Event Archive

This is an archive of past events within the Department of English Studies. Please see our current events for forthcoming activities.

Some of our public events are recorded and are available as podcasts via our Research English At Durham blog.

Late Summer Lectures: The Changing Face of Collection in Folk Music: A Short Lecture in Ethnomusicology

9th October 2012, 17:30 to 19:00, Alington House, Durham, Elise Gayraud (Department of Music)

The Late Summer Lectures (LSLS) is a series organised in Durham and Newcastle to foster interest in the Arts and Humanities. For more information on the LSLS, please visit our Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/LSLS2012

The same lecture will also be presented at the Literary and Philosophical Society in Newcastle, the following day.

Personal collections held by folk musicians themselves were not intended to be published, nor were they always classical transcriptions of tunes with details on ornamentation or fiddle techniques. All that was recorded was short or basic reminders for musicians who already knew the tunes or for callers who regularly called dances. Since these are personal records, personal compositions frequently are included in the collections, most of them composed "in a traditional style", as many interviewees like to describe it. A modern way of making these collections available to a wider audience is sharing them on the internet. The potential of this new medium as a sharing device has been widely studied and has been used in the case of folk resources. Some examples of this are the creation of databases of more or less accurate transcriptions of tunes on ABC form or sheet music, and the use of video sharing websites to share videos of dances or recordings of different versions of tunes. This short lecture intends to explore and place in perspective the evolution of collections of folk heritage.

Contact latesummerlectures@gmail.com for more information about this event.