The first in-depth study of diverse and radical innovation in Arab
music
From jazz trumpeters drawing on the noises of warfare in Beirut to
female heavy metallers in Alexandria, the Arab culture offers a wealth
of exciting, challenging, and diverse musics. The essays in this
collection investigate the plethora of compositional and improvisational
techniques, performance styles, political motivations, professional
trainings, and inter-continental collaborations that claim the mantle of
"innovation" within Arab and Arab diaspora music. While most books on
Middle Eastern music-making focus on notions of tradition and regionally
specific genres, The Arab Avant Garde presents a radically hybrid and
globally dialectic set of practices. Engaging the "avant-garde"--a term
with Eurocentric resonances--this anthology disturbs that presumed
exclusivity, drawing on and challenging a growing body of literature
about alternative modernities.
Chapters delve into genres and modes as diverse as jazz, musical
theatre, improvisation, hip hop, and heavy metal as performed in
countries like Iraq, Egypt, Lebanon, Syria, Palestine, and the United
States. Focusing on multiple ways in which the "Arab avant-garde"
becomes manifest, this anthology brings together international writers
with eclectic disciplinary trainings--practicing musicians, area studies
specialists, ethnomusicologists, and scholars of popular culture and
media. Contributors include Sami W. Asmar, Michael Khoury, Saed Muhssin,
Marina Peterson, Kamran Rastegar, Caroline Rooney, and Shayna
Silverstein, as well as the editors.
