Thursday, January 01, 2009

Music and Culture

I went to First Night Montpelier last night with the family, mainly so Alice could dance. As usual at this event there are a ton of performances throughout the afternoon, many focused on non-Western music, for lack of a better term. Last year Alice surprised us when she broke out into a wicked hoe-down during a Klezmer performance, so we headed to see the same folks again this year to start the afternoon off. While Alice didn't bust out as much as last year, due probably to being a bit tired from her recent nap and a venue change to a fluorescent-lit room and all, I couldn't help but appreciate the scene we were taking in. Here was a group of Vermont-transplanted Jews keeping alive their musical, linguistic, and cultural history with an art form that has been passed down all the way back from the home land, or Eastern Europe anyway, for centuries. Some audience members were totally into it, doing that Jewish line dancing thing and all, and a tiny little cultural center popped up for a moment. Considering that Orange County where I grew up is 1/2 hour and fifty years behind Montpelier, it was good to see this. So that got me thinking what music I should be listening to, performing, or otherwise spreading to keep my seven-generation Central Vermont Yankee culture alive.
I can say that music wasn't huge in my upbringing, at least 'traditional' music. My grandmother would tell stories of 'kitchen junkets' back in her youth, when a designated family up on West Hill (or South or East Hill in Williamstown and Brookfield, respectively) would invite everyone over on a Saturday night, clear out the kitchen, and hoe down to fiddle music. I certainly don't carry this tradition on, and it seems the only ones who do are hippies who co-opted contra dancing and old folks who put on museum shows.
So we left the show to see a guy who blows bubbles and get something to eat, then made our way over to see 35th Parallel. Here's an outfit that throws my earlier thinking on its head, two Americans, one Jewish I presume (not that it matters but it plays into the above reference of maintaining one's culture through their music), that specialize in multiple world music styles: "35th Parallel's name comes from the latitude line intersecting the regions that inspire their music - the Middle East, North India, North Africa, the Mediterranean, and the United States." These guys pull bits of culture from all over the world and meld it together into their own art form that respects its influences while creating a new sense of wonder regarding non-Western music, culture, and thought.
So now my hypothesis was getting all screwy, and we went home. After dropping off Alice and Julie I shot up to Hardwick to see my brother's band, Dog House Roses play a rare gig at Claire's. These guys play rock music, well-rooted in the 4/4 Western (not Country-Western) aesthetic. No tablas, bouzoukis, fiddles, or dance callers. I then realized that this music, while it seems 'simpler' than all that other fancy stuff, is a legitimate, traditional form for Americans and even Western Europeans from the latter half of the 20th century and beyond. It certainly evolves, as do all traditional art forms, and it steals from others, but in the end it is as important as Raga, Jazz, Klezmer, or whatever.
Now I can appreciate the The Kinks, or The Stooges, or Built to Spill, or Alejandro Escovedo, or Sun Kil Moon, or whatever and know that it is simply the tradition of music that is being carried on. I don't have to worry that I'm not saving my culture from fading away, because my culture and its art evolves with the times while still keeping its distinct identity (those contra dancers still kick up a mean show). And what is really fascinating and deserves it own analysis someday is how we as a species have always sought melodic/harmonic sounds to integrate into our lives. I guess any music therefore maintains Human Culture in that regard.

Oh what the hell am I babbling about, I've been listening to the Misfits all week.

TB

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