| Blutopia: Visions of the Future and Revisions of the Past in the Work of Sun Ra, Duke Ellington, and Anthony Braxton Contributor(s): Lock, Graham (Author) |
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ISBN: 0822324040 ISBN-13: 9780822324041 Publisher: Duke University Press OUR PRICE: $102.55 Product Type: Hardcover - Other Formats Published: January 2000 Annotation: "Graham Lock's "Blutopia" will stand as a pivotal text in the development of a serious consideration of African American creative music. Lock offers a range of fresh, new materials, and is at the same time approaching the problematic of the black musical intellectual tradition from an extremely exciting and original perspective."-- John Corbett, author of "Extended Play: Sounding Off from John Cage to Dr. Funkenstein" "Lock is upping the ante on the scholarship of music. He gently leads the reader into largely unknown territory with impressive lucidity and evenhandedness."--John Szwed, author of "Space Is the Place: The Lives and Times of Sun Ra "Graham Lock's rightly-named book expertly and impeccably attends to the mission African-American music has been on. Its address of a utopic assertion shaded by blue, dystopic truth in the work of Sun Ra, Ellington, and Braxton knowingly shows how distinctly out music 'in the tradition' has long been. Entering the discourse advanced by such assertion with exemplary grace and discernment, ever the right tone and touch, it succeeds beautifully in recognizing and furthering the music's blutopic studies."--Nathaniel Mackey, University of California, Santa Cruz |
| Additional Information |
| BISAC Categories: - Music | Genres & Styles - Jazz - Music | History & Criticism - General - Biography & Autobiography | Music |
| Dewey: 781.650 |
| LCCN: 99034402 |
| Physical Information: 1.2" H x 6.09" W x 9.62" (1.48 lbs) 336 pages |
| Themes: - Chronological Period - 20th Century - Ethnic Orientation - African American |
| Descriptions, Reviews, Etc. |
| Publisher Description: In Blutopia Graham Lock studies the music and thought of three pioneering twentieth-century musicians: Sun Ra, Duke Ellington, and Anthony Braxton. Providing an alternative to previous analyses of their work, Lock shows how these distinctive artists were each influenced by a common musical and spiritual heritage and participated in self-conscious efforts to create a utopian vision of the future. A century after Ellington's birth, Lock reassesses his use of music as a form of black history and compares the different approaches of Ra, a band leader who focused on the future and cosmology, and Braxton, a contemporary composer whose work creates its own elaborate mythology. Arguing that the majority of writing on black music and musicians has--even if inadvertently--incorporated racial stereotypes, he explains how each artist reacted to criticism and sought to break free of categorical confines. Drawing on social history, musicology, biography, cultural theory, and, most of all, statements by the musicians themselves, Lock writes of their influential work. Blutopia will be a welcome contribution to the literature on twentieth-century African American music and creativity. It will interest students of jazz, American music, African American studies, American culture, and cultural studies. |