The University of New Mexico’s Department of Music and the College of Fine Arts welcomes Dr. Solis to Keller Hall for his lecture on Thursday, February 18th at 2:00pm, “The Black Pacific: Music, Race, and Indigeneity in Australia and Papua New Guinea.”
From the Fisk Jubilee Singers’ tour of Australasia in the 1890s to Snoop Dogg’s visit to Brisbane in 2014, the last century has seen ongoing, intensive intersections between Indigenous and African Diasporic musicians and activists in the Southwestern Pacific. Dr. Gabriel Solis explores the musical history examining how it represents a continuation of older Indigenous cosmopolitanism and a newer structure, emerging alongside colonial processes.
Dr. Gabriel Solis is Professor of Music, African American Studies, and Anthropology at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. A scholar of historical ethnomusicology, he has done research in the U.S, Australia, and Papua New Guinea. His work focuses on musical racialization as a component of global modernity. In addition to the books Monk’s Music: Thelonious Monk and Jazz History in the Making (2008), Thelonious Monk Quartet with John Coltrane (2014), and Musical Improvisation: Art, Education, and Society (2009, co-edited with Bruno Nettl), he is the author of articles and book chapters that have appeared in such journals as Ethnomusicology, Popular Music and Society, the Journal of the Royal Musical Association, the Musical Quarterly, Musicultures, and Critical Sociology.
An Americanish Songbook: Linda Ronstadt’s “other” Country
This talk will consider performances and recordings by singer Linda Ronstadt to propose what I refer to as her Americanish musical songbook. The suffix “ish” here intends to accentuate the “somewhat” or “to some extent” of “American” that Ronstadt—Tucson born and raised—lived and sonically imagined through her extraordinary musical career.
Arab Musicking on the U.S.–Mexico Border
This talk explores the relationship between trauma and identity by examining Arab music performance on the U.S.–Mexico border. Drawing on the musicking of Syrian and Mexican migrant communities, I interrogate theories of cultural and psychological trauma and borderland epistemologies to explore how border tensions influence the often-fraught views of identity.
Music from the Americas presents The Low Frequency Trio
Formed by Antonio Rosales (bass clarinet), Juan José García (doublebass), and José Luis Hurtado (piano), LOW FREQUENCY TRIO is one of the few ensembles in the world that plays music that was exclusively composed for them.