Larry Hamberlin
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- January 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780195338928
- eISBN:
- 9780199855865
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195338928.003.0006
- Subject:
- Music, Opera, Popular
Of all operatic characters, the most influential on American popular culture was Cho-Cho-San, the title character of Giacomo Puccini's Madama Butterfly. This chapter surveys the large repertoire of ...
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Of all operatic characters, the most influential on American popular culture was Cho-Cho-San, the title character of Giacomo Puccini's Madama Butterfly. This chapter surveys the large repertoire of Butterfly songs, which, like the opera, allegorize the United States' flexing of imperialistic muscle in the Far East as a love story between a powerful American man and a powerless Japanese woman. Unlike the opera, these popular songs, of which “Poor Butterfly” emerges as the most important, explore a wide range of alternative readings of that allegory, from validating Pinkerton as hero, not villain, to empowering Cho-Cho-San.Less
Of all operatic characters, the most influential on American popular culture was Cho-Cho-San, the title character of Giacomo Puccini's Madama Butterfly. This chapter surveys the large repertoire of Butterfly songs, which, like the opera, allegorize the United States' flexing of imperialistic muscle in the Far East as a love story between a powerful American man and a powerless Japanese woman. Unlike the opera, these popular songs, of which “Poor Butterfly” emerges as the most important, explore a wide range of alternative readings of that allegory, from validating Pinkerton as hero, not villain, to empowering Cho-Cho-San.
Derek B. Scott
- Published in print:
- 2003
- Published Online:
- May 2008
- ISBN:
- 9780195151961
- eISBN:
- 9780199870394
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195151961.003.0004
- Subject:
- Music, Theory, Analysis, Composition
This chapter focuses on representations of the American Indian in popular styles of Western music from the 18th century to the present. The intention is to show how cultural difference is ...
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This chapter focuses on representations of the American Indian in popular styles of Western music from the 18th century to the present. The intention is to show how cultural difference is represented, when little is known or understood about the culture of those being represented, and to consider how shifting perceptions of the Native American can be related to changes in attitude to the “civilized” and the natural world. The emphasis on the popular sharpens the argument, because this kind of representation needs to be widely understood and easily assimilated in order for it to be popular. The ideology embedded in way the American Indian is represented tells us, predictably, about the attitudes of the person who stands outside Native American culture.Less
This chapter focuses on representations of the American Indian in popular styles of Western music from the 18th century to the present. The intention is to show how cultural difference is represented, when little is known or understood about the culture of those being represented, and to consider how shifting perceptions of the Native American can be related to changes in attitude to the “civilized” and the natural world. The emphasis on the popular sharpens the argument, because this kind of representation needs to be widely understood and easily assimilated in order for it to be popular. The ideology embedded in way the American Indian is represented tells us, predictably, about the attitudes of the person who stands outside Native American culture.
Jim Lovensheimer
- Published in print:
- 2010
- Published Online:
- September 2010
- ISBN:
- 9780195377026
- eISBN:
- 9780199864560
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195377026.003.0007
- Subject:
- Music, Popular, History, American
From its opening scene, South Pacific presents problematic images of colonialism that indicate a Western cultural hegemony over the indigenous island peoples and suggests the subsequent influence of ...
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From its opening scene, South Pacific presents problematic images of colonialism that indicate a Western cultural hegemony over the indigenous island peoples and suggests the subsequent influence of postwar capitalism in the region. The character of Bloody Mary simultaneously represents an attempt at assimilation and a carefully enforced outsider status. Although her economic acumen gives Mary a degree of power within the imposed culture, her ethnic difference prevents her assimilation into it. This friction plays an important role in the subplot of Mary, her daughter, and Joe Cable, who cannot reconcile himself to loving an Other. Further, this chapter examines Nellie’s presence at the end of the play as an indicator of the increased postwar American presence in the South Pacific and reinforces a discussion of Nellie as an autonomous character with more power, cultural as well as emotional, than she is generally credited for. The chapter concludes with a discussion of the cultural power of popular song and how popular song topics pervade the musical.Less
From its opening scene, South Pacific presents problematic images of colonialism that indicate a Western cultural hegemony over the indigenous island peoples and suggests the subsequent influence of postwar capitalism in the region. The character of Bloody Mary simultaneously represents an attempt at assimilation and a carefully enforced outsider status. Although her economic acumen gives Mary a degree of power within the imposed culture, her ethnic difference prevents her assimilation into it. This friction plays an important role in the subplot of Mary, her daughter, and Joe Cable, who cannot reconcile himself to loving an Other. Further, this chapter examines Nellie’s presence at the end of the play as an indicator of the increased postwar American presence in the South Pacific and reinforces a discussion of Nellie as an autonomous character with more power, cultural as well as emotional, than she is generally credited for. The chapter concludes with a discussion of the cultural power of popular song and how popular song topics pervade the musical.
