SOAS Studies in Music
About the Book Series
The SOAS Studies in Music Routledge Book Series is one of the world’s leading series in the discipline of ethnomusicology and global music studies. Our core mission is to produce high-quality, ethnographically rich studies of music-making worldwide, with particular interests in Asia and Africa. We publish monographs, edited volumes, and translations that explore musical repertories and performance practice, critical issues in ethnomusicology, sound studies, historical and analytical approaches to music across the globe. We recognize the value of applied, interdisciplinary and collaborative research, and our authors draw on current approaches from musicology, anthropology, history, and digital humanities.
Series Editors
- Professor Rachel Harris (SOAS University of London)
- Dr Richard Williams (SOAS University of London)
Editorial Board
- Professor Kwasi Ampene (University of Michigan)
- Professor Linda Barwick (University of Sydney)
- Professor Angela Impey (SOAS University of London)
- Dr Peter McMurray (University of Cambridge)
- Dr Moshe Morad (Tel Aviv University)
- Professor Suzel Reily (Universidade Estadual de Campinas)
- Professor Henry Spiller (University California Davis)
- Dr Marié Abe (University of Berkeley California)
Ritual and Music of North China: Shawm Bands in Shanxi
1st Edition
By Stephen Jones
June 14, 2017
The rich local traditions of musical life in rural China are still little known. Music-making in village society is largely ceremonial, and shawm bands account for a significant part of such music. This is the first major ethnographic study of Chinese shawm bands in their ceremonial and social ...
Ritual and Music of North China: Volume 2: Shaanbei
1st Edition
By Stephen Jones
June 14, 2017
This second volume of Stephen Jones' work on ritual and musical life in north China, again with accompanying downloadable resources, gives an impression of music-making in daily life in the poor mountainous region of Shaanbei, northwest China. It conveys some of the diverse musical activities ...
Beyond 'Innocence': Amis Aboriginal Song in Taiwan as an Ecosystem
1st Edition
By Shzr Ee Tan
June 13, 2017
Taiwan aboriginal song has received extensive media coverage since the launch and settlement of a copyright lawsuit following pop group Enigma's allegedly unauthorized use of Amis voices in the 1996 Olympics hit, Return To Innocence. Taking as her starting point the ripple effects of this case, ...
The Musical Human: Rethinking John Blacking's Ethnomusicology in the Twenty-First Century
1st Edition
Edited
By Suzel Reily
March 06, 2017
The musical human: without a doubt, this vision of the human species as naturally musical has become the most enduring legacy John Blacking bequeathed to ethnomusicology. The image aptly embodies his preoccupations, which integrated theoretical and methodological issues within the discipline with a...
An Introduction to Japanese Folk Performing Arts
1st Edition
By Terence A. Lancashire
November 28, 2016
Japanese folk performing arts incorporate a body of entertainments that range from the ritual to the secular. They may be the ritual dances at Shinto shrines performed to summon and entertain deities; group dances to drive away disease-bearing spirits; or theatrical mime to portray the tenets of ...
And We're All Brothers: Singing in Yiddish in Contemporary North America
1st Edition
By Abigail Wood
November 15, 2016
The dawn of the twenty-first century marked a turning period for American Yiddish culture. The 'Old World' of Yiddish-speaking Eastern Europe was fading from living memory - yet at the same time, Yiddish song enjoyed a renaissance of creative interest, both among a younger generation seeking ...
Ethnomusicological Encounters with Music and Musicians: Essays in Honor of Robert Garfias
1st Edition
Edited
By Timothy Rice
November 15, 2016
Designed as a tribute to Robert Garfias, who has conducted field work in more cultures than any other living ethnomusicologist, this volume explores the originating encounter in field work of ethnomusicologists with the musicians and musical traditions they study. The nineteen contributors provide ...
The Instrumental Music of Wutaishan's Buddhist Monasteries: Social and Ritual Contexts
1st Edition
By Beth Szczepanski
November 15, 2016
Beth Szczepanski examines how traditional and modern elements interact in the current practice, reception and functions of wind music, or shengguan, at monasteries in Wutaishan, one of China's four holy mountains of Buddhism. The book provides an invaluable insight into the political and economic ...
Female Voices from an Ewe Dance-drumming Community in Ghana: Our Music Has Become a Divine Spirit
1st Edition
By James Burns
November 10, 2016
Ewe dance-drumming has been extensively studied throughout the history of ethnomusicology, but up to now there has not been a single study that addresses Ewe female musicians. James Burns redresses this deficiency through a detailed ethnography of a group of female musicians from the Dzigbordi ...
Music and the Performance of Identity on Marie-Galante, French Antilles
1st Edition
By Ron Emoff
November 10, 2016
Marie-Galante is a small island situated in the Caribbean to the south of Guadeloupe. The majority of Marie-Galantais are descendants of the slave era, though a few French settlers also occupy the island. Along with its neighbours Guadeloupe and Martinique, Marie-Galante forms an official ...
The Gei of Geisha: Music, Identity and Meaning
1st Edition
By Kelly M. Foreman
November 10, 2016
The Japanese geisha is an international icon, known almost universally as a symbol of traditional Japan. Numerous books exist on the topic, yet this is the first to focus on the 'gei' of geisha - the art that constitutes their title (gei translates as fine art, sha refers to person). Kelly M. ...
Timba: The Sound of the Cuban Crisis
1st Edition
By Vincenzo Perna
November 10, 2016
Cuban music is recognized unanimously as a major historical force behind Latin American popular music, and as an important player in the development of US popular music and jazz. However, the music produced on the island after the Revolution in 1959 has been largely overlooked and overshadowed by ...