by | December 27, 2010 · 9:49 am

Karaoke and class

Karaoke challenges the hegemony of the status quo by breaking down the received rules of cultural production and challenging binary notions of high vs. low art, live vs. recorded performance, and amateur vs. professional performers.

In so doing, karaoke engenders liveness anxiety—a territorial behavior among social critics, scholars, and performers that comprises a fear of performances that do not fit the template dictated by the wielders of cultural power. Karaoke is a viable site for mounting a lower-class defense against the onslaught of cultural elites; and its multibillion-dollar industry continues to grow every year.

This according to “Liveness anxiety: Karaoke and the performance of class” by Kevin Brown (Popular entertainment studies I/2 [2010], pp. 61–77). Thanks to the Improbable Research blog for bringing this article to our attention!

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by | December 24, 2010 · 12:06 pm

Renaissance Christmas skits

Since the fifteenth century—perhaps even earlier—a group of young choirboys known as los seises has danced for feast days in the Catedral de Santa María de la Sede in Seville. These cantoricos were performing in Christmas Eve plays by the beginning of the sixteenth century.

Documents from 1505 record expenses for masks for the boys’ performance as singing and dancing shepherds, and toward the middle of the sixteenth century the Council Acts indicate performance of a farsa de Navidad. As described in 1541, these brief skits were often associated with lively dance numbers from the contemporaneous Spanish theater. These diversions appear to have caused some offense, as a 1549 decision banned the performances, allowing only devotional singing.

This according to “Los seises in the golden age of Seville” by Lynn Matluck Brooks (Dance chronicle V/2 [1982], pp. 121–155). Below, los seises perform in 2010.

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by | December 21, 2010 · 7:17 am

Ringtones redux

Cell phone ringtones have been the subject of scholarly investigation for at least a decade; approaches to them have ranged from the practical to the postmodern.

The earliest academic study that we know of is “On the ringtones of cell phones (携帯電話着信メロディーについて)” in the Journal of the Acoustical Society of Japan (社団法人日本音響学会) LVII/11 (2001), pp. 725–728. Legal aspects were explored the following year in “Die Lizenzierungspraxis der GEMA bei Ruftonmelodien: Rechteeinräumung und Rechtefluß” by Jürgen Becker in Recht im Wandel seines sozialen und technologischen Umfeldes: Festschrift für Manfred Rehbinder (München: C.H. Beck, 2002, pp. 187–198).

Then the cultural theorists began to take note. The stage was set by discussions of aspects of postmodernism and colonialism in “The semiotics of cell-phone ring tones” by Erkki Pekkilä in Musical semiotics revisited (Helsinki: International Semiotics Institute, 2003, pp. 110–120). Recent cultural analyses have included “The musical madeleine: Communication, performance, and identity in musical ringtones” by Imar de Vries (Popular music and society XXXIII/1 [February 2010], pp. 61–74) and “What does answering the phone mean? A sociology of the phone ring and musical ringtones” by Christian Licoppe (scheduled for future publication in Cultural Sociology).

Above, heeding the summons of a ringtone in Bangladesh.

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by | December 18, 2010 · 7:09 am

Ken Butler’s anxious objects

 

With his background as a professional jazz guitarist and his MFA in painting, Ken Butler had a long-standing interest in combining his two passions, but he couldn’t find the right connection. Then one night an axe in his basement caught his eye.

In about an hour and a half he had added a bridge, strings, and a contact microphone to the axe. As he describes it, “Suddenly the world opened up to me in terms of “That’s a cello. That’s a violin.’”

Since that night Butler has built hundreds of hybrid instruments, which he describes as “anxious objects”. While all of them can be played, he considers most of them to be primarily collage sculptures; but some of them sound good enough that he considers them real instruments, and performs on them. His raw materials have included a toy Uzi, a motorcycle manifold, and parts of discarded mannequins (inset).

This according to “Ken Butler & the anxious objects: Turning unmusical things into instruments” by W. Kim Heron (Metro Times, 28 January 2004).  Below, Butler demonstrates several of his creations.

