Contribution to Book
Bilateral Negotiations in Bimusicality: Insiders, Outsiders, and the “Real Version” in Middle Eastern Music Performance
Performing Ethnomusicology
(2004)
Abstract
This chapter provides an overview of insiders, outsiders, and the real version in Middle Eastern music performance. It claims that learning about music through lessons and informal apprenticeships as well as performing have been important components of the author's fieldwork experience. Politically, the mere presence of such an ensemble from the Middle East is a powerful and affirmative statement for multiculturalism. The William and Mary Middle Eastern Music Ensemble, for example, play ambassadorial roles on several levels. Following the leader or the musician who has the most convincing idea at the moment is one of the aesthetic trademarks of music, for example, in Arab music, one has to follow the singer or, alternatively, the strongest musician. Whether or not one is born and bred in a musical tradition, one's musicality is the result of a patchwork of experiences. A culturally specific sense of musicality may certainly be developed through the process of being native to that culture, but musicians' musicalities are also collections of encounters and choices.
Disciplines
Publication Date
August 13, 2004
Editor
Ted Solis
Publisher
University of California Press
ISBN
9780520238749
DOI
doi.org/10.1525/california/9780520238749.003.0013
Citation Information
Anne K. Rasmussen. "Bilateral Negotiations in Bimusicality: Insiders, Outsiders, and the “Real Version” in Middle Eastern Music Performance" Performing Ethnomusicology (2004) p. 215 - 228 Available at: http://works.bepress.com/anne-rasmussen/22/