Hi Everyone:
Thanks for today. I appreciate the discussion and the debate. For more information on the thorny (and not easily definable) issue of authenticity see an article here or for an article about authenticity with tie-ins to race, see here. If you are interested in the article that I wrote about Latin Musical culture in Toronto, see here.
Thanks for your understanding and encouragment regarding next Monday. So, we will have our class next Thursday (the 15th) in the library at 12:30 in room B 202 C (it is at the back of the library). If you cannot come, or have to duck out for a private lesson, I certainly understand. I’ll look forward to seeing you then and please check out the Madonna article in addition to our usual reading on the syllabus.
Lastly, keep thinking about the precis assignment.
I’m starting a list (below) that I will update about what articles have been claimed.
Andy
CLAIMED SCHOLARLY ARTICLES:
THE VIRTUAL ORCHESTRA: TECHNICAL AND CREATIVE ISSUES
Author BIANCHI, F. W.; CAMPBELL, R. H.
Source Journal of Sound and Vibration, vol. 232, no. 1, pp. 275-279, April
Sarah Dale
Not Pretty Girls?: Sexuality, Spirituality, and Gender Construction in Women’s Rock Music.
McCarthy, Kate
Journal of Popular Culture, vol. 39, no. 1, pp. 69-94, February 2006 ISSN 0022-3840
Erin Ellison
McGowan, James. “Understanding Musical Styles Through Sociolinguistic Models” Discourses in Music Vol. 4, No. 1. (Fall 2002)
Jeff LacRochelle
“Improvising character. Jazz, the actor, and protocols of improvisation” by Marshall Soules
Alastair Whitehead
Reflecting Surfaces: The Use of Elements from Indian Music in Popular Music and Jazz
Gerry Farrell
Popular Music, Vol. 7, No. 2, The South Asia/West Crossover. (May, 1988), pp. 189-205.
Liam Morin
McCarthy, Kate Not Pretty Girls?:Sexuality, Spirituality, and Gender Construction in Women’s Rock Music
Journal of Popular Culture Go To Journal Record 39:1 (February 2006) Go to Journal Issue P. 69-94
Angela Hilts
Megan Thomas
Borders, James. “Formand the concept album: aspects of modernism in Frank Zappa’s early releases". Perspectives of New Music. 39.1 (Wntr 2001): 118(44)
Veronica Meza
Title:
POP MUSIC: AUTHENTiCiTY, CREATiViTY AND TECHNOLOGY.
Authors:
Kendall, Gavin1
Mike Archer:
“Miles Davis’s Unfinished Electric Revolution
Veal, Michael E.
Andrew Roorda
Journal of American and Comparative Cultures, “Beat Streets in the Global Hood: Connective Marginalities of the Hip Hop Globe” by Halifu Osumare.
Minimalism, Postminimalism, and the Resurgence of Tonality in Recent American Music
Jonathan W. Bernard American Music, Vol. 21, No. 1 (Spring, 2003), pp. 112-133.
Joshua Cohen
Chris DeSantis
Gillespie, Wayne Personality of Rock Musicians, Psychology of Music Go to Journal Record 28:2 (2000)
Lizzy Clarke
“Girls with guitars and Other Stange Stories” Journal of the American Musicological Society
Harrison, Anna C Children’s Gender-Typed Preferences for Musical Instruments: An Intervention Study
Psychology of Music Go to Journal Record 28:1 (2000) Go to Journal Issue p. 81-97
Danielle Bourgeois
Inglis, Ian “The Ed Sullivan Show” and the (Censored) Sounds of the Sixties Journal of Popular Culture (August 2006).
Al Rowe
Matt DeLuca
Barthes, Roland (1977), “The death of the author.” In: Roland Barthes, Image - music - text. New York: Hill and Wang, 1977 (translated by Stephen Heath).
Olivier Clements
Personality and music: can traits explain how people use music in everyday life?
Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic in British Journal of Psychology
Chris DeSantis
Personality of Rock Musicians
Gillespie, Wayne; Myors, Brett
Kristjan Bergey
Crichton, Patrick
The Jazz Major in Australia: Falling Between the Cracks?
Jazz Education Journal 34:6 (May-June 2002) p. 57-60, 62-63
Loraina Fitzsimmons:
What Is Indie Rock. by Hibbett, Ryan. popular Music & Society; Feb2005, Vol. 28 Issue 1, p55-77, 23p
Alex Tait
Back, Les. “Voices of hate, sounds of hybridity: black music and the complexities of racism.” Black Music Research Journal 20.2 (Fall 2000): 127(23).
