Rock Music: Race and Ethnicity
"We Got to Fight the Powers That Be": Race and Ethnicity in Rock Music
Despite the origins of rock music being grounded in the foundations established by Black blues, gospel, and rhythm and blues artists in the United States, the rock music industry and academic scholarship of the genre tend to focus on white voices. These readings center on critical race theory and highlight representations of people of color in rock music.
Books
Just Around Midnight: Rock and Roll and the Racial Imagination by
By the time Jimi Hendrix died in 1970, the idea of a black man playing lead guitar in a rock band seemed exotic. Yet a mere ten years earlier, Chuck Berry and Bo Diddley had stood among the most influential rock and roll performers. Why did rock and roll become "white"? Just around Midnight reveals the interplay of popular music and racial thought that was responsible for this shift within the music industry and in the minds of fans. Rooted in rhythm-and-blues pioneered by black musicians, 1950s rock and roll was racially inclusive and attracted listeners and performers across the color line. In the 1960s, however, rock and roll gave way to rock: a new musical ideal regarded as more serious, more artistic-and the province of white musicians. Decoding the racial discourses that have distorted standard histories of rock music, Jack Hamilton underscores how ideas of "authenticity" have blinded us to rock's inextricably interracial artistic enterprise. According to the standard storyline, the authentic white musician was guided by an individual creative vision, whereas black musicians were deemed authentic only when they stayed true to black tradition. Serious rock became white because only white musicians could be original without being accused of betraying their race. Juxtaposing Sam Cooke and Bob Dylan, Aretha Franklin and Janis Joplin, Jimi Hendrix and the Rolling Stones, and many others, Hamilton challenges the racial categories that oversimplified the sixties revolution and provides a deeper appreciation of the twists and turns that kept the music alive.
Call Number: ML3534 .H336 2016ISBN: 9780674416598Publication Date: 2016-09-26
A Change Is Gonna Come: Music, Race & the Soul of America by
". . . extraordinarily far-reaching. . . . highly accessible." --Notes "No one has written this way about music in a long, long time. Lucid, insightful, with real spiritual, political, intellectual, and emotional grasp of the whole picture. A book about why music matters, and how, and to whom." --Dave Marsh, author of Louie, Louie and Born to Run: The Bruce Springsteen Story "This book is urgently needed: a comprehensive look at the various forms of black popular music, both as music and as seen in a larger social context. No one can do this better than Craig Werner." --Henry Louis Gates, Jr., W.E.B. Du Bois Professor of the Humanities, Harvard University "[Werner has] mastered the extremely difficult art of writing about music as both an aesthetic and social force that conveys, implies, symbolizes, and represents ideas as well as emotion, but without reducing its complexities and ambiguities to merely didactic categories." --African American Review A Change Is Gonna Come is the story of more than four decades of enormously influential black music, from the hopeful, angry refrains of the Freedom movement, to the slick pop of Motown; from the disco inferno to the Million Man March; from Woodstock's "Summer of Love" to the war in Vietnam and the race riots that inspired Marvin Gaye to write "What's Going On." Originally published in 1998, A Change Is Gonna Come drew the attention of scholars and general readers alike. This new edition, featuring four new and updated chapters, will reintroduce Werner's seminal study of black music to a new generation of readers. Craig Werner is Professor of Afro-American Studies at the University of Wisconsin, and author of many books, including Playing the Changes: From Afro-Modernism to the Jazz Impulse and Up Around the Bend: An Oral History of Creedence Clearwater Revival. His most recent book is Higher Ground: Stevie Wonder, Aretha Franklin, Curtis Mayfield, and the Rise and Fall of American Soul.
