society

Music Society
Question:

In your comments this week please note some of the weaknesses and strengths of the assigned article, how this reading relates to past readings. Lastly, briefly cite another instance where hip-hop or other seemingly foreign musical styles have been adopted by youth sub-cultures and if you have any ideas/knowledge of why/how please share.

Also Post links

In our last lecture, we discussed immigrant populations and the ways they use music in their new home countries. This week we will continue our exploration by looking at hip-hop in Italy.

For the last few years, Italy has been in the news quite frequently due to the nation’s Trump styled xenophobic (now ex) Interior Minister, Matteo Salvini. For the last two summers, the world has watched Italy refuse to allow boats of migrants from Africa to dock. This video depicts one famous standoff that lasted for weeks during the summer of 2019:
Captain of rescue ship carrying 42 migrants arrested in Italy
Much like in the US, there is a relentless anti-immigrant campaign that has captivated Italy. In 2018 following the discovery of 16-year-old Desiree Mariottini’s battered and raped body at a “drug den” in the Roman neighborhood of San Lorenzo, Matteo Salvini intensified calls for a country free of “migrants” (Horowitz, 2018). Fascism in Italy: The hipster fascists trying to bring Mussolini back into the mainstreamUsing the death of Mariottini as a rallying cry, Salvini and other far-right sympathizers such as the Casapound political partyhave worked hard to take over parliamentary seats and other leadership posts held by centrists and the left. Many see Salvini as an opportunist while others have noted his checkered past with the Lega Nord (a fascist and separatist party) and have called him corrupt and owned by Putin. Writer Roberto Saviano famously dubbed Salvini “il ministro della malavita” – “the minister of the underworld” (Phelan, 2018).

(Naples, Italy)
So speaking of the “underworld” or organized-crime, most Americans have heard of the Mafia, but who has heard of the Camorra?
On December 7, 2011 in a town outside of Naples (Italy) one of Italy’s most wanted criminals was finally arrested after nearly 20 years on the run. This high profile capture made international news. Michele Zagaria, head of the notorious Casalesi clan, quite possibly the strongest and most influential of the groups that make up the Camorra (Naples’ glocal organized crime network) was found in a bunker beneath his home (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-16065556). This arrest came just weeks after the implosion of (yet another racist and corrupt) ex-Italian Prime Minister, Silvio Berlusconi’s government. Although it is possible both events were unrelated, it was highly speculated that they in fact were.
Another moment when the organized-crime clans of Naples quietly made international headlines came 3 years earlier when legendary South African singer Miriam Makeba died onstage near Naples in the suburb of Castel Volturno, from a heart attack. Makeba had been performing at an event protesting organized-crime and xenophobia, held in solidarity with exiled writer Roberto Saviano (who I mentioned earlier in this lecture). The event was also organized in response to six Ghanaian immigrants who were killed in clan violence. Saviano’s 2006 international best-seller Gomorrah exposed the clans and the Italian government’s involvement with organized crime. His bold exploration of the underworld made him a hero in his hometown of Naples and a walking target simultaneously. Saviano has spent more than a decade living in exile under armed protection. Armed protection paid for by the Italian government which ex-Interior Minister Salvini threatened to cancel every chance he got while on the job.

Even as recently as last week the Camorra was cited as being involved in violent anti-covid lock-down protests.

Southern Italy in all of its picturesque charms is also the site of suffocating corruption that reaches from the depths of the underworld, through the government and into the arts and culture of the people. Many point to the suffocating corruption as the catalyst that has helped the xenophobic policies and rhetoric of Salvini and others like him take hold throughout the South. This week we will look at the appropriation of seemingly foreign styles of music to tackle very local issues.

The article Hannibal’s Children is a outdated, but it gives a clear background of hip-hop’s early years in Italy. Hip-hop in Italy went from a fringe subculture in the early 1990s to a VERY lucrative business in less than a decade. Hip-hop was once the music of a small segment of Italian youth and migrants trying to escape, criticize, condemn and in some cases make sense of old practices, racism and corruption. Since the early 2000s hip-hop has gone from the squats (centro-sociale) to the mainstream.

