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The intertribal pow-wow is the most widespread venue for traditional Indian music and dance in North America. Heartbeat of the People is an insider's journey into the dances and music, the traditions and regalia, and the functions and significance of these vital cultural events. Tara Browner focuses on the Northern pow-wow of the northern Great Plains and Great Lakes to investigate the underlying tribal and regional frameworks that reinforce personal tribal affiliations. Interviews with dancers...

This book traces the lives of the Snowdens, an African American family of musicians and farmers living in rural Knox County, Ohio. Howard L. Sacks and Judith Rose Sacks examine the Snowdens' musical and social exchanges with rural whites from the 1850s through the early 1920s and provide a detailed exploration of the claim that the Snowden family taught the song "Dixie" to Dan Emmett-–the white musician and blackface minstrel credited with writing the song. This edition features a new introducti...

Fourteen musicians tell their stories about how they became who they are, the commitment required, the struggles, failures and successes, and the fierce ambition which has driven them. The interviews criss-cross with one another. They may be national stories but they are also international stories. They may be about musicians but they are also about artists, writers, sculptors, theatre practitioners and the intersections our art-forms have with one another. In the telling of their stories, throu...

Fiddling has had a lengthy history in Africa which has long been ignored. Jacqueline Cogdell DjeDje corrects this oversight with an expansive study on fiddling in the Fulbe, Hausa, and Dagbamba cultures of West Africa. DjeDje not only explains the history of the instrument itself, but also discusses the processes of stylistic transference and adaptation, suggesting how these may have contributed to differing performance practices. Additionally, DjeDje delves into the music, the performance conte...

Pandit Ravi Shankar, a Bengali cultural catalyst if ever there was one, is the most famous Indian alive. When people say that India colonised the Western mind, much of it was of his doing, and when it came to getting people to pay heed to the wonders of Hindustani music, nobody ever surpassed Ravi Shankar India's best-known sitar player opened the breach through which many others poured. Through his influence, this missionary, pioneer and experimenter changed the face of contemporary Western mus...

As a new nation built on immigration and cultural mixing, Canada is a land where artists bend and even defy traditional boundaries. Including Celtic fiddle traditions of Cape Breton, Quebecois chanson, Inuit throat singing and more, this guide to the music of Canada focuses on some of the longer-standing roots music traditions created in established cultural communities, together with some of the newer hybrids those styles have brought forth.

Founded in England in 1993 by the young DJ and promoter James Lavelle, the record label Mo'Wax would become an icon of independent music, a pioneer of new genres, and the epicenter of a movement in popular culture. A strong countercultural and international identity informed every aspect of Mo'Wax's output, from its roster of groundbreaking musicians to the artists and designers responsible for the album covers, music videos, and packaging. Artwork on vinyl and CD sleeves by the graffiti legend...

These songs in many different styles embody the fundamental values of traditional Maori culture and form a vital part of marae ceremonial. Most common song types are represented: laments, love songs, war chants, songs of welcome, face-saving songs and witty occasional songs. They are remarkable for the sophistication of the music and the power and subtlety of the words. Both Orbell and McLean are widely known and respected and have published extensively. Margaret Orbell is the author of a number...

In nineteenth-century British society music and musicians were organized as they had never been before. This organization was manifested, in part, by the introduction of music into powerful institutions, both out of belief in music's inherently beneficial properties, and also to promote music occupations and professions in society at large. This book provides a representative and varied sample of the interactions between music and organizations in various locations in the nineteenth-century Brit...