Call Number: ML3479 .W47 2006ISBN: 0472031473Publication Date: 2006-01-09
Race, Rock, and Elvis by
Did Elvis Presley's brand of rock 'n' roll help revise racial attitudes in postwar America? Michael T. Bertrand delves into this question and many others to investigate popular music's revolutionary influence on black-white relations in the South. Youthful fans of rhythm and blues, rock 'n' roll, and other black-inspired music often broke from their segregationist elders and ignored the color line. Not coincidentally, these same young white people--the southern branch of a national and commercialized youth culture--led a general relaxation of racist attitudes. Bertrand argues that African American music facilitated a new recognition of black people as fellow human beings. African American audiences welcomed Elvis with enthusiasm while racially mixed audiences flocked to music venues at a time when adults expected separate performances for black and white audiences. Bertrand also describes the critical role of radio and recordings in making African American culture available to white fans on an unprecedented scale. Over time, southern working-class youth used the new music to define and express new values and build their own identities.
Call Number: ML3918.R63 B47 2000ISBN: 9780252025860Publication Date: 2000-08-01
Rock the Nation: Latin/o Identities and the Latin Rock Diaspora by
Rock the Nation analyzes Latino/a identity through rock 'n' roll music and its deep Latin/o history. By linking rock music to Latinos and to music from Latin America, the author argues that Latin/o music, people, and culture have been central to the development of rock music as a major popular music form, in spite of North American racial logic that marginalizes Latino/as as outsiders, foreigners, and always exotic.
According to the author, the Latin/o Rock Diaspora illuminates complex identity issues and interesting paradoxes with regard to identity politics, such as nationalism. Latino/as use rock music for assimilation to mainstream North American culture, while in Latin America, rock music in Spanish is used to resist English and the hegemony of U.S. culture. Meanwhile, singing in English and adopting U.S. popular culture allows youth to resist the hegemonic nationalisms of their own countries. Thus, throughout the Americas, Latino/as utilize rock music for assimilation to mainstream national culture(s), for resistance to the hegemony of dominant culture(s), and for mediating the negotiation of Latino/a identities.
Call Number: ML3534.6.L29 A83 2010ISBN: 9781441168979Publication Date: 2010-05-06
Heartbeat, Warble, and the Electric Powwow: American Indian Music by
Despite centuries of suppression and oppression, American Indian music survives today as a profound cultural force. Heartbeat, Warble, and the Electric Powwow celebrates in depth the vibrant soundscape of Native North America, from the "heartbeat" of intertribal drums and "warble" of Native flutes to contemporary rock, hip-hop, and electronic music. Drawing on more than one hundred interviews with musicians, producers, ethnographers, and record-label owners, author and musician Craig Harris conjures an aural tapestry in which powwow drums and end-blown woodwinds resound alongside operatic and symphonic strains, jazz and reggae, country music, and blues. Harris begins with an exploration of the powwow, from sacred ceremonies to intertribal gatherings. He examines the traditions of the Native American flute and its revival with artists such as two-time Grammy winners R. Carlos Nakai and Mary Youngblood. Singers and songwriters, including Buffy Sainte-Marie, Keith Secola, and Joanne Shenandoah, provide insights into their music and their lives as American Indians. Harris also traces American Indian rock, reggae, punk, and pop over four decades, punctuating his survey with commentary from such artists as Tom Bee, founder of Native America's first rock band, XIT. Grammy-winner Taj Mahal recalls influential guitarist Jesse Ed Davis; ex-bandmates reflect on Rock Hall of Fame inductee Redbone; Robbie Robertson, Pura Fe, and Rita Coolidge describe how their groundbreaking 1993 album, Music for the Native Americans, evolved; and DJs A Tribe Called Red discuss their melding of archival powwow recordings into fiery dance music. The many voices and sounds that weave throughout Harris's engaging, accessible account portray a sonic landscape that defies stereotyping and continues to expand. Heartbeat, Warble, and the Electric Powwow is the story--told by those who live it--of resisting a half-millennium of cultural suppression to create new sounds while preserving old roots. Listen in! Visit this book's page on the oupress.com website for a link to the book's Spotify playlist.
