Wasn't That a Mighty Day: African American Blues and Gospel Songs on Disaster takes a comprehensive look at sacred and secular disaster songs, shining a spotlight on their historical and cultural importance. Featuring newly transcribed lyrics, the book offers sustained attention to how both Black and white communities responded to many of the tragic events that occurred before the mid-1950s. Through detailed textual analysis, Luigi Monge explores songs on natural disasters (hurricanes, floods, tornadoes, and earthquakes); accidental disasters (sinkings, fires, train wrecks, explosions, and air disasters); and infestations, epidemics, and diseases (the boll weevil, the jake leg, and influenza). Analyzed songs cover some of the most well-known disasters of the time period from the sinking of the Titanic and the 1930 drought to the Hindenburg accident, and more. Thirty previously unreleased African American disaster songs appear in this volume for the first time, revealing their pertinence to the relevant disasters. By comparing the song lyrics to critical moments in history, Monge is able to explore how deeply and directly these catastrophes affected Black communities; how African Americans in general, and blues and gospel singers in particular, faced and reacted to disaster; whether these collective tragedies prompted different reactions among white people and, if so, why; and more broadly, how the role of memory in recounting and commenting on historical and cultural facts shaped African American society from 1879 to 1955.

Cowboy Bebop is one of the most beloved anime series of all time, and if you ask its fans why, you can expect to hear about its music. Composer Yoko Kanno created an eclectic blend of jazz, rock, lullabies, folk and funk (to list just a few) for Cowboy Bebop's many moods and environments. Cowboy Bebop's blend of science fiction, westerns and gangster films promised to be "the work which becomes a new genre itself," and only Kanno's score could deliver. In this volume of 33 1/3 Japan, musicologist Rose Bridges helps listeners make sense of the music of Cowboy Bebop. The book places it within the context of Bebop's influences and Kanno's larger body of work. It analyzes how the music tells Spike, Faye, Jet and the rest of the crew's stories. Cowboy Bebop and its music are like nothing else, and they deserve a guide to match. 33 1/3 Global, a series related to but independent from 33 1/3, takes the format of the original series of short, music-basedbooks and brings the focus to music throughout the world. With initial volumes focusing on Japanese and Brazilian music, the series will also include volumes on the popular music of Australia/Oceania, Europe, Africa, the Middle East, and more.

American composer Morton Feldman is increasingly seen to have been one of the key figures in late-twentieth-century music, with his work exerting a powerful influence into the twenty-first century. At the same time, much about his music remains enigmatic, largely due to long-standing myths about supposedly intuitive or aleatoric working practices. In Composing Ambiguity, Alistair Noble reveals key aspects of Feldman's musical language as it developed during a crucial period in the early 1950s. Drawing models from primary sources, including Feldman's musical sketches, he shows that Feldman worked deliberately within a two-dimensional frame, allowing a focus upon the fundamental materials of sounding pitch in time. Beyond this, Feldman's work is revealed to be essentially concerned with the 12-tone chromatic field, and with the delineation of complexes of simple proportions in 'crystalline' forms. Through close reading of several important works from the early 1950s, Noble shows that there is a remarkable consistency of compositional method, despite the varied experimental notations used by Feldman at this time. Not only are there direct relations to be found between staff-notated works and grid scores, but much of the language developed by Feldman in this period was still in use even in his late works of the 1980s.

Artistic Practice as Research in Music: Theory, Criticism, Practice brings together internationally renowned scholars and practitioners to explore the cultural, institutional, theoretical, methodological, epistemological, ethical and practical aspects and implications of the rapidly evolving area of artistic research in music. Through various theoretical positions and case studies, and by establishing robust connections between theoretical debates and concrete examples of artistic research projects, the authors discuss the conditions under which artistic practice becomes a research activity; how practice-led research is understood in conservatoire settings; issues of assessment in relation to musical performance as research; methodological possibilities open to music practitioners entering academic environments as researchers; the role of technology in processes of musical composition as research; the role and value of performerly knowledge in music-analytical enquiry; issues in relation to live performance as a research method; artistic collaboration and improvisation as research tools; interdisciplinary concerns of the artist-researcher; and the relationship between the affordances of a musical instrument and artistic research in musical performance. Readers will come away from the book with fresh insights about the theoretical, critical and practical work being done by experts in this exciting new field of enquiry.

