Highlights from the Ethnomusicology Archive: Musical Aesthetics in Los Angeles

In 1992 and 1993, Professor Steven Loza taught the course Musical Aesthetics in Los Angeles.  A number of these classes were recorded and the recordings became part of the Ethnomusicology Archive's Department of Ethnomusicology collection.  Twenty-four of these recordings are now available online on the Ethnomusicology Archive channel as part of California Light and Sound.  I thought that I would highlight several of them.

In this Introductory lecture, Loza discusses how the class will examine on a cross-cultural basis the diverse musical contexts within the city of Los Angeles. Includes observations about gangster rap, Korean American culture in Los Angeles, and the LA Riots which occurred the previous year. (1993)

Professor Loza invited an amazing array of guest lecturers.

The legendary film composer James Horner (1953-2015) and Scott Lipscomb, then graduate student in Systematic Musicology, now Associate Dean for Academic Affairs and Director of Graduate Studies at the College-Conservatory of Music, University of Cincinnati.  (1992)

Rudy Salas, lead guitarist and songwriter for Tierra, and David Reyes, author of Land of a Thousand Dances: Chicano Rock 'n' Roll from Southern California. (1992)

Ernest Fleischmann (1924-2010), Executive Director of the Los Angeles Philharmonic. (1992)

Conversation between jazz trumpeter Charles Moore (1941-2014) and awarding-winning author, educator, journalist, and activist Herb Boyd about African-American music in Los Angeles and how it relates to the African-American experience; then Grammy-nominated jazz bandleader, trumpeter, composer, arranger and educator, Gerald Wilson (1918-2014) speaks of his life and experiences in the music world. (1993)

Johnny Mori, seminal member of the taiko group Kinnara Taiko (Senshin Buddhist Temple, Los Angeles) and the original taiko drummer for the Grammy nominated jazz-fusion band Hiroshima, speaks about growing up in Los Angeles and how it affected his development as a musician. (1993)

The class also inspired volume 10 of Selected Reports in Ethnomusicology: Musical Aesthetics and Multiculturalism in Los Angeles (UCLA Ethnomusicology Publications, 1994).  "Volume X investigates musical aesthetics from both theoretical and ethnographic orientations. Its scope includes many of the ethnic communities of Los Angeles presented in detail and covers the issue of multiculturalism on a city-wide basis." 

The contributors include:

Musical aesthetics and multiculturalism in Los Angeles: an introduction / Steven Loza
L.A.: one society, one culture, many options / Jacques Maquet
Music and the cultural imagination / Roger W.H. Savage
Interpreting metaphors: cross-cultural aesthetics as hermeneutic project / Angeles Sancho-Velázquez
Identity, nationalism, and aesthetics among Chicano/Mexicano musicians in Los Angeles / Steven Loza
The evolution of banda music and the current banda movement in Los Angeles / Carlos Manuel Haro and Steven Loza
Music at the 1993 Los Angeles Marathon: an experiment in team fieldwork and urban ethnomusicology / Timothy Rice
Music in the Chinese community of Los Angeles: an overview / Guangming Li
Eleanor Hague (1875-1954): pioneering Latin Americanist / Robert Stevenson
The bands of tomorrow are here today: the proud, progressive, and postmodern sounds of Las Tres and Goddess 13 / George Lipsitz
Los Angeles gangsta rap and the aesthetics of violence / Steven Loza ... [et al.]
Social aspects of Persian music in Los Angeles / Behzad Allahyar
Context-dependent aesthetics: mariachi music in Los Angeles / Steven Pearlman
"Popular prices will prevail": setting the social role of European-based concert music / Catherine Parsons Smith
Outside-in: lost in L.A. with Bobby Bradford / Grace M.

Remember, you can watch all twenty-four of these recordings online on the Ethnomusicology Archive channel!