Based on extensive research in India and Pakistan, this new study examines the ways drumming and voices interconnect over vast areas of South Asia and considers what it means for instruments to be voice-like and carry textual messages in particular contexts. Richard K. Wolf employs a hybrid, novelistic form of presentation in which the fictional protagonist Muharram Ali, a man obsessed with finding music he believes will dissolve religious and political barriers, interacts with Wolf's field consultants, to communicate ethnographic and historical realities that transcend the local details of any one person's life. The result is a daring narrative that follows Muharram Ali on a journey that explores how the themes of South Asian Muslims and their neighbors coming together, moving apart, and relating to God and spiritual intermediaries resonate across ritual and expressive forms such as drumming and dancing.

Over the past four decades, the spectacular, "globalized" aspects of cultural circulation have received the majority of scholarly - and consumer - attention, particularly in the study of South Asian music. Ethnomusicologists increasingly cast their studies in transnational terms, in part to take account of these emerging, globally mediated forms and their localized counterparts. As a result, a broad range of community-based and other locally-focused performance traditions in the regions of South Asia have remained relatively unexplored. markets have fostered the development of an aesthetic based The authors of Theorizing the Local provide a challenging and compelling counter-perspective to the overwhelming attention paid to the "globalized," arguing for the sustained value of comparative microstudies which are not concerned primarily with the flow of capital and neoliberal politics. What does it mean, they ask, for musical activities to be local in an increasingly interconnected world? What are the motivations for theoretical thought, and how are theoretical formulations instigated by the needs of performers, agents promoting regional identity, efforts to sustain or counter gender conventions, or desires to compete? To what extent can theoretical activity be localized to the very acts of making music, interacting, and composing? intriguing-often music sharing common melodic, harmonic, or Theorizing the Local offers unusual glimpses into rich musical worlds of south and west Asia, worlds which have never before been presented in a single volume. The authors cross the traditional borders of scholarship and region, exploring in unmatched detail a vast array of musical practices and significant ethnographic discoveries extending from Nepal to India, India to Sri Lanka, Pakistan to Iran. Enriched by audio and video tracks on the extensive companion website, Theorizing the Local represents an important and necessary addition to the study of South Asian musical traditions and a broader understanding of 21st century music of the world.

Kay Kaufman Shelemay's impact as a mentor and colleague to a generation of scholars shines brightly in this wide-ranging edited collection. Shelemay took the field of ethnomusicology by storm with her bold and historically rich ethnography of Ethiopian Jewish music, pioneering the field of musical diaspora studies. Her investigation of musical communities-emphasizing memory, mobility, and the shifting of boundaries-has inspired many of the authors of this volume. The essays treat such diverse topics as cantorial life in America, gender and fertility among Ethiopians in Israel, transnational performance itineraries of griots and Korean drummers, and video games. This volume embraces Western art music, American music, African music, music and ritual, the performing body, and the internet. The seamless flow between ethnomusicology and historical musicology in this volume will interest a wide range of music scholars for generations to come.

Over the past four decades, the spectacular, "globalized" aspects of cultural circulation have received the majority of scholarly - and consumer - attention, particularly in the study of South Asian music. Ethnomusicologists increasingly cast their studies in transnational terms, in part to take account of these emerging, globally mediated forms and their localized counterparts. As a result, a broad range of community-based and other locally-focused performance traditions in the regions of South Asia have remained relatively unexplored. markets have fostered the development of an aesthetic based The authors of Theorizing the Local provide a challenging and compelling counter-perspective to the overwhelming attention paid to the "globalized," arguing for the sustained value of comparative microstudies which are not concerned primarily with the flow of capital and neoliberal politics. What does it mean, they ask, for musical activities to be local in an increasingly interconnected world? What are the motivations for theoretical thought, and how are theoretical formulations instigated by the needs of performers, agents promoting regional identity, efforts to sustain or counter gender conventions, or desires to compete? To what extent can theoretical activity be localized to the very acts of making music, interacting, and composing? intriguing-often music sharing common melodic, harmonic, or Theorizing the Local offers unusual glimpses into rich musical worlds of south and west Asia, worlds which have never before been presented in a single volume. The authors cross the traditional borders of scholarship and region, exploring in unmatched detail a vast array of musical practices and significant ethnographic discoveries extending from Nepal to India, India to Sri Lanka, Pakistan to Iran. Enriched by audio and video tracks on the extensive companion website, Theorizing the Local represents an important and necessary addition to the study of South Asian musical traditions and a broader understanding of 21st century music of the world.

Based on extensive research in India and Pakistan, this new study examines the ways drumming and voices interconnect over vast areas of South Asia and considers what it means for instruments to be voice-like and carry textual messages in particular contexts. Richard K. Wolf employs a hybrid, novelistic form of presentation in which the fictional protagonist Muharram Ali, a man obsessed with finding music he believes will dissolve religious and political barriers, interacts with Wolf's field consultants, to communicate ethnographic and historical realities that transcend the local details of any one person's life. The result is a daring narrative that follows Muharram Ali on a journey that explores how the themes of South Asian Muslims and their neighbors coming together, moving apart, and relating to God and spiritual intermediaries resonate across ritual and expressive forms such as drumming and dancing.