TRANS 24: Special issue on Music, Sound and Culture in Central America

Posted on by

Dear colleagues,

We are pleased to announce the publication of a new issue of TRANS-Revista Transcultural de Música, in this case volume 24, corresponding to the year 2020.  It includes a special dossier on “Music, Sound and Culture in Central America”, edited by Antonio Monte Casablanca (Free University of Berlin), Amanda Minks (University of Oklahoma) and Helga Zambrano (University of California – Los Angeles).

In the words of the editors, this volume “aims to integrate the Central American region into current academic knowledge and debates around the categories of music, sound and orality, particularly from the different points of view of the humanities and social sciences.” Beyond the intrinsic quality and interest of each of the articles, this collection, as a whole, reveals the rich (ethno)musicological thinking of a region that perhaps has not received due attention from music and sound studies. The publication of this special issue also responds to the Ibero-American vocation of TRANS-Revista Transcultural de Música, the flagship journal of SIBE, the Spanish Society for Ethnomusicology.  The issue is completed with the usual section of reviews.

Continue reading →

Afro-Futurism. Arena Rap. The Self-Producer. Popular Music Research Day

Posted on by

Dear All,

Join us for an interactive Popular Music Studies Research Day with renowned speakers Laina Dawes, Steve Waksman and Paula Wolfe to discuss: what it means to be a black artist, the advent of arena rap, and the poetry of the recording studio.

Fugitive Ontology and Black Static: Afro-Pessimism vs. Afro-Futurism in Popular Music Laina Dawes: Columbia University. Author of What Are You Doing Here? A Black Woman’s Life and Liberation in Heavy Metal (Bazillion Points)

Rock, Rap, and Race in the U.S. Concert Industry Steve Waksman: Smith College. Author of Instruments of Desire: The Electric Guitar and the Shaping of Musical Experience (Harvard University Press) and This Ain’t the Summer of Love: Conflict and Crossover in Heavy Metal and Punk (University of California Press)

Songwriting, Music Production, Self-Production: Locating the Emotion, Maintaining the Objective, Positioning Genre Paula Wolfe: Author of Women in the studio: creativity, control and gender in popular music sound production (Routledge)

Time, place and registration

Tuesday 25 May 2021, 1-5 pm London time

Zoom (details on registration)

Register:

https://t.co/YMs7OxvFHX?amp=1

Publication: Gear Acquisition Syndrome – Consumption of Instruments and Technology in Popular Music

Posted on by

Dear IASPM-ites,

With apologies for cross-posting: Jonas Menze and I are pleased to be able to announce that our latest book, Gear Acquisition Syndrome – Consumption of Instruments and Technology in Popular Music, featuring a foreword by Steve Waksman, has been published today. Scholars interested in how musicians acquire, use, collect and regard musical equipment as part of their extended selves, essential for their music-making, may find it a stimulating and enjoyable read.

The book is available as a free, downloadable open access eBook here: https://unipress.hud.ac.uk/plugins/books/27/

Abstract:

Gear Acquisition Syndrome, also known as GAS, is commonly understood as the musicians’ unrelenting urge to buy and own instruments and equipment as an anticipated catalyst of creative energy and bringer of happiness. For many musicians, it involves the unavoidable compulsion to spend money one does not have on gear perhaps not even needed. The urge is directed by the belief that acquiring another instrument will make one a better player.

This book pioneers research into the complex phenomenon named GAS from a variety of disciplines, including popular music studies and music technology, cultural and leisure studies, consumption research, sociology, psychology and psychiatry. The newly created theoretical framework and empirical studies of online communities and offline music stores allow the study to consider musical, social and personal motives, which influence the way musicians think about and deal with equipment. As is shown, GAS encompasses a variety of practices and psychological processes. In an often life-long endeavour, upgrading the rig is accompanied by musical learning processes in popular music.

cfp: NCU IASPM 2021 Conference

Posted on by

Dear Friends, we would like to invite you to our conference: “Regional Experiences and External Influences: Reclaiming Identities by Popular Music in the Digital Era“. The event will take place on the 16-17th September 2021 in Toruń (Poland). The registration is open now! We will be waiting for your abstracts (approx. 500 words) until June 15.

