South Central Graduate Music Consortium
Fifth Annual Conference
September 7-8, 2007
Duke University
Durham, North Carolina
REVISED SCHEDULE:
There is a change in the speaker line-up for Sessions 1 and 3.
Please see Abstracts for the updated list.
The South Central Graduate Music Consortium consists of graduate music students from Duke University, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and University of Virginia, and hosts an annual conference featuring current student research, panel discussions, and presentations of new student works.
The 2007 SCGMC Conference will be held at Duke University on September 7-8, 2007. Here you will find all the latest information related to the conference, including the conference schedule, registration details and abstracts.
We look forward to seeing you at Duke in September!
Friday, September 7
2:30-3:00 |
Registration |
| 3:00-4:30 | Session 1: Music and Technology Bone Hall, Biddle Music Building |
| 5:00 | Keynote Address: Technology, Commodification, and Authenticity in Popular Music |
| 7:00 | Dinner |
Saturday, September 8
8:30-9:00 |
Breakfast |
| 9:00-11:00 | Session 2: Topics in the Western Art Music Tradition |
| 11:15-12:45 | Composers Session: New Works Roundtable |
| 12:45-2:30 | Lunch |
| 2:30-4:00 | Session 3: Perspectives on 20th-Century American Music |
This year’s keynote speaker at the 2007 SCGMC Conference will be Dr. Jeremy Wallach, Assistant Professor of Popular Culture at Bowling Green State University. Dr. Wallach received his Ph.D. in anthropology from the University of Pennsylvania. His research interests include the popular music of Southeast Asia and North America, music and technology, postcolonial theory, and globalization.
Dr. Wallach’s keynote address is titled “Technology, Commodification, and Authenticity in Popular Music”.
If you would like to register for the 2007 SCGMC Conference, please e-mail our registration and housing coordinator, Angela Mace (angela.mace@duke.edu) by August 31st, 2007, along with your name as you would like it to appear on your official conference nametag.
Please plan to arrive at the Biddle Music Building at Duke University’s East Campus between 2:30 and 3:00 on Friday, September 7 to register. The registration fee for the 2007 SCGMC Conference is $5.00.
If you are coming from out of town and would like to stay with one of our students, please also contact Angela Mace.
The Biddle Music Building is located on the north side of Duke University’s East Campus, on Markham Avenue.
From I-85N:
Exit at Highway 147S (Durham Freeway, exit 172), and take the exit for Swift Avenue (exit 14). Turn left onto Swift. Follow Swift to the next stoplight (where Swift becomes Broad Street) and continue on Broad Street. Turn right onto Markham Avenue, then left into the parking lot between Clarendon and Sedgefield streets.
From I-85S:
Exit at Duke Street (exit 176B). Turn left onto Duke Street, which turns into Gregson Street after crossing the overpass. Follow Gregson south about half a mile to Markham Avenue. Turn right onto Markham Avenue. After you pass the stoplight at Buchanan Boulevard, go another four blocks and turn right into the parking lot between Sedgefield and Clarendon streets.
From 15/501N:
Exit at Highway 147S (Durham Freeway, exit 108B). Proceed south about 1.5 miles, and exit at Swift Avenue (exit 14). Turn left onto Swift. Follow Swift to the next stoplight (where Swift becomes Broad Street) and continue on Broad Street. Turn right onto Markham Avenue, then left into the parking lot between Clarendon and Sedgefield streets.
Parking
Free parking is available in the Asbury United Methodist Church parking lot on Markham Avenue, between Clarendon and Sedgefield Sts, right across from the Biddle Music Building. The main entrance to the Biddle Music Building faces away from Markham Avenue.
Maps
Duke University Official Map
The 2007 SCGMC Conference Google Map
Session 1: Music and Technology
“Cleaning the Mirror”: The Overlap of Ethics and Aesthetics in John Coltrane’s “Late” Period
Matthew Somoroff, Duke University
In the mid-1960s, Coltrane made his spiritual concerns overt—through his album and composition titles, through interviews, and, of course, through the sonic content of the music he and his ensembles played. Since that time, mythologizing of Coltrane as spiritual leader and musical visionary has proliferated, as evidenced by biographies of the musician by J.C. Thomas, Bill Cole, and Eric Nisenson. From a consideration of literature on Coltrane and his music, it seems that the conception of Coltrane’s music as a medium for self-realization—a “journey” into one’s inner being—arises as much from authors writing about Coltrane as from Coltrane and his fellow musicians.