Susan Rutherford
- Published in print:
- 2019
- Published Online:
- September 2020
- ISBN:
- 9780226670188
- eISBN:
- 9780226670218
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Chicago Press
- DOI:
- 10.7208/chicago/9780226670218.003.0011
- Subject:
- Music, History, Western
The conflict between ideas of authenticity and commercialism features heavily in current discourses on contemporary popular music, but similar tensions can be identified much earlier. This chapter ...
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The conflict between ideas of authenticity and commercialism features heavily in current discourses on contemporary popular music, but similar tensions can be identified much earlier. This chapter considers the case of the baritone and composer Henry Russell, one of the most prominent and charismatic "London voices" of the mid-nineteenth century in Britain and the United States. An early exemplar of the solo recitalist, Russell combined both music and rich seams of anecdote in his self-accompanied performances. His popular appeal lay in his distinctive, declamatory singing style (adept at bringing life to either a thrilling descriptive scena or a sentimental ballad), and his catchy melodies with their settings of lyrics by poets aligned with radical political movements such as Charles Mackay and Eliza Cook. Dubbed by the press as the “singer for the million” during the peak of Chartism in 1848, Russell illustrates the complexity of notions of authenticity: not simply in personal terms as a Jew who for most of his career obscured his ethnicity, but also the ways in which his voice and songs both sincerely articulated the needs of the oppressed and served to contain social unrest.Less
The conflict between ideas of authenticity and commercialism features heavily in current discourses on contemporary popular music, but similar tensions can be identified much earlier. This chapter considers the case of the baritone and composer Henry Russell, one of the most prominent and charismatic "London voices" of the mid-nineteenth century in Britain and the United States. An early exemplar of the solo recitalist, Russell combined both music and rich seams of anecdote in his self-accompanied performances. His popular appeal lay in his distinctive, declamatory singing style (adept at bringing life to either a thrilling descriptive scena or a sentimental ballad), and his catchy melodies with their settings of lyrics by poets aligned with radical political movements such as Charles Mackay and Eliza Cook. Dubbed by the press as the “singer for the million” during the peak of Chartism in 1848, Russell illustrates the complexity of notions of authenticity: not simply in personal terms as a Jew who for most of his career obscured his ethnicity, but also the ways in which his voice and songs both sincerely articulated the needs of the oppressed and served to contain social unrest.
Xueping Zhong
- Published in print:
- 2010
- Published Online:
- November 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780824834173
- eISBN:
- 9780824870010
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Hawai'i Press
- DOI:
- 10.21313/hawaii/9780824834173.003.0007
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Asian Studies
This chapter focuses songs, especially their lyrics, composed for television dramas. In an age when poetry reading has become a marginalized activity, popular songs, including those composed for ...
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This chapter focuses songs, especially their lyrics, composed for television dramas. In an age when poetry reading has become a marginalized activity, popular songs, including those composed for television dramas, have become (popular) poetics of the age.Together with the exponential increase in the production of television dramas in the last three decades, the bulk of songs composed for them has also accumulated into a phenomenon of its own. Some of them have become part of the regular repertoire of popular music, often heard independent of their original dramas. As part of television drama and popular culture, their musically conveyed expression manifests a range of sentiments, indeed the pathos of the age. As such, they offer another point of entry into understanding contemporary Chinese mainstream culture and the social and ideological implications within it.Less
This chapter focuses songs, especially their lyrics, composed for television dramas. In an age when poetry reading has become a marginalized activity, popular songs, including those composed for television dramas, have become (popular) poetics of the age.Together with the exponential increase in the production of television dramas in the last three decades, the bulk of songs composed for them has also accumulated into a phenomenon of its own. Some of them have become part of the regular repertoire of popular music, often heard independent of their original dramas. As part of television drama and popular culture, their musically conveyed expression manifests a range of sentiments, indeed the pathos of the age. As such, they offer another point of entry into understanding contemporary Chinese mainstream culture and the social and ideological implications within it.
Clive Scott
- Published in print:
- 1990
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780198151593
- eISBN:
- 9780191672750
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198151593.003.0003
- Subject:
- Literature, European Literature, Poetry
This chapter focuses on the history of poetry, its origin, and contexts. In this chapter, analysis centres on the invention of free verse and its evolution and developments. What features made 1886 ...
