Introduction: Screened Music, Trans-contextualisation and Ethnomusicological Approaches
2009; Taylor & Francis; Volume: 18; Issue: 1 Linguagem: Inglês
10.1080/17411910902833588
ISSN1741-1920
Autores Tópico(s)Musicology and Musical Analysis
ResumoAbstract This paper proposes the use of the term 'screened music' as a means of encompassing a broad range of methodological approaches that emphasise agency, process and context, moving beyond the extant focus on Western musical traditions associated with film music analysis. It argues that perspectives from ethnomusicology offer new possibilities for understanding screened musics in their numerous forms. In particular, focus on practitioner perspectives and self-reflexive ethnography can provide insights into industrial and political processes as well as issues relating to ethics and responsibility. The notion of agency as embedded in processes of de- re- and trans-contextualisation offers new ways to explore the use of 'exotic' or hegemonic musics, as well as the emergence and development of style. This paper also considers issues of representation, including problematic stereotyping of the 'primitive other', national identity, code formation and viral re-signification. Keywords: Screened MusicDe-/Re-/Trans-contextualisationRepresentationEthnographic Filmmaking(Self-reflexive) EthnographyViral re-significationFilm music Notes 1. A 'mondo' film is a documentary film normally depicting sensational subjects. The genre started with the Italian film Mondo Cane (A Dog's World) made in by Paola Cavara, Gultiero Jacopetti and Franco Prosperi. This film consists of a series of travelogue vignettes showing cultural practices throughout the world intended to shock or surprise the mostly Western audience. 2. Collins (2008a Collins , Karen . 2008a . From Pac-man to pop music: Interactive audio in games and new media . Aldershot : Ashgate . [Google Scholar]) and Sexton (2007 Sexton , Jamie , 2007 . Music, sound and multimedia: From the live to the virtual . Edinburgh : Edinburgh University Press .[Crossref] , [Google Scholar]) are both reviewed in this volume. 3. Music, Sound and the Moving Image: http://msmi.lupjournals.org; Music and the Moving Image:http://www.press.uillinois.edu/journals/mmi.html ; The Soundtrack: http://www.intellectbooks.co.uk/journals.php?issn=17514193.17514193(all last accessed 21 March 2009). 4. A number of the articles in this volume were first presented at the Sound, Music and Moving Image conference (2007) held at Senate House, University of London, 10–12 September, organised by Julie Brown and Miguel Mera under the auspices of the Institute of Musical Research. 5. This point is famously explored in Hobsbawm and Ranger (1992 Hobsbawm , Eric , and Terrence Ranger . 1992 . The invention of tradition . Cambridge : Cambridge University Press . [Google Scholar]) which reveals that some of the most resilient traditions are those based upon a largely fictitious history, often involving complex processes of syncretisation and migration. 6. These issues have been discussed with respect to cassettes and their impact in a number of places around the globe (Wallis and Malm 1984 Wallis , R. , and Krister Malm . 1984 . Big sounds from small peoples: The music industry in small countries . London : Constable . [Google Scholar]; Manuel 1993 Manuel , Peter . 1993 . Cassette culture: Popular music and technology in North India . Chicago : University of Chicago Press . [Google Scholar]). For a variety of approaches to the impact of specific 'new' technologies, see also, for example, Tapscott (1998 Tapscott , Don . 1998 . Growing up digital: The rise of the net generation . New York and London : McGraw-Hill . [Google Scholar]), Haynes (2000 Haynes , Jonathan , 2000 . Nigerian video films . Athens : Ohio University Press . [Google Scholar]), Askew and Wilk (2002 Askew , Kelly , and Richard R. Wilk , 2002 . The anthropology of media: A reader . Oxford : Blackwell . [Google Scholar]), Strangelove (2005 Strangelove , Michael . 2005 . The empire of mind: Digital piracy and the anti-capitalist movement . Toronto : University of Toronto Press .[Crossref] , [Google Scholar]) and Collins (2008a,b). 7. For further discussion on this issue see Laing (2007 Laing , Heather . 2007 . The gendered score: Music in 1940s melodrama and the woman's film . Aldershot : Ashgate . [Google Scholar]). 8. See also Dana Benelli's exploration of the travelogue-expedition film's influence on Hollywood cinema (2002 Benelli , Dana . 2002 . Hollywood and the travelogue . Visual Anthropology 15 ( 1 ): 3 – 16 .[Taylor & Francis Online] , [Google Scholar]). 9. Mickey-mousing is a technique of close synchronisation of on-screen visual actions with musical gestures. 10. See, for example, Cohen (1991 Cohen , Sara . 1991 . Rock culture in Liverpool: Popular music in the making . New York : Oxford University Press . [Google Scholar]), Thornton (1995 Thornton , Sarah . 1995 . Club cultures: Music, media and subcultural capital . Cambridge : Polity Press . [Google Scholar]), and Toynbee (2000 Toynbee , Jason . 2000 . Making popular music: Musicians, creativity and institutions . London : Arnold . [Google Scholar]). 11. Harris's ethnographic study of Uyghur pop videos, global sounds, and textual meaning in urban and rural contexts (2005) is a notable exception. Also significant is Pease's study of internet fandom of Korean pop music in China (2006). 12. In terms of music, issues relating to fieldwork, representation and ethics have been the focus of two recent volumes: Barz and Cooley (1997 Barz , Gregory , and Timothy Cooley , 1997 . Shadows in the field: New perspectives for fieldwork in ethnomusicology . Oxford : Oxford University Press . [Google Scholar]) and Cooley's (2003 Cooley , Timothy , 2003 . Fieldwork impact . British Journal of Ethnomusicology 12 ( 1 ), special issue . [Google Scholar]) special issue of the British Journal of Ethnomusicology. Additional informationNotes on contributorsMiguel Mera Miguel Mera is widely published in music and moving image studies, from music in historical drama to the use of popular songs in contemporary cinema. His publications include European film music (Ashgate, 2006) and Mychael Danna's The Ice Storm: A film score guide (Scarecrow, 2007). He is a Principal Lecturer in Music at Anglia Ruskin University. Miguel also composes music for film and television and his work has been screened and broadcast throughout the worldAnna MorcomAnna Morcom works on a range of issues relating to contemporary music and dance culture in India and Tibet, including film, media, modernity, nationalism, globalisation and economic development/marginalisation. She is the author of Hindi Film Songs and the Cinema (Ashgate, 2007). She is Research Council UK Academic Fellow in the Music Department at Royal Holloway College, University of London
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