The main objective of the conference is to exchange the experiences of studying popular music regional scenes. Such panorama tends to functionally and structurally reflect the specific and diversified character of cultural regionalism itself, including music and its social functions. We shall examine local popular music scenes in three varied but overlapping perspectives located mainly in the fields of musicology, sociology, anthropology, literary studies, cultural studies, political science, but we do not limit the academic areas of research. Thus, the experts of the enumerated fields covering the research on popular music are welcome.

Check out the full call for papers on our website https://bit.ly/3tnUnOR.

The event is organised by International Association for the Study of Popular Music and Nicolaus Copernicus University in Toruń.

Any questions? Ask us: iaspm2020torun@gmail.com.

We are looking forward for your submissions! 

IASPM-Norden Roundtable 4: The Future(s) of Popular Music Scholarship in the Nordic Region

Posted on by

IASPM-Norden Roundtable 4

The Future(s) of Popular Music Scholarship in the Nordic Region

April 24, 5:15pm?6:15pm, CET

Zoom-meeting link: https://uniarts.zoom.us/j/66450612073

Speakers:

Johannes Brusila

Nicola Dibben

Morten Michelsen

This roundtable seeks to continue discussion on the state and prospects of popular music scholarship in the Nordic region. It does so by focusing on the anticipated directions and trajectories within the field, whetherreactionary or progressive, and their socio-political foundations. What is likely to change in popular music scholarship and what is not; what are the possible and probable unifying tendencies and what in turn the divisive ones; what does the future hold for different generations of popular music scholars; and what might be decidedly Nordic in these developments? The Nordic branch of IASPM has assembled a roundtable of three experienced scholars to address these and similar issues. The roundtable will begin with short remarks from each of the invited speakers, leaving plenty of time for discussion.

This roundtable is the fourth in a series of online meetings, organized by IASPM-Norden, taking place over the course of the winter and spring 2021. The events will not be regular research presentations, but instead seek to start conversations that address pressing questions in Nordic popular music scholarship, pedagogy, cultural policy, and beyond.

Stay Underground? Punk in China, Indonesia and the Big Band: Inter-Asia Pop Online Workshop #7

Posted on by

We are pleased to host the seventh Inter-Asia Popular Music Studies Group (IAPMS or Inter-Asia Pop) Online Workshop. On Thursday, April 15, Dr. Jian Xiao will give a talk on punk in China and Indonesia.

The event is free. but you need to register in advance: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSeaOq-TcU6obMJAezrFK4JeQBuPKb8zLXYTsNAIw_xP_JlKjQ/viewform?usp=pp_url

We will send you a reminder with the instruction to the video conference twice: one day before and one hour before the event. Please find more detail below.

Continue reading →

Nominations for Election to IASPM Executive Committee positions

Posted on by

Dear IASPM Members,

The International Executive Committee would like to invite IASPM members to apply to stand as a member of the Executive Committee. If you would like to nominate someone to stand for a position, please email Beatriz Goubert Secretary@IASPM.net, who is copied in to this email. (Please do not press reply all, and reply to the whole list 😊).

Please discuss any nomination with the person involved before nominating them, if you are not self-nominating. We have had cases in the past where people have been nominated and are not willing to stand, which is not very helpful!

IASPM Executive Committee positions are all available for vote at the Biennial AGM, so you can be nominated for any position, whether or not the holder of the current position is standing again. IASPM Executive Committee positions include Chair, General Secretary, Membership Secretary, Treasurer, Web/Publications, and Member-at-large.

We are in particular seeking someone to stand as IASPM Treasurer, to handle our finances, as Simone Kruger is stepping down.

If you wish to nominate someone, please email Beatriz, the deadline for submission of nominations is 31 May 2021.

Voting will be take place electronically in advance of and at the start of the AGM, 12 Noon BST, 1 July 2021,  details will be sent out in due course.

Many thanks

Rupert Till

IASPM Research Seminar April 2021

Posted on by

Dear Colleagues,

The April 2021 Research Seminar will be arranged by IASPM’s Latin American Branch. You can get your free tickets here.

https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/iaspm-research-seminar-april-2021-popular-music-research-in-latin-america-tickets-149115272795

22th April 2021, Thursday

15:00 – Sao Paolo, Brazil / Chile

The event will be on Zoom, online, and can also be watched on IASPM’s YouTube page, streamed live. On this page you can also watch videos of previous seminars. https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCii1IhY4vnGskTwf3GUyhjQ

Continue reading →