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This chapter focuses on the history of poetry, its origin, and contexts. In this chapter, analysis centres on the invention of free verse and its evolution and developments. What features made 1886 peculiarly the year in which free verse should emerge? Speculations on this subject lead to a catalogue of the first published examples of free verse as they appeared in literary journals, the primary of which is the La Vogue. The chapter also provides survey of the contributions made by vers libéré, vers libres classiques, popular song, translations of Whitman, and the prose poem to the emergence of free verse.Less
This chapter focuses on the history of poetry, its origin, and contexts. In this chapter, analysis centres on the invention of free verse and its evolution and developments. What features made 1886 peculiarly the year in which free verse should emerge? Speculations on this subject lead to a catalogue of the first published examples of free verse as they appeared in literary journals, the primary of which is the La Vogue. The chapter also provides survey of the contributions made by vers libéré, vers libres classiques, popular song, translations of Whitman, and the prose poem to the emergence of free verse.
David Brackett
- Published in print:
- 2000
- Published Online:
- May 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780520225411
- eISBN:
- 9780520925700
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of California Press
- DOI:
- 10.1525/california/9780520225411.003.0006
- Subject:
- Music, History, American
This chapter focuses on XTC's 1989 recording The Mayor of Simpleton. It analyzes this song in relation to the tension between academic discourse and the constitution of the popular song as an object ...
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This chapter focuses on XTC's 1989 recording The Mayor of Simpleton. It analyzes this song in relation to the tension between academic discourse and the constitution of the popular song as an object of study. It suggests that the lyrics of this song shows that even among the brainiest pop musicians, it is clearly undesirable to display one's analytical tendencies. It also highlights the conflict between the discourse of musicology and the interpretation of popular music.Less
This chapter focuses on XTC's 1989 recording The Mayor of Simpleton. It analyzes this song in relation to the tension between academic discourse and the constitution of the popular song as an object of study. It suggests that the lyrics of this song shows that even among the brainiest pop musicians, it is clearly undesirable to display one's analytical tendencies. It also highlights the conflict between the discourse of musicology and the interpretation of popular music.
Katherine Spring
- Published in print:
- 2013
- Published Online:
- January 2014
- ISBN:
- 9780199842216
- eISBN:
- 9780199369584
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199842216.003.0004
- Subject:
- Music, Popular, History, Western
Chapter 3 shows how Hollywood's earliest sound films adapted conventions of the musical stage in order to privilege the discrete presentation of songs over norms of narrative coherence. Through the ...
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Chapter 3 shows how Hollywood's earliest sound films adapted conventions of the musical stage in order to privilege the discrete presentation of songs over norms of narrative coherence. Through the 1910s and 1920s, vaudeville and Broadway shows featured live star vocalists who presented songs as accentuated, discrete moments of performance within narrative contexts, and whose repeated song presentations across a given show resulted in the vocalists becoming associated with particular songs. The “star-song attraction” translated into contemporaneous studio advertisements and was bolstered by the cross-promotion of motion picture songs with sheet music, phonograph records, and radio. It also was made manifest by early sound films whose narratives were engineered in ways that highlighted discrete, modular units of song performance. Extended analyses of Applause (1929) and Weary River (1929) demonstrate how such films could capitalize on the cachet of (allegedly) singing stars: Helen Morgan in Applause, and Richard Barthelmess in Weary River.Less
Chapter 3 shows how Hollywood's earliest sound films adapted conventions of the musical stage in order to privilege the discrete presentation of songs over norms of narrative coherence. Through the 1910s and 1920s, vaudeville and Broadway shows featured live star vocalists who presented songs as accentuated, discrete moments of performance within narrative contexts, and whose repeated song presentations across a given show resulted in the vocalists becoming associated with particular songs. The “star-song attraction” translated into contemporaneous studio advertisements and was bolstered by the cross-promotion of motion picture songs with sheet music, phonograph records, and radio. It also was made manifest by early sound films whose narratives were engineered in ways that highlighted discrete, modular units of song performance. Extended analyses of Applause (1929) and Weary River (1929) demonstrate how such films could capitalize on the cachet of (allegedly) singing stars: Helen Morgan in Applause, and Richard Barthelmess in Weary River.
