Curriculum Vitae

Thomas Solomon
Professor of Music

address:
Grieg Academy-Department of Music
University of Bergen
Lars Hilles gt. 3
5015 Bergen
Norway

phone: +47 55 586 982
fax: +47 55 586 960

e-mail: thomas.solomon[at]grieg.uib.no


Education:
B.A.: May 1984, Texas A&M University, College Station
Major area: English
Minor area: Linguistics

Master of Music: May 1991, University of Texas, Austin
Major area: Ethnomusicology
Minor area: Anthropology
Master's Report: Text-Tune Relationships in Quechua Song: Discourse-Centered Approaches to Southern Peruvian Verbal Art

Ph.D.: May 1997, University of Texas, Austin
Major area: Anthropology
Dissertation: Mountains of Song: Musical Constructions of Ecology, Place, and Identity in the Bolivian Andes

Academic Employment:

1997: Visiting Adjunct Professor, Department of Music, New York University
1998-1999: Visiting Assistant Professor, School of Music, University of Minnesota
1999-2002: Assistant Professor, Graduate Program in Music, Istanbul Technical University, Istanbul, Turkey
2002-2012: Førsteamanuensis / Associate Professor, Grieg Academy-Department of Music, University of Bergen, Norway
2012-present: Professor, Grieg Academy-Department of Music, University of Bergen, Norway

Publications:

Books edited:

2011. Music and Identity in Norway and Beyond: Essays Commemorating Edvard Grieg the Humanist. Bergen: Fagbokforlaget.

2012. (co-edited with Sylvia Nannyonga-Tamusuza). Ethnomusicology in East Africa: Perspectives from Uganda and Beyond. Kampala: Fountain Publishers.

Journal articles and book chapters:

1994. "Coplas de Todos Santos in Cochabamba: Language, Music, and Performance in Bolivian Quechua Song Dueling." Journal of American Folklore 107(425):378-414. (Link will only work from computers inside the network of an institution that subscribes to JSTOR.)

1995. "Creando Etnicidad por Medio de la Música en el Norte de Potosí." Anales de la Reunión Anual de Etnología 1993, Tomo II. La Paz, Bolivia: Museo Nacional de Etnología y Folklore, pp.47-76.

2000. "Dueling Landscapes: Singing Places and Identities in Highland Bolivia." Ethnomusicology 44(2):257-280. (Link will only work from computers inside the network of an institution that subscribes to JSTOR).

2002. "Rapping Sufis and Morphing Saz-es: Imaginations of Identity in Turkish Music Videos." In Looking Back, Looking Ahead: Popular Music Studies 20 Years Later. Proceedings of the Eleventh Biannual IASPM Conference July 6-10, 2001, Turku, Finland, ed. Kimi Kärki, Rebecca Leydon and Henri Terho, pp.265-277. Turku: IASPM-Norden.

2004. "Musikalske Konstruktioner af Sted og Identitet i Bolivias Højland" ["Musical Constructions of Place and Identity in Highland Bolivia"]. Jordens Folk 39(3):48-53. Copenhagen, Denmark. (In Danish.) Online version at AnthroBase.com.

2005. "'Listening to Istanbul': Imagining Place in Turkish Rap Music." Studia Musicologica Norvegica 31:46-67. Online version at idunn.no (link will only work from computers inside the network of an institution that subscribes to idunn.no). [Note: in this online version of the article there are some problems with Turkish characters that were not encoded properly.]

2005. "'Living Underground is Tough': Authenticity and Locality in the Hip-hop Community in Istanbul, Turkey." Popular Music 24(1):1-20. PDF courtesy of and © 2005 Cambridge University Press. Reproduced by permission.

2006. "Dueling Landscapes: Singing Places and Identities in Highland Bolivia." In Ethnomusicology: A Contemporary Reader, ed. Jennifer Post, 311-327. London: Routledge. [Revised version of Solomon 2000.]

2006. "Quechua." In The Greenwood Encyclopedia of World Folklore and Folklife. Volume 4: North and South America, ed. William M. Clements, 208-216. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press.

2006. "Hardcore Muslims: Islamic Themes in Turkish Rap in Diaspora and in the Homeland." Yearbook for Traditional Music 38:59-78. (Link will only work from computers inside the network of an institution that subscribes to JSTOR.)

2007. "Articulating the Historical Moment: Turkey, Europe, and Eurovision 2003." In A Song for Europe: Popular Music and Politics in the Eurovision Song Contest, ed. Ivan Raykoff and Robert Tobin, 135-145. Aldershot: Ashgate.

