Hi folks. I'm Kay. I'm a twenty-something lady living in the frozen north, attempting to wear a bunch of hats at once and occasionally succeeding. For my day job, I work as a research assistant to a musicologist. We're studying Canadian music. I also work as a chorister in an opera house, and fingers crossed I'll get roles in the future. In my spare time, I write fanfiction (and occasionally original fic), and I compose electronic music. I also play a lot of video games (I'm partial to sci-fi/fantasy/dystopia and RPG/adventure/FPS), many of which I play with my husband. I have had depression/dysthymia since I was probably 4 or 5 years old; it was formally diagnosed in the past year. Anxiety rears its head far too often for my liking. I love to learn. Everything is interesting. If I wasn't going into music, I'd probably be in astronomy. Questions welcome.
Ah, yes, the frozen north. Bluh. What is there to study in Canadian music? Is it different than other musics? I must confess, I haven't done any music study since I learned flute in high school, but this is interesting. I cheerfully assume by your tagline thingy that you appreciate Homestuck.
Oh boy here we go :P You've actually hit at least one nail on the head here. The first question in studying Canadian music (and Canadian culture in general) is, well, does it exist? This is a (fortunate or unfortunate) side effect of our approach to multiculturalism: since we became a country thanks to a LOT of immigration, we've always thought it important that everyone get to keep their own culture alive and thriving. (This is of course offset by the absolutely shit-tastic historical and current government policies around First Nations, Inuit, and Métis people. Way to go colonialisation. Slow clap.) This raises the question: what does "Canadian" mean? Does it mean cultures belonging to the ultimate native Canadians - i.e., the First Nations peoples and Inuit? Does it mean the cultures created solely in Canada - i.e., the Métis, the Acadians? Does it mean the culture of anyone identifying as Canadian? What makes the culture of a Pakistani immigrant to Canada "Canadian", and not "Pakistani" (for instance)? You see we run into problems of definition really fast. The easiest answer to all the questions above is, well, yes. Yes to all of these. We (ideally) aim to be inclusive. One of my supervisor's overarching topics of research is the issue of genre in music. This is particularly interesting when you look at Canadian music because a lot of Canadian artists tend to cross genres liberally. Our rock bands are not solely rock bands - you could also class them as indie rock, or folk rock, or country rock ... and all at the same time. Why is this? Is it solely because our population is a tenth the size of the US, our nearest cultural exchange partner? US music marketing is very niche-oriented, because (sweeping generalization alert) US music markets are very niche-oriented. Country fans are not rock fans are not indie fans. In Canada, do we just not have the numbers to do that? Or, perhaps, is this genre-crossing due to our liberal culture-inclusion traditions? Who the fuck knows? Also, is genre solely based on musical characteristics? Or, for instance, does the definition of "heavy metal" include the costumes and performance practices of the bands called "heavy metal"? Genres have all sorts of connotations. We currently have three projects on the go. The first, which occupies most of my time, is a study of the music of one particular band. This band, called Humphrey and the Dumptrucks (I kid you not) was active in Saskatchewan in the 70s, and they're an eclectic mix of jug band, bluegrass, rock, folk, country, blues, and indie, with a little bit of beach sound thrown in. And kazoos. My current job is to transcribe all five of their albums into sheet music, so that my supervisor can pick it apart and look at which bits of the music 'belong to' any one of those genres I mentioned above. She is also looking at the history of their performances, their fan base, their habits, their lyrics, etc etc etc. The second and third are less far along. The second is a study of the portrayal of Louis Riel in Canadian music since circa the 1860s. (Who's Louis Riel? Short version: smart dude was pretty unimpressed by British immigrants tossing the Métis settlers in Manitoba out on their asses and stood up to the government of the time. shit happened, an English guy got executed (justified or not is a damn good question), Riel went to Montana and eventually thought he was a messianic figure for the Métis (mentally ill? not sure), then went to Saskatchewan where the same thing that happened in Manitoba was happening again: instead of doing things diplomatically like he did in Manitoba, he thought that, given his messianic/prophet status, he could beat the British quite soundly. Unfortunately a lot of people died. He was eventually executed. French Canadians tend to think of him as a hero because he stood up for their rights; English Canadians tend to think of him as a traitor because he rebelled against the government. It's complicated.) So we're looking at whether or not the stereotypes of Riel in different cultures hold true in their music. Does all English music mentioning Riel say that he's a terrorist and a traitor? Does all French music call him a hero? Does anyone mention that he might have been a bit off his rocker? Does anyone talk about his religious beliefs? What about First Nations or Métis music? And finally, we're looking at the status and mythology surrounding Sophie-Carmen Eckhardt-Gramatté. Sophie-Carmen was a composer, musician, and patron of the arts here in the Prairies. She was born in Russia; her mother, who worked on the Tolstoy estate, claimed she was Tolstoy's illegitimate child. (Bullshit.) This was only the start of this strange mythological 'cult' around Sophie-Carmen. She is consistently portrayed as this heroic yet vaguely tortured figure, very Beethoven. She frequently chose deliberately androgynous/masculine clothing, hairstyles, and portrayals. Her first husband, a painter, followed this trend. Her second husband wrote a huge book about how fucking brilliant she was. She is always toted as this fantastic composer figure. ... and the thing is, her music is okay, but it's not incredible, and her impact on Prairie arts is far more due to her extensive patronage than to her compositions or musicianship. So what's driving this strange portrayal? Why have we continued this? Why did it start? ... there ya go. :D and yes! I like me some Homestuck. I'm up to date, but I reeeeeeeeally need to go back and read the whole thing again. I've lost track of a lot of plot threads.
ooooh that is all super neat. i'm also canadian but eckhardt-gramatté doesn't ring a bell, perhaps because i'm from ontario. canadian music really does drift back and forth across musical genres. the first time my mom heard me listening to the weakerthans she wanted to know 'since when do you listen to country?'