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by | December 13, 2010 · 7:13 am

Musica ragionata

Libreria Musicale Italiana launched the series Musica ragionata in 2009 with Musica poetica: Retorica e musica nel periodo della Riforma by Ferruccio Civra; the book explores Reformation treatises on rhetoric and on music, illuminating the connections between them. The series is overseen by Alberto Basso.

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by | December 11, 2010 · 6:50 am

The Joe Heaney Archives

Seosamh Ó hÉanaí (Joe Heaney, 1919–84) was considered by many to be the finest Irish traditional singer of his generation. Born and raised in rural western Ireland, over his lifetime he brought his vast repertoire of sean-nós (old-style) songs and stories, and his majestic, richly ornamented performances of them, to audiences around the world.

Cartlann Sheosaimh Uí Éanaí/Joe Heaney Archives, launched by Ollscoil na hÉireann, Gaillimh/National University of Ireland, Galway in 2010, is a repository of recordings of Heaney’s singing, storytelling, and traditional lore in both Irish and English, along with videos, interviews, transcriptions, translations, and notes. Below, Heaney sings Contae Mhaigh Eo; the images are views of his native Connemara.

 

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by | December 9, 2010 · 6:32 am

Francophone Music Criticism, 1789–1914

Launched by the Institute of Musical Research at the University of London in 2010, Francophone Music Criticism, 1789–1914 is a repository of digitized, searchable reviews relating to French music and ballet. Texts are grouped into collections devoted to particular works, events, series, performers, or authors. Bibliographical resources and work in progress of a more general nature are also included. The database’s development network is headed by Katharine Ellis and Mark Everist.

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by | December 6, 2010 · 6:39 am

Verdi’s gastromusicology

In opera, eating and drinking function largely as they do in society—they define social relationships. The antisocial act of refusing to share food or drink with merry people carries a negative connotation and implies an unfortunate result. Further gastromusicological laws may be deduced from Verdi’s operas:

    • A meal is never sad.
    • Hunger is never happy.
    • A shared meal or drink is a socially cohesive event.
    • The presence of food or drink precludes immediate catastrophe (unless poison is involved).
    • The act of feasting is a morally neutral event, but a feasting group or individual is morally negative when contrasted with a positive hungry group or individual.
    • The hero is a sober individual.
    • Music and text may lie, but the gastronomic sign never does.

The interaction between these gastronomic codes and other interweaving codes is often complex.

This according to “Feasting and fasting in Verdi’s operas” by Pierpaolo Polzonetti (Studi verdiani XIV [1999] pp. 69–106).

Above and below, Libiamo ne’ lieti calici from La traviata, as performed by the Metropolitan Opera in 2018.

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by | December 4, 2010 · 7:04 am

Falla: Grabaciones históricas

The Centro de Documentación Musical de Andalucía released Manuel de Falla 1876–1946: Grabaciones históricas in 2009 as part of its series Documentos Sonoros del Patrimonio Musical de Andalucía. The earliest recording included is Fantasía Bética, performed by Mark Hambourg in 1923; the most recent is Fuego fatuo, recorded by the Orquesta Sinfónica de Radio Televisión Española, directed by Antoni Ros Marbà, in 1976.

The accompanying booklet provides complete discographical information, numerous historical photographs, and notes in Spanish, English, and French by Andrés Ruiz Tarazona. Additional performers include Andrés Segovia, the Orquesta Bética de Cámara de Sevilla, which Falla founded in 1923, and the composer himself at the piano.

Above, Alicia de Larrocha performs Falla’s own piano transcription of “Danza del fuego” from his El amor brujo.

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by | December 1, 2010 · 6:41 am

The java jive

 

The universal availability and divergent imagery of coffee in people’s lives has been expressed in popular music more often than many of us realize. “You’re the cream in my coffee: A discography of java jive” by B. Lee Cooper and William Schurk (Popular music and society XXIII/2 [summer 1999] pp. 91–100) lists over 100 coffee-related popular songs from the 1920s to the 1990s. The songs are grouped both alphabetically and by subject; topics include addictive stimulants, commercial jingles, companionship and socialization, and sexual metaphors.

Click here to hear the Ink Spots performing their 1940 hit Java jive by Ben Oakland and Milton Drake.

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