Clarence Bernard Henry
- Published in print:
- 2008
- Published Online:
- March 2014
- ISBN:
- 9781604730821
- eISBN:
- 9781604733341
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University Press of Mississippi
- DOI:
- 10.14325/mississippi/9781604730821.003.0004
- Subject:
- Music, Ethnomusicology, World Music
This chapter examines the appropriation of sacred themes, imagery, and symbols from the Candomblé religion in Brazilian popular music, analyzes the sacred/secular connection of Brazilian samba, and ...
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This chapter examines the appropriation of sacred themes, imagery, and symbols from the Candomblé religion in Brazilian popular music, analyzes the sacred/secular connection of Brazilian samba, and describes the iconic images and inspirations for popular songs from the axé music of the Orixás. It also suggests that the appropriations of axé, African roots, sacred themes, imagery, and symbols from the andomblé religion in Brazilian popular music correspond to black expressions of religiosity embedded in popular styles such as soul, reggae, jazz, Afro- Beat, and many others.Less
This chapter examines the appropriation of sacred themes, imagery, and symbols from the Candomblé religion in Brazilian popular music, analyzes the sacred/secular connection of Brazilian samba, and describes the iconic images and inspirations for popular songs from the axé music of the Orixás. It also suggests that the appropriations of axé, African roots, sacred themes, imagery, and symbols from the andomblé religion in Brazilian popular music correspond to black expressions of religiosity embedded in popular styles such as soul, reggae, jazz, Afro- Beat, and many others.
Eric Drott
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- May 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780520268968
- eISBN:
- 9780520950085
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of California Press
- DOI:
- 10.1525/california/9780520268968.003.0003
- Subject:
- Music, History, Western
The uses ascribed to music during May and the après-mai period varied not only across musical and political formations, but also from one musical genre to another. This chapter examines this topic in ...
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The uses ascribed to music during May and the après-mai period varied not only across musical and political formations, but also from one musical genre to another. This chapter examines this topic in detail and provides a framework for understanding how genre mediates political expression. The norms, ideologies, and discourses that govern different genres play a decisive role in determining what can or cannot be said through music, what uses a song can or cannot afford. Of particular importance is the correlation of genre and identity, inasmuch as the political agency imputed to a given social group conditions what functions will be attributed to the music(s) associated with this group. To flesh out this thesis, the chapter examines how the events of May were represented in different types of popular song. By examining songs drawn from the genres of the literary chanson (Léo Ferré's “L'été 68”), the revolutionary chanson (Dominique Grange's “Les nouveaux partisans”), and contemporary French pop music (Evariste's “La révolution”), it is shown how the conventions governing subject matter, rhetoric, imagery, and musical style in each influenced their depictions of May '68.Less
The uses ascribed to music during May and the après-mai period varied not only across musical and political formations, but also from one musical genre to another. This chapter examines this topic in detail and provides a framework for understanding how genre mediates political expression. The norms, ideologies, and discourses that govern different genres play a decisive role in determining what can or cannot be said through music, what uses a song can or cannot afford. Of particular importance is the correlation of genre and identity, inasmuch as the political agency imputed to a given social group conditions what functions will be attributed to the music(s) associated with this group. To flesh out this thesis, the chapter examines how the events of May were represented in different types of popular song. By examining songs drawn from the genres of the literary chanson (Léo Ferré's “L'été 68”), the revolutionary chanson (Dominique Grange's “Les nouveaux partisans”), and contemporary French pop music (Evariste's “La révolution”), it is shown how the conventions governing subject matter, rhetoric, imagery, and musical style in each influenced their depictions of May '68.
Katherine Spring
- Published in print:
- 2013
- Published Online:
- January 2014
- ISBN:
- 9780199842216
- eISBN:
- 9780199369584
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199842216.003.0006
- Subject:
- Music, Popular, History, Western
Chapter 5 accounts for the emergence of the plausible integration of songs, an approach that developed in tandem with the diminished use of the popular song and the rise of the orchestral background ...