Call Number: ML3557 .H38 2016ISBN: 9780806151687Publication Date: 2016-05-06
Brimful of Asia: Negotiating Ethnicity on the UK Music Scene by
During the 1990s, Asian pop artists began entering the mainstream of the British music industry for the first time. Bands such as Black Star Liner, Cornershop, Fun Da Mental and Voodoo Queens, led those within and without the industry to start asking questions such as what did it mean to be Asian? How did the bands' Asian background affect their music? What did their music say about Asians in Britain? In this book, Rehan Hyder draws on in-depth interviews with musicians from these bands and with critics and record producers, to examine the pressures associated with making music as a young Asian in today's multi-ethnic Britain.
Call Number: ML3492 .H93 2004ISBN: 0754606775Publication Date: 2004-08-01
Jews, Race and Popular Music by
Jon Stratton provides a pioneering work on Jews as a racialized group in the popular music of America, Britain and Australia during the twentieth and early twenty-first centuries. Rather than taking a narrative, historical approach the book consists of a number of case studies, looking at the American, British and Australian music industries. Stratton's primary motivation is to uncover how the racialized positioning of Jews, which was sometimes similar but often different in each of the societies under consideration, affected the kinds of music with which Jews have become involved. Stratton explores race as a cultural construction and continues discussions undertaken in Jewish Studies concerning the racialization of the Jews and the stereotyping of Jews in order to present an in-depth and critical understanding of Jews, race and popular music.
Call Number: ML3470 .S79 2009ISBN: 9780754668046Publication Date: 2016-03-22
White Riot: Punk Rock and the Politics of Race by
From the Clash to Los Crudos, skinheads to afro-punks, the punk rock movement has been obsessed by race. And yet the connections have never been traced in a comprehensive way. White Riot is the definitive study of the subject, collecting first-person writing, lyrics, letters to zines, and analyses of punk history from across the globe. This book brings together writing from leading critics such as Greil Marcus and Dick Hebdige, personal reflections from punk pioneers such as Jimmy Pursey, Darryl Jenifer and Mimi Nguyen, and reports on punk scenes from Toronto to Jakarta.
Call Number: ML3918.R63 W55 2011ISBN: 9781844676880Publication Date: 2011-07-18
Rockin' the Borders: Rock Music and Social, Culture, and Political Change by
Rock music challenges hegemonic orders based on class, gender, nation, ethnicity/race or generation. This volume investigates how rock has played an integral part in the formation of identities and life-styles since the 1950's. Rock music is used as a wide concept, including different genres, e.g. rock 'n' roll, pop, punk, hip hop and blues. Unlike most other books on rock music, this volume focuses on how rock music becomes a part of everyday life and the formation of identities in a variety of European states such as England, Finland, Sweden and Wales, the USA, and also states that used to be on the other side of the Iron Curtain-such as GDR and Czechoslovakia. Thus, it includes a comparative perspective based on temporal as well as spatial aspects that further deepen the understanding of how rock music and society are intertwined. Rockin' the Borders is an interdisciplinary volume; the authors represent a variety of backgrounds: History, Ethnology, Folklore, Sociology and Sociology of Music, thus presenting us with an interesting mix of theoretical perspectives and methods.
Call Number: ML3534 .R63482 2010ISBN: 9781443821636Publication Date: 2010-07-01
Talkin' 'Bout a Revolution: Music and Social Change in America by
(Book). Talkin' 'Bout a Revolution is a comprehensive guide to the relationship between American music and politics. Music expert Dick Weissman opens with the dawn of American history, then moves to the book's key focus: 20th-century music songs by and about Native Americans, African-Americans, women, Spanish-speaking groups, and more. Unprecedented in its approach, the book offers a multidisciplinary discussion that is broad and diverse, and illuminates how social events impact music as well as how music impacts social events. Weissman delves deep, covering everything from current Native American music to "music of hate" racist and neo-Nazi music to the music of the Gulf wars, union songs, patriotic and antiwar songs, and beyond. A powerful tool for professors teaching classes about politics and music and a stimulating, accessible read for all kinds of appreciators, from casual music fans to social science lovers and devout music history buffs.