This book presents a world-class collection of Brain-Computer Music Interfacing (BCMI) tools. The text focuses on how these tools enable the extraction of meaningful control information from brain signals, and discusses how to design effective generative music techniques that respond to this information. Features: reviews important techniques for hands-free interaction with computers, including event-related potentials with P300 waves; explores questions of semiotic brain-computer interfacing (BCI), and the use of machine learning to dig into relationships among music and emotions; offers tutorials on signal extraction, brain electric fields, passive BCI, and applications for genetic algorithms, along with historical surveys; describes how BCMI research advocates the importance of better scientific understanding of the brain for its potential impact on musical creativity; presents broad coverage of this emerging, interdisciplinary area, from hard-core EEG analysis to practical musical applications.

This study provides a new view of a composer long considered to be one of the century's most rigorously intellectual creators, Anton Webern. By examining a central pre-twelve-tone work, the Trakl cycle, Op 14, in the context of the Viennese intellectual and artistic climate, Professor Shreffler shows how Webern's responses to Trakl's complex verse enabled him to expand his musical vocabulary. The author's emphasis on Webern's compositional process is of particular importance: whether because of the anxiety of creating a new musical language, or because of an innate hyper-perfectionism (or both), Webern rejected most of what he composed. A close examination of the manuscript sources - fragments, sketches, and fair copies - of Webern's comparatively neglected middle-period lieder enables her to shed light on Webern's musical language and his working methods. A focus on the sources also helps to modify the view that his music progressed steadily in the direction of the twelve-tone technique. The works reveal instead a concern with expressing the essence of the text; this lyricism, rather than articulating a substantially different aesthetic from the later works, provides a better understanding of the consummate lyricism of all his music, however compressed or fragmented its utterance in the `classic' twelve-tone works.

* Intense focus on the emergence of a new, post-Civil Rights Movement black identity * Offers an alternative history and musicology of the Black Power Movement * Defines Black Power Music - a musical and political reality * Explores the intense interconnections between black popular culture and black political culture * Essential reading for all students engaged in black popular music studies, African American studies, popular culture studies, ethnic studies as well as sociology, ethnomusicology and political science.

Innovative sounds in pop, rock and soul in the 1960s and 1970s meant that music appealed to more people than ever before. While some songs appealed to a broad audience, some targeted a much narrower demographic, meaning songs on the pop charts might not do as well on the adult contemporary or soul charts, or vice versa. This book examines forty songs featured on song charts of the 1960s and 1970s. Charts considered are Billboard Pop, Billboard Soul, Adult Contemporary, Cashbox and British Charts. Each listing includes discussion of the factors that contributed to the songs' popularity. Author interviews with songwriters, musicians and artists such as KC (of KC and the Sunshine Band), Mark Farner (of Grand Funk), Jerry Butler, Ron Dante (of the Archies and the Cuff Links), Freda Payne, Lou Christie, Tommy Roe, The Spinners and others tell the stories behind some of the era's most popular songs.

This volume of primary source material examines the organisation of music in Britian during the ninteenth century. Sources explore music careers and professions, music societies, festivals and concerts, and popular music. The collection of materials are accompanied by an introduction by Rosemary Golding, as well as headnotes contextualising the pieces. This collection will be of great value to students and scholars.

This book will be of interest to scholars, students and practitioners in the fields of ethnomusicology, music education, social learning and community music. It applies concepts and approaches from these disciplines with ethnographic data to identify a pedagogy for the learning and teaching of traditional music in community-based organisations.

The Sound of Ontology: Music as a Model for Metaphysics explores connections between Western art music in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, and the ideas that dominated philosophy leading up to and during that period. In the process of establishing John Cage as Richard Wagner's heir via Arnold Schoenberg, the author discovers that the old metaphysics of representation is still in charge of how we think about music and about experience in general. Instead of settling for the positivist definition of music as mere sound framed by time, LaFave provides a phenomenology of music that reveals pitch as the ontological counterpart to frequency, and music as a vehicle for understanding how, as Heidegger observed, the Being of "things of value" are invariably grounded in the Being of "things of nature." Numerous musical examples and a poem by Wallace Stevens illustrate LaFave's case that hierarchy is intrinsic to this understanding. Alfred North Whitehead's process philosophy is brought to bear alongside Heidegger's phenomenological ontology to show that not only music, but reality itself, depends on a play of interlocking hierarchies to effect the nature-value connection, making aesthetics first philosophy.

- Comprehensive overview offering a careful balance of the practical and theoretical - No competing titles - Diverse set of contributors from a range of geographical regions and professional/academic backgrounds

This volume explores the interrelation of international relations, music, and diplomacy from a multidisciplinary perspective. Throughout history, diplomats have gathered for musical events, and musicians have served as national representatives. Whatever political unit is under consideration (city-states, empires, nation-states), music has proven to be a component of diplomacy, its ceremonies, and its strategies. Following the recent acoustic turn in IR theory, the authors explore the notion of "musical diplomacies" and ask whether and how it differs from other types of cultural diplomacy. Accordingly, sounds and voices are dealt with in acoustic terms but are not restricted to music per se, also taking into consideration the voices (speech) of musicians in the international arena. Read an interview with the editors here: https://www.sciencespo.fr/ceri/en/content/international-relations-music-and-diplomacy-sounds-and-voices-international-stage

Offers a comprehensive guide to approaching a degree in music, tailored to the needs of first-year undergraduate students. Questions for discussion, chapter-by-chapter assignments, and downloadable eResources provide practical tools to develop students' professional, practical and academic skills. Includes contributions from faculty across all areas of music that establish foundations to prepare students for all types of music specialities.