If Coltrane’s “late-period” music constitutes the substance of a transformative and/or confessional exercise conducted upon the self, how does the exercise operate, i.e., what are its phases and/or steps? And how did Coltrane conceive of his music as spiritual exercise? This paper uses the late writings of theorist Michel Foucault on pre-Christian and Christian “practices of the self” as a frame for considering Coltrane’s music and words about his music as spiritual practice. It is argued that Coltrane’s musical practices challenge certain dichotomies that Foucault defines in his schema of practices of the self: namely, self-creation vs. self-discovery.
Post-Fidelity: A New Age of Technological Innovation and Music Consumption
Dan Guberman, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
For most of the twentieth century, advances in sound recording and reproduction technology were aimed primarily at improvements in fidelity. With the popularization of the MP3 at the turn of the millennium came a dramatic shift towards what I call the post-fidelity age. In this new age of music consumption, the consumer’s focus is not on the sound quality of the recordings, but on the ability and convenience of amassing and transporting them. Technological innovation has followed suit, as seen in the vastly successful iPod. This is true for nearly all types of music consumers. Even those categorized as “audiophiles,” the traditional proponents of high quality sound, are not immune to these new values.
I will demonstrate the emergence of the post-fidelity age by drawing upon the leading audio equipment publications of the past half-century, including High Fidelity, Stereo Review, and Sound and Vision. Particularly telling evidence can be seen in the imagery in sound equipment advertising, which now, rather than addressing sound quality, focus on other features such as visual aesthetics. I will support this evidence by employing articles from the same publications. The writers continue to make frequent reference to their search for the greatest quality music playback equipment, but when put into practice they often demonstrate that they too have joined the post-fidelity mentality of amassing lower fidelity music in greater quantities.
Live, A-Live, Live-Ly
Peter Tschirhart, University of Virginia
It is arguably the case that the past century’s advancements in media technologies have produced machines that excel principally in reproduction, and which act to form an enveloping “Mass-Reality.” This reality employs concepts such as “Live” that posit a close proximity between source and recipient.
The “Live,” however, is nothing of the sort but is instead, in the words of Deleuze, a “bare material repetition (repetition of the Same)” that appears “only in the sense that another repetition is disguised within it, constituting it and constituting itself in disguising itself.” This condition provokes a crisis of identity and being: which are the machines involved, and who or what are we in our relation with them?
To answer these questions and understand this complex ontology, we must simultaneously recognize the constructed nature of the Mass-Real—move beyond radio stations, symphony broadcasts, and rock concerts—and begin to utilize performance as a method of critique that (productively) engages a cybernetic integration rendering un-mediated components inextricable from the mechanical, and vice versa. Performances, in other words, that empower non-reproductive internal difference.
My presentation will enact and explain this new performative surrealism. Through juxtaposition and layering, it will integrate and distinguish Life and Live, promote a thorough but self-critical cybernetic fusion, and encourage the proliferation of mixed-ontology performances demanding at least one mediated, and one un-mediated source.
Session 2: Topics in the Western Art Music Tradition
Sixteenth-Century Papal Patronage: A Study in Mobility
Karen Cook, Duke University
The choir of the Cappella Pontificia has played an integral role in the canonization of sacred music and has acted as a backdrop to the biographies of many early composers. However, the Cappella’s structural evolution also provides valuable insight into the broader economic and social system of patronage. While patronage is often narrowly construed to imply payment in exchange for something, it can be more widely defined as an action taken by any person or group in favor of an individual, an institution, or a cause. In the case of the Cappella Pontificia, the papacy provided a more or less consistent opportunity for patronage, and at no point more than the first half of the sixteenth century. Popes Julius II, Leo X, Clement VII and Paul III came from learned backgrounds and powerful families, and well understood the importance of cultural goods in marketing one’s status. Yet, despite the prestige and security granted to members of the choir, a small few chose to leave the chapel to seek employment elsewhere. Of the approximate one hundred and eleven men who joined the Sistine Chapel Choir between 1503 and the reformulation of the Choir’s Constitution in 1545, only eighteen are known to have voluntarily left the organization for reasons other than retirement, and only twelve have movements that can clearly be traced. An inspection of these twelve demonstrates that in the Renaissance, the definitions of both patronage and product are much more flexible and ephemeral than previously thought.