Call Number: ML3917.U6 W45 2010ISBN: 9781423442837Publication Date: 2010-05-01
Articles
- "Race, Ethnicity, Expressive Authenticity: Can White People Sing the Blues?" by Joel Rudinow, The Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism, Winter 1994
- "'Represent': Race, Space and Place in Rap Music" by Murray Forman, Popular Music, 11 December 2000
- "Jews, Punk and the Holocaust: From the Velvet Underground to the Ramones -- The Jewish-American Story" by Jon Stratton, Popular Music, 07 January 2005
- "Black Like This: Race, Generation, and Rock in the Post-Civil Rights Era" by Maureen Mahon, American Ethnologist, May 2000
- "Latinos in the Garage: A Genealogical Examination of the Latino/a Presence and Influence in Garage Rock (and Rock and Pop Music)" by Roberto Avant-Mier, Popular Music and Society, 01 December 2008
- "Listening for Willie Mae 'Big Mama' Thornton’s Voice: The Sound of Race and Gender Transgressions in Rock and Roll" by Maureen Mahone, Women and Music: A Journal of Gender and Culture, 2011
- "Race, Hegemony, and the Birth of Rock & Roll" by Paul Linden, Journal of the Music & Entertainment Industry Educators Association, 2012
- "'Did You Think When I Opened My Mouth?': Asian American Indie Rock and the Middling Noise of Racialization" by Douglas Ishii, Global Asian American Popular Cultures, 01 January 2016
- "Walk the (Gendered and Racialized) Line: Retrospective Consecration and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame" by Ashlee Bledose, American Behavioral Scientist, 29 September 2020
- "A (Mexican) Native American Rock Band: Redbone, Racial Legibility, and Native-Chicanx Intimacy" by Jedediah Kuhn, American Studies, 2022
- Articles PlusIndex to hundreds of millions electronic resources, including journal and newspaper articles, e-books, dissertations, and media in campus library collections.
Suggested Subject Headings
"African American rock musicians"
"Ethnicity in music"
"Jewish rock musicians"
"Music and race"
Recommended Memoirs and Biographies
Respect by
This "comprehensive and illuminating" biography of the Queen of Soul (USA Today) was hailed by Rolling Stone as "a remarkably complex portrait of Aretha Franklin's music and her tumultuous life." Aretha Franklin began life as the golden daughter of a progressive and promiscuous Baptist preacher. Raised without her mother, she was a gospel prodigy who gave birth to two sons in her teens and left them and her native Detroit for New York, where she struggled to find her true voice. It was not until 1967, when a white Jewish producer insisted she return to her gospel-soul roots, that fame and fortune finally came via "Respect" and a rapidfire string of hits. She continued to evolve for decades, amidst personal tragedy, surprise Grammy performances, and career reinventions. Again and again, Aretha stubbornly found a way to triumph over troubles, even as they continued to build. Her hold on the crown was tenacious, and in Respect, David Ritz gives us the definitive life of one of the greatest talents in all American culture.
