Happy Black History Month – we are so glad you are here. This month instead of a broader view of the collection, we are focusing on the works that have been added to our collection since our blogpost last year. We highly encourage you to come down to see the physical display in the library; however, all materials there are also included in this blogpost. Read until the end to find some additional resources we recommend.
Content note: Note that some of these materials have potentially harmful language rooted in historical prejudices. Please take care.
Social issues in Black music
- From blues to Beyoncé: a century of black women’s generational sonic rhetorics by Alexis McGee traces how Black women have used sound to create community across time. Recommended chapter: “Queer(ing) Sound, Time, and Grammar: Black Women’s Methods for Generative Prosodic Rhetoric.”
- Intimate entanglements in the ethnography of performance: race, gender, vulnerability edited by Sidra Lawrence and Michelle Kisliuk explores sensory knowledge as an important dimension of understanding ethnographic work. Recommended chapter: “Ethnomusicological Empathy: Excavating a Black Graduate Student's Heartland” by Danielle Davis
- Musical landscapes in color: conversations with Black American composers by William C. Banfield tells the stories of 41 Black composers across different genres and their experiences within the industry. Recommended chapter: “The composer as conductor and composer.”
- Musical crossroads: stories behind the objects of African American music edited by Dwandalyn R. Reece uses the objects in the Smithsonian to explore how those objects expand understanding of Black music making. Recommended chapter: “Music in the community, music of the community.”
- On rhetoric and Black music by Earl H. Brooks examines how Black music functions are a rhetorical device, central to public discourse. Recommended chapter: “Ragtime, race, and rhetoric.”
- Songs of slavery and emancipation by Mathew Callahan is the story about and compilation of songs written by free and enslaved people about emancipation. Recommended chapter: “Finding the songs.”
- Tales from the symphony: perspectives from African American musicians by Robert Lee Watt features conversations from Black musicians playing in symphony orchestras across the US, and their experiences in that setting.
- Union divided: Black musicians’ fight for labor equality by Leta E. Miller tells the story of the Black locals of the American Federations of Musicians in the 1910s through the post-war period, detailing their struggles and successes. Recommended chapter: "Early Black Locals: three case studies.”
The genres of Black music
- Black punk now: fiction, nonfiction, and comics edited by Chris L. Terry and James Spooner tells the story of Black punk today, designed for those who identify with the community or newcomers. Recommended chapter: “Big takeover: zines as a freedom technology for Black punks and other marginalized groups” by Golden Sunrise Collier.
- Expanding the music theory canon: inclusive examples for analysis from the common practice period by Paula Maust is an anthology of people of colour writing in the Common Practice Period.
- First things first: hi-hop ladies who changed the game by Nadirah Simmons tells the stories of firsts for women in hip-hop. Recommended chapter: “Queen Latifah.”
- The meaning of soul: Black music and resilience since the 1960s by Emily J. Lordi re-tells the story of soul music in a way that moves beyond the most popular artists and instead focuses on the music and context. Recommended chapter: “Never catch me: false endings from soul to post-soul.”
- Psalms of my people: a story of Black liberation as told through hip-hop by Lenny Duncan follows Black liberation from the Civil Rights movement to today. Recommended chapter: “One Mic and Multitudes.”
- Southern history remixed: on rock ‘n’ roll and the dilemma of race by Michael T. Bertrand traces the racial tensions in the US south through rock ‘n’ roll in the 40s-60s. Recommended chapter: “Remixing the Master, Restoring the Music: The Central Theme of Southern History Reconsidered.”
- Wasn’t that a mighty day: African American blues and gospel songs on disaster by Luigi Monge explores how disasters (of the environment, disease, technology, etc.) are told through song, in order to understand how these disasters impacted Black communities. Recommended chapter: “Natural Disasters.”
The geography of Black music
- Amplifications of Black sound from colonial Mexico: vocality and beyond by Sarah Finley is a study of Black music within colonial Latin America. Recommended chapter: “Harmonizing Blackness in urban political ceremonies.”
- Beyond the bassline: 500 years of black British music, edited by Paul Bradshaw, is a series of essays and photographs which charts the importance of Black artists and musicians in shaping Britain’s culture.
- Black music in Britain in the twenty-first century edited by Monique Charles and Mary W. Gani is an interdisciplinary exploration of Black music in Britain, following the genres created or expanded there in the 21st Century. Recommended chapter: “Public Pedagogies of Resistance: Black British Women, Talk Di Ting” by Silhouette Bushay.
- Hey America! The epic story of Black music and the White House by Stuart Cosgrove charts decades of Black music in the United States, through to the modern day. Recommended chapter: “Disco Inferno.”
- Jazz space Detroit: photographs of Black music, jazz, and dance by Barbara Weinberg takes the reader directly to Detroit in the 20th century with pages of photographs.
- South Side impresarios: how race women transformed Chicago’s classical music scene by Samantha Ege focuses in on the transformation work of Black women in Chicago in between the world wars. Recommended chapter: “She proclaimed a Chicago Renaissance.”
- Welcome 2 Houston: hip hop heritage in Hustle Town by Lanston Collin Wilkins explores how place and music intertwine in the hip hop culture of Houston, using interviews from local artists. Recommended chapter: “Everybody Inherits the Hood.”
- Wichita blues: music in the African American community by Patrick Joseph O’Connor was featured in our Jazz display but we are excited to include it here as well. This book tells the history more broadly of Black history in Kansas and the jazz scene specific to Wichita. Recommended chapter: “Early African Americans in Kansas: cowboys, soldiers, settlers, and minstrels.”
Music
- Black composers series, 1974-1978 conducted by Paul Freeman.
- Credo: for soprano, baritone solo, SATB chorus and piano by Margaret Bonds.
- The collected piano works of R. Nathaniel Dett with introductions by Dominique-René de Lerma and Vivian Flagg McBrier.
- Contrasts: for piano trio by David Baker.
- For Marcos Balter: for violin and orchestra by Tyshawn Sorey (2020).
- Four Black American dances: for orchestra by Carlos Simon, Jr.
- Hear them: for baritone saxophone and piano by Carlos Simon Jr. (2020).
- Homage: chamber music from the African continent & diaspora performed by Samantha Ege.
- The Oxford book of choral music by Black composers edited by Marques L. A. Garrett.
- Red clay & Mississippi Delta: for wind quintet by Valerie Coleman.
- Revisiting the window’s view: for cello and harp (2020) by Jeffrey Mumford.
- Violin concertos by Black composers of the 18th & 19th centuries performed by Rachel barton Pine, Encore Chamber Orchestra, conducted by Daniel Hege.
- Tethered voices: for narrator and orchestra by James Lee III.
- Wide as heaven: a century of song by Black American composers performed by James Martin.
Resources
Blog category