5. Music of the nations

Looking at the contentious history of the Eurovision Song Contest, ‘Music of the nations’ considers the complex relationship between world music, nationalism, and the modern nation-state. In her winning song in 2016, ‘1944’, the Ukrainian entry Jamala switched from English to Crimean Tatar, a political reference to the Russian annexation of Ukraine. Zimbabwe changed its anthem from ‘God Save the Queen’ to an African song via ‘Ode to Joy.’ ‘HaTikva’ went from a chorus at an international congress to the Israeli national anthem. There are also supra- or international anthems like the ‘Internationale’, a standard of the socialist movement worldwide.

3. Between myth and history

‘Between myth and history’ begins with the 1932 Cairo Congress in Arab Music. The Arab contingent sought advice on progress, while the European delegates romanticized traditional Arab music. These contradictions, and Islam’s relationship with music, shaped the life-stories of three figures: 14th-century polymath Ibn Khaldūn; 20th-century Egyptian singer Umm Kulthūm; and ethnomusicologist Robert Lachmann, who found musical echoes of Muslim and Jewish pilgrims in Djerba, where he had been expecting to find local music fixed in time by isolation. The Mediterranean has inspired written and sung epics, which were translated into architecture and politics, taking them from myth into history.

8. World music matters

‘World music matters’ looks at the sites of music and musical instrument creation under threat from climate change. The word ‘matter’ refers not only to the significance but the materiality of world music and sound itself. As diasporas expand, the routes and borders they once travelled are closing. From the Calais Jungle to Babylon Orchestra, world musicians collaborate with each other and create new fusions. In the 21st century, world music is more diverse than ever, and we must find new ways to sustain and engage with world music that put the musician and the ethnographer on an equal footing.

6. Diaspora

‘Diaspora’ explores the effect of human displacement on world music after the ‘discovery’ of the New World by Columbus in 1492, which set off a chain of diasporas. The music of diaspora addresses both place and homelessness, wandering and the dream of return. Three diasporas are investigated, beginning with the Sephardic diaspora, which arose in turn from the expulsion of Jews from Europe; the displacement of Africans resulting from colonial slave trade; and the South Asian diaspora, which draws upon music to represent the post-colonial world. Diasporic music is diverse, including reggae, klezmer, bhangra, Bollywood, and hip-hop among other genres.

4. Music of the folk

If folk music made it possible to imagine world music, it did so from a European perspective. ‘Music of the folk’ examines what concepts of folk and nationality meant to Hungarian composers Bartók and Kodály and explores the global success of folk-inspired Celtic music. Musical pioneers often straddled two cultures, such as Leadbelly, who performed both rural Southern blues and more sophisticated fusion. Leadbelly’s story and others were documented by the Lomax family of folk musician scholars. The spread of polka across the world suggests that there is a place for folk music within world music, contradicting claims that the idea of world music encourages homogenization.

2. The West and the world

‘The West and the world’ investigates the unequal balance of power in the transcription, recording, and history of world music. World music may have been forged in the ‘Middle Passage’ from Africa to slavery elsewhere, but its musicians were nameless. Their music-making was documented by those with power. Collectors of world music have an anthological impulse, bringing together songs from different cultures. Johann Gottfried Herder’s collection of Volkslieder or ‘Folk Songs’ and two of the first anthologies on record—the Demonstration Collection and Music of the Orient—show that the products of the overarching anthological impulse can be very different.

7. Empire, decoloniality, and the globalization of world music

‘Empire, decoloniality, and the globalization of world music’ takes empire and globalization as points of departure, exploring street music in Romania and wedding music in Kolkata—global music performed locally that collapses the difference between world music and traditional folk music. The globalization of world music has been brought about by the development of modern cities into ‘global cities’, improved recording technologies, easy media access, and the expansion of ethnomusicology. The Rough Guides to World Music provide extensive documentation of the postmodern encounter with world music, and perhaps unintentionally act as a guide to recent trends in ethnomusicology.

1. In the beginning … Myth and meaning in world music

‘In the beginning … Myth and meaning in world music’ looks at world music’s real and imagined beginnings. These origins are documented in European missionaries’ observations of indigenous peoples and represented by the first musicians in religious and philosophical writings. Ideas about music in different cultures may be irreconcilable, and some have no word for music at all. Ethnomusicologists like Charles Seeger explored the problem of using words to describe music, although words may not properly convey it. Today’s world music stars bring the past into the present through performance, reliving the moment of encounter and discovery in collaborations spanning the globe.