(below is a photo of a centro-sociale still in existence in Naples, Italy)

Hip-hop throughout Italy has gone from being a critique and alternative to corruption, to in some instances, making money for the same corrupt organizations many of the “old school” artists were trying to avoid.

In continuation of our discussion on the social uses of music, we will look at the early use of rap in Sothern Italy. I will give a bit of history on the music of Naples, as well as a brief look at the city’s neo-melodic music. I will try to keep the lecture brief as I would like you to listen to a playlist and to watch a few related clips.

Before moving any further with this lecture, I want you to review how we began our semester during our intro lecture and lecture 2:

Why Music as Communication?
Music has the ability to communicate the following:
TIME, PLACE, EMOTION
Music can also:
ORGANIZE, COORDINATE, IDENTIFY
As passive listeners, we may miss music in action. Through this semester’s readings and discussions, we will hopefully become better, more discerning listeners, creators, critics and consumers of music.

Music, like other arts is not autonomous. It is a pervasive aspect of the cultural life of a society.

During week 2 we looked at David Reisman’s article Listening to Music (1950) and Steven Brown’s (2006) “How Does Music Work?” Toward a Pragmatics of Musical Communication. While both pieces lay the groundwork for a semester of exploration, Brown’s article states on pages 1-2 that music is…
“An associative enhancer of communication at the group level… Music is a functional object whose universal persistence over time and place has resulted from its contributions to the operations of societies”

If you get nothing else out of this class, please take these two ideas with you.

Now on to a little history…

Italy is a long peninsula that stretches from mainland Europe, nearly to Africa in its most southern territories. It is diverse in culture and language/dialects and has only existed as a unified nation for about 150 years. This fact of unification is much to the dismay of Northern Italy who believes they are culturally different from their southern compatriots and feels unfairly saddled with the burden of “southern” economic inequities. Concurrently the south of Italy complains of exploitation both economically and culturally by the more industrial North. Modern Italy is a nation in a precarious situation that includes internal strife, xenophobia and economic distress, that cannot be blamed entirely on the Mezzogiorno (the region of the nation south of Rome).
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/italy/8378166/Italy-divided-over-its-unified-history.html

Music and food are, in my opinion, the heart and soul of Naples, Italy. Both cultural products document a history of invasions, colonization, natural disasters, ingenuity, and poverty. In the 16th century, a system of Conservatories was started as a place to “conserve” orphans (of which there were a lot). Orphans (as well as other children) in the conservatories were trained in music and eventually entered the commercial music industry of Europe taking with them the teachings and style of the Neapolitan School. By the late 17th century churches and royal courts across Europe sought to employ products of the Neapolitan conservatory system allowing the spread of Neapolitan musical forms, styles of playing, teaching, and composing music. Due to the prevalence of musicians trained in the Neapolitan conservatories or trained by students of the conservatories, a diversity of Neapolitan songs and styles are among the most popular in classical music and opera. Today most famous songs associated with Italy come from Naples such as the famous O’ Sole Mio (which Elvis used the melody of in his 1960 hit “It’s Now or Never”).
Elvis – It’s Now Or Never (O Sole Mio)

O’ Sole Mio is sung by gondoliers for throngs of tourists visiting the iconic canals of Venice… a region which supports the xenophobic Lega Nord (Northern League) mentioned in our reading Hannibal’s Children.

Founded in the 9th century as a Greek colony, Naples has been ruled by the Greeks, the Moors, The French, The Spanish and is currently home to a NATO base since the end of WWII. Due to its geographic position as a port city and a turbulent history of uprisings and natural disasters, the city’s arts are characterized by a multitude of seemingly foreign influences. Among the styles that are either foreign (of a recent nature) or have retained a piece of the city’s past are hip-hop and the neo-melodic forms.

