Grové was arguably the first composer to incorporate Black African elements into the fabric of his music, venturing far beyond mere couleur locale to forge a creative synthesis of the indigenous and the "Western". His vast oeuvre encompasses every genre, from opera and ballet to chamber music, orchestral works and song. But he is also a fine essayist, and his short fiction has received praise from André P. Brink. This is the first study of its kind to be devoted to a South African composer.
The present Reader is a selection of texts on South African music which are chosen not only for their importance or the frequency of citations, but with the express purpose of providing the reader with a deep understanding of the music itself. Consequently, there are readings that are chosen because they have been influential, but there are also many which, though published, have not enjoyed very wide circulation. There are those which are of obvious historic interest, and others which speak to contemporary issues. Among other things, the volume provides an excellent sense of the varying ideologies and approaches that determine the relationship between author and subject. The reader is indispensable to scholars and enthusiasts of South African music and it is of great interest to ethnomusicologists more generally. It is also an excellent resource for those who do not have immediate access to harder-to-find articles, and is perhaps most vital to those who are looking to find a way into the world of South African music.
This publication contains details of a new up-and-coming generation of composers. It provides information on 318 composers and as such is a standard reference word on local composers.
Mzilikazi Khumalo (1932-2021), an iconic figure in choral music in South Africa, rose to prominence as one of Africa's leading composers of art music. This is a work of music history. Biographical essays on Khumalo's major works, including those for choir, orchestra, and opera are complemented by contextual studies of his compositions and arrangements as well as reflections on his roles as editor, conductor, and music director. Specifically in the context of South Africa's cultural and political transition from Apartheid to democracy, Khumalo's key role in establishing the Nation Building Massed Choir Festival, a multi-racial institution that forged an inclusive space for music, in the 1980s is discussed as evidence of his importance and relevance in South African culture. Khumalo's major works are studied in relation to contemporary art music, choral composition, and traditional song. These are UShaka KaSenzangakhona (1996), an African epic, and Princess Magogo KaDinuzulu (2002), one of the first indigenous African operas. Khumalo's artistic collaborators provide insight into their experiences working on these major projects, documenting the relationships the composer cultivated with his peers. This volume addresses a lacuna in the literature on South African art music which until recently tended to focus on works in the classical tradition and shows that Khumalo is a composer without peer in his synthesis of classical and choral, traditional and contemporary.
During the past two decades, the study of sexuality and gender in music has become a decidedly mainstream activity. To be sure, music has long been obviously and intimately involved in matters pertaining to relations, both sexual and otherwise, between and amongst the sexes. Its use in courtship is the one that perhaps first comes to mind, this use being probably as old as music itself. This book contains all the papers presented at the conference by the same name.
Jacobus Kloppers, an eminent composer, organist, pedagogue, and scholar, significantly contributed to musicological and organ teaching in South Africa and Canada and, in the latter context, art music, and liturgical composition. A Passage of Nostalgia – The Life and Work of Jacobus Kloppers, as a symbolic gesture, constitute recognition of his work both in South Africa and Canada. This publication is unique in that, apart from relevant disciplinary perspectives, biographical and autobiographical narrative, and anecdote, all constitute a necessary means through which the authors illuminate Kloppers’ compositional process and its creative outcomes. In this regard, Kloppers generously dedicated his time to the project to make information on his life and work available, often in complex ways. This retrospective input supports the work offered as an authentic, self-reflective recounting of a life of dedicated service in music. The construct of nostalgia as an overarching theme to this volume on some level denotes Kloppers’ position of cultural and religious ‘insidedness’ and ‘outsidedness’. However, apart from representing a return to a lost and challenging past, the composer’s creative work affirms his individuality, sense of artistic self, and propensity for spiritual acceptance and tolerance. Moreover, nostalgia in his oeuvre takes on importance as a rhetorical artistic practice by which continuity is as central as discontinuity.
Jazz and Totalitarianism examines jazz in a range of regimes that in significant ways may be described as totalitarian, historically covering the period from the Franco regime in Spain beginning in the 1930s to present day Iran and China. The book presents an overview of the two central terms and their development since their contemporaneous appearance in cultural and historiographical discourses in the early twentieth century, comprising fifteen essays written by specialists on particular regimes situated in a wide variety of time periods and places. Interdisciplinary in nature, this compelling work will appeal to students from Music and Jazz Studies to Political Science, Sociology, and Cultural Theory.
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