Deutscher Kirchengesang in der Neuzeit: Eine Gesangsbuchanthologie

A book review is presented for Deutscher Kirchengesang in der Neuzeit: Eine Gesangsbuchanthologie, ed. by Gustav Adolf Krieg. Berlin: Verlag der Weltreligionen im Insel Verlag, 2013. 984 pp. ISBN: 978-3-458-70040-1

“La Voz del Pueblo, una Canción, una Frase Notable, una Rima, lograron sobrevivir”. El nacimiento de la Estética Musical y el momento musicológico global

In this intellectual history of the emergence of modern musical aesthetics globally, I concern myself with the birth of aesthetics as a modern philosophical field and the expansion of music historiography to include the entire world. These global musicological moments are abundantly evident in the earliest writings of Johann Gottfried Herder (1744-1803), who would channel and sustain their confluence throughout his vast body of publications. The title of the essay comes from Herder, specifically from the seminal volumes he called Volkslieder (Folk Songs, 1778/79), in which he connects his foundational writings on aesthetics, the Kritische Wälder (Critical Forests) to the first comprehensive concept of global music aesthetics. The history of Herder reception is itself a critical thread in the intellectual history of musical aesthetics that links the eighteenth to the twenty-first century. I follow this critical thread to eighteenth-century South Asia in search of a foundational modern Indian musical aesthetics, particularly in the South Indian classical genre, kriti, and the vast aesthetic domain of rāga theory, which also took a turn toward the modern at the end of the eighteenth century. The essay concludes by returning to the present with examples of Herder’s aesthetic principles in musical performance in today’s global migration crisis. It is that intellectual history, with the cases from past and present, enlightenments in Europe and South Asia, especially their global dimensions, that shapes the theory of global musicological moments at the heart of this essay.En esta historia intelectual de la aparición de la estética musical global, trato del nacimiento de la estética como un campo filosófico moderno y la expansión de la historiografía musical hasta incluir el mundo entero. Estos momentos musicológicos globales son muy evidentes en los primeros escritos de Johann Gottfried Herder (1744-1803), quien canalizaría y mantendría esa confluencia a lo largo de su vasta obra publicada. El título de este artículo procede de Herder, específicamente de los volúmenes que llamó Volkslieder (Canciones populares, 1778/79), en los que conecta sus escritos fundacionales sobre estética, Kritische Wälder (Selvas críticas), con el primer concepto integral de estética musical global. La historia de la recepción de Herder es en sí un hilo conductor crítico en la historia intelectual de la estética musical que conecta el siglo XVIII con el XXI. Sigo este hilo conductor hasta el sur de Asia en el siglo XVIII a la búsqueda de una moderna estética musical hindú fundacional, particularmente en el género clásico kriti, del sur de la India, y el vasto dominio estético de la teoría de los rāga, que también dio un giro hacia lo moderno a finales del siglo XVIII. El artículo concluye volviendo al presente con ejemplos de principios estéticos de Herder aplicados a interpretaciones musicales en la actual crisis migratoria global. Es esa historia intelectual, con ejemplos del pasado y del presente, de la Ilustración en Europa y en el sur de Asia, especialmente sus dimensiones globales, la que da forma a la teoría de momentos musicológicos globales que constituye el núcleo de este artículo

Ethnomusicology Matters:Influencing Social and Political Realities

This book gathers international voices from the field of ethnomusicology discussing the socio-political relevance of the discipline. The articles draw from contemporary discourses that take into account the role of music and dance in shaping social and political realities. An important field connected to political relevance is heritage, either in connection with the UNESCO or with archives. Ontologies of indigenous groups and their relevance in knowledge production is discussed in ethnomusicology nowadays as well as the possibilities of decolonising the discipline. Two articles from ethno-choreology explore dance from the gender perspective and in the post-socialist political structures. Different approaches from applied ethnomusicology deal with social justice, participatory dialogical practice, and the socio-political relevance of performance. Forced migration is seen as comprehensive topic for future ethnomusicology. The contents of the book mirror influential discourses of ethnomusicology today that will definitely shape the future development of the discipline

What Might Have Been Lost

This article examines the role of “independent” folk music (indie-folk) in personal identity formation. It builds upon Paul Ricoeur’s theory of narrative identity, which argues (i) that it is through the mechanism of narrative that people build a more or less coherent life-story, and (ii) emphasizes the role of art (most notably literary fiction and poetry) as a mediator in the comprehension and regulation of transitory life experiences. This article aims to apply these insights to studying the role of indie-folk, a narrative art form adhering to the traditional understanding of folk music as a genre rooted in oral tradition, in the construction of personal identity. Studying the daily use of indie-folk songs by audience members through in-depth interviewing, it shows that (i) the reception of indie-folk music results in ritualistic listening behavior aimed at coping with the experience of accelerating social time; (ii) that respondents use indie-folk narratives as resources for reading the self, and (iii) that indie-folk songs provide healing images that are effective in coping with the experience of narrated time as discordant. In arguing for the central role of narrative in identity formation, this article aims to contribute to existing research on music as a “technology of the self” (DeNora). It specifically emphasizes how narrative particles are tools and building blocks in identity construction, a process characterized by the oscillation between narrative coherence and disruption

TRY plant trait database – enhanced coverage and open access

Plant traits - the morphological, anatomical, physiological, biochemical and phenological characteristics of plants - determine how plants respond to environmental factors, affect other trophic levels, and influence ecosystem properties and their benefits and detriments to people. Plant trait data thus represent the basis for a vast area of research spanning from evolutionary biology, community and functional ecology, to biodiversity conservation, ecosystem and landscape management, restoration, biogeography and earth system modelling. Since its foundation in 2007, the TRY database of plant traits has grown continuously. It now provides unprecedented data coverage under an open access data policy and is the main plant trait database used by the research community worldwide. Increasingly, the TRY database also supports new frontiers of trait‐based plant research, including the identification of data gaps and the subsequent mobilization or measurement of new data. To support this development, in this article we evaluate the extent of the trait data compiled in TRY and analyse emerging patterns of data coverage and representativeness. Best species coverage is achieved for categorical traits - almost complete coverage for ‘plant growth form’. However, most traits relevant for ecology and vegetation modelling are characterized by continuous intraspecific variation and trait–environmental relationships. These traits have to be measured on individual plants in their respective environment. Despite unprecedented data coverage, we observe a humbling lack of completeness and representativeness of these continuous traits in many aspects. We, therefore, conclude that reducing data gaps and biases in the TRY database remains a key challenge and requires a coordinated approach to data mobilization and trait measurements. This can only be achieved in collaboration with other initiatives