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Chapter 5 accounts for the emergence of the plausible integration of songs, an approach that developed in tandem with the diminished use of the popular song and the rise of the orchestral background film score. The chapter recounts the debates in the trade press over the perceived problem that the motion picture song posed: songs threatened narrative coherence and continuity. As the vogue for motion picture songs diminished, the studios cut their branch publishing offices, reduced the staffs of music departments, and employed in-house composers who attempted to cultivate a musical aesthetic based on the Romantic traditions of orchestral scoring. Case studies of In Old Arizona (1929) and Safe in Hell (1931) illustrate some of the practices enacted for the plausible incorporation of songs. These analyses also reveal the use of intermittent scoring that is typically associated with the classical Hollywood film score in subsequent years.Less
Chapter 5 accounts for the emergence of the plausible integration of songs, an approach that developed in tandem with the diminished use of the popular song and the rise of the orchestral background film score. The chapter recounts the debates in the trade press over the perceived problem that the motion picture song posed: songs threatened narrative coherence and continuity. As the vogue for motion picture songs diminished, the studios cut their branch publishing offices, reduced the staffs of music departments, and employed in-house composers who attempted to cultivate a musical aesthetic based on the Romantic traditions of orchestral scoring. Case studies of In Old Arizona (1929) and Safe in Hell (1931) illustrate some of the practices enacted for the plausible incorporation of songs. These analyses also reveal the use of intermittent scoring that is typically associated with the classical Hollywood film score in subsequent years.
Thomas Christensen
- Published in print:
- 2019
- Published Online:
- January 2020
- ISBN:
- 9780226626925
- eISBN:
- 9780226627083
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Chicago Press
- DOI:
- 10.7208/chicago/9780226627083.003.0005
- Subject:
- Music, History, Western
A complicating factor in Fetis's theory of tonality was the repertoire of popular folk songs (the chansons populaires) that collectors were beginning to transcribe and publish in various anthologies ...
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A complicating factor in Fetis's theory of tonality was the repertoire of popular folk songs (the chansons populaires) that collectors were beginning to transcribe and publish in various anthologies throughout the nineteenth century. In this Chapter we see how some of these song catchers insisted that many of their songs, particularly those from the more remote provinces of France such as Brittany, seemed to be based on differing scale systems, some of which suggested modal origins that could be traced to the Middle Ages, or perhaps even earlier to the Greeks. But the picture was not clear. Some of the oldest of the popular songs sounded to many ears as if they were in simple major or minor keys. This evidence suggested that tonality might have roots in vernacular traditions, although a number of church musicians continued to insist that the modal system of the church represented the true, authentic musical language of the people.Less
A complicating factor in Fetis's theory of tonality was the repertoire of popular folk songs (the chansons populaires) that collectors were beginning to transcribe and publish in various anthologies throughout the nineteenth century. In this Chapter we see how some of these song catchers insisted that many of their songs, particularly those from the more remote provinces of France such as Brittany, seemed to be based on differing scale systems, some of which suggested modal origins that could be traced to the Middle Ages, or perhaps even earlier to the Greeks. But the picture was not clear. Some of the oldest of the popular songs sounded to many ears as if they were in simple major or minor keys. This evidence suggested that tonality might have roots in vernacular traditions, although a number of church musicians continued to insist that the modal system of the church represented the true, authentic musical language of the people.
Katherine Spring
- Published in print:
- 2013
- Published Online:
- January 2014
- ISBN:
- 9780199842216
- eISBN:
- 9780199369584
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199842216.003.0005
- Subject:
- Music, Popular, History, Western
Chapter 4 delineates theme songs and incidental songs, and explains how each type of song functioned in dramatically conventional ways: for example, to unify disparate narrative events and ...
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Chapter 4 delineates theme songs and incidental songs, and explains how each type of song functioned in dramatically conventional ways: for example, to unify disparate narrative events and characters, to establish geographic and temporal settings, and to convey through lyrics the emotions absent in character dialogue. Whereas films belonging to the musical genre could justify the intrusive appearance of song performances by recourse to audience expectations about Broadway stage musicals, non-musical films motivated star-song performances in narratively cumbersome ways. Analyses of the “strained integration” of songs in two films —Check and Double Check (RKO, 1930) and Possessed (MGM, 1931)—shows how star-song performances were sometimes justified by comparatively weaker means, and thus resulted in narrative disruption rather than coherence. In these cases, the careful motivation of songs called attention to precisely what the classical film sought to efface: the construction of narrative.Less
Chapter 4 delineates theme songs and incidental songs, and explains how each type of song functioned in dramatically conventional ways: for example, to unify disparate narrative events and characters, to establish geographic and temporal settings, and to convey through lyrics the emotions absent in character dialogue. Whereas films belonging to the musical genre could justify the intrusive appearance of song performances by recourse to audience expectations about Broadway stage musicals, non-musical films motivated star-song performances in narratively cumbersome ways. Analyses of the “strained integration” of songs in two films —Check and Double Check (RKO, 1930) and Possessed (MGM, 1931)—shows how star-song performances were sometimes justified by comparatively weaker means, and thus resulted in narrative disruption rather than coherence. In these cases, the careful motivation of songs called attention to precisely what the classical film sought to efface: the construction of narrative.
Roger Parker and Susan Rutherford (eds)
- Published in print:
- 2019
- Published Online:
- September 2020
- ISBN:
- 9780226670188
- eISBN:
- 9780226670218
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of Chicago Press
- DOI:
- 10.7208/chicago/9780226670218.001.0001
- Subject:
- Music, History, Western
Samuel Leigh’s New Picture of London (1839) promised its readers a way of making sense of the English capital at a time when it was, through expansion and diversification, becoming ever more ...
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Samuel Leigh’s New Picture of London (1839) promised its readers a way of making sense of the English capital at a time when it was, through expansion and diversification, becoming ever more bewildering to its inhabitants. We argue that one important way of coming to terms with the implications of that diversity is to consider London through the medium of voice: the speaking, shouting, singing, preaching, groaning, sighing, even sobbing voices—singly, or in concert, or in imagined representations—that sounded through the city during two tumultuous decades in the first half of the nineteenth century. Our volume begins on London’s street with itinerant balladeers and organ boys and ends with scientific experiments on acoustics, including en route essays on domestic singing, amateur choral societies, elite opera houses, popular performers, religious orators, and on the perception of voice in some key literary works of the period.Less
Samuel Leigh’s New Picture of London (1839) promised its readers a way of making sense of the English capital at a time when it was, through expansion and diversification, becoming ever more bewildering to its inhabitants. We argue that one important way of coming to terms with the implications of that diversity is to consider London through the medium of voice: the speaking, shouting, singing, preaching, groaning, sighing, even sobbing voices—singly, or in concert, or in imagined representations—that sounded through the city during two tumultuous decades in the first half of the nineteenth century. Our volume begins on London’s street with itinerant balladeers and organ boys and ends with scientific experiments on acoustics, including en route essays on domestic singing, amateur choral societies, elite opera houses, popular performers, religious orators, and on the perception of voice in some key literary works of the period.
Larry Kart
- Published in print:
- 2004
- Published Online:
- October 2013
- ISBN:
- 9780300104202
- eISBN:
- 9780300128192
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Yale University Press
- DOI:
- 10.12987/yale/9780300104202.003.0009
- Subject:
- Music, Theory, Analysis, Composition
This chapter focuses on and discusses the relationship between jazz and pre-rock 'n' roll American popular songs. For a good deal of jazz's history the majority of its harmonic and structural ...
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This chapter focuses on and discusses the relationship between jazz and pre-rock 'n' roll American popular songs. For a good deal of jazz's history the majority of its harmonic and structural frameworks were taken or borrowed from American popular songs—though “taken” and “borrowed” may imply that there was a distance between jazz and Tin Pan Alley when instead it was more a matter of difference than distance, and a difference that at times was not easy to detect. Furthermore, jazz's musical habits and its emotional atmosphere had a significant influence on the emotional tone, rhythmic traits, and melodic and harmonic flavor of a great many American popular songs—the very same songs that jazz musicians often would immediately put to fervent use.Less
This chapter focuses on and discusses the relationship between jazz and pre-rock 'n' roll American popular songs. For a good deal of jazz's history the majority of its harmonic and structural frameworks were taken or borrowed from American popular songs—though “taken” and “borrowed” may imply that there was a distance between jazz and Tin Pan Alley when instead it was more a matter of difference than distance, and a difference that at times was not easy to detect. Furthermore, jazz's musical habits and its emotional atmosphere had a significant influence on the emotional tone, rhythmic traits, and melodic and harmonic flavor of a great many American popular songs—the very same songs that jazz musicians often would immediately put to fervent use.
Ian Christie
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- January 2013
- ISBN:
- 9780199797615
- eISBN:
- 9780199979738
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199797615.003.0006
- Subject:
- Music, Popular, History, Western
This chapter explores film exhibition in the 1890s and 1900s in light of evidence for the musical accompaniment of forms of screen media produced in London from the seventeenth to the nineteenth ...
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This chapter explores film exhibition in the 1890s and 1900s in light of evidence for the musical accompaniment of forms of screen media produced in London from the seventeenth to the nineteenth centuries. Early films are also considered in terms of remediation, such as the emergence of films inspired by popular song titles at the turn of the century, and the fact that popular songs formed the principal content for the various synchronized sound systems developed in the 1900s. This chapter thus provides historical evidence that in London music would likely have been used to accompany early film exhibition from the inception of the medium.Less
This chapter explores film exhibition in the 1890s and 1900s in light of evidence for the musical accompaniment of forms of screen media produced in London from the seventeenth to the nineteenth centuries. Early films are also considered in terms of remediation, such as the emergence of films inspired by popular song titles at the turn of the century, and the fact that popular songs formed the principal content for the various synchronized sound systems developed in the 1900s. This chapter thus provides historical evidence that in London music would likely have been used to accompany early film exhibition from the inception of the medium.
