The recent furor from senior academics in response to a public lecture about the whiteness of music education reflects a longstanding race problem in music — it’s time to address this.
It may seem counter-intuitive to turn to Leonard Cohen’s ‘depressing’ songs during times of grief and uncertainty. But he shows there is always a reason to keep on keeping on.
His single Yeke Yeke was the first African song to pass a million in sales, but it’s meaning was best understood in Guinea, home of the griot and kora star.
Busking has long been a way for musicians to gain performance experience and garner a following. Digital platforms are powerful tools that can transmit local artists to global audiences.
Surf music was born in 1960. Its twangy instrumentals can be traced through many artists from The Shadows and Fleetwood Mac to Australia’s The Sunnyboys and The Cruel Sea.
The music alone, despite its unquestionable majesty, cannot entirely explain the enduring appeal of a band that existed for barely two years before its lead singer took his own life.
Fifty years ago, on July 11, 1969, David Bowie released Space Oddity. With its adventurous orchestration, unsettling harmonics and melancholy narrative, the now classic song captured a moment.
Long known as a spectacle of quirky Euro-kitsch, this year’s contest more closely resembled singing TV shows such as The Voice. Notable exceptions, however, were Iceland’s Hatari and our own Kate Miller-Heidke.
Leonard Cohen’s letter to his former girlfriend on her death bed became a viral phenomenon. But the words that circulated on social media were a paraphrased version, not his own.
Remixing a Beatles album might be seen as both artistically redundant and cynically commercial. But this remixed classic allows us to experience the album in a new way.
The enquiry into sacredness is not over, it’s just beginning for the 21st century, and in wildly disparate modes and places. In music, Nick Cave, Hozier and Dr G. Yunupingu have led the way.