Elizabeth Billington and Nancy Storace: English Divas in Italian Opera, 1786-1810
Anna Ochs, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
In late-eighteenth-century London, two Englishwomen, Elizabeth Billington and Nancy Storace, broke into the Italian opera scene, traditionally dominated by Italian singers. But, why were they able to succeed where other British performers did not? Many personal, cultural, and musical elements contributed to their triumph, such as their travels and performances in Italy, the increased popularity of musical performances in London, and failures in recruiting Italian singers. In this paper, I focus on the role of Billington’s and Storace’s mastery of Italian opera conventions in their Italian opera fame.
Despite the differences between their singing styles and specializations, both Billington and Storace received rave reviews for their performances of Italian opera at the King’s Theatre in London. Billington was known for her use of extensive melodic ornamentation in serious operas, as in La Clemenza di Scipione by J.C. Bach, while Storace excelled in the combination of “chaste” embellishments with comedic acting in comic operas, as in Gli Schiavi per amore by Paisiello.
The analyses of two signature arias, “”Se ti perdo” by Guglielmi, as performed by Billington, and “Dove ridotta sono,” by Paisiello, performed by Storace, demonstrate the skills of both Billington and Storace in melodic ornamentation. By combining contemporary writings on the singers in Italian opera with analyses of arias sung by both women, I will illustrate that musical and dramatic skill helped Billington and Storace to overcome the established boundaries of Italian opera in London during their London careers, from the 1780s until the 1810s.
Ludwig Berger's Role in the Education of Felix and Fanny Mendelssohn Reconsidered
Angela R. Mace, Duke University
Although Carl Friedrich Zelter typically receives the credit for launching the phenomenal career of Felix Mendelssohn, there is another man who had a profound influence on the young Felix and his sister Fanny: Ludwig Berger. Now largely forgotten, Berger was in his day one of Berlin's most eminent pedagogues, a virtuoso pianist, and an acclaimed interpreter of Beethoven's works. He was from 1817 to 1822 the siblings' piano and composition instructor. In 1819, Zelter assumed the primary role of composition instructor and mentor, overshadowing Berger, who later expressed some bitterness. In his 1963 dissertation on Berger, Dieter Siebenkäs states that Berger's influence can be found in Felix Mendelssohn's works, but does not elaborate. Berger provided the Mendelssohns with technical guidance at the piano that Zelter, who was not a pianist, could not give; thus Berger's influence, especially on the siblings' early keyboard works, deserves a closer look. Also a prolific composer of Lieder and the first to set Wilhelm Müller's "Die Schöne Müllerin," Berger's influence on Fanny's early Lieder bears closer study. Most importantly, Berger was among the first to introduce Felix and Fanny to the music of Beethoven, which was perhaps his most lasting contribution to forming their musical taste and style.
“The League of Virtue:” Constructing a Schumann Cult in 1860s Germany
Laurie McManus, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
An 1868 article that appeared in the Neue Zeitschrift für Musik declared that a cult had formed around Robert Schumann since his death twelve years earlier. This “Tugendbund” (League of Virtue) sought to preserve Schumann’s aesthetic principles, which had once been progressive, but were now, the author argued, out of date. This idea of a Schumann cult in the 1860s has been little explored, despite the numerous composers, critics, and music historians who collectively contributed to it. One reason may be the periodization of nineteenth-century German music history, which creates an imaginary break between the aesthetic battle of the New Germans in the 1850s and “the second age of the symphony” in the 1870s. In fact, the perceived Schumann cult was a cultural outgrowth of the same aesthetic debates of the early 1850s, which by 1868 had cooled only somewhat. The very publication of the “Tugendbund” excerpt in the Neue Zeitschrift was a musical-political statement on part of editor Franz Brendel, most likely in response to a long series of articles on “Schumanniana” by Adolf Schubring. Since the article has received little attention, it will be my starting point for analyzing the Schumann cult, its members and music, as it was constructed by all sides of the musical-political spectrum in the 1860s.
