Exercises. The World of World music

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ПРАКТИКУМ ПО ДИСЦИПЛИНЕ

THE WORLD OF WORLD MUSIC

World Music is perhaps the broadest and most cosmopolitan musical category ever created. This genre includes some of the world's oldest music and some of the newest. It includes music from all over the globe: calypso from Trinidad, Armenian chants, Maori songs from New Zealand, Mongolian throat singing, to name a few among hundreds. World Music may feature only human voices, or it may be played on instruments as diverse as the jun-jun (a Nigerian «talking drum»), the didgeridoo (a wind instrument played by Australian Aborigines), the saz (a Turkish lute), and the kandili (a Lithuanian lap harp). It is also played on more international instruments, such as the electric guitar, piano, and accordion. Artists such as Youssou N'Dour of Senegal, Lot Lorien of Bulgaria, Kodo of Japan, and King Sunny Ade of Nigeria play it, and festivals celebrate it. In Morocco, there is the World Sacred Music Festival, the WOW (Window on the World) Festival in the U.K., the WOMEX (World Music Exposition) Festival, which is held in various European locations, and the WOMAD (World of Music, Art, and Dance) Festival, which is held on a different continent every year. World Music is truly music for the planet Earth.

The term World Music is not new, but as an official marketing category it dates back only to 1987. On June 29 of that year, a group of music industry executives from the U.K. met at a pub called the Empress of Russia in Islington, a section of London. They discussed how to increase interest in traditional and international music, and they decided to come up with one generic name that identified both types. Suggestions included World Beat, but they decided that this name excluded music without percussion. The term Tropical Music was considered, but it seemed to exclude music from temperate lands. The executives rejected Ethnic Music because it sounded too academic and boring. The term Roots Music was thought to exclude nontraditional music, while the term International Pop excluded more traditional music. World Music was chosen, in the words of Ian Anderson, a participant at the meeting, «because it seemed to include the most and exclude the least». The music executives also agreed to label all their international recordings with stickers that identified the recordings as World Music. Now, at least, music retailers could place international music in its own section of their stores just as they could do with folk music, rock, and country. Customers could look in this section for music from Madagascar or Burma or just browse through selections from all over the world. This system of classification quickly spread from the U.K. to the United States, France (where it became «Musique du Monde»), and elsewhere.

Some World Music artists have gotten a boost from Western musicians. In 1970, Paul Simon introduced millions of people worldwide to the haunting music of the Andes in his song «El Condor Pasa». Simon was backed up on this song by the Peruvian group «Los Incas». In 1986, he recorded the album Graceland. Accompanied by the South African band «Ladysmith Black Mumbazo», Simon introduced his listeners to the exciting sounds of South African music. As editor of the magazine «Folk Roots» and leader of the Rock group «Jethro Tull», Ian Anderson has been a strong supporter of World Music and has recorded albums that show World Music influences. Britain's Peter Gabriel, formerly of the group «Genesis», tours with World Music groups. He also founded the WOMAD festival, the most prestigious of World Music festivals and established Real World Studio in the U.K. where some of the top World Music artists have recorded.

The category of World Music can be divided into two main types. One type is Traditional World Music or Roots Music. This is the music played by the traditional peoples of the world as it has been for hundreds of years, more or less unchanged by outside influences. The other type goes by a number of names such as Crossover World Music, World Fusion, or Ethno-Progressive. This type combines traditional music with another form. Often it combines traditional music with Western music, like the Juju Music of Nigeria, which marries ethnic West African music and Western pop. Or, sometimes, it may combine various types of music from various places. In 1980, Jamaican star Bob Marley performed a concert in Harare to celebrate the independence of Zimbabwe. As a result of that pivotal concert, Jamaican Reggae became popular in Africa, merging with various forms of local music to become African Reggae. There are even more unusual combinations. For instance, the group «Celtic Salsa» blends the music of Scotland with the rhythms of Latin American dance music.

World Music has even traveled into space. In 1972, the Voyager 2 spacecraft was being prepared for a journey that would eventually take it out of the solar system. NASA decided that the space probe should carry a 12-inch, gold-plated copper disk containing sounds and images that would introduce our species to an extraterrestrial intelligence that might someday find it. A committee led by the noted space scientist Carl Sagan of Cornell University chose the contents for the «golden record». Some of the recording was of natural, nonmusical sounds: thunder, surf, wind, the cries of birds, whales, and other animals. Some was spoken: recorded greetings in 122 75 languages. Most of the recording, however, was dedicated to music. Classical music was represented by Bach, Beethoven, and Mozart. Jazz was represented by Louis Armstrong, rock and roll by Chuck Berry. The greatest part of the music, though, was selections of what would today be considered traditional forms of world music. There was music played by an Indonesian orchestra, the music played at Pygmy initiation rites for girls, the house-building songs sung by men in New Guinea, and the night chants of the Navajo Indians. Scientists preparing Voyager 2 for its journey through the solar system wanted to portray the diversity of life and culture on our planet. As artists and followers of the genre know, World Music does exactly that.

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