2008. "'Bu Vatan Bizim' ['This Land is Ours']: Nationalist Discourse in Turkish Rap Music." In Freedom and Prejudice: Approaches to Media and Culture, ed. Süheyla Kırca Schroeder and LuEtt Hanson, 204-222. Istanbul: Bahçeşehir University Press. PDF. [Note: In this PDF version, I have corrected a number of errors that were introduced during the editorial process and included in the printed version. I have also coverted the B&W figures to color ones. The PDF file is rather large, ca. 12 MB.]

2008. "'Bu Vatan Bizim' ['This Land Is Ours']: Nationalism in Turkish Rap in Diaspora and in the Homeland." In Practising Popular Music: Proceedings of the 12th Biennial IASPM-International Conference, Montréal 2003, ed. Alex Gyde and Geoff Stahl, 873-889. IASPM.

2008. "Diverse Diasporas: Multiple Identities in 'Turkish Rap' in Germany." In Music from Turkey in the Diaspora, ed. Ursula Hemetek and Hande Sağlam, 77-88. Vienna: Institut für Volksmusikforschung und Ethnomusikologie.

2008. "Music as Culture? Reflections on an Ethnomusicological Moment." Studia Musicologica Norvegica 34:68-90.

2009. "Berlin-Frankfurt-Istanbul: Turkish Hip-Hop in Motion." European Journal of Cultural Studies 12(3):305-327.

2009. "'Türkçe Rapin Kız Sesi': Ayben'in Müziğinde Toplumsal Cinsiyet ve Vokal Nitelik." In Karaelmas 2009: Medya ve Kültür, ed. Nurçay Türkoğlu and Sevilen Toprak Alayoğlu, 497-509. Istanbul: Urban Çeviri Hizmetleri Ltd. Şti.

2009/2009. "'İstanbul'u Dinlemek': Türk Rap Müziğinde Mekan Tahayyülü." In Müzik, Direniş ve Haz, ed. Ayşe Bilge Gürsoy and Alkan Avcıoğlu. Istanbul: Es Yayınları. Pp. 115-158 in the first printing (2009), pp.113-154 in the corrected second printing (2010).

2010. "The Local and the Global in Turkish Rap Music: A View from Istanbul." Porte Akademik 1(1):242-252.

2011. "Hardcore Muslims: Islamic Themes in Turkish Rap between Diaspora and Homeland." In Muslim Rap, Halal Soaps, and Revolutionary Theater: Artistic Developments in the Muslim World, ed. Karin van Nieuwkerk, 27-54. Austin: University of Texas Press. [Revised and expanded version of 2006 article above.]

2011. "Introduction." In Music and Identity in Norway and Beyond: Essays Commemorating Edvard Grieg the Humanist, ed. Thomas Solomon, 13-38. Bergen: Fagbokforlaget.

2011."Whose Diaspora?: Hybrid Identities in 'Turkish Rap' in Germany." In Music and Identity in Norway and Beyond: Essays Commemorating Edvard Grieg the Humanist, ed. by Thomas Solomon, 253-267. Bergen: Fagbokforlaget.

2011. "'Türkçe Rapin Kız Sesi': Ayben'in Müziğinde Toplumsal Cinsiyet ve Vokal Nitelik." Porte Akademik 1(2):413-423.

2012. "Where is the Postcolonial in Ethnomusicology?" In Ethnomusicology in East Africa: Perspectives from Uganda and Beyond, ed. Sylvia Nannyonga-Tamusuza and Thomas Solomon, 216-251. Kampala: Fountain Publishers.

in press. "Ayben: 'The Girl's Voice in Turkish Rap.'" In Women Singers in Global Contexts: Music, Biography, and Identity, ed. Ruth Hellier-Tinoco. Urbana: University of Illinois Press. [Scheduled for publication ca. November 2012.]

Reviews:

1998. Reviews of two CDs of Andean music: Traditional Music of Peru 3: Cajamarca and the Colca Valley, and Peru and Bolivia: The Sounds of Evolving Traditions: Central Andean Music and Festivals. Yearbook for Traditional Music 30:196-197.

2004. Review of Phat Beats, Dope Rhymes: Hip Hop Down Under Comin' Upper, by Ian Maxwell. IASPM website review section.

2008. Review of Music and the Poetics of Production in The Bolivian Andes, by Henry Stobart. Journal of Latin American Studies 40(2):376-378.

2009. Review of Music of the Sirens, ed. Linda Phyllis Austern and Inna Naroditskaya. Journal of Folklore Research: JFR Reviews.