Philip Lambert
- Published in print:
- 2013
- Published Online:
- April 2017
- ISBN:
- 9780252037603
- eISBN:
- 9780252094842
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Illinois Press
- DOI:
- 10.5406/illinois/9780252037603.003.0005
- Subject:
- Music, History, American
This chapter focuses on Wilder's last decade. His catalog of original compositions for instrumental groups, large and small, continued to grow, as did his collection of distinguished contributions to ...
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This chapter focuses on Wilder's last decade. His catalog of original compositions for instrumental groups, large and small, continued to grow, as did his collection of distinguished contributions to the popular-song genre. His interest in writing for the stage persisted as well. Still more pivotal was a new attitude of reflection and historical contemplation, both personal and professional, and a commitment to preserve his thoughts for posterity. He had always been a writer, but his yield had often been restricted by the dimensions of a postcard or a page of hotel stationery. In the early 1970s, he began to expand his literary medium and his scope in the direction of a comprehensive memoir. He found that he had a lot of stories to tell and insights to share, not only about himself but also about the music that stood at the core of his artistic consciousness.Less
This chapter focuses on Wilder's last decade. His catalog of original compositions for instrumental groups, large and small, continued to grow, as did his collection of distinguished contributions to the popular-song genre. His interest in writing for the stage persisted as well. Still more pivotal was a new attitude of reflection and historical contemplation, both personal and professional, and a commitment to preserve his thoughts for posterity. He had always been a writer, but his yield had often been restricted by the dimensions of a postcard or a page of hotel stationery. In the early 1970s, he began to expand his literary medium and his scope in the direction of a comprehensive memoir. He found that he had a lot of stories to tell and insights to share, not only about himself but also about the music that stood at the core of his artistic consciousness.
Laurence Coupe
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- July 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780719071126
- eISBN:
- 9781781702079
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Manchester University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7228/manchester/9780719071126.003.0007
- Subject:
- Literature, 20th-century and Contemporary Literature
This chapter reviews the lessons on the ‘Beat’ – or ‘beatific’ – vision that was discussed in the previous chapters. It examines the relationship between the fifties writers and the sixties ...
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This chapter reviews the lessons on the ‘Beat’ – or ‘beatific’ – vision that was discussed in the previous chapters. It examines the relationship between the fifties writers and the sixties songwriters, emphasising the power of popular song to make complex religious philosophies accessible and to make the spiritual dimension of existence seem immediate. The chapter also discusses the tensions that existed within the Beatles and Bob Dylan.Less
This chapter reviews the lessons on the ‘Beat’ – or ‘beatific’ – vision that was discussed in the previous chapters. It examines the relationship between the fifties writers and the sixties songwriters, emphasising the power of popular song to make complex religious philosophies accessible and to make the spiritual dimension of existence seem immediate. The chapter also discusses the tensions that existed within the Beatles and Bob Dylan.
Philip Lambert
- Published in print:
- 2013
- Published Online:
- April 2017
- ISBN:
- 9780252037603
- eISBN:
- 9780252094842
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of Illinois Press
- DOI:
- 10.5406/illinois/9780252037603.001.0001
- Subject:
- Music, History, American
The music of Alec Wilder (1907–1980) blends several American musical traditions, such as jazz and the American popular song, with classical European forms and techniques. Stylish and accessible, ...
