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Article: Black music and writing black music history: American music and narrative strategies.(Becoming: Blackness and the Musical Imagination)(Critical essay)
- Article from:
- Black Music Research Journal
- Article date:
- March 22, 2008
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 2008 Center For Black Music Research. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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My aim in this paper is to draw attention to ways of writing American music history and to draw from its narrative approaches implications for black music research. In the process, I touch upon three subjects: narrative strategies for writing American music history, an impediment to the writing of a complete history of American music, and an idea for the construction of a model for the latter by combining musical practice with a diasporal approach to black music history.
In an article entitled "Defining American Music," the British musicologist and Keele University professor David Nicholls asked the question, "What do we mean by American music?" His description ...