Wasn't That a Mighty Day: African American Blues and Gospel Songs on Disaster takes a comprehensive look at sacred and secular disaster songs, shining a spotlight on their historical and cultural importance. Featuring newly transcribed lyrics, the book offers sustained attention to how both Black and white communities responded to many of the tragic events that occurred before the mid-1950s. Through detailed textual analysis, Luigi Monge explores songs on natural disasters (hurricanes, floods, tornadoes, and earthquakes); accidental disasters (sinkings, fires, train wrecks, explosions, and air disasters); and infestations, epidemics, and diseases (the boll weevil, the jake leg, and influenza). Analyzed songs cover some of the most well-known disasters of the time period from the sinking of the Titanic and the 1930 drought to the Hindenburg accident, and more. Thirty previously unreleased African American disaster songs appear in this volume for the first time, revealing their pertinence to the relevant disasters. By comparing the song lyrics to critical moments in history, Monge is able to explore how deeply and directly these catastrophes affected Black communities; how African Americans in general, and blues and gospel singers in particular, faced and reacted to disaster; whether these collective tragedies prompted different reactions among white people and, if so, why; and more broadly, how the role of memory in recounting and commenting on historical and cultural facts shaped African American society from 1879 to 1955.

Cutting-edge perspectives on a hot topic, with few competing titles on the market Contributor list includes some very well known professionals, as well as diverse academics from different disciplines Accessible and interdisciplinary introductory volume

The monograph concerns one of the most important trends in contemporary classical Polish music. The ‟new romanticism� represented the reaction to the crisis of the avant-garde in the 70s. It appeared in works by the ‟1933 generation� (Penderecki, Górecki, Kilar), ‟the Stalowa Wola generation� (Knapik, Lasoń, Krzanowski), and others. This music matched tradition with contemporary techniques and strong emotionalism. Its romantic dimension and seriousness were in sheer contrast to the ‟double-coding� of Postmodernism. It stemmed from the political situation in Poland during the ‟Iron Curtain� times. The book also focuses on the topic’s American (Schonberg, Rochberg) and European contexts. The author also analyzes 104 compositions and 30 interviews (incl. with Penderecki) to present an even fuller picture.

For a century and more, the idea of democracy has fuelled musicians' imaginations. Seeking to go beyond music's proven capacity to contribute to specific political causes, musicians have explored how aspects of their practice embody democratic principles. This may involve adopting particular approaches to compositional material, performance practice, relationships to audiences, or modes of dissemination and distribution. Finding Democracy in Music is the first study to offer a wide-ranging investigation of ways in which democracy may thus be found in music. A guiding theme of the volume is that this takes place in a plurality of ways, depending upon the perspective taken to music's manifold relationships, and the idea of democracy being entertained. Contributing authors explore various genres including orchestral composition, jazz, the post-war avant-garde, online performance, and contemporary popular music, as well as employing a wide array of theoretical, archival, and ethnographic methodologies. Particular attention is given to the contested nature of democracy as a category, and the gaps that frequently arise between utopian aspiration and reality. In so doing, the volume interrogates a key way in which music helps to articulate and shape our social lives and our politics.

A BBC RADIO 4 BOOK OF THE WEEK Bessie Smith: singer, icon, pioneer. Scotland's National Poet Jackie Kay brings to life the tempestuous story of the greatest blues singer who ever lived. 'A gem of a book . . . beautiful.' BERNARDINE EVARISTO 'A wonderful writer on a magnificent singer.' ROBERT WYATT 'Kay's book is the amplifier that Smith's voice deserves.' SUNDAY TIMES 'The most vivid evocation of Bessie Smith I have ever read.' IAN CARR, BBC MUSIC BESSIE SMITH was born in Tennessee in 1894. Orphaned by the age of nine, she sang on street corners before becoming a big name in travelling shows. In 1923 she made her first recording for a new start-up called Columbia Records. It sold 780,000 copies and made her a star. Smith's life was notoriously difficult: she drank pints of 'bathtub gin', got into violent fist fights, spent huge sums of money and had passionate love affairs with men and women. She once single-handedly fought off a cohort of the Ku Klux Klan. As a young black girl growing up in Glasgow, Jackie Kay found in Bessie someone with whom she could identify and who she could idolise. In this remarkable book Kay mixes biography, fiction, poetry and prose to create an enthralling account of an extraordinary life. 'Biographies don't usually bring the subject to life again. This one did. I finished the book then started it again immediately.' PEGGY SEEGER 'What a life! What gulpable storytelling! Exactly the kind of writing about music we need: personal, ardent, playfully confrontational, questioning, undogmatic. A love song to a complicated idol.' KATE MOLLESON 'Pure joy: one trailblazing woman pays tribute to another. Jackie Kay finds the music in the short, dazzling, capricious life of Bessie Smith.' HELEN LEWIS