Jon Wong
Japanese Popular Music in Singapore and the Hybridization of Asian Music by Benjamin Wal-min Ng
EVAN DIAMOND:
‘Understand us before you end
us’: regulation, governmentality,
and the confessional practices of
raving bodies
CHARITY MARSH
Garrett Hack
Jams of Consequence: Rethinking the Jazz Age in Japan and China
Nichole T. Rustin
WEEK X: 1970s Soul, Funk & Disco (Parliament/Funkadelic, Philadelphia Soul, Stevie Wonder)Reading: Chapter 11 (pp. 341 – 349) & Chapter 12 (pp. 372 – 376) from Starr & Waterman’s American Popular Music
Humber College
Andrew Scott
Funk Music
Represented another “back to basics” reaction to the grandiosity of art rock
Album oriented rock was mainly geared at white males (for listening)
Funk re-connected popular musical culture to dance
Re-affirms concepts of authenticity and corporeality (the body)
Discussion points brought up in text….
1). The image of black “funkmasters” came uncomfortably close to racial stereotyping”
2). “The record industry’s packaging of black ‘authenticity’—as symbolized by strongly rhythmic, body-oriented music.”
3). “the success of funk music in the mainstream pop market capitalized to some degree upon long standing white American fantasies about black culture.”
Soul Music=“the secularization of gospel” (Jerry Wexler).
Ray Charles played “I Got a Woman.”
“I Got a Saviour (Way over Jordan)” or “Jesus is all the world to me”
Charles’s gospel and secular fusions were popular but controversial.
Musical Example: “I Got a Woman” (1954) and “I Can’t Stop Loving You” (1962).
Roots of Funk: Soul Music
“High priest of soul,” Brother Ray Charles
The Godfather of Soul—James Brown
Queen of Soul in Aretha Franklin
Soul Music as product of the “black power” movement in the United States.
student non-violent coordination committee (SNCC)
mid-1960s students increasingly impatient the slow pace of social change
Rallying cry: “I’m black and I’m proud” (James Brown)
The song cost Brown his white or crossover audience as many interpreted the song as a “call to arms” of blacks against whites.
Soul became a term that was first coined and used by African Americans to describe a new and distinctive black musical genre as well as a cultural style.
Musical Example: “Gonna Have a Funky Good Time” (James Brown)
James Brown
The “rhythmic revolution”
1965 breakthrough hit “Papa’s got a brand new bag.”
Known as a hard working band and “the Hardest working man in showbiz”
Side musicians: Maceo Parker, Bootsy Collins, Fred Wesley, Pee Wee Ellis
Compositional Methodology: sing an improvised melody—loosely organized—while the band grooved on one chord, horns punctuating the response to Brown’s vocal calls.
No chord changes or little melodic variety to sustain the listener interest, rhythm and groove are it
Brown treats every instrument and voice in the group as if each were a drum.
The Protestant Work Ethic vs. The Perpetual Now
V to I tonal move
Brown’s songs as idea of instant gratification in music and the “perpetual now.”
1970s Funk…
Stevie Wonder as pioneer of electronic synthesizers
Black concept albums: “Talking Book” and “Inner Visions.”
“Livin’ for the City” which offers his take on black, urban America.
One of the most successful performers of the 1970s.
By mid decade, Wonder had earned 10 Grammy awards and had signed a $13 million dollar contract with Motown
Musical Example: “Sir Duke” (1976) CD#9 (track 7)
Earth, Wind and Fire
Earth Wind & Fire used James Brown’s music as a springboard.
Maurice White (former session drummer for Chess)
Band combined Egyptian Mythology and soul music and African folk songs.
Theatrical live performances which featured a huge ensemble, pyrotechnics and an elaborate stage design.
Musical Example: “Shining Star” (CD #9 Track 5).
Parliament Funkadelic
George Clinton: grew up in New Jersey
Formed a doo wop group called The Parliaments
Worked at Motown Records
Parliament Funkadelic and P-Funk
Loose collective of musicians influenced by theatrical traditions, funk, disco, acid rock and psychedelic rock
Plus the science-fiction that is often appropriated by the blackspoitation genre (i.e.. SunRa and Space is the Place
Musical Example: “Give Up the Funk (Tear the Roof off the Sucker)” (CD #9 Track 6).
Rock gets funky, goes global and inclusive
Combined soul, jazz, r&b, gospel and even acid rock.
integrated musically, it seemed to be integrated on a cultural level.
“Here was a band with men and women, black and white, that had not just one role, but many roles – the women played, the men sang, the AA’s freaked out and the whites got funky.”
Musical Example: “Everyday People” (1969) CD #9 Track 1.
Disco
Began in places like Fire Island in New York and in Manhattan at clubs like The Loft and the 10th Floor.
Tied into gay culture and also DJ culture.
Dance music
lack of syncopation, a straight 4/4 disco beat, violin shots that act much in the same was as horn breaks worked for some of the jazz rock groups and a great deal of synthesizer sounds and non-sequitor lyrics.
