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PerArt04


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Tours, Travels, and Cosmopolitanism: Rethinking Japan's International Music Exchanges 
Convenor:
Anne Prescott (Five Colleges, Inc.)
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Section:
Performing Arts
Sessions:
Thursday 26 August, -
Time zone: Europe/Brussels

Short Abstract:

This panel draws on the idea of cosmopolitan modernity, and looks at the ways in which musical fascination, aspiration, and pleasure associated with international music tours and travels greatly impacted the wider historical, cultural and political discourses of Japan from the 1920s to the 1960s.

Long Abstract:

International exchange through music is manifested in performances by Japanese and non-Japanese musicians, both in Japan as well as beyond. While these exchanges have become more visible with the abundance of social media in recent years, they have been occurring for centuries. The individual papers in this panel examine three case studies from the 1920s to the 1960s, in which transnational and transcultural interchange through music has impacted the music and/or musicians in question.

In particular, the presentations focus on Western art music, Argentinian tango and Afro-American music, looking at the ways in which these genres transformed traditional Japanese music scenes between the 1920s and 1960s, through performances given by touring musicians from abroad and by Japanese musicians undertaking international travels. While Japanese musicians had done this through collaborations with non-Japanese musicians as well as independently, touring musicians in Japan performed 'foreign-ness' in Japan through music, while negotiating their artistic goals. Both dynamics of such music exchange led to changing historical discourses in Japan as well as in each genre's 'home' countries.

This panel draws on the idea of cosmopolitan modernity, and looks at the ways in which musical fascination, aspiration, and pleasure associated with international music tours and travels greatly impacted the wider historical, cultural and political discourses of Japan at this time. By invoking musical cosmopolitanism, this panel considers cosmopolitan endeavours as not limited to the realm of the elites but those that have involved fluidity and mobility, enabling dialogue across international and multiple music cultures, and across social classes. As such, the panel reveals the ways in which the two-way conversations between musicians fabricated Japan's music cultures, while bringing to light how such international music exchange was shaped by, and also shaped, the governmental and education policies of Japan at this time.

Accepted papers:

Session 1 Thursday 26 August, 2021, -