Narrativizing Recorded Popular Song

2019 ◽  
pp. 39-57
Author(s):  
Alexander C. Harden
Keyword(s):  
Popular Song

Early Cinema in Scotland

2018 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Social History ◽  
Small Towns ◽  
Early Cinema ◽  
Popular Song ◽  
Feature Film ◽  
Local Newspapers ◽  
The Social ◽  
Production History ◽  
History Of ◽  
International Audience

This collection of essays, drawn from a three-year AHRC research project, provides a detailed context for the history of early cinema in Scotland from its inception in 1896 till the arrival of sound in the early 1930s. It details the movement from travelling fairground shows to the establishment of permanent cinemas, and from variety and live entertainment to the dominance of the feature film. It addresses the promotion of cinema as a socially ‘useful’ entertainment, and, distinctively, it considers the early development of cinema in small towns as well as in larger cities. Using local newspapers and other archive sources, it details the evolution and the diversity of the social experience of cinema, both for picture goers and for cinema staff. In production, it examines the early attempts to establish a feature film production sector, with a detailed production history of Rob Roy (United Films, 1911), and it records the importance, both for exhibition and for social history, of ‘local topicals’. It considers the popularity of Scotland as an imaginary location for European and American films, drawing their popularity from the international audience for writers such as Walter Scott and J.M. Barrie and the ubiquity of Scottish popular song. The book concludes with a consideration of the arrival of sound in Scittish cinemas. As an afterpiece, it offers an annotated filmography of Scottish-themed feature films from 1896 to 1927, drawing evidence from synopses and reviews in contemporary trade journals.

Korngold and His World

2019 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Chamber Music ◽  
Musical Theater ◽  
Musical Language ◽  
American Film ◽  
Popular Song ◽  
Film Scores ◽  
Hollywood Film ◽  
English Translations ◽  
Erich Wolfgang Korngold ◽  
American Popular Song

Erich Wolfgang Korngold (1897–1957) was the last compositional prodigy to emerge from the Austro-German tradition of Mozart and Mendelssohn. He was lauded in his youth by everyone from Mahler to Puccini and his auspicious career in the early 1900s spanned chamber music, opera, and musical theater. Today, he is best known for his Hollywood film scores, composed between 1935 and 1947. From his prewar operas in Vienna to his pathbreaking contributions to American film, this book provides a substantial reassessment of Korngold's life and accomplishments. Korngold struggled to reconcile the musical language of his Viennese upbringing with American popular song and cinema, and was forced to adapt to a new life after wartime emigration to Hollywood. The book examines Korngold's operas and film scores, the critical reception of his music, and his place in the milieus of both the Old and New Worlds. It also features numerous historical documents—many previously unpublished and in first-ever English translations—including essays by the composer as well as memoirs by his wife, Luzi Korngold, and his father, the renowned music critic Julius Korngold.

When Culturally Significant Songs are Decontextualised: The Initiation Song Somagwaza, A Case Study

2018 ◽  
Vol 28 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
T Dowling ◽  
Somikazi Deyi ◽  
Anele Gobodwana
Keyword(s):  
Qualitative Research ◽  
Comparative Method ◽  
Popular Song ◽  
Focus Group Discussions ◽  
Group Discussions ◽  
Ritual Music ◽  
Constant Comparative Method ◽  
Small Focus ◽  
Over Time

While there have been a number of studies on the decontextualisation and secularisation of traditional ritual music in America, Taiwan and other parts of the globe, very little has been written on the processes and transformations that South Africa’s indigenous ceremonial songs go through over time. This study was prompted by the authors’ interest in, and engagement with the Xhosa initiation song Somagwaza, which has been re-imagined as a popular song, but has also purportedly found its way into other religious spaces. In this article, we attempted to investigate the extent to which the song Somagwaza is still associated with the Xhosa initiation ritual and to analyse evidence of it being decontextualised and secularised in contemporary South Africa. Our methodology included an examination of the various academic treatments of the song, an analysis of the lyrics of a popular song, bearing the same name, holding small focus group discussions, and distributing questionnaires to speakers of isiXhosa on the topic of the song. The data gathered were analysed using the constant comparative method of analysing qualitative research.

Mapping Places and Identities through Contemporary Bulawayo Popular Song Texts

Muziki ◽  
2021 ◽  
pp. 1-18
Author(s):  
Nkululeko Sibanda ◽  
Nozizwe Dhlamini
Keyword(s):  
Popular Song ◽  
Song Texts

Popular Song Index: First Supplement

Notes ◽  
1979 ◽  
Vol 35 (3) ◽  
pp. 637
Author(s):  
Patricia Felch ◽  
Patricia Pate Havlice
Keyword(s):  
Popular Song

SINGING HEAVEN ON EARTH: COPTIC COUNTERPUBLICS AND POPULAR SONG AT EGYPTIANMŪLIDFESTIVALS

2017 ◽  
Vol 49 (3) ◽  
pp. 375-394
Author(s):  
Carolyn M. Ramzy
Keyword(s):  
Middle Class ◽  
Popular Song ◽  
Coptic Church ◽  
Popular Festivals ◽  
Religious Songs

AbstractThis article explores the performative politics of devotional soundscapes at Coptic Christianmūlidfestivals. Echoing the state's reformist efforts in the 1990s to transform Muslim saint festivals into utilitarian spaces and their goers into “modern” Egyptian citizens, today the Coptic Church works to refashion these popular festivals from places of debauchery into morally productive spaces. Aided by affluent Cairene-based volunteers, church choirs travel from Cairo's poshest neighborhoods to these festivals to actively sing, disseminate, and teach popular religious songs (taratīl) in an effort to develop poorer Christian pilgrims into modern, pious, and more audible “citizens of heaven.” Through the analysis of one church choir'staratīlministry at themūlid, I illustrate how middle-class spiritual volunteers disrupt and, at times, reinscribe the Coptic Church's disciplinary efforts on the festival's poorer pilgrims, particularly as they look to modernize popular festivity into grounds of Christian ethical transformation.

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