Testimony by
New York Times Bestseller * On the 40th anniversary of The Band's legendary The Last Waltz concert, Robbie Robertson finally tells his own spellbinding story of the band that changed music history, his extraordinary personal journey, and his creative friendships with some of the greatest artists of the last half-century. Robbie Robertson's singular contributions to popular music have made him one of the most beloved songwriters and guitarists of his time. With songs like "The Weight," "The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down," and "Up on Cripple Creek," he and his partners in The Band fashioned a music that has endured for decades, influencing countless musicians. In this captivating memoir, written over five years of reflection, Robbie Robertson employs his unique storyteller's voice to weave together the journey that led him to some of the most pivotal events in music history. He recounts the adventures of his half-Jewish, half-Mohawk upbringing on the Six Nations Indian Reserve and on the gritty streets of Toronto; his odyssey at sixteen to the Mississippi Delta, the fountainhead of American music; the wild early years on the road with rockabilly legend Ronnie Hawkins and The Hawks; his unexpected ties to the Cosa Nostra underworld; the gripping trial-by-fire "going electric" with Bob Dylan on his 1966 world tour, and their ensuing celebrated collaborations; the formation of the Band and the forging of their unique sound, culminating with history's most famous farewell concert, brought to life for all time in Martin Scorsese's great movie The Last Waltz. This is the story of a time and place--the moment when rock 'n' roll became life, when legends like Buddy Holly and Bo Diddley criss-crossed the circuit of clubs and roadhouses from Texas to Toronto, when The Beatles, Hendrix, The Stones, and Warhol moved through the same streets and hotel rooms. It's the story of exciting change as the world tumbled through the '60s and early 70's, and a generation came of age, built on music, love and freedom. Above all, it's the moving story of the profound friendship between five young men who together created a new kind of popular music. Testimony is Robbie Robertson's story, lyrical and true, as only he could tell it.
Face the Music by
NEW YORK TIMES and INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLER In Face the Music, Paul Stanley--the co-founder and famous "Starchild" frontman of KISS--reveals for the first time the incredible highs and equally incredible lows in his life both inside and outside the band. Face the Music is the shocking, funny, smart, inspirational story of one of rock's most enduring icons and the group he helped create, define, and immortalize. Stanley mixes compelling personal revelations and gripping, gritty war stories that will surprise even the most steadfast member of the KISS Army. He takes us back to his childhood in the 1950s and '60s, a traumatic time made more painful thanks to a physical deformity. Born with a condition called microtia, he grew up partially deaf, with only one ear. But this instilled in him an inner drive to succeed in the most unlikely of pursuits: music. With never-before-seen photos and images throughout, Stanley's memoir is a fully realized and unflinching portrait of a rock star, a chronicle of the stories behind the famous anthems, the many brawls and betrayals, and all the drama and pyrotechnics on and off the stage. Raw and confessional, Stanley offers candid insights into his personal relationships, and the turbulent dynamics with his bandmates over the past four decades. And no one comes out unscathed--including Stanley himself. "People say I was brave to write such a revealing book, but I wrote it because I needed to personally reflect on my own life. I know everyone will see themselves somewhere in this book, and where my story might take them is why I'm sharing it." --Paul Stanley
Eruption by
Get a completely new look at guitar legend Eddie Van Halen with this groundbreaking oral history, composed of more than fifty hours of interviews with Eddie himself as well as his family, friends, and colleagues. When rock legend Eddie Van Halen died of cancer on October 6, 2020, the entire world seemed to stop and grieve. Since his band Van Halen burst onto the scene with their self-titled debut album in 1978, Eddie had been hailed as an icon not only to fans of rock music and heavy metal, but to performers across all genres and around the world. Van Halen's debut sounded unlike anything that listeners had heard before and remains a quintessential rock album of the era. Over the course of more than four decades, Eddie gained renown for his innovative guitar playing, and particularly for popularizing the tapping guitar solo technique. Unfortunately for Eddie and his legions of fans, he died before he was ever able to put his life down to paper in his own words, and much of his compelling backstory has remained elusive--until now. In Eruption, music journalists Brad Tolinski and Chris Gill share with fans, new and old alike, a candid, compulsively readable, and definitive oral history of the most influential rock guitarist since Jimi Hendrix. It is based on more than 50+ hours of unreleased interviews they recorded with Eddie Van Halen over the years, most of them conducted at the legendary 5150 studios at Ed's home in Los Angeles. The heart of Eruption is drawn from these intimate and wide-ranging talks, as well as conversations with family, friends, and colleagues. In addition to discussing his greatest triumphs as a groundbreaking musician, including an unprecedented dive into Van Halen's masterpiece 1984, the book also takes an unflinching look at Edward's early struggles as young Dutch immigrant unable to speak the English language, which resulted in lifelong issues with social anxiety and substance abuse. Eruption: Conversations with Eddie Van Halen also examines his brilliance as an inventor who changed the face of guitar manufacturing. As entertaining as it is revealing, Eruption is the closest readers will ever get to hearing Eddie's side of the story when it comes to his extraordinary life.