2009. Review of Among the Jasmine Trees: Music and Modernity in Contemporary Syria, by Jonathan Holt Shannon. Popular Music 28(3):437-438.

2010. Review of Music in Motion: Diversity and Dialogue in Europe, ed. Bernd Clausen, Ursula Hemetek, and Eva Sæther. Studia Musicologica Norvegica 36:187-191.

2011. Review of Sailing on the Sea of Love: The Music of the Bauls of Bengal, by Charles Capwell. Journal of Folklore Research: JFR Reviews.

2012. Review of The Republic of Love: Cultural Intimacy in Turkish Popular Music, by Martin Stokes. Popular Music 31(1):190-192.

2012. Review of Opera Indigene: Re/presenting First Nations and Indigenous Cultures, ed. Pamela Karantonis and Dylan Robinson. Journal of Folklore Research: JFR Reviews.


Conference papers (most recent year first):

2012

Competition, performance interaction and society in Highland Bolivia. Annual conference of the British Forum for Ethnomusicology, 29 March-1 April, Durham

Self-censorship as critique: The case of Turkish rapper Sagopa Kajmer. Meeting of the Nordic network Researching Music Censorship, 26-27 April, Oslo

2011

When media fail. Annual conference of the British Forum for Ethnomusicology, 7-10 April, Falmouth

Performing indigeneity: Aesthetics and politics of folkloric festivals in highland Bolivia. 41st World Conference of the International Council for Traditional Music, 13-19 July, St. John's, Newfoundland, Canada

"His bird doesn't stand up": Censorship of the female rapping voice in Turkey. Meeting of the Nordic network Researching Music Censorship, 29-30 September, Lund, Sweden

Theorizing music and diaspora. 2nd International Symposium on Ethnomusicology in Uganda, 20-23 October, Kampala

2010

"The girl's voice in Turkish rap": Gender and subjectivity in the life and music of Ayben. 2nd International Symposium "Representation in Music/Musical Representation," 19-22 October, Istanbul

Turkish hip-hop in motion. 8th Nordic Conference on Middle Eastern Studies, 24-26 September, Bergen

"The girl's voice in Turkish rap": Gender, vocality and subjectivity in the life and music of Ayben. Seminar on Gender and Popular Music, Centre for Women's and Gender Research (SKOK), 30 September, Bergen

On playing badly and the limits of musical knowledge. Annual conference of the British Forum for Ethnomusicology, 8-11 April, Oxford, UK

2009

Where is the postcolonial in ethnomusicology? 1st International Symposium on Ethnomusicology in Uganda, 23-25 November, Kampala

Performing indigeneity: Aesthetics and politics of folkloric festivals in highland Bolivia. First Annual Norwegian Latin America Research Conference, 12-13 November, Oslo

"The girl's voice in Turkish rap": Gender and vocality in the music of Ayben. Middle East and Central Asia Music Forum, 6 November, London

"The girl's voice in Turkish rap": Gender and subjectivity in the music of Ayben. Karalemas 2009: Medya ve Kültür. Beşinci Kültür Araştırmaları Sempozyumu [Karaelmas 2009: Media and Culture. 5th Cultural Studies Symposium], 2-4 July, Zonguldak, Turkey

Turkish hip-hop in motion. 15th Biennial Conference of the International Association for the Study of Popular Music, 13-17 July, Liverpool

2008

Hardcore Muslims: Islamic themes in Turkish rap between diaspora and homeland. European Science Foundation Exploratory Workshop on "Islamization of the Cultural Sphere?: Critical Perspectives on Islam and Performing Arts in Western Europe and the Middle East," 23-24 October, Amsterdam

Who are the Laz? Music and cultural Identity on the Turkish Black Sea Coast. Fifth meeting of the ICTM Study Group "Music and Minorities," 24 May-1 June, Prague

"The girl's voice in Turkish rap": Gender, poetics & difference. 15th Nordic Congress of Musicology, 5-8 August, Oslo

2007

Every way that I can? Turkey and the Eurovision Song Contest. Symposium: Turkey and Europe: Cultural Dimensions, 14 February, Champaign-Urbana, Illinois

Hardcore Muslims: Islamic themes in Turkish rap in diaspora and in the homeland. Conference: Religion on the Borders: New Challenges in the Academic study of Religion, 19-22 April, Stockholm

Whose diaspora? Lessons from "Turkish Rap" in Germany. 39th World Conference of the International Council for Traditional Music, 4-11 July, Vienna

Whose diaspora? Hybrid identities in "Turkish Rap" in Germany. Symposium "Music and Identity," 13-14 September, Bergen

