THIS IS HOW WE DO: LIVING AND LEARNING IN AN APPALACHIAN EXPERIMENTAL MUSIC SCENE A Thesis by SHANNON A.B. PERRY Submitted to the Graduate School Appalachian State University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of MASTER OF ARTS MAY 2011 Center for Appalachian Studies THIS IS HOW WE DO: LIVING AND LEARNING IN AN APPALACHIAN EXPERIMENTAL MUSIC SCENE A Thesis by SHANNON A.B. PERRY May 2011 APPROVED BY: ________________________________ Fred J. Hay Chairperson, Thesis Committee ________________________________ Susan E. Keefe Member, Thesis Committee ________________________________ Patricia D. Beaver Member, Thesis Committee ________________________________ Patricia D. Beaver Director, Center for Appalachian Studies ________________________________ Edelma D. Huntley Dean, Research and Graduate Studies Copyright by Shannon A.B. Perry 2011 All Rights Reserved ABSTRACT THIS IS HOW WE DO: LIVING AND LEARNING IN AN APPALACHIAN EXPERIMENTAL MUSIC SCENE (2011) Shannon A.B. Perry, A.B. & B.S.Ed., University of Georgia M.A., Appalachian State University Chairperson: Fred J. Hay At the grassroots, Appalachian music encompasses much more than traditional music genres, like old-time and bluegrass. While these prevailing musics continue to inform most popular and scholarly understandings of the region’s musical heritage, many contemporary scholars dismiss such narrow definitions of “Appalachian music” as exclusionary and inaccurate. Many researchers have, thus, sought to broaden current understandings of Appalachia’s diverse contemporary and historical cultural landscape as well as explore connections between Appalachian and other regional, national, and global cultural phenomena. In April 2009, I began participant observation and interviewing in an experimental music scene unfolding in downtown Boone, North Carolina. This ethnographic material extrapolates on largely unexplored connections between Appalachian Studies and an international music underground similarly dissonant with “mainstream” American cultural understandings and projects. Because I am a musical performer in this scene, I also incorporate autoethnographic reflections of my own embodied activities and experiences. In contextualizing my observations and conclusions about the culture of this “non-Appalachian, Appalachian” music scene, I trace Appalachian identity through the history of iv American indie music before exploring this history’s intersections with Boone’s local history of alternative music scenes. I began my field work under the assumption that participants were engaged in constructing some unified, collective identity. After a time in the field, however, this initial focus seemed to simplify the complex social processes underway within this small but diverse music scene. No one identity or agreed upon culture existed between all participants. Instead, what they held in common proved far more interesting: a commitment to learning about and through various, sometimes opposed historically-contingent socio-cultural fields—or figured worlds—of alternative music. My research question necessarily shifted to accommodate such a realization. This thesis, then, explores this central question: How does learning happen in a local experimental music scene collectively engaged in negotiating and remaking disparate alternative music worlds? v DEDICATION For All seekers of the couer-rage to create. “Music is a plane of wisdom, because music is a universal language. It is a language of honor, it is a noble precept, a gift of the Airy Kingdom. Music is air, a universal existence. common to all the living.” – Sun Ra, “Music: The Neglected Plane of Wisdom,” 1955 vi ACKNOWLEDGMENTS First and foremost, I would like to thank the members of my thesis committee, Dr. Fred Hay, Dr. Susan Keefe, and Dr. Patricia Beaver. Fred deserves credit for telling me to stop the obsessive planning and get down to writing. Thank you for helping me rethink earlier drafts and acting as my music consultant. I could not have asked for a kinder, more laissez-faire chairperson. Sue, I cannot thank you enough for all the sound academic and personal advice. Without your theoretical and methodological guidance, I might still be trying to make sense of my chaotic thought process and research design. Pat, thank you for sharing your personal experiences, designing fun and practical assignments for your students, and encouraging each of us to find and pursue our passions. I would also like to acknowledge the many other professors who guided and encouraged my thinking and writing about the issues explored herein: Katherine Ledford, Kristan Cockerill, Bruce Stewart, Cecelia Conway, Conrad “Ozzie” Ostwalt, Chuck Smith, and Sandy Ballard. Debbie Bauer, thank you for keeping all of us organized and helping me land some post-graduation employment. Most of us already know Dean Williams knows the W.L. Eury Appalachian Collection just about by heart. To my surprise, his broad knowledge also extends to punk and alternative Appalachian music, including Boone’s past scenes. Thank you for helping me locate some important primary sources, including unsuspecting key informants lingering in the Belk Library. My return to school and, therefore, this thesis would have been impossible without two years of Chancellor's Fellowship support from the Cratis D. Williams Graduate School. The Center for Appalachian Studies provided much appreciated research funding through the Carl A. Ross Appalachian Studies Memorial Scholarship and the William C. Friday Research Fellowship. Several vii Office of Student Research and Graduate Student Senate Association grants also enabled me to attend conferences and receive preliminary feedback on pieces of this research. To all the musicians with whom I have played during my time in Boone, and especially those who were kind of enough to humor me with a sit-down interview, you have my deepest gratitude and utmost respect. This research would obviously not exist without your passionate musical practice and artistic search for how we might achieve a more culturally-sensitive and sustainable future world. Special thanks to John “Blindman” Doherty for connecting me with participants of Boone's 1980s and 1990s scenes and hooking me up with much otherwise irretrievable primary source material. Thank you to Kevin Freeman for reading through chapter drafts and commenting. My Appalachian Studies graduate cohort provided much inspiration through their own diverse research interests, projects, and inquiries. Donna Corriher, Ashley Brewer, Skye McFarland, and Rebecca Jones deserve special recognition for support provided in various, much appreciated, ways. A very heartfelt thank you to my mother and biggest supporter, Rosie Basas Perry, and the strong, inspiring women I am honored to call kin: Kimberly Perry Cullen, Clarissa McGarigle, Beverly Ann Knight Perry, Phyllis Pierce, Molly Fooks, Medina Basas, and Sonja Rivers. I also owe a note of gratitude to my father-in-law, George M. Pierce, for encouraging both Michael and me to be what we are and to keep reaching for all we hope to be. I appreciate the continued love and support emanating from The Golden Bough Bookstore in Macon, Georgia, and, especially from King Henry, Mary Katherine Dunwody, Davis Wells, Clark “After Dark” Bush, William “Willie D.” Dantzler, John L. Tate, Marshal McDonald, Eric Wakefield, and Heatherly and Blake Darnell. Finally, to my love, Michael Pierce: I'm done! Let's play some music! viii TABLE OF CONTENTS ABSTRACT ............................................................................................................................. iv DEDICATION ......................................................................................................................... vi ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ...................................................................................................... vii INTRODUCTION Appalachian Stepchild Redux.................................................................... 1 CHAPTER ONE Communities of Practice in Figured Worlds: A Review of the Literature . 10 From identity to practice ..................................................................................................... 10 Communities of Practice ..................................................................................................... 15 Figured Worlds ................................................................................................................... 20 Consumption and Improvisation as Everyday Practice ...................................................... 27 A Brief Note on Language .................................................................................................. 31 Conclusion .......................................................................................................................... 32 CHAPTER TWO Research Methods ...................................................................................... 34 Limits of Applicability ........................................................................................................ 39 Data Analysis ...................................................................................................................... 40 CHAPTER THREE Historical Overview of Appalachian Identity in the Figured World of American Indie Music, 1980-2010 ......................................................................................... 42 Appalachian Identity ..........................................................................................................