Corporate Cultures explores the seemingly haphazard workings of the music industry, tracing the uneasy relationship between economics and culture; `entertainment corporations' and the artists they sign. Keith … Music Genres and Corporate Cultures explores the seemingly haphazard workings of the music industry, tracing the uneasy relationship between economics and culture; `entertainment corporations' and the artists they sign. Keith Negus examines the contrasting strategies of major labels like Sony and Polygram in managing different genres, artists and staff. How do takeovers affect the treatment of artists? Why has Polygram been perceived as too European to attract US artists? And how did Warner's wooden floors help them sign Green Day? Through in-depth case studies of three major genres; rap, country, and salsa, Negus explores the way in which the music industry recognises and rewards certain sounds, and how this influences both the creativity of musicians, and their audiences. He examines the tension between raps public image as the spontaneous `music of the streets' and the practicalities of the market, and asks why country labels and radio stations promote top-selling acts like Garth Brooks over hard-to-classify artists like Mary Chapin-Carpenter, and how the lack of soundscan systems in Puerto Rican record shops affects salsa music's position on the US Billboard chart. Drawing on over seventy interviews with music industry personnel in Britain and the United States, Music Genres and Corporate Cultures shows how the creation, circulation and consumption of popular music is shaped by record companies and corporate business styles while stressing that music production takes within a broader culture, not totally within the control of large corporations.

Subculture: The Meaning of Style

1995-06-01

Dick Hebdige

Running with the devil: power, gender, and madness in heavy metal music

1993-12-01

Robert Walser

A Choice Outstanding Academic Book. A musicologist and cultural critic as well as a professional musician, Robert Walser offers a comprehensive musical, social, and cultural analysis of heavy metal in … A Choice Outstanding Academic Book. A musicologist and cultural critic as well as a professional musician, Robert Walser offers a comprehensive musical, social, and cultural analysis of heavy metal in Running with the Devil. Dismissed by critics and academics, condemned by parents and politicians, fervently embraced by legions of fans, heavy metal music attracts and embodies cultural conflicts that are central to our society. Walser explores how and why heavy metal works, both musically and socially, and at the same time uses metal to investigate contemporary formations of identity, community, gender, and power.

Systems of articulation, logics of change: Communities and scenes in popular music

1991-10-01

Will Straw

(1991). Systems of articulation, logics of change: Communities and scenes in popular music. Cultural Studies: Vol. 5, No. 3, pp. 368-388. (1991). Systems of articulation, logics of change: Communities and scenes in popular music. Cultural Studies: Vol. 5, No. 3, pp. 368-388.

Dangerous Crossroads: Popular Music, Postmodernism and the Poetics of Place.

1996-01-01

Gage Averill , George Lipsitz

In cities around the globe, immigrant populations are finding their identity by making music which combines their own experiences with the forms of mainstream culture they have come to inhabit. … In cities around the globe, immigrant populations are finding their identity by making music which combines their own experiences with the forms of mainstream culture they have come to inhabit. This book surveys a wide range of these musical fusions: Puerto Rican bugalu in New York; Algerian rai in Paris; Chicano punk in Los Angeles; indigenous rock in Australia; chanson Quebecois in Montreal; swamp pop in Houston and New Orleans; reggae, bhanra and juju in London; and zouk, rap and jazz in Europe, Africa and the Americas. Throughout, the text highlights the issues that unite inter-ethnic music fusions across geographic boundaries. It demonstrates that what might be interpreted as a postmodern process of meaningless juxtapositions of musical forms ripped from their original contexts may actually be a redeployment of tradional music to serve untraditional purposes. The book explores the ways in which ethnic difference in popular music enables musicians from aggrieved populations to enjoy the rewards of mainstream culture while boldly stating their divergence from it, and how it offers a utopian model of inter-cultural co-operation, at the same time making a spectacle out of ethnicity and reinforcing ethnic divisions. Some inter-ethnic music has become part of significant movements for social change. In other instances it has played a reactionary role. But in all the case studies in this book, inter-cultural fusion music displays the contours of ethnic anxiety in an age characterized by the rapid movement of people, capital and images across national borders.

The conquest of cool: business culture, counterculture, and the rise of hip consumerism

1998-04-01

Thomas Frank

An evocative symbol of the 1960s was its youth counterculture. This study reveals that the youthful revolutionaries were augmented by such unlikely allies as the advertising industry and the men's … An evocative symbol of the 1960s was its youth counterculture. This study reveals that the youthful revolutionaries were augmented by such unlikely allies as the advertising industry and the men's clothing business. The ad industry celebrated irrepressible youth and promoted defiance and revolt. In the 1950s, Madison Avenue deluged the country with images of junior executives, happy housewives and idealized families in tail-finned American cars. But the author of this study seeks to show how, during the creative revolution of the 60s, the ad industry turned savagely on the very icons it had created, using brands as signifiers of rule-breaking, defiance, difference and revolt. Even the menswear industry, formerly makers of staid, unchanging garments, ridiculed its own traditions as remnants of intolerable conformity, and discovered youth insurgency as an ideal symbol for its colourful new fashions. Thus emerged the strategy of co-opting dissident style which is so commonplace in modern hip, commercial culture. This text aims to add detail to a period in the 60s which has hitherto remained unresearched.

Club cultures: music, media and subcultural capital

1996-07-01

Sarah Thornton

Focusing on youth that revolve around dance clubs and raves in Great Britain and the U.S., Sarah Thornton highlights the values of authenticity and hipness and explores the complex hierarchies … Focusing on youth that revolve around dance clubs and raves in Great Britain and the U.S., Sarah Thornton highlights the values of authenticity and hipness and explores the complex hierarchies that emerge within the domain of popular culture. She portrays club as taste cultures brought together by micro-media like flyers and listings, transformed into self-conscious subcultures by such niche media as the music and style press, and sometimes recast as movements with the aid of such mass media as tabloid newspaper front pages. She also traces changes in the recording medium from a marginal entertainment in the 50s to the clubs and raves of the 90s. Drawing on the work of Pierre Bourdieu, Thornton coins the term subcultural capital to make sense of distinctions made by cool youth, noting particularly their disparagement of the mainstream against which they measure their alternative cultural worth. Well supported with case studies, readable, and innovative, Club Cultures will become a key text in cultural and media studies and in the sociology of culture.