Whose diaspora? Hybrid identities in "Turkish Rap" in Germany. 14th Nordic Migration Researchers' Conference, 14-16 November, Bergen

Diverse diasporas: Multiple identities in "Turkish Rap" in Germany. International Symposium: Echoes of Diversity: Music from Turkey in the "Diaspora," 23-24 November, Vienna

2006

Transformations of Turkish hip-hop nationalism, from diaspora to the homeland. Freedom and Prejudice: International Conference on Communication, Mass Media & Culture, 5-7 October, Istanbul

Whose hybridity? Whose diaspora? Agency and identity in transnational musics. ICTM Colloquium, "Emerging Musical Identities," 13-15 May, Middletown (Wesleyan University)

Berlin-Frankfurt-Istanbul: Local, trans-local, and global imaginaries in Turkish hip-hop. Sixth International Crossroads in Cultural Studies Conference, 20-23 July, Istanbul

Transformations of Turkish hip-hop nationalism, from diaspora to the homeland. Fourth meeting of the ICTM Study Group "Music and Minorities," 25 August-1 September, Varna, Bulgaria

2005

Berlin-Frankfurt-Istanbul: Local, trans-local, and global imaginaries in Turkish rap music. Conference: "The Local, the Regional, and the Global in the Emergence of Popular Music Cultures," 24-26 October, Copenhagen

The local and the global in Turkish rap: A view From Istanbul. Conference: "Representation in Music/Musical Representation," 6-8 October, Istanbul

Hip-hop for Allah?: Islamic themes in Turkish rap - in diaspora and in the homeland. 38th World Conference of the International Council for Traditional Music, 3-10 August, Sheffield, England

"'Every way that I can'? Turkey and the Eurovision Song Contest." 13th Biennial Conference of the International Association for the Study of Popular Music, 25-30 July, Rome

2004

The local and the global in Turkish rap: A view from Istanbul. 2nd Annual Media and Cultural Studies Conference: Globalization, Americanization and Contemporary Popular Culture, 20-22 May, Istanbul

"Every way that I can"? Turkey and the Eurovision Song Contest. Society for Ethnomusicology annual meeting, 3-7 Nov, Tucson

2003

"Bu Vatan Bizim" ["This Land Is Ours"]: Nationalism in Turkish rap in diaspora and in the homeland. International Association for the Study of Popular Music biennial meeting, 3-7 July, Montréal, Quebec

2002

Music in mountain cultures: Some general features and issues. Society for Ethnomusicology annual meeting, 23-27 Oct, Estes Park, Colorado

2001

Rapping sufis and morphing saz-es: Imaginations of identity in Turkish music videos. International Associaton for the Study of Popular Music biennial meeting, 6-10 July, Turku, Finland

"Living underground is tough": Locality and authenticity in the hip-hop scene in Istanbul, Turkey. Society for Ethnomusicology annual meeting, 24-28 Oct, Detroit

1998

Musical constructions of place-identity in highland Bolivia. Society for Ethnomusicology annual meeting, 22-25 Oct, Bloomington

1997

Performing Indianness: poetics and politics of folkloric festivals in highland Bolivia. Society for Ethnomusicology annual meeting, 22-26 Oct, Pittsburgh

Aesthetics and politics of folkloric performance in highland Bolivia. American Anthropological Association annual meeting, 19-23 Nov, Washington, D.C.

1995

"Our place, our custom": musical folkloricization and indigenous resistance in the Bolivian Andes. Society for Ethnomusicology annual meeting, 19-22 Oct, Los Angeles

Copyright, copy-write, and the right to copy: 'La Bamba' and the politics of Mexican-American ethnicity. Conference on Popular Musics and the Politics of Mediation, 15-16 Apr, Austin, Texas

"La Bamba" crosses the border: the political economy of a Mexican folk song. American Ethnological Society annual meeting, 27-30 Apr, Austin, Texas

1994

Performing place, evoking ethnicity: musical constructions of space and identity in highland Bolivia. Society for Ethnomusicology annual meeting, 20-23 Oct, Milwaukee, Wisconsin

Dueling landscapes: singing places and identities in highland Bolivia. American Anthropological Association annual meeting, 30 Nov-4 Dec, Atlanta, Georgia

1993

Creando etnicidad por medio de la música en el Norte de Potosí. Reunión Anual de Etnología, Museo Nacional de Etnología y Folklore, 26-29 Oct, La Paz, Bolivia

Construcciones musicales del medio ambiente. Primer Encuentro Nacional de Etnomusicología, 9-10 Nov, Cochabamba, Bolivia

