Blutopia : Visions of the Future and Revisions of the Past in the Work of Sun Ra, Duke Ellington, and Anthony Braxton

Graham Lock

ISBN 10: 0822324407 / ISBN 13: 9780822324409

Published by Duke University Press Jan 2000, 2000

About this Item

Neuware - In Blutopia Graham Lock studies the music and thought of three pioneering twentieth-century musicians: Sun Ra, Duke Ellington, and Anthony Braxton. Providing an alternative to previous analyses of their work, Lock shows how these distinctive artists were each influenced by a common musical and spiritual heritage and participated in self-conscious efforts to create a utopian vision of the future. A century after Ellington s birth, Lock reassesses his use of music as a form of black history and compares the different approaches of Ra, a band leader who focused on the future and cosmology, and Braxton, a contemporary composer whose work creates its own elaborate mythology. Arguing that the majority of writing on black music and musicians has-even if inadvertently-incorporated racial stereotypes, he explains how each artist reacted to criticism and sought to break free of categorical confines. Drawing on social history, musicology, biography, cultural theory, and, most of all, statements by the musicians themselves, Lock writes of their influential work. Blutopia will be a welcome contribution to the literature on twentieth-century African American music and creativity. It will interest students of jazz, American music, African American studies, American culture, and cultural studies.

Seller Inventory # 9780822324409

Bibliographic Details

• Title: Blutopia : Visions of the Future and Revisions of the Past in the Work of Sun Ra, Duke Ellington, and Anthony Braxton
• Publisher: Duke University Press Jan 2000
• Publication Date: 2000
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0822324407
• ISBN 13: 9780822324409
• Binding: Taschenbuch
• Condition: Neu
• Dimensions: 237W x 147H x 24D millimeters 237 millimeters width by 147 millimeters height by 24 millimeters depth
• Weight: 540 grams

About this title

Synopsis

In Blutopia Graham Lock studies the music and thought of three pioneering twentieth-century musicians: Sun Ra, Duke Ellington, and Anthony Braxton. Providing an alternative to previous analyses of their work, Lock shows how these distinctive artists were each influenced by a common musical and spiritual heritage and participated in self-conscious efforts to create a utopian vision of the future.
A century after Ellington’s birth, Lock reassesses his use of music as a form of black history and compares the different approaches of Ra, a band leader who focused on the future and cosmology, and Braxton, a contemporary composer whose work creates its own elaborate mythology. Arguing that the majority of writing on black music and musicians has—even if inadvertently—incorporated racial stereotypes, he explains how each artist reacted to criticism and sought to break free of categorical confines. Drawing on social history, musicology, biography, cultural theory, and, most of all, statements by the musicians themselves, Lock writes of their influential work.
Blutopia will be a welcome contribution to the literature on twentieth-century African American music and creativity. It will interest students of jazz, American music, African American studies, American culture, and cultural studies.

About the Author

Graham Lock is Special Lecturer in American Music at the University of Nottingham. He is the author of numerous articles, reviews, and books, including Forces in Motion: Anthony Braxton and the Meta-reality of Creative Music and Chasing the Vibration: Meetings with Creative Musicians.