The neo-melodic style is unique to Naples. It is the city’s most loved and hated music as it represents for some, alignment with corruption. The melismatic styling of neo-melodic singers is thought to come from North Africa, however, there is debate on this as this history doesn’t sit well with everyone. Some of the earliest recordings in this style are from the early 20th century. These recordings show the use of an ornate, Arabic inflected vocal styling referred to as Fronne ‘e Limone (the branch of the lemon tree) as a way for people on the outside of the city’s prison to communicate with their brethren on the inside. In the early 1900s, one could stand outside the prison walls and sing a message to someone waiting on the other side of the wall…who needs phones and internet! Many neo-melodic songs of today continue to deal with the plight of the incarcerated, the soon to be incarcerated, and the previously incarcerated. Today the subject matter and system in which many neo-melodic artists produce their recordings and perform live all seem to relate directly back to the Camorra. In many ways, this music is synonymous with mal vita aka thug life or bad life. For more info on neo-melodici please see:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/musicblog/2009/apr/14/scene-and-heard-neomelodics

In contrast to the regional appeal of neo-melodic music, hip-hop in Southern Italy has in the past stood as a space of celebrating a diverse history, standing against corruption and confronting the nation’s xenophobic tendencies despite a history that suggests something quite different from an insular past (especially in the case of the Mezzogiorno…but then again it is this past that Northern Italy takes issue with).

Dawson and Palumbo’s article though not without flaws does a great job of characterizing the Mezzogiorno’s hiphop scene of the 1990s (even if it leaves out quite a few very important groups such as La Famiglia). The article illustrates the use of an appropriated style as a site of identity negotiation. Hip-hop allowed youth the ability to express disapproval of institutional corruption while affirming their identity in a hostile political environment as Italians (both as southern and/or as immigrant) through the sampling and playing of more traditional and nostalgic styles. In Naples especially, hip-hop was a form of resistance to a life dictated by the ever-present Camorra and the often superficial mainstream Italian media (a large amount of which is controlled by Berlusconi’s private companies); it was often a celebration of communicating in one’s own dialect to Neapolitans near and far.

Hip-hop has been appropriated across the globe since it’s early years by youth who either found pleasure in the process of either attempting to mimic American music or by others who found power in making it their own vehicle for expression. It is worthwhile to watch this transition on a global level and try to make sense of it as it is happening. Hip-hop globally is in another phase of appropriation where it has left the streets and communities and is now the soundtrack of consumption, yet there is still something in hip-hop that keeps it a “music of resistance”. John Frey, a former student of mine made a very astute observation commenting that:

“…lyrical content in a lot of [American] southern rap music is extremely transgressive. Take a group like Migos, for instance. They’re a group of wealthy, successful, young, flashy black guys who rap about having money, selling drugs, and sometimes, their appreciation for white women. In the deep south, these are inherently political, confrontational, and troubling images for many people, and I think that counts for something.”

John’s observations on what seems like mindless lyrics and lame aspirations also function as a moment of rebellion against the roles that society deems acceptable for the young men and women making this music. By acknowledging that hip-hop can be more than music, but a space to challenge society even in what might be a negative manner we begin to develop a richer dialogue about characters like Keith Ape, Post Malone, and other performers whose use of hip-hop might be more than tasteless mimicry for profit.

In short, I hope this week’s lecture and article illustrates music’s ability to transport history, style, and aspects of ideology across borders. Even if some seemingly key components are “lost in translation” they are often replaced with what is needed at the community level, especially when music is adopted through cooperative practice (and not just sampling alone). I hope the article by Dawson and Palumbo challenges your ideas on the subjects of authenticity and appropriation. I also encourage you to point out the shortcomings of the article.

This week’s playlist…

For more on:
S.Berlusconi and Matteo Salvini- http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-11981754

https://nyti.ms/2AuRfax

M. Makeba- http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/11/10/south-african-music-legen_n_142584.html#

Roberto Saviano- http://www.vice.com/read/crooked-men-0000453-v21n9

https://www.thelocal.it/20180622/roberto-saviano-matteo-salvini-police-protection