1992

Coplas about coplas and coplas about selves: performance as cultural practice in Bolivian Quechua song dueling. Society for Ethnomusicology annual meeting, 22-25 Oct, Seattle, Washington

1989

'La Bamba': mass mediation, copyright, and the political economy of a Mexican 'folk song.' Society for Ethnomusicology annual meeting, 9-12 Nov, Cambridge, Massachusetts

Invited talks and seminars at: Dokuz Eylül University, Department of Music (Izmir, Turkey); Marmara University, Department of International Relations (Istanbul, Turkey); Istanbul Bilgi University, Department of International Relations (Istanbul, Turkey); St. John's College, Oxford University; London South Bank University, Information Communication Technology Department; School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), University of London; Department of Music, Columbia University; Department of Musicology, University of Oslo; Department of Music, University of Illinois; Music Section, Faculty of Teacher and Cultural Education, Stord/Haugesund University College, Stord, Norway

Honors, Awards:
American Folklore Society Fellows 1995 Student Essay Award
Fulbright-Hays Doctoral Dissertation Abroad Fellowship for field research in Bolivia, Jan 1993-Jan 1994
Tinker Foundation field research grant for field research in Bolivia, Sept-Dec 1990
W. P. Robertson scholarship, University of Texas at Austin, Fall 1991-Spring 1992
Foreign Language and Area Study Fellowships, University of Texas at Austin:
First Year Study of Hindi Language, 1986-87
Second Year Study of Hindi Language, 1987-88
Third Year Study of Hindi Language, 1988-89
First Year Study of Malayalam Language, Summer 1987
Second Year Study of Malayalam Language, Summer 1988
President's Endowed Scholar, Texas A&M University, 1980-1984
Valedictorian, West Orange-Stark High School, Orange, Texas, May 1980

Fieldwork, research projects:
Monterrey, Mexico, March 1989, field work on Mexican urban popular music
1989-1992, research on issues of copyright and the "ownership" of folk music, using the song "La Bamba" as a case study
Departments of Cochabamba and Potosí, Bolivia, Sept-Dec 1990, field work on music and verbal arts of Quechua-speaking peasants and townspeople
Department of Potosí, Bolivia, Jan 1993-Jan 1994, field work on music, ecology and ethnicity among Quechua- and Aymara-speaking peasants
Istanbul, Turkey, Sept 1999-Aug 2002, research on identity construction in Turkish music videoclips
Istanbul, Turkey, Jan 2001-Aug 2002, field work on Turkish rap music and hip hop

Memberships in professional societies:
Society For Ethnomusicology
British Forum for Ethnomusicology
International Council for Traditional Music
International Association for the Study of Popular Music

Foreign Languages:
Spanish (speaking, reading)
Turkish (speaking, reading)
Quechua (speaking, reading)
Norwegian (speaking, reading)
Danish, Swedish, French, German (reading)

Musical Performance:
1982-1990: regular participant in Irish music tune sessions at O'Brien's Cafe (Austin, Texas), playing tenor banjo, mandolin, bouzouki
1985-1990: member of Univ. of Texas Andean Music Ensemble, playing panpipes, charango
1985-1987: studied North Indian classical music: sitar, tabla, vocal music
1987-1988: member of Univ. of Texas Mariachi Ensemble, playing guitar, vihuela
1987-1988: member of the Yassous, quintet performing Greek and Middle Eastern music, playing bouzouki and hammered dulcimer
1988-1989: member of Univ. of Texas Brazilian Music Ensemble, playing cavaquinho, percussion
1988-1992: member of Grupo Silencio, quartet performing Latin American folk music and nueva canción, playing panpipes, charango, guitar, percussion. Cassette release: Grupo Silencio. 1990. Approx. 40 minutes
Sept 1998-June 1999: Director of the University of Minnesota Andean Ensemble, teaching performance on Andean wind instruments including panpipes and duct flutes


Courses prepared to teach:

Undergraduate classes
Intro. to Music in World Cultures
Intro. to Cultural Anthropology
Musics of the Andean Countries
Musics of Latin America
Art Musics of Asia
Popular Musics and Mass Media
Language and Culture
Native North American Musics

Graduate seminars
Popular Music Studies
Music and Identity
Music and Gender
Language and Music
Music, Place, and Ecology
Anthropology of Place
History and Theory of Folklore
Intro. to Graduate Linguistic Anthropology
History and Theory of Ethnomusicology
Research Methods in Ethnomusicology

Updated 7 May 2012

Return to Tom Solomon's home page.