The race of sound :
listening, timbre, and vocality in African American music /
Nina Sun Eidsheim.

Description

Main Author

Eidsheim, Nina Sun, 1975-

Language(s)

English

Published

©2019
Durham : Duke University Press, 2019.

Subjects

Scott, Jimmy, > Scott, Jimmy, / 1925-2014.
Holiday, Billie, > Holiday, Billie, / 1915-1959.
Anderson, Marian, > Anderson, Marian, / 1897-1993.
Scott, Jimmy, > Scott, Jimmy, / 1925-2014.
Holiday, Billie, > Holiday, Billie, / 1915-1959.
Anderson, Marian, > Anderson, Marian, / 1897-1993.
Vocaloid (Computer file)
Music > Music / Social aspects.
Music and race.
African Americans.
Singing > Singing / [0]: http://id.loc.gov/authorities/subjects/sh85122827 / Social aspects > Singing / [0]: http://id.loc.gov/authorities/subjects/sh85122827 / Social aspects / [0]: http://id.loc.gov/authorities/subjects/sh00002758 / United States.
Music > Music / Social aspects > Music / Social aspects / United States.
Tone color (Music) > Tone color (Music) / [0]: http://id.loc.gov/authorities/subjects/sh85135970 / Social aspects > Tone color (Music) / [0]: http://id.loc.gov/authorities/subjects/sh85135970 / Social aspects / [0]: http://id.loc.gov/authorities/subjects/sh00002758 / United States.
Voice culture > Voice culture / [0]: http://id.loc.gov/authorities/subjects/sh85144229 / Social aspects > Voice culture / [0]: http://id.loc.gov/authorities/subjects/sh85144229 / Social aspects / [0]: http://id.loc.gov/authorities/subjects/sh00002758 / United States.
Music and race > Music and race / [0]: http://id.loc.gov/authorities/subjects/sh85088890 / United States.
African Americans > African Americans / Music > African Americans / Music / [0]: http://id.loc.gov/authorities/subjects/sh85001968 / Social aspects.
United States.

Summary

Traces the ways in which sonic attributes that might seem natural, such as the voice and its qualities, are socially produced. The author illustrates how listeners measure race through sound and locate racial subjectivities in vocal timbre - the color or tone of a voice. The author examines singers Marian Anderson, Billie Holiday, and Jimmy Scott as well as the vocal synthesis technology Vocaloid to show how listeners carry a series of assumptions about the nature of the voice and to whom it belongs. Outlining how the voice is linked to ideas of racial essentialism and authenticity, the author untangled the relationship between race, gender, vocal technique, and timbre while addressing an undertheorized space of racial and ethnic performance. In so doing, she advances our knowledge of the cultural-historical formation of the timbral politics of difference and the ways that comprehending voice remains central to understanding human experience, all the while advocating for a form of listening that would allow us to hear singers in a self-reflexive, denaturalized way.

Physical Description

xiv, 268 pages : illustrations ; 23 cm.

ISBN

0822368560
9780822368564
0822368684
9780822368687

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