The First Time by The pop singer, Oscar-winning actress, and television star reveals the details of her volatile life, including her years with the late Sonny Bono, stories about her childhood, and her professional experiences.
Room Full of Mirrors by
It has been more than thirty-five years since Jimi Hendrix died, but his music and spirit are still very much alive for his fans everywhere. Charles R. Cross vividly recounts the life of Hendrix, from his difficult childhood and adolescence in Seattle through his incredible rise to celebrity in London's swinging sixties. It is the story of an outrageous life--with legendary tales of sex, drugs, and excess--while it also reveals a man who struggled to accept his role as idol and who privately craved the kind of normal family life he never had. Using never-before-seen documents and private letters, and based on hundreds of interviews with those who knew Hendrix--many of whom had never before agreed to be interviewed--Room Full of Mirrors unlocks the vast mystery of one of music's most enduring legends.
A Natural Woman by
Carole King takes us from her early beginnings in Brooklyn, to her remarkable success as one of the world's most acclaimed songwriting and performing talents of all time. A Natural Woman chronicles King's extraordinary life, drawing readers into her musical world, including her phenomenally successful #1 album Tapestry, and into her journey as a performer, mother, wife and present-day activist. Deeply personal, King's long-awaited memoir offers readers a front-row seat to the woman behind the legend. The book will include dozens of photos from King's childhood, her own family, and behind-the-scenes images from her performances.
The Universal Tone by
The intimate and long-awaited autobiography of a legend. In 1967 in San Francisco, just a few weeks after the Summer of Love, a young Mexican guitarist took the stage at the Fillmore Auditorium and played a blistering solo that announced the arrival of a prodigious musical talent. Two years later -- after he played a historic set at Woodstock -- the world came to know the name Carlos Santana, his sensual and instantly recognizable guitar sound, and the legendary band that blended electric blues, psychedelic rock, Latin rhythms, and modern jazz, and that still bears his name. Carlos Santana's unforgettable memoir offers a page-turning tale of musical self-determination and inner self-discovery, with personal stories filled with colorful detail and life-affirming lessons. The Universal Tone traces his journey from his earliest days playing the strip bars in Tijuana while barely in his teens and brings to light the establishment of his signature guitar sound; his roles as husband, father, recording legend, and rock guitar star; his indebtedness to musical and spiritual influences -- from John Coltrane and John Lee Hooker to Miles Davis and Harry Belafonte; and his deep, lifelong dedication to a spiritual path that he developed from his Catholic upbringing, Eastern philosophies, and other mystical sources. It includes his recording some of the most popular and influential rock albums of all time, up to and beyond the 1999 sensation Supernatural, which garnered nine Grammy Awards and stands as arguably the most amazing career comeback in popular music history. It's a profoundly inspiring tale of divine inspiration and musical fearlessness that does not balk at finding the humor in the world of high-flying fame, or at speaking plainly of Santana's personal revelations and the infinite possibility he sees in each person he meets. "Love is the light that is inside of all of us, everyone," he writes. "I salute the light that you are and that is inside your heart."
The Rice Room by
An instant best-seller when originally published in 1994, this expanded and updated edition of The Rice Room tells of growing up with a double identity--Chinese and American. Ben Fong-Torres was torn between an alluring American lifestyle--including Elvis and rock 'n' roll--and the traditional cultural heritage his proud immigrant parents struggled to instill in their five children. Now illustrated with personal family photographs as well as photos of the author with various celebrities, Fong-Torres rounds out his life story with a new final chapter.