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The music of Alec Wilder (1907–1980) blends several American musical traditions, such as jazz and the American popular song, with classical European forms and techniques. Stylish and accessible, Wilder's musical oeuvre ranged from sonatas, suites, concertos, operas, ballets, and art songs to woodwind quintets, brass quintets, jazz suites, and hundreds of popular songs. Wilder enjoyed a close musical kinship with a wide variety of musicians, including classical conductors such as Erich Leinsdorf, Frederick Fennell, and Gunther Schuller; jazz musicians Marian McPartland, Stan Getz, and Zoot Sims; and popular singers including Frank Sinatra, Mabel Mercer, Peggy Lee, and Tony Bennett. In this biography and critical investigation of Wilder's music, Wilder's early work as a part-time student at the Eastman School of Music, his ascent through the ranks of the commercial recording industry in New York City in the 1930s and 1940s, his turn toward concert music from the 1950s onward, and his devotion late in his life to the study of American popular songs of the first half of the twentieth century are chronicled. The book discusses some of his best-known music, such as the revolutionary octets and songs such as I'll Be Around, While We're Young, and Blackberry Winter, and explains the unique blend of cultivated and vernacular traditions in his singular musical language.Less
The music of Alec Wilder (1907–1980) blends several American musical traditions, such as jazz and the American popular song, with classical European forms and techniques. Stylish and accessible, Wilder's musical oeuvre ranged from sonatas, suites, concertos, operas, ballets, and art songs to woodwind quintets, brass quintets, jazz suites, and hundreds of popular songs. Wilder enjoyed a close musical kinship with a wide variety of musicians, including classical conductors such as Erich Leinsdorf, Frederick Fennell, and Gunther Schuller; jazz musicians Marian McPartland, Stan Getz, and Zoot Sims; and popular singers including Frank Sinatra, Mabel Mercer, Peggy Lee, and Tony Bennett. In this biography and critical investigation of Wilder's music, Wilder's early work as a part-time student at the Eastman School of Music, his ascent through the ranks of the commercial recording industry in New York City in the 1930s and 1940s, his turn toward concert music from the 1950s onward, and his devotion late in his life to the study of American popular songs of the first half of the twentieth century are chronicled. The book discusses some of his best-known music, such as the revolutionary octets and songs such as I'll Be Around, While We're Young, and Blackberry Winter, and explains the unique blend of cultivated and vernacular traditions in his singular musical language.
Sharon Ammen
- Published in print:
- 2016
- Published Online:
- September 2017
- ISBN:
- 9780252040658
- eISBN:
- 9780252099090
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of Illinois Press
- DOI:
- 10.5406/illinois/9780252040658.001.0001
- Subject:
- Music, History, American
Before Sophie Tucker “corked up” to entertain her audiences with ragtime songs in “Negro dialect” and before Fanny Brice stumbled into the footlights in her rendition of the “Dying Swan,” the ...
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Before Sophie Tucker “corked up” to entertain her audiences with ragtime songs in “Negro dialect” and before Fanny Brice stumbled into the footlights in her rendition of the “Dying Swan,” the reigning queen of comedy and song on the American stage was May Irwin. A performer in both vaudeville and the legitimate stage, Irwin was also known as an accomplished homemaker and loving mother, a political activist, a real estate tycoon, and a prolific writer of articles, composer of songs, and author of a popular cookbook. This book is the first full-length study of Irwin and focuses on the strategies she used to remain successful, both personally and publicly, throughout a long life. Her success far exceeded those of her contemporaries, even though she was involved in often controversial political activities such as suffragism and pacifism. As a female comic, she made fun of the dominant male culture by anchoring her more radical views with domestic feminism.Using her body weight as a source of self-deprecating humor, she nevertheless retained an aura of attractiveness. One of the first celebrity chefs, she filled her cookbook with jokes and songs. Irwin is identified closely with the birth of the “coon” song and may have been forgotten because of the racism associated with what was undeniably popular American music from the 1890s through the 1920s. The author delves into the audience response to Irwin’s performances, both in her coon shouting and in her character work in musical farce.Less
Before Sophie Tucker “corked up” to entertain her audiences with ragtime songs in “Negro dialect” and before Fanny Brice stumbled into the footlights in her rendition of the “Dying Swan,” the reigning queen of comedy and song on the American stage was May Irwin. A performer in both vaudeville and the legitimate stage, Irwin was also known as an accomplished homemaker and loving mother, a political activist, a real estate tycoon, and a prolific writer of articles, composer of songs, and author of a popular cookbook. This book is the first full-length study of Irwin and focuses on the strategies she used to remain successful, both personally and publicly, throughout a long life. Her success far exceeded those of her contemporaries, even though she was involved in often controversial political activities such as suffragism and pacifism. As a female comic, she made fun of the dominant male culture by anchoring her more radical views with domestic feminism.Using her body weight as a source of self-deprecating humor, she nevertheless retained an aura of attractiveness. One of the first celebrity chefs, she filled her cookbook with jokes and songs. Irwin is identified closely with the birth of the “coon” song and may have been forgotten because of the racism associated with what was undeniably popular American music from the 1890s through the 1920s. The author delves into the audience response to Irwin’s performances, both in her coon shouting and in her character work in musical farce.