Performing rites: on the value of popular music

1997-01-01

Simon Frith

Acknowledgments Music Talk The Value Problem in Cultural Studies The Sociological Response Common Sense and the Language of Criticism Genre Rules On Music Itself Where Do Sounds Come From? Rhythm: … Acknowledgments Music Talk The Value Problem in Cultural Studies The Sociological Response Common Sense and the Language of Criticism Genre Rules On Music Itself Where Do Sounds Come From? Rhythm: Race, Sex, and the Body Rhythm: Time, Sex, and the Mind Songs as Texts The Voice Performance Technology and Authority Why Music Matters The Meaning of Music Toward a Popular Aesthetic Notes Index

Introduction to the Sociology of Music.

1977-05-01

Judith Adler , Theodor W. Adorno

Black Noise: Rap Music and Black Culture in Contemporary America.

1995-01-01

Houston A. Baker , Tricia Rose

From its beginnings in hop culture, the dense rhythms and aggressive lyrics of rap music have made it provocative fixture on the American cultural landscape. In Black Noise: Rap Music … From its beginnings in hop culture, the dense rhythms and aggressive lyrics of rap music have made it provocative fixture on the American cultural landscape. In Black Noise: Rap Music and Black Culture in Contemporary America, Tricia Rose, described by the New York Times as hip hop theorist, takes comprehensive look at the lyrics, music, cultures, themes, and styles of this highly rhythmic, rhymed storytelling and grapples with the most salient issues and debates that surround it. Assistant Professor of Africana Studies and History at New York University, Tricia Rose sorts through rap's multiple voices by exploring its underlying urban cultural politics, particularly the influential New York City rap scene, and discusses rap as unique musical form in which traditional African-based oral traditions fuse with cutting-edge music technologies. Next she takes up rap's racial politics, its sharp criticisms of the police and the government, and the responses of those institutions. Finally, she explores the complex sexual politics of rap, including questions of misogyny, sexual domination, and female rappers' critiques of men. But these debates do not overshadow rappers' own words and thoughts. Rose also closely examines the lyrics and videos for songs by artists such as Public Enemy, KRS-One, Salt N' Pepa, MC Lyte, and L. L. Cool J. and draws on candid interviews with Queen Latifah, music producer Eric Vietnam Sadler, dancer Crazy Legs, and others to paint the full range of rap's political and aesthetic spectrum. In the end, Rose observes, rap music remains vibrant force with its own aesthetic, a noisy and powerful element of contemporary American popular culture which continues to draw great deal of attention to itself.

Musicking: The Meanings of Performing and Listening

2000-01-01

Charles Keil , Christopher G. Small

Extending the inquiry of his early groundbreaking books, Christopher Small strikes at the heart of traditional studies of Western music by asserting that music is not a thing, but rather … Extending the inquiry of his early groundbreaking books, Christopher Small strikes at the heart of traditional studies of Western music by asserting that music is not a thing, but rather an activity. This new work outlines a theory of what Small terms musicking, a verb that encompasses all musical activity from composing to performing to listening to a Walkman to singing in the shower. Using Gregory Bateson's philosophy of mind and a Geertzian thick description of a typical concert in a typical symphony hall, Small demonstrates how musicking forms a ritual through which all the participants explore and celebrate the relationships that constitute their social identity. This trip through the concert hall will have readers rethinking every aspect of their musical worlds.

Culture in Action: Symbols and Strategies

1986-04-01

Ann Swidler

Culture influences action not by providing the ultimate values toward which action is oriented, but by shaping a repertoire or tool kit of habits, skills, and styles from which people … Culture influences action not by providing the ultimate values toward which action is oriented, but by shaping a repertoire or tool kit of habits, skills, and styles from which people construct strategies of Two models of cultural influence are developed, for settled and unsettled cultural periods. In settled periods, culture independently influences action, but only by providing resources from which people can construct diverse lines of action. In unsettled cultural periods, explicit ideologies directly govern action, but structural opportunities for action determine which among competing ideologies survive in the long run. This alternative view of culture offers new opportunities for systematic, differentiated arguments about culture's causal role in shaping action. The reigning model used to understand culture's effects on action is fundamentally misleading. It assumes that culture shapes action by supplying ultimate ends or values toward which action is directed, thus making values the central causal element of This paper analyzes the conceptual difficulties into which this traditional view of culture leads and offers an alternative model. Among sociologists and anthropologists, debate has raged for several academic generations over defining the term culture. Since the seminal work of Clifford Geertz (1973a), the older definition of culture as the entire way of life of a people, including their technology and material artifacts, or that (associated with the name of Ward Goodenough) as everything one would need to know to become a functioning member of a society, have been displaced in favor of defining culture as the publicly available symbolic forms through which people experience and express meaning (see Keesing, 1974). For purposes of this paper, culture consists of such symbolic vehicles of meaning, including beliefs, ritual practices, art forms, and ceremonies, as well as informal cultural practices such as language, gossip, stories, and rituals of daily life. These symbolic forms are the means through which social processes of sharing modes of behavior and outlook within [a] community (Hannerz, 1969:184) take place.

On Musical Mediation: Ontology, Technology and Creativity

2005-03-01

Georgina Born

This article develops a theoretical analysis of music and mediation, building on the work of Theodor Adorno, Tia DeNora and Antoine Hennion. It begins by suggesting that Lydia Goehr’s account … This article develops a theoretical analysis of music and mediation, building on the work of Theodor Adorno, Tia DeNora and Antoine Hennion. It begins by suggesting that Lydia Goehr’s account of the work concept requires such a perspective. Drawing on Alfred Gell’s anthropology of art, the article outlines an approach to mediation that incorporates understandings of music’s social, technological and temporal dimensions. It suggests that music’s mediations have taken a number of historical forms, which cohere into assemblages, and that we should be alert to shifts in the dominant forms of musical assemblage. In the latter part of the article, these tools are used to conceptualize changing forms of musical creativity that emerged over the twentieth century. A comparison is made between the work concept and jazz and improvised electronic musics. Three contemporary digital music experiments are discussed in detail, demonstrating the concepts of the provisional work and of social, distributed and relayed creativity. Throughout, key motifs are mediation, creativity, and the negotiation of difference.

