Anno 2016/1-2
Rivista di Analisi e Teoria Musicale
Anno XXII n. 1-2, 2016
Do we need “popular music”? Critical perspectives from music studies
Abbiamo bisogno della “popular music”? Prospettive critiche dagli studi musicali
edited by / a cura di Alessandro Bratus
Indice
Alessandro Bratus, In che modo abbiamo bisogno della popular music? Riflessioni su interstizi e spazi disciplinari, in luogo di un’introduzione, pp. 7-32
John Covach, The Way We Were: Rethinking the Popular in a Flat World , pp. 33-46
Stefano La Via, La canzone d’autore come terreno d’incontro tra “colto e “popolare” (con annotazioni critiche su alcune tendenze della popular musicology), pp. 47-80
Timothy D. Taylor, The Hip, the Cool, and the Edgy, or the Dominant Cultural Logic, of Neoliberal Capitalism, pp. 81-102
Philippe Gonin, Popular or not Popular? The Late 1960s, Counterculture and the Avant-garde in “Rock Music”. The Example of Pink Floyd’s «Ummagumma», pp. 103-128
Dietrich Helms, Do We Need “populäre Musik”? A German Perspective, pp. 129-156
Vincenzo Caporaletti, Quali basi epistemologiche per una musicologia della popular music?, pp. 169-196
Max Paddison, Critical Reflections on the Concept of Popular Music, pp. 197-214
Notes on Contributors, pp. 225-226
Notizie sugli autori, pp. 227-228
In che modo abbiamo bisogno della popular music? Riflessioni su interstizi e spazi disciplinari, in luogo di un’introduzione
Abstract completo e PDFThe Way We Were: Rethinking the Popular in a Flat World
In the United States, the recent twenty years have seen the emergence of what might be defined as a “flat world” (Thomas L. Friedman) of musical styles – a reshaped cultural environment in which many listeners and scholars no longer view classical music as more sophisticated than other styles. The high brow/low brow distinction that once made the engagement with classical music a marker of cultural and intellectual superiority has been largely replaced by a sense that any style of music may be interesting and sophisticated in its own ways.
La canzone d’autore come terreno d’incontro tra “colto e “popolare” (con annotazioni critiche su alcune tendenze della popular musicology)
The study of the relationhips between verbal language and musical expression, if applied to the most various historical and cultural contexts, facilitates a critical- analytical and interdisciplinary-transversal approach, capable of seriously challenging the traditional dichotomy “art” / “popular” cultures (colto / popolare), as well as the most recent tendency – especially in Italy – to give different meanings to analogous terms such as popolare and popular. Such a transcultural approach emphasizes not only divergences, especially in terms of compositional technique and textual transmission, but also no less relevant concordances, concerning the basic principles of music-word interaction.
The Hip, the Cool, and the Edgy, or the Dominant Cultural Logic, of Neoliberal Capitalism
Fredric Jameson’s 1984 essay “Postmodernism, or, the Cultural Logic of Late Capitalism”, was an enormously influential work that offered a way of attempting to understand cultural production in the era of “late capitalism”. Jameson’s articulation of postmodernism as the “dominant cultural logic” was widely cited and employed, but ultimately waned through overuse of the term “postmodern”, and with that overuse came the disuse of Jameson’s ideas.
Popular or not Popular? The Late 1960s, Counterculture and the Avant-garde in “Rock Music”. The Example of Pink Floyd’s «Ummagumma»
From the USA (Frank Zappa, The Velvet Underground, The Grateful Dead) to the UK (AMM, Pink Floyd, The Beatles, Soft Machine), experimentation seemed to be one of the preoccupations of the pop “avant-garde” that arose in Anglo-American popular music at the end of the 1960s, under labels as diverse as progressive, art or psychedelic rock. In regard to the linguistic resources of experimental music, two major kinds of approaches (“symphonic temptation” and “experimental temptation”) can be distinguished.
Do We Need “populäre Musik”? A German Perspective
The question in the title of this special issue is hard to answer from a global perspective. Local scholarly and institutional traditions but also local definitions of the term “popular music” have a strong influence on our way of thought. This article discusses the conceptual history that is associated with the German “populäre Musik” in following it back to its origins in the 18th century and distinguishing it from equivalent expressions like Volksmusik, Unterhaltungsmusik, Gebrauchsmusik, Umgangsmusik, Trivialmusik and Popmusik.
Quali basi epistemologiche per una musicologia della popular music?
This article aims firstly to test the musicological resilience, and possibly probe the limits, of the epistemological field identified by the notion of “popular music” as an object of study. Starting with an examination of the nomothetic value of this formula, it will therefore discuss the conditions of feasibility of this field as an autonomous and distinct entity within the topology of musical experiences and systems. Secondly, it aims to explore the epistemic consistency and methodolog- ical effectiveness of the academic disciplines that are proposed as the privileged, if not exclusive, instruments of study of this field.
Critical Reflections on the Concept of Popular Music
Defining what is understood by the term “popular music” has always been problematic, and the term has tended to be used in a vague and indistinct way that can encompass a wide range of fundamentally different musics. This article examines attempts to define the concept of popular music, and considers the problems and debates they raise, drawing particularly on the extensive Anglo-American work that has been done in this area since the 1970s.
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