research
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June 14-30, 2008 Following up preliminary fieldwork in Taiwan, this summer I delved deeper into the indie music scenes of Taipei City and Taizhong, Taiwan. I couldn’t help but notice the significant number of Waigoren (English speaking foreigners) on the scene. Digging a bit deeper I found that Waigoren, first American GIs of the Cold…
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I had the opportunity to work with colleagues at Virginia Commonwealth University and other area colleges as a member of the local arrangements committee. Lead by Sarah Jane Brubaker and Denise Bissler, we organized all local aspects of the conference, including the venue, accommodations, and literature about amenities, history and culture in the city of…
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The Scene Article, written by avant-jazz musician Matt White of Richmond, provides thoughtful commentary on what it takes to build a local music scene. White modestly claims to know little about music scenes, but as this post and his scene-building work with Patchwork Collective shows, active people who know some and do much is perhaps…
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Millikin University, Decatur, IL April 2-5, 2009 In April I found myself in the Midwest listening to old time music and learning that the South is overrepresented in American music history and that “Peterson had it wrong” about country music – he couldn’t feel what the music meant to people. As a sociologist from the…
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In the US, the 1990s was the decade of “grrl power” as third-wave feminists renewed the movement through cultural expression, and particularly musical expression, of women’s identities. The movement began underground in the late 1980s in the form of woman-made ‘zines (self produced and distributed magazines) and all-female punk bands who stared the Riot Grrl…
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Austin, TX March 18-22, 2009 After missing a flight and hitching a ride from Dallas, Wendy and I finally made it to South by South West, an indie music festival in Austin where she followed several of her dissertation informants (Thao, Asobi Seksu, Airborne Toxic Event…) and I followed my field sites, the local scenes…
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Stackboy Ent., an organization of seven young MCs, lyricists and producers, entertained a crowd of over fifty at the Outback Lodge in Charlottesville back in November 2007. Stackboy Ent is on stage with DJ XSV, the crowd is pushing up to the stage, hands in the air, and the whole building is buzzing with sound…
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January 26th, 2008 (letterpress flyer created by John Bylander @ Virginia Art of the Book Center) Ambient Pancakes was an all night sleep over of ambient music and noise that culminated in vegan pancakes. It was the closing event of Audio January, a month long series of performances, workshops and installations at the Bridge Performing…
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February 16th Surround Sound is the third show in a series of that showcases Charlottesville musicians at Satellite Ballroom. The first FreakFest, featured fringe rock, and the second Noble Savages, featured Rock, Hip-Hop and Pop. Surround sound features experimental, ambient and jazz music. This line up posed a mind bending challenge for sound engineers –…
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On stage, four men in blue shirts and blue jeans played a solid 12 song set early Saturday afternoon at LaTaza’s Low Country Broil, a fundraiser for coffee growers in Guatemala. As the morning fog broke into sticky afternoon sunshine, sweat dripped into their eyes as they sang and onto the stage as they moved…
jacob alden sargent 