Disco
1975 to 1980: focus on social dancing and choreographed moves that go back 19th century parlour room
Reaction to the two pillars of rock: the fetishization of the album and the concept of musicians as artists
Instead disco produces faceless/nameless studio groups
We see the rise of the producer: Jacques Morali, Robert Stigwood
Tie in with disposable culture
Re-discovery of the single (as opposed to the album)
Development of turntable techniques: blending one track into the next for continuous dancing Highly informing to contemporary hip hop, techno, house etc.
(the disco sucks movement) pictured
Disco and the birth of the 12”
Underground music that sometimes broke onto the national scene: George McKray’s “Rock Your Baby” (TK label)
DJ’s demanded 12” singles which were re-mixed and extended beyond the length of radio singles.
Originally for clubs, but soon became popular and were commercially released.
“Love to Love you Baby” was recorded in Germany with her sexual nuanced 1976 hit: 1st 12’
“Bad Girls.”
Listening Guide from text:
1). The beat
2). Steady med-fast tempo
3). Straightforward, repetitive form
4). Straightforward subject matter/lyrics
5). Limited harmonic vocabulary
Musical Example: “Love to Love You Baby” (Donna Summer) CD #9 Track 4
Disco goes mainstream
“Saturday Night Fever”
based upon the journalistic writing of Nick Cohen in New York Magazine that discussed the death of the 1960’s counter-culturalism and idealism
The film was shot at a working class disco called the 2001 Odyssey in Bay Ridge Brooklyn
Ignoring gay musical sources
2nd career for The Bee Gees, an Australian band of brothers Maurice, Barry and Robin Gibb (or Brothers Gibb).
Production, polished songwriting and falsetto singing.
Robert Stigwood and Casablanca Records.
Philadelphia Soul
Philadelphia (Philly) soul
sweet style of soul music with funk influences but tempered by lush instrumental arrangements
a precursor to disco
Also influenced Adult contemporary and smooth jazz
Some jazz influence
Musical example: “The Backstabbers” by The O’Jays (CD #9 Track 3).
The Village People
French disco producer named Jacques Morali who exploited the gay roots of disco with an American band called the Village People.
“Macho Man” and “YMCA” inside jokes to those who knew about NYC gay culture and hang-out locales.
Juxtaposition worked: they were gay anthems to those who understood and novelty hits for those who did not.
Comfortable entrée into the Disco world.
Week IX: WEEK IX Heavy Metal (Led Zeppelin, Black Sabbath, NWBHM, Metallica)Reading: Chapter 11 (pp. 334 – 338) from Starr & Waterman’s American Popular Music
Humber College
Andrew Scott
Heavy Metal
Late 1960s/early 1970s: a number of blues /psychedelic influenced bands (England) developed on the work of earlier bands playing loud/riff based heavy blues (John Mayall, The Animals, The Yardbirds).
Influential hit: “Purple Haze” Jimi Hendrix
Created a loud and mysterious (sometimes evincing) musical style
Some bands (Black Sabbath) pictured right: used religious iconography/symbolism/occult in their lyrics heighten the transgressive nature of the music
Aesthetic Qualities
Heavy metal aligned itself with pageantry of spectacle through the theatrical nature of the performance, the extreme volume, the musical virtuosity (as manifested in fast playing styles on the guitar most notably), emphasis on the semiotics of machismo.
-performance practices: head banging, gesticulations, the beginnings of the signifiers of arena-rock : mosh pits, hand salutes (“devil horns”), bodily involved rock guitar solos
Interest in album format (rather than recorded single)
1968:Pre-cursors to Metal
1968: Blue Cheer re-records “Summertime Blues” (Eddie Cochran), Steppenwolf’s “Born to Be Wild” (see earlier slide), Yardbirds’s “Think About It” and Iron Butterfly’s “In-a-Gadda-Da-Vida”
Burgeoning interest in (and exploitation/employment of) technology creates a general interest in “heavier” sounds.
“Revolution” The Beatles
“They may be world famous, but four shrieking monkeys are not going to use a privileged family name without permission” - Frau Eva von Zeppelin
From The Yardbirds came Mick Taylor, Eric Clapton, Jeff Beck and Jimmy Page (Clapton’s successor)
Brock up in 1968: Page puts together a new band to fulfil Scandinavian concert commitments
The New Yardbirds.
Led Zeppelin(Musical Example: “Whole Lotta Love” (1969) from CD #7
Page: a hero of the British blues movement—fast soloing and distorted tone (signifiers of metal)
John Paul Jones (bassist/keyboardist/session player)—bringing “spacey” quality to live performances
Robert Plant (Birmingham and almost entirely unknown): his “stripped to the waist sexuality” would become paramount to image/success of the band
His “high tenor” voice established a heavy metal aesthetic norm
As did bombastic drummer John Bonham—plus orchestral percussive effects (chimes, gongs etc).
