Guthrie P. Ramsey: Race, Power, and the Production of Musical Canons Series

Event time: 
Monday, April 5, 2021 - 5:30pm to 6:30pm
Event Contact Name: 
Raymond Vogel
Event Contact Email: 
Event Description: 

Speaker: 

Professor Guthrie P. Ramsey, Jr.

Title of Talk:  

Music: More Beautiful, More Terrible--A Discussion with Prof. Guthrie Ramsey on A Spiritual Vibe, Vol. 1. 

Part of the series Race, Power and the Production of Musical Canons

Abstract:

In the African American tradition, music has come to serve as a coded form of self-expression; a guided mediation; a call to action and a vehicle for relaxation. This presentation addresses the role of music in everyday life, which is often downplayed in its academic study. By thinking through music’s power to chart pleasure and combat strife, we can offer our teaching relevance for today’s revolutionary challenges.

This panel discussion will focus on Prof. Ramsey’s A Spiritual Vibe, Vol 1 recording, which can be found here.

An additional video about Prof. Ramsey’s production of the this recording can be found here.

Speaker Bio:

A member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, Guthrie P. Ramsey, Jr. is a music historian, pianist, composer, and the Edmund J. and Louise W. Kahn Term Professor of Music at the University of Pennsylvania. A widely-published writer, he’s the author of Race Music: Black Cultures from Bebop to Hip-Hop (2003), and The Amazing Bud Powell: Black Genius, Jazz History and the Challenge of Bebop (2013). Dr. Ramsey is co-author beside Samuel A. Floyd, Jr., with Melanie Zeck of The Transformation of Black Music: The Rhythms, the Songs and the Ships of the African Diaspora (2017) and editor of Rae Linda Brown, The Heart of a Woman: The Life and Music of Florence B. Price (2020). His books in progress include Who Hears Here?, a collection of essays, and the monograph Sound Proof: Black Music, Magic and Racial Intimacies, a history of African American music from the slave-era to the present. He was editor for the series Music of the African Diaspora at the University of California Press for ten years and founding editor of the blog Musiqology.com.

Zoom Webinar Information:

Click here to register: https://yale.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_ejS2EvkZQ-a038ZKwR36Qg