help help help
i'm having a hard time trying to find something to write about for my research paper. i need to write a paper as part of my graduation requirements, but i also need to write it so that i may submit it to the universities i am applying to for evaluation. it's frustrating because i want to write something that has meaning and relevance to my own ideas but also stays true to credible musical research. i guess i really just don't know what to talk about. i want to put everything i've said in prior posts and apply it to something legitimate. but what exactly, i can't say. what should i focus on? where do i start? i did a presentation on lully and how his operas were influenced by the ruling idealogy of king louis xiv. i think i could do something along that line.
i was just thinking about something that is a bit funny. i was talking to dr. baker recently and she was just mentioning what she thought i wanted to write about or what i did not want to write about. so she said, "well george crumb is out because you don't like him...." but i was just thinking that just because we write or do reasearch on someone does not me we have to like the composer or his music. certainly we can do research on him/her to dispprove his music or place him in the correct social context?
i want to focus on music, and how it is used by powerful figures in society to sway society. i want to write about how music is manipulated. music, like religion, like anything else, can be manipulated to promote certain ideologies. i want to show how music has been used throughout history in this manner. i can't write about every instance, but i need to find a period to focus on. a few years in a countries history. we probably do not notice it, but music right now is being swayed by those in powerful positions. take for example what i have written about in regards to my experiences at the university i attend. is it not obvious?
maybe, what i want to do is something that requires far more research than i can handle. well, it is not that i cannot handle the research. it is that my resources are limited and so is my time. i don't know what to do. ahhhhhh!
someone give me some ideas!
i was just thinking about something that is a bit funny. i was talking to dr. baker recently and she was just mentioning what she thought i wanted to write about or what i did not want to write about. so she said, "well george crumb is out because you don't like him...." but i was just thinking that just because we write or do reasearch on someone does not me we have to like the composer or his music. certainly we can do research on him/her to dispprove his music or place him in the correct social context?
i want to focus on music, and how it is used by powerful figures in society to sway society. i want to write about how music is manipulated. music, like religion, like anything else, can be manipulated to promote certain ideologies. i want to show how music has been used throughout history in this manner. i can't write about every instance, but i need to find a period to focus on. a few years in a countries history. we probably do not notice it, but music right now is being swayed by those in powerful positions. take for example what i have written about in regards to my experiences at the university i attend. is it not obvious?
maybe, what i want to do is something that requires far more research than i can handle. well, it is not that i cannot handle the research. it is that my resources are limited and so is my time. i don't know what to do. ahhhhhh!
someone give me some ideas!
1 Comments:
You point toward an ambitious topic. Several things spring to my mind if you want some input:
1) If you wanted to focus on a single figure: Cornelius Cardew was keenly aware of the social context of music and a full treatment of his transition toward radicalism from 1950 to his mysterious death in the early '80s. I believe he was on the verge of a breakthrough in reconnecting the audience to new music as he raised a number of social issues that current composers have yet to come to terms with.
2) The music composition departments of university campuses of North America approximately between 1945 - 1980 were ideologically dominated by a virulently intolerant strain of serialist composers.
3) The transition between the Baroque and Classical eras is marked by a movement from sacred music toward secular music sponsored by wealthy patrons. Broad strokes, I know, that's my generalized impression of it.
4) The effect the Great Depression had on the music of Ruth Crawford-Seeger and how she completely changes styles in response to the social climate.
5) The efforts of the Stalinist government to directly affect the music of Soviet composers and the impact this had.
6) Composer Conlon Nancarrow's exile in Mexico City. I don't know a lot of details about this one. But I do sympathize with his politics so this facinates me.
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