Paper short abstract:

This paper explores the ways in which the brass players dwell in the Posaunenchor, namely, a congregational brass band. Its music making is a social interaction, a form of dwelling with hospitality. Posaunenchor mediates the sense of being together and being accepted as a space of hospitality.

Paper long abstract:

Hospitality appears various forms. This paper explores an aesthetics of dwelling in relation to hospitality and through the case of brass band, though brass band is not immediately associated with this theme.

I will demonstrate the ways in which the brass players dwell in the Posaunenchor, namely, a congregational brass band in German protestant Church, based on my ethnographic fieldwork findings in Germany, and will try to describe how hospitality is emotionally and bodily shared with the brass players through their music making. Although Posaunenchor is commonly regarded as the music which signifies the words of the God, what is the most significant point of Posaunenchor is for the brass players to share a sense of being together and being accepted.

The music making of Posaunenchor is a social interaction, a form of dwelling with hospitality. Any players with a wide range of social backgrounds, age groups, and levels of musical ability feel accepted in the group and being in the sound. Through this form, the players experience the sense of intimately being together through their music making. As Ingold precisely said, sound is not an object of our perception, but "the medium of our perception" (2007: 11). This paper will show how Posaunenchor mediates the sense of being together and being accepted as a space of hospitality.