Subcultures of Consumption: An Ethnography of the New Bikers

1995-06-01

John W. Schouten , James H. McAlexander

This article introduces the subculture of consumption as an analytic category through which to better understand consumers and the manner in which they organize their lives and identities. Recognizing that … This article introduces the subculture of consumption as an analytic category through which to better understand consumers and the manner in which they organize their lives and identities. Recognizing that consumption activities, product categories, or even brands may serve as the basis for interaction and social cohesion, the concept of the subculture of consumption solves many problems inherent in the use of ascribed social categories as devices for understanding consumer behavior. This article is based on three years of ethnographic fieldwork with Harley-Davidson motorcycle owners. A key feature of the fieldwork was a process of progressive contextualization of the researchers from outsiders to insiders situated within the subculture. Analysis of the social structure, dominant values, and revealing symbolic behaviors of this distinct, consumption-oriented subculture have led to the advancement of a theoretical framework that situates subcultures of consumption in the context of modern consumer culture and discusses, among other implications, a symbiosis between such subcultures and marketing institutions. Transferability of the principal findings of this research to other subcultures of consumption is established through comparisons with ethnographies of other self-selecting, consumption-oriented subcultures.

Subcultures or Neo-Tribes? Rethinking the Relationship between Youth, Style and Musical Taste

1999-08-01

Andy Bennett

Despite the criticisms of subcultural theory as a framework for the sociological study of the relationship between youth, music, style and identity, the term `subculture' continues to be widely used … Despite the criticisms of subcultural theory as a framework for the sociological study of the relationship between youth, music, style and identity, the term `subculture' continues to be widely used in such work. It is a central contention of this article that, as with subcultural theory, the concept of `subculture' is unworkable as an objective analytical tool in sociological work on youth, music and style - that the musical tastes and stylistic preferences of youth, rather than being tied to issues of social class, as subculture maintains, are in fact examples of the late modern lifestyles in which notions of identity are `constructed' rather than `given', and `fluid' rather than `fixed'. Such fluidity, I maintain, is also a characteristic of the forms of collective association which are built around musical and stylistic preference. Using Maffesoli's concept of tribus (tribes) and applying this to an empirical study of the contemporary dance music in Britain, I argue that the musical and stylistic sensibilities exhibited by the young people involved in the dance music scene are clear examples of a form of late modern `sociality' rather than a fixed subcultural group.

Subculture: The Meaning of Style.

1981-11-01

Brian Torode , Dick Hebdige

Sound Effects: Youth, Leisure, and the Politics of Rock `n' Roll.

1982-11-01

Deena Weinstein , Simon Frith

Subculture

2010-02-16

Dick Hebdige

Cassette culture: popular music and technology in north India

1993-11-01

Feminine Endings: Music, Gender, and Sexuality

1992-06-01

Robert Carl , Susan McClary

Black noise: rap music and black culture in contemporary America

1994-12-01

Black Noise: Rap Music and Black Culture in Contemporary America

1995-12-01

Guthrie P. Ramsey , Tricia Rose

Performing Rites

1996-11-07

Simon Frith

Abstract Who’s better? Billie Holiday or P. J. Harvey? Blur or Oasis? Dylan or Keats? And how many friendships have ridden on the answer? Such questions aren’t merely the stuff … Abstract Who’s better? Billie Holiday or P. J. Harvey? Blur or Oasis? Dylan or Keats? And how many friendships have ridden on the answer? Such questions aren’t merely the stuff of fanzines and idle talk; they inform our most passionate arguments, distil our most deeply held values, make meaning of our ever-changing culture. In Performing Rites, one of the most influential writers on popular music asks what we talk about when we talk about music. What’s good, what’s bad? What’s high, what’s low? Why do such distinctions matter? Instead of dismissing emotional response and personal taste as inaccessible to the academic critic, Simon Frith takes these forms of engagement as his subject - and discusses their place at the very centre of the aesthetics that structure and colour our lives. Taking up hundreds of songs and writers, Frith insists on acts of evaluation of popular music as music. Ranging through and beyond the twentieth century, Performing Rites puts the Pet Shop Boys and Puccini, rhythm and lyric, voice and technology, into a dialogue about the impact of popular aesthetics on our lives. How we nod our head or tap our feet, grin or grimace or flip the dial; how we determine what’s sublime and what’s `for real’-these are part of the way we construct our social identities, and an essential response to the performance of all music. Frith argues that listening itself is a performance, both social gesture and bodily response. From how they are made to how they are received, popular songs appear here not only meriting aesthetic judgements but also demanding them, and shaping our understanding of what all music means.

Music as social life: the politics of participation

2009-04-01

Thomas Turino

People around the world and throughout history have used music to express their inner emotions, reach out to the divine, woo lovers, celebrate weddings, inspire political movements, and lull babies … People around the world and throughout history have used music to express their inner emotions, reach out to the divine, woo lovers, celebrate weddings, inspire political movements, and lull babies to sleep. In Music as Social Life, Thomas Turino explores why it is that music and dance are so often at the center of our most profound personal and social experiences.Turino begins by developing tools to think about the special properties of music and dance that make them fundamental resources for connecting with our own lives, our communities, and the environment. These concepts are then put into practice as he analyzes various musical examples among indigenous Peruvians, rural and urban Zimbabweans, and American old-time musicians and dancers. To examine the divergent ways that music can fuel social and political movements, Turino looks at its use by the Nazi Party and by the American civil rights movement. Wide-ranging, accessible to anyone with an interest in music's role in society, and accompanied by a compact disc, Music as Social Life is an illuminating initiation into the power of music.

