Women's Voices Across Musical Worlds

by Jane A. Bernstein (Editor)

Written by a distinguished group of musicologists and ethnomusicologists, the essays collected here provide a cross-cultural and cross-historical view of the roles women have played as creators and performers and the representation of women in world, popular, and western art music.

Organized in five sections, the readings deal with a broad spectrum of topics and approaches about women, gender, and sexuality in music across Asia, Europe, the Middle East, and the Americas from the twelfth century to the present. Included are such significant themes as class and sexual politics in domestic and professional music making, the sequestration of female musical performance, the lament, gender identity through performance, and women singers as empowered voices of the people.

In celebrating the diversity of women's musical voices, this eclectic collection will appeal to students, scholars, and general readers interested in music history, world music, and women's studies.

Genres: Nonfiction, Music

344 pages, Hardcover

First published October 30, 2003

Reviews

[Craig Monson · Rating 5 out of 5]

In the interest of full discloser: I wrote a chapter in this book. But I also taught from it half-a-dozen times. It has the virtue of speaking to the “theoretically challenged”: you needn’t have studied several years of music theory and you needn’t be a 3rd-, 4th-, 5th-wave (or however many waves we’re up to by now) feminist to follow what’s being said. It’s also not limited to the western-classical tradition: I learned a lot about such unfamiliar, extraordinarily talented and influential performers as Uum Kulthem (hard to imagine [literally] millions of mourners turning out for the funeral of an American singer) and Mercedes Sosa (hard to imagine an American performer lying in state in the US capital rotunda). Thanks to Youtube, it’s also now possible to experience the various genres, styles, and performers quite easily, often in multiple examples (very interesting to hear both Mercedes Sosa and Joan Baez perform “Gracias a la vida,” both separately and together). Those who are interested in hearing in new and unfamiliar ways might like it.