Sound and Circulation: Immobility and Obduracy in South African Electronic Music

Abstract

This paper responds to the common assumption in much recent ethnomusicology that today music is more accessible, ubiquitous and mobile than ever before. In particular, I argue that this assumption runs aground when confronted with sonic practices in South Africa. Based on fieldwork with electronic musicians in Johannesburg and its surrounding areas, I ask how music is practiced and experienced in a context where musical equipment and storage devices constantly break down and where people are largely immobile. I focus on four factors: the physical layout of urban spaces; the immanence of crime and theft; the breakdown of musical equipment; and the interruption of information storage and transfer. By examining these factors, I elucidate the ways in which breakdown, obduracy and failure have generative as well as negative effects on music production and experience. IntroductionThe relationship between music and mobility has been a central concern in ethnomusicology for at least three decades. From studies of migration and diaspora

Afro-Sweden

“…To safely access the latter from the former, there is a single pedestrian crossing at a lone traffic light. (Though not engineered quite as restrictively, this sociospatial design resonates with Gavin Steingo's [2015] lucid description of peri-urban transit in Soweto, South Africa, particularly the "obdurate" divisions between spaces conceived as ethnic enclaves under apartheid.) Maureen calls the division "socioeconomic," but of course it's sociocultural, too, and racial.…”

Sounding the Indian Ocean: Musical Circulations in the Afro-Asiatic Seascape

“…While music and mobility has received considerable attention in studies of sound, migration, identity formation, and globalization (Granger et al 2016), the relationship between music and immobility is still largely unexamined. Notable exceptions include Titus (2016) and Steingo (2015;.…”

Introduction

“…For Larkin, technological "inability" does not refer simply to quirks in a narrative structured around "modernity." Instead, his point is that failure and imperfection have generative as well as negative effects and that these effects are impor tant in and of themselves (see also Morris 2010;Steingo 2015Steingo , 2016. This insight is particularly applicable in certain parts of the world-such as Kano, Nigeria, where Larkin conducted fieldwork-where technological failure or imperfection is a quotidian and normal part of life.…”