This book studies George Crumb's Winds of Destiny (2004) and Black Angels (1970) as artefacts of collective memory and cultural trauma. It situates these two pieces in Crumb's output and unpacks the complex methodologies needed to understand these pieces as contributions and challenges to traditional narratives of the Civil War and the Vietnam War. This book shows how this association began and how it endures through connections to iconic Vietnam War media, including films and books. Together these analyses show the legacy of trauma in American collective memory, which is in a continuous crisis. \This book will be of interest to students of contemporary American music, American studies, and memory studies. It benefits readers by newly situating Crumb's music within these three fields of study.

Listen to Pop! discusses the evolution of pop music in America from the 1950s to the present, diving into its impact on American culture, particularly through its association with television, and its enduring legacy. Listen to Pop!: Exploring a Musical Genre provides readers with an overview and a history of the pop music genre. The bulk of the book is devoted to analysis of 50 must-hear musical examples, which include artists, songs, and albums. Additionally, the book contains chapters that analyze the impact of pop music on American popular culture and the legacy of pop music, including how the music is used today in film and television soundtracks and in television commercials. The book deals with all of the various subgenres of pop music from the 1950s to the present. The selection of material discussed reflects the artists, songs, and albums topping the pop music charts of the period, and while the volume examines these items individually, it also discusses how our definition of pop music has evolved over the decades. This combination of detailed examination of specific songs, albums, and artists and discussion of background, legacy, and impact distinguishes it from other books on the subject and make it a vital reference and interesting read for all readers and music aficionados. Analyzes a diversity, stylistically and otherwise, of must-hear examples Traces the evolution of pop music from the end of World War II to the present Extensively discusses the interplay between popular music and television Identifies certain formulas for success, such as the "oldies" chord progression through the 20th century to the present

A Pitchfork Best Music Book of 2022 When Tom Breihan launched his Stereogum column in early 2018, "The Number Ones"-a space in which he has been writing about every #1 hit in the history of the Billboard Hot 100, in chronological order-he figured he'd post capsule-size reviews for each song. But there was so much more to uncover. The column has taken on a life of its own, sparking online debate and occasional death threats. The Billboard Hot 100 began in 1958, and after four years of posting the column, Breihan is still in the early aughts. But readers no longer have to wait for his brilliant synthesis of what the history of #1s has meant to music and our culture. In The Number Ones, Breihan writes about twenty pivotal #1s throughout chart history, revealing a remarkably fluid and connected story of music that is as entertaining as it is enlightening. The Numbers Ones features the greatest pop artists of all time, from the Brill Building songwriters to the Beatles and the Beach Boys; from Motown to Michael Jackson, Prince, and Mariah Carey; and from the digital revolution to the K-pop system. Breihan also ponders great artists who have never hit the top spot, like Bob Dylan, Bruce Springsteen, and James Brown. Breihan illuminates what makes indelible ear candy across the decades-including dance crazes, recording innovations, television phenomena, disco, AOR, MTV, rap, compact discs, mp3s, social media, memes, and much more-leaving readers to wonder what could possibly happen next.

Aimed at lay, student, and academic readers alike, this book concerns the imagination and, specifically, imagination in music. It opens with a discussion of the invalidity of the idea of the creative genius and the connected view that ideas originate just in the individual mind. An alternative view of the imaginative process is then presented, that ideas spring from a subconscious dialogue activated by engagement in the world around. Ideas are therefore never just of our own making. This view is supported by evidence from many studies and corresponds with descriptions by artists of their experience of imagining. The third subject is how imaginations can be shared when musicians work with other artists, and the way the constraints imposed by trying to share subconscious imagining result in clearly distinct forms of joint working. The final chapter covers the use of the musical imagination in making meanings from music. The evidence is that music does not communicate meanings directly, and so composers or performers cannot be looked to as authorities on its meaning. Instead, music is commonly heard as analogous to human experience, and listeners who perceive such analogies may then imagine their own meanings from the music.