Performer(s): Dubai Traditional Indian Music Group (Vento Entertainment)
Culture/Origin: India
Orchestration: sitar, tabla, flute
I recently attended an international festival hosted by one of West Virginia's largest universities, Marshall University, which is located about 45 minutes from the university (WVSU) that I assist at. I was there to observe the Japanese musical performances for my fieldwork project. In addition to a representation of Japanese culture, they also had representation of Indian culture there, among others. Furthermore, our state is home to Prabhupada's Palace of Gold, which is located in the northern part of the state. I make mention of the palace as I visited it last year and it got me more interested in Indian culture, and in particular, the music, which is why I decided to choose Indian music for this week's blog.
Looking at the models presented by Koops (2010), what we see in the video here would fall under "Authenticity as Continuum" as it represents absolute authenticity of Indian music. Not only are the performers (who are Indian themselves) playing on traditional Indian instruments, but they have also dressed and performed in a genuine traditional manner. However, as Koops mentions, authenticity is a challenging concept and absolute authenticity is not really possible in a classroom setting. As Koops' explains "teachers must evaluate how far on the continuum a musician can go without negating potential educational benefits of teaching in the music classroom or distorting the music in a disrespectful way" (Authenticity as Continuum, para. 1). When we teach world music, although we may not be able to have absolute authenticity, we need to ensure that the music is authentic enough that it does not disrespect the culture from which the music originated.
References:
Koops, L. H. (2010). Can't we just change the words? Music Educators Journal, 97(1), 23-28. doi:10.1177/0027432110376892.
Hi Joshua,
ReplyDeleteThanks for sharing your thoughts this week. I enjoy the video you provided and you can see the authentic value it holds. With the performers dressed in attire, it created a visual authentic feel as well. I love when I see performances where the ensemble members are in costume. Not only is it visually appealing to watch them in their "native" attire, but it also makes the performance more authentic. This would be a true definition of Authenticity as Continuum, however you mentioned that we need to ensure music is authentic enough that it does not disrespect cultures. I am curious as to what you do in the classroom when providing authentic music experiences with your children?
Hi Matthew. In answering your question, as I said in week 1's full class discussion, we haven't really gotten to do much world music, especially in regards to authenticity (the most we've done are pieces inspired by other cultures). However, although not necessarily world music, in band, we often perform transcriptions and arrangements of orchestral works. Transcriptions try to be as authentic as possible to the original version, but it doesn't always come out that way. In those cases where the transcription or arrangement didn't quite accurately portray what the original did, we may modify it so that it is a better, and thus more authentic, performance of that piece.
DeleteThere's one instance that I can instantly recall where we did a medley of music from the movie, Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End. This arrangement's ending was not an authentic representation of how the music was portrayed in the movie, so I completely rearranged the last part of that arrangement so that it was a more accurate representation of the movie's score.