Global Western Art Music Network
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This Connection Grant supports a cross-cultural, cross-sectoral, and interdisciplinary conference titled “Global Musical Modernities and Local Agency” (GMMaLA) and its associated projects, which will build upon partnerships established during the inaugural Global Western Art Music symposium held at the University of Chicago in November 2024. GMMaLA aims to address pressing challenges within academic, educational, and musical circles, as well as broader societal concerns, regarding the legacies of European music. It explores the historical and contemporary embeddedness of European music in colonialism and cultural encounters, and its influence on diverse global musical modernities. By moving beyond the tendency in musical scholarship to view the global spread of music solely through the lens of Western critical theory and interests, this conference empowers diverse scholars and practitioners from the Global South (Asia, the Middle East, Africa, and Central/South America).
The idea of global musical modernity draws upon theoretical approaches and disciplinary conversations taking place in multiple research fields, including musical modernity (Bohlman 2019, Heile and Wilson 2019, Heile 2024, Janz and Chien-Chang 2019, Lee and Miller 2023, Wade 2014), global music studies (Beckles Willson 2019, Chua 2022, Hijleh 2019, Kroier 2012, Nikolić 2021, Olley 2016, Romanou 2015, Strohm 2018, Wetzel 2012), and musicological studies focussed on the spread of Western art music (El-Shawan 2002, Everett and Lao 2004, Fukunaka 2017, Nelson 2020, Petrocelli 2019, and Scheding 2019). Global musical modernity serves in all cases as a powerful decolonial method by challenging and expanding the boundaries traditionally set by Western musical modernism. We distinguish “modernity” from “modernism” to focus on modernity as a way of life and an aspect of nation-building, as opposed to modernism, typically construed as an aesthetic stance. At the same time, we note the close connection between the two terms, as indicated by the title of the flagship academic journal Modernism/Modernity (1994– ). Diverse contemporary musical practices around the world powerfully demonstrate resistance to colonial conditions, highlighting the agency of global music-makers in reshaping modernism into modernity. GMMaLA advocates for a broader definition of decolonization that includes diverse global perspectives, emphasizing the importance of recognizing the complex interplay between Western and global musical traditions in the pursuit of decoloniality.
We will bring together an international community of scholars, musical practitioners, and emerging voices to galvanize discourse and mobilize knowledge around this emerging field of study. The Connection Grant will provide funding to mobilize knowledge via these activities:
The overall goal of this conference and its subsequent planned knowledge mobilization activities is to elaborate, understand, and challenge current assumptions regarding the position and nature of European and Eurocentric music within a global context. Promoting post-European thinking and foregrounding paradigm-shifting discourse from a range of interdisciplinary perspectives, conference papers will address such pressing issues as decolonization and equity, diversity, and inclusion initiatives within the cultural and educational sectors. We launch these events with the concept of “Difference in Relation” as a cornerstone idea, sparking interdisciplinary discussions to redefine the spread of European music in global contexts, its relationship to other musical repertoires, and its influence on global musical modernity.
Ultimately, our goal is to consolidate the establishment and sustainability of a GMMaLA project, as a platform for cross-disciplinary, cross-sectoral, international, and intercultural partnerships, which will lead to: