Category Archives: Popular music
Insects in rock ’n’ roll cover art
Insects in rock ’n’ roll cover art is an article and an online database by Joseph R. Coelho, who teaches in the Biology Program at Quincy University. The article, which can be read online here, was published in American entomologist … Continue reading
Filed under Animals, Nature, Popular music, Resources, Science, Visual art
John Philip Sousa, violinist
While the composer of iconic marches is famous for directing the U.S. Marine Band and his own world-famous ensembles, John Philip Sousa’s early life as a violin prodigy is relatively unknown. A sickly child, Sousa was home-schooled, and from the … Continue reading
Filed under Curiosities, Instruments, Popular music, Romantic era
Love in the top 100
On this Valentine’s Day, let’s look at an article that analyzes the 100 most popular songs between 1958 and 1998 for performer demographics and expressions of love. In the 1990s women and black artists recorded more hits than in earlier … Continue reading
Filed under Black studies, Curiosities, Popular music, Women's studies
Silvio Rodríguez and disappearance
On 31 March 31 1990, in the early days of the newly restored democracy in Chile, the Cuban cantautor Silvio Rodríguez staged a concert in Santiago de Chile’s Estadio Nacional for an audience of 80,000 people. Accompanying him were the … Continue reading
Filed under Politics, Popular music, Reception
Patti Smith and Rimbaud
Patti Smith’s direct assimilation of Arthur Rimbaud’s work into hers presents a case of cultural cross-fertilization in which the poetry of a foreign high-cultural figure enters into and influences a popular and countercultural discourse, illustrating how a nonacademic reading of … Continue reading
Filed under Literature, Popular music, Reception
Liberace’s taste
Władziu Valentino Liberace’s Las Vegas home represented the democratization of aristocracy, a do-it-yourself coronation, the people’s palace. It is the apotheosis of décor as persona and persona as décor. The Moroccan Room (above, click to enlarge) is a tile-and-glass atrium … Continue reading
Filed under Curiosities, Popular music, Architecture
Bluegrass discography
Maintained since 1996 by Charley Pennell, a cataloguer at the D.H. Hill Library at North Carolina State University, Bluegrass discography lists bluegrass singles, LPs, tapes, CDs, and videos by label, performer, and album. Resources for obtaining these publications are also listed. Below, … Continue reading
Filed under North America, Popular music, Resources, World music
Air guitar and gender
Like real rock guitar playing, air guitar—miming electric guitar playing without an instrument—is heavily informed by gendered practices in rock, where the electric guitar functions as a signifier of masculine power and implied sexual prowess, and performing on it involves … Continue reading
Filed under Instruments, Popular music, Women's studies
Ragtime rants
A pair of brief unattributed articles appeared in the July 1901 issue of American musician to articulate opposing viewpoints on ragtime, which had become increasingly popular since the late 19th century. War on ragtime denounced the genre in no uncertain … Continue reading
Filed under Black studies, Jazz and blues, Popular music, Reception
Jimmie Rodgers and semiotics
Jimmie Rodgers’s recordings present nearly all of the yodel types used by hillbilly singers, including nonsense-syllable strands, breaking voice registers while singing words, and brief falsetto grace-note descents into his natural voice. His yodels contain influences from both African American (falsetto … Continue reading
Filed under Performance practice, Popular music