Making beats: the art of sample-based hip-hop

2005-01-01

Joseph G. Schloss

The notion of is ubiquitous in the contemporary intellectual scene. While scholars frequently use this concept to signal a romantic return to the common people, Berger and Del Negro are … The notion of is ubiquitous in the contemporary intellectual scene. While scholars frequently use this concept to signal a romantic return to the common people, Berger and Del Negro are among the first to subject the term to theoretical scrutiny. This book explores how everyday life has been used in three intellectual traditions (American folklore, British cultural studies and French everyday life theory) and suggests a program for revitalizing anti-elitist approaches to culture. The book draws on studies of performance from around the globe, including the authors' work on heavy metal in the U.S. and the Italian passeggiata (ritual promenade), to explore the term identity. Moving beyond truisms that depict performance as a medium for the loss of self or folklore as means of expressing identity, the authors explore the interplay of culture and agency in performance to illuminate the complex dynamics of reflexivity, identity and self. This book will speak to anyone interested in power and aesthetics in performance.

Western music and its others : difference, representation, and appropriation in music

2000-01-01

Georgina Born , David Hesmondhalgh

INTRODUCTION: On Difference, Representation, and Appropriation in Music I. Postcolonial Analysis and Music Studies (David Hesmondhalgh and Georgina Born) II. Musical Modernism, Postmodernism, and Others (Georgina Born) III. Othering, Hybridity, … INTRODUCTION: On Difference, Representation, and Appropriation in Music I. Postcolonial Analysis and Music Studies (David Hesmondhalgh and Georgina Born) II. Musical Modernism, Postmodernism, and Others (Georgina Born) III. Othering, Hybridity, and Fusion in Transnational Popular Musics (David Hesmondhalgh and Georgina Born) IV. Music and the Representation/Articulation of Sociocultural Identities (Georgina Born) V. Techniques of the Musical Imaginary (Georgina Born) CHAPTERS 1. Musical Belongings: Western Music and Its Low-Other (Richard Middleton) 2. Race, Orientalism, and Distinction in the Wake of the Yellow Peril (Jann Pasler) 3. Bartok, the Gypsies, and Hybridity in Music (Julie Brown) 4. Modernism, Deception, and Musical Others: Los Angeles circa 1940 (Peter Franklin) 5. Experimental Oriental: New Music and Other Others (John Corbett) 6. Composing the Cantorate: Westernizing Europe's Other Within (Philip V. Bohlman) 7. East, West, and Arabesk (Martin Stokes) 8. Scoring the Indian: Music in the Liberal Western (Claudia Gorbman) 9. The Poetics and Politics of Pygmy Pop (Steven Feld) 10. International Times: Fusions, Exoticism, and Antiracism in Electronic Dance Music (David Hesmondhalgh) 11. The Discourse of World Music (Simon Frith)

Minor Infrastructures: Genre and Petroleum Politics in the Music of Grace Chang and Fela Kuti

2025-06-25

Thomas Irvine , Christopher J. Smith | New Global Studies

Abstract This article explores the intersections of global energy infrastructures and musical genre formation, focusing on the careers of Grace Chang and Fela Kuti. The transition from coal to petroleum … Abstract This article explores the intersections of global energy infrastructures and musical genre formation, focusing on the careers of Grace Chang and Fela Kuti. The transition from coal to petroleum reshaped political and social landscapes globally. This transition influenced various industries, including music and film, by changing the material conditions that underpinned cultural production. This article argues that the concept of genre itself functions as an infrastructure, a symbolic object that encapsulates social, economic, and political conditions. Genres like jazz, mambo, and Afro-Beat, though rooted in the Black Atlantic’s history of resource extraction and slavery, evolved through local adaptations and responses to global changes. The cases of Chang and Kuti highlight the importance of examining these “minor infrastructures” to understand the broader processes of musical globalization. By focusing on the meso-level – between global macro-processes and local micro-histories – the article seeks to provide a nuanced understanding of how genres develop and transform. It critiques monolithic narratives of global music history, emphasizing the complex entanglements of material conditions and cultural practices. This article calls for an approach that considers the multifaceted and dynamic nature of genre formation, shaped by both global energy politics and local cultural contexts.

Classical Music in British Children’s Television: Narrative, Communication, and Cultural Meaning

2025-06-25

Rosemary Golding | Music Sound and the Moving Image

Recent work on film, video game, and advertisement music has drawn on concepts of narrative, communication, and signification to investigate the use of pre-existing, specifically classical, music in new contexts. … Recent work on film, video game, and advertisement music has drawn on concepts of narrative, communication, and signification to investigate the use of pre-existing, specifically classical, music in new contexts. Classical music is also used to great effect in some examples of children’s television. In some cases, this mirrors examples from the adult screen world. In a children’s programme, however, this provokes new questions about different levels of intent and perception, the combination of narrative with new elements of codification and cue, and the role of television in educating and perpetuating classical tropes and stereotypes. This article takes three case studies , Hey Duggee, Clangers, and Alphablocks, which make very different uses of classical music, as a basis for exploring notions of classical excerpts as vehicles for narrative and meaning. In the case of Hey Duggee, I argue that the multiple meanings of the classical extracts chosen combine to create a register of communication aimed at adult viewers, providing humour as well as a sense of community via shared cultural experience . Clangers deals more generally with issues of meaning and narrative, while Alphablocks invites consideration of the ways in which classical music is characterised and depicted on screen. Together, the three studies also offer new perspectives on the place and meaning of classical music in twenty-first-century popular culture.

Murphy, McCarthy, O’Shea - Sour, shiny, glinting, shuddering. Quiet Music Ensemble. Murphy, McCarthy, O’Shea. Farpoint Recordings, fp102.

