Ethnomusicology

[Keith Davis]

As a musician, this is an interesting topic. I think most musicians, and
maybe I would qualify that by saying improvising musicians, jazz musicians,
those who incorporate different "styles", already know this instinctively.
Of course, as in anything, different styles and systems appear over time,
but these seem to be  "intellectual" developments, as opposed to what I
would call folk or traditional source material. Sort of like a classical
composer taking folk songs and making a symphony from them. Another
approach might be the elaborate system of Indian classical music, where
everything is very strictly dictated, while at the same time allowing for a
certain amount of improvisation and personal interpretation.

A few years ago, I was clicking through the channels, and came across the
close of a PBS show about China. The last scene was of this old guy sitting
on a chair on the burm between the rice paddies, playing a triangular
shaped guitar type instrument and singing. Suddenly, I got a shock when I
realized the guy was singing the blues! The Chinese blues...it's universal.

I haven't finished the whole article, but I will. Mr. Witzel's book
mentioned in the article looks very interesting, as well.

Thanks for sharing this.

On Tue, Nov 3, 2015 at 1:12 PM, ish mailian <ishmailian at gmail.com> wrote:

> http://thesmartset.com/face-the-music/
>



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