Jazz and its Social Meanings in Iran: From Cultural Colonialism to the Universal

How is it that musical styles acquire particular social meanings in specific times and places? This chapter explores the case of jazz in Iran, examining various aspects of jazz and its social meanings in Iran from the 1950s onward, focusing in particular on the period of cultural liberalism that followed the election of the reformist president Mohammad Khatami in 1997. When Euro- American popular music continued to be branded as a form of cultural imperialism, jazz remained largely outside this category. Instead, the positioning of jazz since the late 1990s has served to define its meanings largely through the metaphors of music “as art” and, more recently, as a form of “universal” musical expression

Pamyua's Akutaq: Traditions of Modern Inuit Modalities in Alaska

This essay positions the award-winning band Pamyua’s “Afro-Inuit” soundscapes and business acumen as characteristic of Inuit modernities, interrupting static notions of cultural music and questioning what “Native” can mean at this moment. I situate Pamyua’s personal and musical alliances along a historical trajectory of circumpolar Inuit transnationalism to illustrate the ways in which the group’s musical modernities are uniquely rooted in each member’s familial and sociocultural soundscapes. I also explore the development of “Pamyua, Inc.” and Arctic Voice Records as a means to subvert what I call “sound quantum” politics through the revisioning of music industry practices using Inuit knowledge.Cet essai présente les paysages sonores afro-inuit et le sens des affaires du groupe primé Pamyua comme caractéristiques des modernités inuites, rompant avec les conceptions statiques de la musique culturelle et interrogeant les significations possibles du terme autochtone aujourd’hui. Je situe les alliances personnelles et musicales de Pamyua sur une trajectoire historique du transnationalisme circumpolaire inuit afin d’illustrer les façons dont les modernités musicales du groupe sont enracinées dans les paysages sonores familiaux et socioculturels singuliers de chaque membre. J’explore également le développement de Pamyua, Inc. et Arctic Voice Records comme moyens de subvertir ce que j’appelle les politiques de quantums sonores par la transformation des pratiques de l’industrie musicale sur la base de la connaissance inuite

Largo for Strings: An Original Composition

The string quartet genre was begun by Haydn during the latter half of the 1700\u27s. Largo for Strings is a work composed for string quartet that takes typical aspects of the genre and. marries them to newer concepts of sound and freer harmonic direction. The project was composed throughout the course of a year and a half, during which the composer studied and worked under the supervision of Dr. Karen Ball. The culmination of the project was the performance of the piece in February of 2012. The work is a single movement ABA piece that makes use of several recurring motifs, especially the interval of a sixth

Scrapbooks

Spanning from the beginning of his career to the dawn of the internet, the scrapbook covers the years 1967 to 1997 and showcase flyers, newspaper articles, critic reviews, programs, promotional materials, newsletters and photographs highlighting his work.https://digitalcommons.colum.edu/lofstromcollection/1002/thumbnail.jp

The Winonan

https://openriver.winona.edu/thewinonan2000s/1230/thumbnail.jp

Bass Is My Religion: Syncretic Spirituality and Navigating the Potential for Misappropriation Among Participants in Electronic Dance Music Culture

At electronic dance music events in the United States, artists and attendees tend to appropriate religious and spiritual sounds, images, and dress, especially from India but also from elsewhere, to varying degrees. This project explicates the effects of adopting religious symbology, ethos, and atmosphere in the music and culture of EDM, specifically in bass music culture. It argues that although individual participants may adopt aspects of religious traditions in ways they perceive as authentic, the potential for misappropriation still exists. In other words, EDM culture creates opportunities for misappropriation that individual participants navigate in order to construct their own individual forms of spirituality in relation to the live music experience and EDM culture at large. Utilizing a set of seven interviews with individuals who have close ties to the EDM community, this project explores the ways that attendees navigate conversations about cultural appropriation, specifically in the bass music community. A set of common attitudes, opinions, and beliefs forges a syncretic spirituality among these seven interviewees, which inform how these individuals navigate conversations about appropriation in the EDM community. In addition to these seven interviews, three case studies that focus on specific artists who spearhead specific subscenes frame this project: the psychedelic downtempo duo Desert Dwellers, the multiethnic trap artist TroyBoi, and the cult dubstep DJ Bassnectar. Synthesizing ideas by these seven interviews with previous EDM scholarship and specific cases within these communities, I conclude that as artists and attendees negotiate meanings with one another, they must ultimately choose to justify their appropriation, often by claiming a syncretic sense of spirituality, or to avoid association with it entirely