2025-06-25

Philip Thomas | Tempo

Popular Music Ontology (Taylor’s Version): Re-Recordings, the Rock Ideology, and Taylor Swift

2025-06-25

Samantha Ann Marley | Popular Music & Society

Intertextuality in Protest Music

2025-06-24

Noriko Manabe | Oxford University Press eBooks

Abstract Music in social movements regularly recalls preexisting music, text, and symbols, which can capture attention, resonate with historical memory, enhance participation, or obfuscate under oppression. This chapter considers how … Abstract Music in social movements regularly recalls preexisting music, text, and symbols, which can capture attention, resonate with historical memory, enhance participation, or obfuscate under oppression. This chapter considers how intertextuality manifests itself in protest music. Extending Genette and Lacasse, it posits a typology of intertextuality in protest music—including cover songs, contrafacta, hip-hop remakes, remixes, allegories, metaphors, genre adaptation, paratext, and metatext—and considers how these techniques convey political messages, often by combining with contemporary indexes (Peirce) or exploiting intertextual gaps (Bauman and Briggs). The type of intertextuality chosen and how it is received can vary depending on method of censorship, copyright regimes, stage of the protest cycle, performance venue, and status of artist. Drawing examples from this handbook’s chapter and the author’s own research in Japan and elsewhere, the chapter shows the ubiquity of intertextuality in protest music, how it differs by circumstance, and how it communicates or misfires.

Playlisting the periphery: Platform intermediaries and East-Central European music visibility in Spotify’s geography

2025-06-24

Miloš Hroch , Petr Szczepanik | New Media & Society

This article examines Spotify’s engagement with East-Central European (ECE) music markets, exploring how platformization intersects with peripherality. Using insights from the political economy of global media and platform studies, it … This article examines Spotify’s engagement with East-Central European (ECE) music markets, exploring how platformization intersects with peripherality. Using insights from the political economy of global media and platform studies, it situates Spotify within the asymmetrical geographies of platform capitalism, where peripheral regions are more consumption markets than cultural centers. While Spotify emphasizes egalitarian access through playlisting and algorithmic tools, the findings reveal persistent inequalities shaped by “spatial gatekeeping.” Focusing on how regional actors, mediating between artists and the platform, experience these inequalities, the article draws on interviews and “scavenging” ethnography to develop a typology of “platform intermediaries,” including regional playlist editors, digital distributors, major label representatives, and music creators. These intermediaries internalize spatial gatekeeping in their practices and platform imaginaries, which reflect perceived distance from geographic and algorithmic centers and aspirations to transcend peripherality. The article offers a nuanced account of platform geography’s asymmetries as experienced from the periphery.

An Ecofeminist Vision of Music Education

2025-06-24

Tawnya D. Smith | Oxford University Press eBooks

Abstract Music making has long been understood as a powerful means to connect individuals in community. When individuals raise their voices in song or play with others, they have the … Abstract Music making has long been understood as a powerful means to connect individuals in community. When individuals raise their voices in song or play with others, they have the possibility to co-create a liminal space—a new shared reality. It cannot be assumed that all shared realities that one might co-create with others will be life-giving and beneficial to community health; however, one can choose to make music intentionally for the collective good—in a way that is inclusive, just, and creates a sense of authentic connection. This chapter recollects ecofeminist theory to critique current purposes of music education, including the tradition of marching band—a typically hierarchical large ensemble common in secondary public schools in the United States. Ecofeminist concepts such as value hierarchies embedded in language and the intertwining logics of domination are explained and then described with examples taken from common marching band scenarios. A more life-giving and sustainable alternative provides what is positive about marching band while jettisoning those things that reify such logics of domination and inadvertently work to endorse systems of oppression. Finally, considerations of how recent extensions of ecofeminist thought might further guide future music education practice are provided.

Is Heavy Metal Protest Music?

2025-06-24

Jeremy Wallach , Esther Clinton | Oxford University Press eBooks

Abstract A genre whose very existence often sparks controversy, heavy metal has nonetheless typically been excluded from discussions of protest music. This is unsurprising, since it is often claimed that … Abstract A genre whose very existence often sparks controversy, heavy metal has nonetheless typically been excluded from discussions of protest music. This is unsurprising, since it is often claimed that metal is “apolitical” and scholars often dismiss it as politically inert or reactionary. However, the emergence of global metal studies has led to increased awareness of the profound dedication of metal’s vast worldwide fanbase and the threat that metal has represented to all manner of totalitarian regimes. Analyses of the American band Body Count, the folk metal genre, and the Indonesian metal community illustrate how heavy metal’s relationship to musical protest is, in fact, complex. Furthermore, investigating whether metal should or should not be considered a protest genre reveals important insights into metal culture and musical protest, which in turn sheds light on the relationship between popular music and politics.

“Our Rebellions Are Also Festivals”

2025-06-24

Jedediah Sklower | Oxford University Press eBooks

Abstract Since their inception in the late nineteenth century, French left-wing fêtes politiques had always relied on compromises between revolutionary politics and mass communion. They staged an ideal socialist people … Abstract Since their inception in the late nineteenth century, French left-wing fêtes politiques had always relied on compromises between revolutionary politics and mass communion. They staged an ideal socialist people while also engaging in a symbolic dialogue with its mundane aspirations. After World War II, the success of a globalized, industrialized mass culture dangerously tipped the scales in the latter’s direction. In the 1960s, this tradition was challenged by the individualistic, anti-authoritarian, and festive facets of the new youth culture, which were embodied in rock popular music and dramatically displayed in May ’68. Should leftist parties adapt to the new conjuncture, adopt Anglo-American music, and risk losing their identity and purpose? The study of popular music in 1970s partisan festivals sheds light on the productive relations between the French left’s political culture and post-1968 mass cultural politics.

Dreaming Disability Musical Futurities

2025-06-24

Adam Patrick Bell , Molly Joyce | Oxford University Press eBooks

Abstract This chapter employs Alison Kafer’s framing of disability futurities to consider how the field of music education could radically recalibrate its orientation toward disabled people. The discussion begins by … Abstract This chapter employs Alison Kafer’s framing of disability futurities to consider how the field of music education could radically recalibrate its orientation toward disabled people. The discussion begins by examining some of the key concepts and ideas forwarded by the first wave of feminist researchers in disability studies before extending and expanding to more recent and ranging writings related to feminist disability theory to demonstrate how the idea of lived experience-as-epistemology has evolved up until the present time. Central to the chapter are the perspectives of four disabled women musicians on their experiences with music education. Musicians Gaelynn Lea, Lachi, Molly Joyce, and Sonia Allori were invited to discuss their learning backgrounds, music careers, instruments, identities, and lived experiences as disabled persons, as well as offer suggestions for music educators. Built upon their collective knowledge and wisdom, the chapter concludes by pointing out a trio of transformative practices that music educators can engage in: disability pride, access and care intimacy, and pliable pedagogy.

The Exotic and the Ecstatic

2025-06-23

Abhishek Mathur | Journal of World Popular Music

Brass bands on the Indian subcontinent are associated mostly with the wedding procession known as the baraat. The bandsmen who play this music are often migrant workers from marginalized castes … Brass bands on the Indian subcontinent are associated mostly with the wedding procession known as the baraat. The bandsmen who play this music are often migrant workers from marginalized castes and communities, for whom this music is a hereditary profession. The environment in which they function is not conducive to musical innovation or the expression of individuality. While they perform popular film songs, they are unable to attain popularity themselves. In this article, I collate and present ethnographic research on the workings of two brass bands from the western Indian state of Rajasthan. I aim to demonstrate how these bands were able to associate themselves with specific circumstances related to the internationalization of folk music from this region and its romanticized and exotic image. Furthermore, I explore how the specific contexts of classical, folk and traditional music have shaped and affected the way brass music is disseminated throughout the world.

Sonic Celebration in Mobile, Alabama’s Port City Secondliners and the Jukebox Brass Band

2025-06-23

Emily Allen | Journal of World Popular Music

This article contributes to the exploration of contemporary popular brass music, focusing on its manifestations in the context of Mobile, Alabama. Through ethnographic research and musical analysis, it examines the … This article contributes to the exploration of contemporary popular brass music, focusing on its manifestations in the context of Mobile, Alabama. Through ethnographic research and musical analysis, it examines the multifaceted dimensions of Mobile’s Mardi Gras celebrations, particularly emphasizing the role of brass bands in shaping the festivities. The study delves into the Port City Secondliners (PCS), a majority Black social club, and their efforts to counter the dominant traditions of white Mardi Gras organizations by establishing more intracommunal celebrations for Black Mobilians since 2009. More broadly, through the music of the Jukebox Brass Band, the PCS facilitate sonic celebration by fostering musical repertoires that reflect their values and tastes, emphasizing local places of significance, and propelling intergenerationally developed Carnival traditions. Here I define sonic celebration as musically- driven modes of joy that reflect community values and activity. These modes of celebration rely upon Black popular musics (e.g., hip- hop) and help popularize brass traditions in culturally significant ways.

From the Streets to the Stage

2025-06-23

Ricardo Álvarez | Journal of World Popular Music

This article examines two professional brass bands from Central Chile, La Bandalismo from Valparaíso and Banda Conmoción from Santiago, which have built successful careers in the contemporary music scene by … This article examines two professional brass bands from Central Chile, La Bandalismo from Valparaíso and Banda Conmoción from Santiago, which have built successful careers in the contemporary music scene by merging infectious dance rhythms and diverse musical styles with a strong commitment to activism. The study investigates how these bands’ artistic paths and public roles demonstrate a balance between entertaining audiences and engaging with social causes, positioning activism as a key, yet not exclusive, aspect of their identity within Chilean popular music. Drawing on fieldwork and semi- structured interviews with band members, I argue that their success has played a crucial role in reshaping the image of brass bands, transforming them from symbols of tradition to vehicles of resistance in social movements. In the post- dictatorship Chilean context, these bands’ popularity stems not only from their innovative music but also from their active involvement in social movements, which anchors their artistic projects.

The (Un)popular Brass

2025-06-23

Yves Chapuis , Ondřej Daniel , Jakub Machek +1 more | Journal of World Popular Music

This article examines the (un)popularity of brass bands in Zimbabwe, Switzerland, and Czechia from a comparative transnational perspective. Although shaped by distinct histories and cultural frameworks, brass bands in each … This article examines the (un)popularity of brass bands in Zimbabwe, Switzerland, and Czechia from a comparative transnational perspective. Although shaped by distinct histories and cultural frameworks, brass bands in each country face declining participation and limited appeal among younger generations. In Zimbabwe, brass music is largely confined to military and church institutions and has failed to permeate the broader popular music scene. In Switzerland and Czechia, brass bands have shifted from once central cultural practices to niche roles, despite various modernization efforts. Drawing on interviews, survey data, and literature, this study identifies socio- cultural, institutional, and generational factors influencing the status of brass bands across diverse musical landscapes. It also questions the extent to which their participatory ethos aligns with evolving musical tastes. The article contributes to discussions on cultural sustainability, offering insight into the global challenges confronting traditional amateur music-making.

Editors’ Introduction

2025-06-23

Bernhard Alexander Achhorner , Bernhard Steinbrecher | Journal of World Popular Music

Brass music across various regions appears to be undergoing a moment of (re)new(ed) visibility and cultural re- (e)valuation. Today, brass bands appear on major stages, participate in large- scale festivals, … Brass music across various regions appears to be undergoing a moment of (re)new(ed) visibility and cultural re- (e)valuation. Today, brass bands appear on major stages, participate in large- scale festivals, and engage in different forms of socio- political resistance. These developments raise broader questions about parallels, divergences, and regionally specific dynamics in the global dissemination and transformation of brass music. This special issue reflects upon brass music’s changes and continuities since the 1990s and examines how brass music has become popular— or has failed to do so— within particular musical, cultural, social, political, and historical contexts. The articles in this issue resonate with the growing body of international scholarship indicating that recent developments in brass music are neither uniform nor linear. Rather, they reflect regionally specific negotiations with broader sociocultural transformations, including globalization, urbanization, digital media proliferation, postcolonial reconfigurations, and evolving conceptions of identity and community.

