Reflections + A Musical Adventure to Olympic Records

My discussion questions are marked in bold.

The common thread I detected in this week's readings was how to weather the power dynamics affecting ethnomusicology. Michelle Kisliuk proposes we document music culture through experience, embracing our subjective stance. This pushes back against the objectivism of colonial anthropologists, a painful past that Kisliuk confronts throughout her experience.

Given that music is embedded in subjectivity, we can ask how music performance is framed to create power. Small's "A Place for Hearing From Musicking" shows how building grand concert halls designed for classical music performances is a way to uphold Western music hegemony. Everything from their imposing structures to the codified human performance that accompany these concert halls (I especially enjoyed the foyer bit - needing a transition space into the sacred hall itself) suggests that this whole opera house trend isn't really about music: it's about power.

If you need further convincing, ask Kevin, the wonderful owner of Olympic Records. The first time I interacted with him, I asked about those classical music records rammed into a few crates. A fan of Prokofiev, I wanted to know if he classical recommendations. I was extremely shy, and felt like an idiot for even asking: the moment I did, Kevin conveyed that he had little interest in classical music. He did, however, inform me that secondhand classical music vinyls are a sure bet: "the people who owned these things never played them," he said, holding a crisp Romeo and Juliet between his palms. What's the difference, then? When music becomes pure performance, or the mere suggestion of culture, does it stop being music? As soon as Kevin bagged the vinyl for me, I went home and played my mint condition Romeo and Juliet. Even now I play it as much as I can, to make up for lost time.

At the same time, a moment in Small's piece that seemed damning for concert halls - "nor does any sound enter from that world, and none of the sounds that are made here will be allowed to escape out into it" - represents, for Harlem's ball culture, a blanket of secrecy that was ripped off when "Paris is Burning" hit the mainstream circuit. Though the glamor of the scene was immediately embraced, little was done to compensate the black and Latinx performers who face ongoing violence and precariousness. This is discussed at length in Ashley Clark's retrospective critique of "Paris is Burning." I agree that the director went about the release in imperfect ways, and in doing so her documentary shed light on the perhaps grim reality of ethnomusicology: will it inevitably harm the subject it seeks to illuminate? In that respect, should underground music cultures be kept in secrecy, airtightness, and therefore relative safety, as the opera houses of Sydney, New York, and Philadelphia?

What I'm getting at is the idea that exclusivity is power. As long as the Harlem ball scene was able to shut out white supremacy from this particular space, it allowed queer folks of color to express themselves freely. Who decides when an underground scene should be thrust into the world, brought to everyone's attention? Had they wanted to come out to the world, did the ball performers have the necessary clout to do so? Matters of power always complicate the act of shedding light.

Now that what's done is done, it's time to listen to the members of this subcultures and meet their needs. There's no reason why ethnomusicology should be detrimental, especially not in the spirit of fieldwork described by Kisliuk. Jennie Livingston made a documentary about the Harlem ball scene because she believed that other people could learn from this subculture and its values. We should make sure that this learning process is respectful of the subjects. We've done the taking - as evidenced by "Paris is Burning"'s zealous voyeurism - and now it's time to give back.

Karaoke as Gender Performance: Don't You Want Me

You're in New York, Lower East Side. You just had dinner at an Indian restaurant advertising live music. The restaurant turns out to be mostly empty, aside from this white man plucking a sitar. Strange. But it doesn't faze you. You're just hyped for karaoke.

That's about where I was that wintry Saturday night, flanked by my best friend Celeste. It was a girls' night out for two pairs of sisters: Celeste and Hortense and Victoire and me. The idea was to find a Korean karaoke spot at St. Mark's Place and have a fun night before we exploded across New England once more: Hortense to Cornell, Celeste to Brooklyn, and me to Providence.

We finally find a place, advertised by a lit-up sign, coaxing us down a narrow corridor into a dingy elevator. Once we're there, the place is nearly empty. We put down a deposit and pile into a tiny room: there's a monitor on the wall and two binders full of songs.

We start off easy: "Take on Me" by A-ha does to our vocal cords what a carpet beater does to a welcome mat. It's good practice. The Human League's "Don't You Want Me" is where Kevin Brown's thesis materializes. While I perform the macho guy's verse, Celeste performs the feminine counterpart: "I was working as a waitress in a cocktail bar." She holds a hand to her face in affected nostalgia. I belt out "don't you want me baby," and arch all the way back on the "O-o-o-oh," gripping a microphone that no longer works. I've become a dude convinced of his own sex-appeal. My movements are Elvis meets Sting, hip gyration but also tremors.

I take on a similar persona when Eminem comes on. Suddenly, I'm able to hit all the lyrics in "Real Slim Shady," even that tricky third verse, almost instinctually, bouncing with the beat. Karaoke is puzzlingly good for self-affirmation. I enjoy performing masculinity. And like Nora in Brown's piece, performing karaoke as a macho man reveals little about my true identity, except that I seek out spaces where experimentation is condoned. Being surrounded by girls I trust doesn't hurt. In fact, when I tried karaoke in a bar last summer, my rendition of "Real Slim Shady" was horrifying. I feared that the strangers present (especially the men) would see me as a failure. Now, Brown's piece has me thinking that maybe failure is the point when it comes to karaoke.

For the most part, I'm expected to act how I look. During karaoke, the personalities in my head with the smallest voices rush forth and scream out. At the end of the day, I have confessed myself to Victoire, Celeste and Hortense, as they have confessed to me. We tried out different personas and failed as a group, in relative privacy. If I wake up with a sore throat the next morning, at least I know I gave it my all.

T.S. Eliot: Making a Case for Theft

“Immature poets imitate; mature poets steal; bad poets deface what they take, and good poets make it into something better, or at least something different.”

T.S. Eliot, The Sacred Wood

I always go back to this quote when I need clarity on issues of appropriation. Right off the bat, T.S. Eliot does something quite curious. He redefines the verb "steal" as an enviable action which requires skill and maturity. It may seem like Eliot is encouraging artists to wrong other artists, when really, the poet is demanding authenticity. Imitating is noncommittal, and through imitation an immature poet eclipses the essence of the imitated work. "Theft," on the other hand, involves shouldering the whole weight of a work's meaning and assuming the consequences.

When I see Japanese footwork, I think "imitation." I can't dispute that the Japanese footworkers we witnessed in class found a way to build on the original dance: the club scene has come to symbolize a legitimate rebellion against the status quo. That being said, it remains a superficial performance. Chicago footwork dancers draw on economic and racial hardship: because of these limitations, they must think outside of the box, experimenting creatively with what they do have. What part of Japanese footwork pushes the limits of possibility? There must be some kind of power structure to push back against in a local way. The fallout of "imitation" is a fragile sense of identity. When will the Harlem club-goers, the Japanese who buy fake dreadlocks, decide they're black enough? How will they ever feel authentic in their performance? The act of imitation is not only disrespectful, it's shortsighted.

Then what does equitable cultural exchange look like? I came across a social media squabble from 2017 involving two basketball players. Retired player Kenyon Martin called out Jeremy Lin for having dreadlocks. In response, Lin posted "i think as minorities, the more that we appreciate each others cultures, the more we influence mainstream society" after mentioning Martin's Chinese tattoos. All right. But is this equitable? I would tend to say no, because dreadlocks on black folks has long been associated with criminality, whereas on other races it's considered fashionable.

Equitable cultural exchange isn't a contest of who gets the most hurt in the process. Equitable exchange means not taking a culture for granted. Being diligent. Empathetic. I want to think it can happen, but it seems difficult in a society where we privilege sharing over listening.