Global Perspectives on Orchestras: Collective Creativity and Social Agency

Abstract

This timely book sheds new light on orchestras as sites of musical creativity, identity formation and negotiation, and intercultural encounters in various contexts. Extending beyond Western symphonic strongholds, the collection gives a vibrant picture of the orchestra's international reach and the interconnectedness of seemingly disparate centers and musical traditions. Ramnarine's lucid introduction reframes the questions scholars might ask about orchestras while recognizing their continuing social and musical value. She argues also for a more inclusive definition of “orchestra” based not on “instrumental forces alone, but rather if they are so described by practitioners” (6). Despite the abundant literature on various instrumental collectives (e.g., symphony, gamelan, steelpan, or jazz orchestras), Ramnarine notes that they are seldom treated holistically with shared histories or concerns; in response, she reclaims comparative anthropology as a theoretical framework to explore such linkages. Moreover, while orchestras are subjected to transnational currents of migration, capitalism, and musical production and distribution technologies, they also play distinctive roles in their local communities, where they shape and are shaped by politics, memories, and histories. Ramnarine's sixteen contributors, with backgrounds in ethnomusicology, historical musicology, theatre history, composition, and performance, explore these global and local connections. Collectively they demonstrate how to address complex research questions by employing various methodological approaches, including careful archival study, close analysis of audiovisual materials, sensitive interviewing, and rich ethnographic detail. Such diverse perspectives are an asset, though some essays could be better connected to the collection's central arguments. Geographically, coverage includes the United Kingdom, Oceania, the Caribbean, and South and East Asia (though Africa and Latin America are largely absent).The collection is organized around three central topics: (1) community and capital in orchestral contexts, (2) intercultural orchestral collaborations, and (3) decolonizing and postcolonial orchestral contexts. Contributions to Part I address workforce and commercial issues alongside social dynamics among musicians, audiences, and administrations. Fiona M. Palmer's archival study of the Liverpool Philharmonic highlights debates regarding labor relations, professionalization, and the role of orchestras in articulating and reinforcing class divides in a major nineteenth-century commercial center. Henry Johnson considers the role of the board of the Southern Sinfonia of New Zealand in cultivating connections to other community institutions and businesses. Ananay Aguilar explains how the London Symphony Orchestra bolstered its reputation as an innovator by adopting new recording, production, marketing, and distribution technologies and establishing an independent label in order to successfully navigate the recording industry crisis of the late 1990s. Such contributions elucidate the long-ignored behind-the-scenes workings of orchestras and provide insight into artistic production processes.Part II explores the use of orchestras to facilitate cultural exchange in colonial and postcolonial contexts. Two contributions focus on the Indian film industry: Anna Morcom considers the symbolic use of the orchestra as a marker of prestige in Bollywood (Hindi) cinema, and Mekala Padmanabhan provides insight into the complex collaborative processes by which film scores are made in Chennai-based Kollywood (Tamil) films. Both contributors demonstrate how Indian film soundtracks—with overlapping layers employing electronic and acoustic instruments and borrowing from Western classical and popular musics, jazz, folk, and devotional songs—demonstrate musicians’ abilities to master disparate styles while enabling a film to appeal to audiences across India and the diaspora. Complex musical flows, notably the “outsourcing” of European orchestral players to India, complicate a unilateral view of globalization. In this section especially, a companion website with audiovisual examples would better illustrate the material under discussion (links in footnotes were cumbersome, and while some were navigable via the e-book, many no longer work).The perspectives of composers also find a place in Part II. Western composers’ intercultural engagements have sometimes been superficial or exoticizing, as Matthew Isaac Cohen's study of the representations of gamelan in interwar America shows. At the same time, he notes that Indonesian audiences might have received such encounters differently. Eero Hämeenniemi aims for a more respectful approach in his sustained collaborations with Carnatic performers (though he does not consider how such collaborations could challenge Western notions of authorship, authority, and work concept). He considers both European compositional practices and Carnatic musics as fluid creative processes, rather than static traditions with fixed boundaries.Part III addresses how orchestras act as sites for negotiating ethnic, nationalist, and postcolonial identities. Especially notable is Shzr Ee Tan's study of four Singaporean musical ensembles (symphony, Chinese, Indian, and Malay orchestras), which demonstrates how state multiculturalism policies and arts subsidies shape competing narratives of national and ethnic identities. Barley Norton likewise addresses state involvement in musical life in his examination of the court orchestra in Hue; the Vietnamese government promotes the ensemble as national cultural heritage, but its musicians retain connections to local Buddhist rituals. Ramnarine's own contribution is a tour de force. Connecting orchestras in London (youth and reggae), Trinidad and Tobago (steelband and symphony), and India (symphony, jazz band, and film orchestra), she presents a model for multisited ethnography informed by autoethnographic, postcolonial, and comparative anthropological theory, thereby providing a compelling conclusion to the volume.Global Perspectives on Orchestras illustrates the productive strategy of organizing topically rather than by geography or chronology, as doing so foregrounds commonalities between seemingly disparate ensembles or locales. Still other themes emerge: the global recording industry, marketing and financial issues, gender dynamics, and musical exchanges between indigenous peoples and white settlers. At the same time, Parts II and III overlap somewhat. Are some intercultural encounters, even those taking place in postcolonial contexts, not decolonizing, and how so? I wondered also why the fascinating essays by Shannon Dudley and Christopher L. Ballengee on steelbands, symphonies, and tassa bands, discussed as embroiled in Trinidad and Tobago's postcolonial identity politics, were included in Part I, when they might have been more thematically appropriate later in the volume. Connecting individual chapters with the theoretical underpinning of each section would have clarified the book's overall structure.Such concerns are minor given the overwhelmingly valuable material contained within this engaging and readable volume that received an honorable mention for the Ellen Koskoff Edited Volume Prize from the Society for Ethnomusicology in 2019. As a whole, it will be of interest to ethnomusicologists and historical musicologists working on orchestral ensembles and to cultural anthropologists and sociologists concerned with institutional dynamics; individual chapters will be of interest to specialists in postcolonial and area studies or film music. Ultimately, emerging from this collection are impressions of musicians as active agents (re)shaping the societies in which they perform. While sometimes targets of criticism, orchestras continue to adapt and respond to their communities; as sites of creative music-making, they inspire composers, performers, and audiences alike. This book helps us better understand why, for whom, and how. May it inspire further research on other kinds of orchestras across the globe.

Cite this work

No public copy is stored for this record, so only the metadata is cited.

Stored only when both papers are in the corpus — 14 citations exist upstream.