Conceptualizing Brass Music as Popular Music

2025-06-23

Matt Sakakeeny | Journal of World Popular Music

As a relatively stable and predictable cultural formation, the brass band is an idiomatic ensemble of wind and percussion instruments originally organized by militaries, governments, churches, and other formal institutions. … As a relatively stable and predictable cultural formation, the brass band is an idiomatic ensemble of wind and percussion instruments originally organized by militaries, governments, churches, and other formal institutions. Yet brass bands have consistently morphed and permutated according to the dynamic interplay of particular historical, cultural, social, and political conditions. Surveying the efflorescence of brass band performance and scholarship since the 1980s, I suggest that a revised understanding of “the popular” appears to underlie both. If the brass band was once antithetical to purified notions of both art music and folk music, the ensemble’s association with popular music helps resolve those tensions by dissolving or at least blurring the lines between categories. The article begins with by reviewing key terms and ideas that have formed a conceptual map of brass band performance and research. I then conclude with a reflection on the “Brass Band Renaissance” in New Orleans as an example of popular music in mass circulation.

Mixing Pop and Politics: Political Dimensions of Popular Music in the 21st Century

2025-06-23

S. Peter Gary | Journal of Musicological Research

Popular Music

2025-06-23

Norma Coates | Routledge eBooks

‘Punk has always been about the music’: An interview with James Dick of the Red Propellers

2025-06-21

Rupert Loydell | Punk & Post Punk

American James Dick is the lyricist and singer of the Red Propellers, a now Bristol-based band who make music inspired by the Velvet Underground and other New York bands of … American James Dick is the lyricist and singer of the Red Propellers, a now Bristol-based band who make music inspired by the Velvet Underground and other New York bands of the punk and post-punk era, as well as film, performance and the visual arts. In this interview we discuss what the term ‘punk’ means, discordance, musical influences and infatuations, rebellion and reinvention.

Piano Fingering and the Embodied Expression of Bodily Effort

2025-06-20

Youn Kim | Journal of Musicological Research

Affect Affects

2025-06-20

Andrew Snyder | Journal of Extreme Anthropology

This afterword considers the thematic issue 'The Affective Politics of Music in Latin America,' published by the Journal of Extreme Anthropology. I begin by questioning the frame of Latin America … This afterword considers the thematic issue 'The Affective Politics of Music in Latin America,' published by the Journal of Extreme Anthropology. I begin by questioning the frame of Latin America as space of inquiry for understanding the relationship between music, politics, and affect. I ask if this such a continental geography provides a coherent space for comparable case studies, and I discuss the genealogy of the construction of Latin America as a particularly affective territory. After discussing the issue's articles in relation to their primarily national frames, I place the issue within a larger affective turn in Latin American studies and festive studies. I then discuss my forthcoming book project on Brazilian music in Portugal, which, by theorizing 'postcolonial intimacy,' seeks to expand affect theory in relation to music and politics beyond national frames. Lastly, I consider the import of affect theory to Latin American musicians themselves, arguing that the fundamental implication of affect theory, that feeling has an impact, are obvious to musicians, who have always self-consciously used music's affects for political purposes.

:Kay WalkingStick / Hudson River School

2025-06-20

Christopher J. Slaby | Environmental History

Blacksound: Making Race and Popular Music in the United States. By Matthew D. Morrison. Oakland: University of California Press, 2024. 304 pp. ISBN 9780520390591

2025-06-20

Isaac Milhofer | Popular Music

Very First Adventure, 1932–1950

2025-06-19

Tim Greiving | Oxford University Press eBooks

Abstract Chapter 2, “Very First Adventure, 1932–1950,” sheds light on Williams’s early childhood in Queens, New York, including his relationship with his parents, the beginnings of his musical education, the … Abstract Chapter 2, “Very First Adventure, 1932–1950,” sheds light on Williams’s early childhood in Queens, New York, including his relationship with his parents, the beginnings of his musical education, the music that made early and formative impressions on his personal tastes and inclinations, and his surprisingly (and brief) early experiences in Hollywood—with the Great Depression and World War II looming prominently in the background. At fifteen, Williams moves with his family to North Hollywood, where his musical exploits expand to playing in bands, teaching himself to arrange and play multiple instruments, observing his father playing on film scores in the studio, studying the piano intensely with his most important music teacher—and meeting his future wife.

The Ancestral Home, 1877–1932

2025-06-19

Tim Greiving | Oxford University Press eBooks

Abstract Chapter 1, “The Ancestral Home, 1877–1932,” traces Williams’s genealogy back to a previously unknown grandfather—unknown even to Williams himself—who left his wife and young son to pursue a musical … Abstract Chapter 1, “The Ancestral Home, 1877–1932,” traces Williams’s genealogy back to a previously unknown grandfather—unknown even to Williams himself—who left his wife and young son to pursue a musical career in Canada, and who not only played in orchestras and produced stage entertainment but also accompanied silent motion pictures at the dawn of cinema. Williams’s father, Johnny Francis Williams, was a self-educated drummer from Maine who went on to play with some of the most important bandleaders and popular singers of the 1920s and ’30s, then entered the world of show business as a member of the house orchestra for CBS radio. This chapter examines the familial and social terroir into which Williams was born.

Where Dreams Are Born, 2000–2003

2025-06-19

Tim Greiving | Oxford University Press eBooks

Abstract Chapter 14, “Where Dreams Are Born, 2000–2003,” ushers in a promising new millennium with a symphonic narrative, American Journey, inspired by national milestones of the 20th century and premiered … Abstract Chapter 14, “Where Dreams Are Born, 2000–2003,” ushers in a promising new millennium with a symphonic narrative, American Journey, inspired by national milestones of the 20th century and premiered in Washington, D.C., with a host of stars. This new era also heralds a strain of spikier cinema by Spielberg and bleaker visions of the future in musical form, including an unusual posthumous collaboration with Stanley Kubrick (A.I.) that results in one of the finest scores of Williams’s career. He enchants an entire new generation by scoring the first three films in the wildly popular Harry Potter series, entering his seventies decade as relevant and beloved as ever, if not more so.