The “Granddaddy of Heavy Metal” (Chris Waterman and Larry Starr
After the tour, the band stayed together as Led Zeppelin
Soon to become the most popular and influential of the heavy metal bands
Their first album (1969), the result of a 30 hour recording session combining original music (Page/Plant) with covers (Willie Dixon, Howlin’ Wolf)
With The Beatles disbanding (1969) Led Zeppelin emerged in 1970 as England’s favourite new band.
Mythological Emphasis
Passing of the guard: the heaviness of their music was partially the overdubbed guitars, and Page’s studio experimentations (mic placement for example)
The general distorted tone of the guitar, sheer volume of the drums and bass.
Video example: “How Many More Times”
Brought in both an appreciation for the Blues and an interest in mysticism
Tunes became a set of vague mythological pieces with lyrical references to Celtic legends, lore, history and black magic
“Stairway to Heaven”
According to Starr and Waterman, “Stairway” (and Santana’s “Oye Como Va”) demonstrate the diversity and breadth of music produced in the 1970s
Demonstrates how the band positioned itself both inside and outside of the mainstream of popular music.
Eg. Utilized standard “rock” compositional devices: hooks, riffs etc. that helped ingratiate it to a listening pubic, but it was 8 minutes in length and was never released as a single
Led Zeppelin IV reached the #2 position on the Billboard chart and stayed there for five years (selling 14 million copies)
“Stairway”
With “Stairway,” we hear two diametrically opposed musical aesthetics: the “riff” based bone crushing rock band and the folk music aficionados inspired by ancient English and Celtic traditions.
Two musical threads: sonic aggression and acoustic intimacy that our Waterman and Starr suggest run through the entire history of heavy metal music coupling (for the genre’s largely youth/male audience) rock physicality with folk mysticism.
Video Example: “Stairway to Heaven”
The narrative juxtaposition of the sensitive (which is the acoustic guitars) with the aggressive (the distorted electric guitars) has continued to show up in heavy metal music from Ozzy Osborne to Metallica.
Lyrically: word painting and a metaphoric teleological narrative of a heavenly stairway: staring in the mythological past (played on period piece instruments) and ultimately soaring upwards and onwards.
Performance Practices of Metal
Although Led Zeppelin was a seminally important hard rock band, their influence as a heavy metal group would pervade into the 1980s (following the group’s breakup) influencing numerous heavy metal groups including Metallica.
Disco so dominated the music of the late 1970s (even Zeppelin was not immune), but in the 1980s heavy metal came back: Judas Priest, Van Helen, Bon Jovi, Motley Crue, Def Leppard and such harder speed metal sounds of Metallica, Slayer, Anthrax and Megadeath.
Black Sabbath
Black Sabbath and Deep Purple (from England) played up the dark, gothic side of metal.
John “Ozzy” Osborne (vocals) with heightened guitar distortion, riff-based composition, Satanically inspired lyrics
Appealing to young/male fans: lots of musical aggression
Like The Ramones (later), the band was easy to emulate: they launched 1000 bands…
Listening Example: “Black Sabbath” (1978)
NWOBHM
Post Disco (late 1970s), British Metal: imbues new life into the genre
Pioneering metal bands had “lost cred” their ephemeral and elusive cultural “cred” by positioning themselves too closely to popular mainstream culture
Divorced itself of the blues influence (so pervasive in early heavy metal), sped up the tempo and added (even) more aggression to the sonic timbre: Judas Priest, Iron Maiden and Def Leopard
Style never reached a wide audience base:
1). Never strived for mainstream acceptance
2). Usurped by bands like Poison and Motley Crue who were more immediately marketable for record labels as they brought with them a more even split in terms of gender appreciation.
Musical Example: “The Number of the Beast” Iron Maiden
Van Halen
Walser: appropriation of musical values from the classical into rock
guitarist Eddie and drummer Alex
singer David Lee Roth and bassist Michael Anthony.
Virtuosity: Eddie’s legato performance style borrowed from classical violin.
Guitar solos: no longer a series of blues “clichés.”
Exhibited the speed, complexity and harmonics of Western art music.
Musical Example: “Eruption”
Metallica
Roots in speed metal style (Megadeath and Anthrax) and self-titled 1991 album underscored metal’s popularity: Billboard #1, sold more than 5 million copies and stayed on the charts for 266 weeks.
Metallica from California, take inspiration from: punk bands and from Rush, Iron Maiden, Diamond Head, Deep Purple and other NWOBHM bands.
Musical Example: “Battery” (1986)
90s Metal
“Hair Bands”
Guns and Roses
A return to rock “authenticity”
A “throw-back” to the “arena” rock of the 1970s.