Afro No-Clash Composing Syncretic African/Western Music
Afro No-Clash Composing syncretic African/Western music: eleven compositions and the frameworks for their systematic analysis by Jim Chapman BA (Dip Psych), B Mus Volume 1 Music Creative Industries Faculty Submitted for the degree of PhD at the Queensland University of Technology 2007 Keywords African musics, analysis, appropriation, aesthetics, blending, composition, cross-cultural, culture, difference, embodiment, ethnomusicology, expectancy, identity, metatheory, multivalence, participation, performance, polyrhythm, postcolonialism, repetition, simultaneity, syncretism, transformation, ubuntu, variation, Western music Abstract Afro No-Clash - Composing syncretic African/Western music: eleven compositions and the frameworks for their systematic analysis. This PhD consists of an artistic work (an album of music) and an exegesis. The album contains eleven works for a variety of ensembles, including an eight-piece pop fusion group, a string quartet, an eleven-piece a cappella ensemble, a five-piece contemporary classical ensemble and a six-piece percussion ensemble. Each of these works embraces a blend of African and Western techniques and aesthetics. These works are the result of a compositional praxis which is closely integrated with a theoretical framework that I develop in the exegesis. The purpose of the exegesis is to provide a framework from which to understand the compositions. Perspectives such as postcolonialism are immediately engaged because of the fact that two distinct world cultures are referenced by these compositions. Similarly, the musical aesthetics of the two source cultures are examined because I need to understand the ways that the value systems are expressed in musical terms, and how they might interact in cross-cultural composition. Examination of the literature reveals that there has been a trend in recent decades towards cultural analysis of cross-cultural music but very little work has been done on the technical analysis of such works (Utz 2003).
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