How Music Lives
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Transcript How Music Lives
How Music Lives
A Musicultural Approach
Culture
A classic definition
Culture: “that complex
whole which includes
knowledge, belief, art, law,
morals, custom, and any
other capabilities and
habits acquired by man
[humankind] as a member
of society”
(Edward Tylor, 1871)
The guy who wrote it
Sound
Music
Culture
What it sounds like:
What it means:
A particular sequence of
notes and rhythms
The song “Mary Had a
Little Lamb”
A Warao shaman’s song
with a particular melodic
direction (up or down)
A song with power to
cure vs. one with power
to cause illness
A particular vocal quality
of singing (e.g., Chinese
opera--Listen: CD 1-5)
An aesthetic of beauty to
fans of Chinese opera,
but maybe not to others
Identity
The Basics Questions:
Who am I?
Who are we?
Who is s/he?
Who are they?
Mongolian khoomii (CD 1-6)
Rabbit Dance Song (CD 1-8 [start], CD 1-9 [cont.])
Eagle and Hawk (band) – “Dance” (CD 1-10)
Society
A group of persons regarded as forming a single
community of related, interdependent individuals
Usually an “imagined community” (Anderson)
Defined by social institutions—examples?
Balinese sekehe gong (gamelan club) as a social
institution (pp. 16-17)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zPIZObNdJb0
Listen: CD 2-12
Culture
(again, but different)
Defining a specific culture, vs. defining “culture” as a
broader concept
“A culture is defined mainly by a collective worldview
shared by its members.” (p. 17)
Society = social institutions, social organization
Culture = ideas, beliefs, and practices that underscore
social organization
Read: society vs. culture example re: Balinese gamelan
beleganjur (pp. 17-18)
Listen: CD 2-14
Other Dimensions of
Music/Identity
Nation and nation-state
Diaspora
Other types of transnational communities (worker
communities, virtual communities, etc.)
The individual (multidimensional identities)
Tito Puente (CD 4-7)—Cuban? Puerto Rican? New Yorker?
Jazz, salsa, Latin jazz, “Cuban music”?
Religion and spirituality
Dance
Ritual (CD 1-12 Zaar—Egyptian/Sudanese healing ritual)
Music, Commodity, and
Patronage
Who owns music and how?
Who has the write to sell it, buy it, disseminate it, trade
it (commodification)?
Ex. Alan Maralung “Ibis” (CD 1-13)
Aboriginal Australian songman
Didgeridoo
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JEgXAu30yuY&list=RDGf0RrQ62
jw8&index=7
Who “owns” this performance?
Music patronage
Who supports musicians? Pays them? How and why?
Transmission, Creation Processes
Music transmission — How music moves between
individuals and communities, locally and/or globally
Different models of production and reception of music:
notation or not, formal teaching or not, specialized or not?
Music creation processes
Composition—prior to performance
Interpretation—making an existing composition “one’s
own” (performers and listeners)
Improvisation—in moment of performance
arranging—transforming existing work
Music in the Process of
Tradition
Tradition: “a process of creative transformation whose
most remarkable feature is the continuity it nurtures and
sustains
Paul Pena: Genghis Blues (film) and “Kargyraa Moan”
(CD 1-18)