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The tale of princess Rāni Bhañiyāõi's suicide and subsequent appearance as a spirit has served as a foundational narrative for the practices of local, Muslim, mānganiār musicians, Hindu patrons, and Bhopa priests in Rajasthan. This chapter examines social practices surrounding drummers, the song genres associated with Rāni Bhañiyāõi, and the variants of her story that have significant local implications.

The mercantile business in the South has been in an upswing. The chapter details the experiences of a young “drummer” Arch Trawick and the opportunities that wholesale drummers had. Advertising was revolutionized accompanying corporate standardization leading to the earliest mass advertising campaigns in the country. Mail-order houses came on the scene and local Southerners became “much addicted to shopping by mail” as it offered autonomy and anonymity which were of high value to the poor as much as the lower prices. Purchases made by tenants were controlled by merchants or land owners. Modern merchandising and advertising found its way in to every aspect of Southern life. Cooking and food preparation was revolutionized during this time and the invention of Coca-Cola can be traced back to the growing network of Southern stores. Textile production and the timber industry triggered economic change in the New South.

Many discussions of biological motion perception involve a description of observers’ attunements for recognizing gender, emotion, action, and identity from point-light displays. This chapter describes an often-neglected determinant of biological motion perception: the role of expertise. First, the authors describe how variability among observers is essential for developing a comprehensive theory of biological motion perception. Then, they describe how the distributed network of brain areas devoted to biological motion perception provides an opportunity for this brain network to be applied to new tasks and environments.

This chapter examines the life and career of batá drummer Pancho Quinto, with a focus on illustrating and contextualizing his unique style as an iyá player and teacher. At the time of his death in 2005 at age 71, Pancho was one of the oldest batá masters in Cuba. He was a teacher to legions of Cuban drummers and likely taught more non-Cubans than any other master. Pancho was a world-renowned recording artist, particularly as a rumbero, and was widely regarded as an innovator, especially within the style of rumba known as guarapachangueo.

This chapter focuses on the ‘Drummer of Tedworth’. This was a notorious poltergeist case that occurred in Wiltshire in the early 1660s that has already been noted in connection with Glanvill's role in relation to it. This is a case study which is initially revealing of commonplace attitudes towards witchcraft and related phenomena in the period. Thereafter, the chapter brings out the complexity of the way in which opinion on such subjects developed. These range from the debate between Glanvill and the ‘wits’ that occurred in the 1660s and 1670s and which throws further light on the nature of sadducism, to an ongoing debate as to whether the case was fraudulent, which lasted much longer.

The most visible of the 1930's drummers, Gene Krupa, had a major effect on his colleagues. The Krupa “look”, his ideas and techniques and showmanship, were dominant during that time. Krupa brought high-level discipline and energy and a whole array of new challenges to drumming. In the 1930s, while defining and formalizing a traditional swing vocabulary for drums, Krupa moved the drummer into the foreground. A technically advanced, exciting player, he had a lot to do with making the drum solo not only acceptable but musically and commercially viable. Drums consumed him; he often said that sticks were seldom out of his hands during waking hours when he first began to play, or later, when he studied with Sanford “Gus” Moeller. Krupa always made that extra effort to play better, more easily, and more creatively.

The development of percussion of Afro-Cuban origin in Latin jazz and other U.S. music such as pop and funk after 1950 depends on the presence of several percussionists in addition to Mongo Santamaría. Among several important Cuban drummers, four stand out. This chapter recounts the percussion exploits of these four individuals who, together with Mongo, laid the rhythmic basis for the growth and development of Latin jazz between 1950 and 1990: Armando Peraza; Patato Valdés; Francisco Aguabella; and Cándido Camero. Each of them possesses very distinct and personal characteristics as a drummer, and all reached their pinnacle of success and visibility in different ways, in different U.S. cities, and, to a certain extent, in different periods. Taken together, these individuals provided a sound foundation for the continued expansion of that hybrid of hybrids, Latin jazz.

This chapter examines how ritual drummers fit into the larger sociocultural world of music making in South and West Asia. The Shiʻi wedding Muharram Ali attended in Lahore is an example of a ritual sequence with contrasting emotional overtones. The idea that individuals relate to elements in the ways that music might structure other such events and sequences raises the problem of reception. Before discussing how we understand musical meaning in complex events, the chapter situates the musical actors in the sociocultural structures and institutions of South and West Asia. It then considers the role of the individual in religious or other events that diverse populations attend and participate in, as well as the ways actors in such complex events bring forth emotionally coded musical components that themselves have a differential impact on participants' emotional conditions. It shows that the very performance of emotive acts such as music, recitation, sermons, and certain kinds of bodily practice have an effect on those who are collectively making that statement.

Begins with George Hoffstaler who joined (1778) a North Carolina regiment, and received a bounty. It gives a striking account of his suffering, and discusses in detail the usefulness and limitations of boys as soldiers. It explains the objections that American and European officers had to boys’ service. That service in European armies, as well as American, is discussed in detail, and includes much on the various roles played by boys (fifers, drummers, etc.)

Chapter 3 examines the pedagogical approaches of ensemble instructors who belong to three categories: (1) former master drummers of a West African national dance ensemble, (2) Africans who have pursued or are pursuing a graduate degree in American universities, and (3) American ethnomusicologists who studied West African ethnic dance drumming traditions in Africa, probing the possible influences of their trainings on their teaching approaches. Also, the chapter includes some semantics into “master drummer,” “mother drummer,” and “lead drummer,” three labels often used in qualifying these directors. Pedagogical issues include teaching dance drumming as an integrated art, oral-aural-visual styles of learning, representing African music in the American classroom, germane to the “authenticity” debate, and the use of solely African or American approaches, or a combination of the preceding as dictated by contextual needs. Chapter 3 also explores the practice of the options of teaching multiple or limited dances within a semester.

Sue Chancellor saw her childhood world literally blown apart when the armies collided around her family's home in early May 1863. This chapter uses the experiences at Chancellorsville of this fourteen-year-old girl and a Union drummer boy named Robert as points of departure to investigate the meaning of the battle and the war for children on both sides. A number of themes emerge, including the greater impact of the war on southern white children than on their northern counterparts; the ways in which adults sought to mold young people's understanding of the conflict; and the indelible nature of children's wartime memories.

This introductory chapter discusses the themes central to the book, which aims to provide a rich understanding of the many variables at work during live Lucumí performances. It presents some of the author’s own experiences with batá and with the Añá community. The chapter then describes the aesthetics of the four- to six-hour toque de santo; ethnomusicological studies of Lucumí music; the two distinct contexts in which Lucumí music flourishes: sacred and secular; and the batá in contemporary Cuba, United States, Mexico, and worldwide.

This chapter first discusses Lucumí beliefs; instruments of the Lucumí religion; and the structure of a toque de santo and the role of money. Batá drumming events were organized around a concept coined “thematic acts,” a model in which various performer-defined themes of action, each with an independent purpose, develop concurrently. The chapter describes these thematic acts, including the state of fiesta, song competitions and drumming competitions, student/teacher exchanges, orisha possession, and salutations. Interviews with batá drummers are also provided.

The evolution of ñongo over the past two decades has reached a point where many elder Cuban drummers become disoriented when they try to understand the performance style of the younger generations. The difficulty in analyzing a rapidly evolving genre lies in distinguishing between incremental evolution and a fundamental break, which would signify the birth of a new genre. This chapter examines the emergence of the “modern style” of ñongo. It argues that though the modern style serves exactly the same ritual function as the more traditional style, this version is actually a new and distinct, albeit related, genre.