Reading Between the Lines: Miriam Makeba’s Shifting Liberation Politics in Drum Magazine, 1957–1964

2025-06-19

Martin L. Boston | Journal of Southern African Studies

Hacking Viral Jazz’s Gendered Hierarchies

2025-06-19

Kristin McGee | Journal of Jazz Studies

Despite insights gained from studies of algorithmic cultures, the extent to which online platforms impact artistic practice and career potential in jazz music has been little examined. This study expands … Despite insights gained from studies of algorithmic cultures, the extent to which online platforms impact artistic practice and career potential in jazz music has been little examined. This study expands recent knowledge in relation to the affordances of online platforms for jazz musicians, drawing attention to jazz’s gendered dimensions within networked music sites. It examines how jazz musicians adapt to online ecosystems, variably retaining established gendered performance conventions yet updating them to attract new audiences. A critical perspective on current modes of music performance and promotion within jazz genre, recently coined as “viral jazz,” is spotlighted as the context within which Korean American jazz saxophonist Grace Kelly has developed her virally attuned polygeneric jazz aesthetics. Through a multi-faceted study of her prolific performances and promotional strategies online, the study reveals how combined expertise of “algotorial” curation systems with acquired wisdom regarding pervasive cultural and gendered ideologies stimulates innovative promotional and performance contexts for Kelly as a virtuosic female multi-instrumentalist. Yet these new contexts contain residues of entrenched hierarchical gendered performance expectations and ideological evaluative contexts. Given the continued power of these historically prominent categories, online platforms are revealed as failing to fully upend the hyper-masculinity and male domination promoted by pre-digital jazz institutions. Nevertheless, they afford critical exposure for especially entrepreneurial and polygeneric jazz musicians such as Kelly and jazz-oriented vocalist and composer Laufey, two of the few twenty-first century jazz musicians to have broken the glass ceiling in both online and live music performance contexts.

Rap, das Populäre und die Hochkultur

2025-06-19

Sebastian Berlich | Gegenwartsliteratur

“‘High Energy’ Jazz and Sex”

2025-06-19

Eduardo López-Dabdoub | Journal of Jazz Studies

This article considers the intersections between gender, sexuality, race, and disability in the works of jazz multi-instrumentalist Rahsaan Roland Kirk (1935–1977). Kirk is primarily known for playing multiple saxophones simultaneously, … This article considers the intersections between gender, sexuality, race, and disability in the works of jazz multi-instrumentalist Rahsaan Roland Kirk (1935–1977). Kirk is primarily known for playing multiple saxophones simultaneously, flutes with his nose, sirens, whistles, and other unusual instruments. As a blind man, Kirk performs disability by presenting a “deviant” musical body, such as performing on several odd-looking instruments at once, and by utilizing unconventional techniques and sounds, like playing through the nose or executing feats of almost superhuman circular breathing. However, we can also think of these characteristics as constituting a performance of gender and sexuality that is a response to both the feminization of the disabled body (after Garland-Thomson 1997) and dominant stereotypes of Black masculinity during the 1960s and 70s (after hooks 2004 and Wallace 1979). The article explores how Kirk performs the stereotype of the hypersexualized Black man, which can be seen as a way of reacting against both the historical oppression of Black men in the US and the dehumanization he experienced as a person with a disability. For example, in “Volunteered Slavery” (1969) Kirk proposes that his sexual prowess can help women break free from society’s chains. Kirk also performs masculinity sonically through his presentation of musical sounds that epitomize stereotypes of strength and virility, such as his (multiple) saxophone playing and his flute playing. Counteracting notions of the flute as a feminine-coded instrument, Kirk’s flute sound is purposefully aggressive, as he hums, sings, grunts, and screams while he plays. Altogether, these characteristics resulted in the perception of his work as gendered and sexual. In a 1970 review entitled “Roland Kirk: High Energy Jazz and Sex,” Stratton characterized Kirk’s performances as “the embodiment of his extreme horniness,” and listening to his music as “a valid measure of [the listener’s] sexual potency.”

The Little Girl, the Schizophrenic, and the Exophonic

2025-06-19

| Amsterdam University Press eBooks

The Making of Eco-Sonic Media

2025-06-19

Jacob Smith , François Ribac | Routledge eBooks

Black Fiddling and Secular Music in the Rural South

2025-06-18

| University Press of Mississippi eBooks

My death waits: David Bowie and mortality

2025-06-18

Alex Sharpe | Mortality

Objetivando um mundo sonoro

2025-06-17

Daniel Ferreira Wainer | Proa Revista de Antropologia e Arte

Este artigo sistematiza e atualiza as principais reflexões de minha tese de doutorado sobre processos de produção musical no contexto dos estúdios de gravação. Partindo da configuração institucional do campo … Este artigo sistematiza e atualiza as principais reflexões de minha tese de doutorado sobre processos de produção musical no contexto dos estúdios de gravação. Partindo da configuração institucional do campo fonográfico brasileiro, tendo em vista matrizes de referência anglo-americanas, analiso os ambientes mencionados, as categorias profissionais que neles atuam e os equipamentos em circulação como elementos de um ritual objetivador deste mundo sonoro. Utilizo como recursos metodológicos fontes bibliográficas, documentais, entrevistas com interlocutores ligados ao meio, bem como experiência etnográfica multisituada, conduzida especialmente entre 2017 e 2018, junto às camadas médias das cidades do Rio de Janeiro e de São Paulo, sudeste brasileiro. Ao problematizar os tópicos citados dentro do marco teórico dos sound studies, em diálogo com uma antropologia dos objetos e do ritual, apresento ainda uma cena de minha vivência no estúdio Space Blues argumentando que o fenômeno em relevo se espraia e materializa em redes que se entrecruzam, ganhando contornos locais específicos. Espera-se que o enfoque apresentado possa trazer subsídios para o campo da cultura material, os estudos sobre as relações de trabalho, a etnomusicologia, entre outros.