Composers Session: New Works Roundtable
Run from Fear for flute, clarinet, piano, electric guitar and double bass
Steven Kemper, University of Virginia
R's Honky-Tonk Piano
Dan Ruccia, Duke University
Hagar’s Prayer, for voice, piano and trumpet
Amy Scurria, Duke University
Talking/Typing, for voice, typing and laptop
Jonathan Zorn, University of Virginia
Session 3: Perspectives on 20th-Century American Music
Technology and the Orchestra
Steven Kemper, University of Virginia
The staggering pace of technological development in the 20th century has facilitated an immense body of musical work that incorporates (or indeed sometimes drives) contemporary innovation. Virtually all current genres of music embrace some form of technology. Rock shows are multi-media stadium-filling spectacles. Broadway uses synthesizers alongside acoustic instruments. Even more traditionally acoustic forms of music such as folk and jazz often amplify instruments or add “natural” sounding processing to create a better live mix. Technology does not just enhance these forms of music, it has become integral in the composition of the music itself. Composers in the Western art music tradition have embraced technology in all forms and push the envelope in creating new interactive systems, processing and synthesis algorithms, and innovative approaches to sound distribution. It is puzzling then, that one of the largest institutions of the Western art music tradition, the symphony orchestra, lacks a representative body of work incorporating technology. An examination of the institution of the symphony orchestra, practical considerations, and compositional interests helps unlock the mystery of the absence of this music in the contemporary repertoire. Through analysis of several examples of successful works integrating music and technology I hope to show that performance of this music is not only possible, but also increasingly practical as advances in technology reduce costs and simplify the design of these systems.
We Shall Overcome!: SNCC, Highlander, and the Little Blue Songbook
Carrie Stubblefield, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
At the height of the American Civil Rights Movement in the 1960s, a slim, paper-bound volume was published, titled We Shall Overcome! Songs of the Southern Freedom Movement. The book contained 46 song transcriptions, along with photographs and commentaries from the Civil Rights struggle, all compiled by Guy and Candie Carawan on behalf of the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee (or SNCC). While the personal anecdotes and images of protest and struggle scattered throughout this book serve to clearly identify it with the activities and members of SNCC, the nature and purpose of the song transcriptions are not immediately apparent. What was this book intended to represent? Is it meant to be a practical songbook, a historical document, or something else altogether? A bound songbook – no matter how portable – would be useless under most protest conditions; mass demonstrations, marches, and jails are no place for such items. Yet the centrality of focus on songs in the book, the attention to detail each transcription demonstrates, and performance instructions written into the text all point toward some intent for practical use; a mere historical document of SNCC’s activities would need none of these features. Furthermore, the song transcriptions, while competently written and thoroughly playable, fail to convey the range and depth of the performance practice associated with these songs.
In this presentation, I will address these questions using evidence from historical documents, field recordings, and interviews with the book’s compilers. I will then follow this line of inquiry as it leads from questions about this particular document to larger questions about the development of performance practice in the music of SNCC – and, by extension – the Civil Rights Movement in the early 1960s.
“Wait ‘til the Beat Drops”: Listening Lessons Among African-American Girls in Durham, NC
Jenny Woodruff, Duke University
In Durham, NC, hip hop surrounds the African-American girls of the John Avery Boys and Girls’ Club in most aspects of their lives. Girls relate to one another and to club staff members in the context of hip hop’s dress, talk, movement and attitudes. For the girls, hip hop is an important part of being ‘black’, and dancing to hip hop is a way in which they test the boundaries of black womanhood. Influenced by hip hop celebrities and critiques from adult mentors, girls discipline their bodies as sites of black female sexuality by practicing and refining movement with other girls. When they dance, girls reveal intimate knowledge of hip hop’s sound. They teach each other discernment in listening and dancing, and chastise each other when they cannot ‘hear’ the music correctly. Attending ethnographically to girls’ danced interactions and to the talk around their playful performances, I analyze how they learn to listen in culturally appropriate ways. By focusing on the musical elements with which they coordinate their bodies and the ways they mark the boundaries of ‘inappropriate’ movement, I argue that skill in listening and the way listening is connected with the body are integral elements in developing what the girls see as appropriate black female sexuality. By collaboratively cultivating listening skill, girls become enculturated in an aesthetic which they share with their peers. Learning this aesthetic is part of a larger education in what it means to become a black woman.