Considering media in music gets to the core of our American musical “experience.” Historically, music distribution has evolved from sheet music and live performances to records, radio, and eventually digital streaming, helping artists reach their listeners and connect with them in different ways. Media shapes cultural trends and preserves musical legacies, making it an essential part of the music world.
Watch
Respond: How many of these music formats are you familiar with? Could you place these different music technologies in different groups? What are some limitations that some of these older technologies had and how were these addressed with newer devices?
Check out Wikipedia’s timeline of audio formats. Pick one and describe its affordances and limitations. Can you identify the switch from analog to digital?
Explore
Learn about the history of printed song sheets exploring this collection from the Library of Congress. Before people could record music they circulated it in print form, either through sheet music or song sheets. Unlike sheet music, song sheets had lyrics but no music. They were a mass medium to make lyrics of new or popular songs available to people. Most of them had a unifying theme: America!
Tip: on the site, click on “collection items.” This collection is licensed as “Public Domain.”
Suggested activity: explore the collection of song sheets and choose one to analyze. Examine the theme, the lyrics, any words or expressions that catch your eye. What function do you think this song served? How do you image it sounded like? Bonus: Try to find a musical rendition of it on Youtube!
Read
Gain insight into the history of Tin Pan Alley, a block of at least a dozen sheet music publishers located in 28th street, between Broadway and 6th Avenue. From the late 19th to the early 20th century, this loud block in New York City was the epicenter of the nation’s music publishing industry, grouping America’s most prolific songwriters, composers, and publishers. A vast number of popular songs that shaped the musical tastes of the era came emerged from Tin Pan Alley, shaping American popular music, introducing new styles and standards that would influence genres like jazz, blues, and Broadway musicals.
Read about Tin Pan Alley through the article below, courtesy of the OER Parlor Songs. Read it online following this link.
Explore
Visualize the spread of the publishing industry throughout NYC in the 19th century through this interactive map. Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License
Further reading
Learn about the implication that music media has in the spread of music around the world with this chapter of Music on the Move (OER textbook by Fosler-Lussier). Attribution-NonCommercial CC BY-NC.
Respond:
- How do changes in music technology impact music-making? (Give a few examples)
- What are some issues related with archiving sounds, especially if these belong to other cultures?
- How can music technologies allow us to “mash up” different musical traditions of the world?
