Women's Bands in America: Performing Music and Gender

(Hardback)

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Women's Bands in America is the first comprehensive exploration of womens bands across the three centuries in American history. Contributors trace women's emerging roles in society as seen through women's bandsconcert and marchingspanning three centuries of American history. Authors explore town, immigrant,industry, family, school, suffrage, military, jazz, and rock bands, adopting a variety of methodologies and theoretical lenses in order to assemble and interrogate their findings within the context of women's roles in American society over time. Contributors bring together a series of disciplines in this unique work, including music education, musicology, American history, women's studies, and history of education. They also draw on numerous primary sources: diaries, film, military records, newspaper articles, oral-history interviews, personal letters, photographs, published ephemera, radio broadcasts, and recordings. Thoroughly, contributors engage in archival historical research, biography, case study, content analysis, iconographic study, oral history, and qualitative research to bring their topics to life. This ambitious collection will be of use not only to students and scholars of instrumental music education, music history and ethnomusicology, but also gender studies and American social history. Contributions by: Vilka E. Castillo Silva, Dawn Farmer, Danelle Larson, Brian Meyers, Sarah Minette, Gayle Murchison, Jeananne Nichols, David Rickels, Joanna Ross Hersey, Sarah Schmalenberger, Amy Spears, and Sondra Wieland Howe.

Reviews

Sullivan expands her topic from womens military bands, the subject of her Bands of Sisters, to virtually all band types encountered in the US: professional, town, vaudeville, school, drum and bugle corps, jazz, and rock as well as military (in the last chapter she extends the discussion to a military band in Mexico). The arrangement is mostly chronological, and the chapters span the 140 years from the late 19th century (starting with Helen May Butlers various ensembles) to the 21st century (rock bands in the Twin Cities). [O]f special merit are contributions by Gayle Murchison and Jeananne Nichols. Murchison writes about the intersectionality of race and gender in jazz, as seen through the life and recordings of Mary Lou Williamss Girl Stars, while untangling a web of connections among members of the jazz world. Nichols details the US WAF Band history, drawing on many primary documents, interviews, and recent theory. Coauthors Dawn Farmer and David Rickels also make effective use of extensive primary sources in bringing to life the stories of pathbreaking band directors Lillian Williams Linsey and Gladys Stone Wright, who served as role models and left lasting legacies in the band world. Summing Up: Recommended. Upper-division undergraduates through faculty and professionals. * CHOICE *
This collection presents a sweeping 140-year story of successful all-women's bands in the United States and Mexico and fills many gaps in our inherited musical histories. Taken together, these essays present a powerful story of resilience, showing that in creating these musical ensembles, women also created an empowering space for their own gendered agency. It would be useful in a variety of undergraduate and graduate courses on gender and music, gender studies, historical musicology and ethnomusicology. -- Ellen Koskoff, University of Rochester's Eastman School of Music
A thrilling journey through the history of womens bands in the USA. Feminist theory is interwoven with compensatory history, to reveal a web of power and constraint versus liberation and resistance in the gendered musical world. Threading it all together is the Editors exciting introduction. Highly recommended. -- Lucy Green, Professor of Music Education, UCL Institute of Education, London UK
Womens Bands in America is a comprehensive and clear must-read source for anyone interested in the history of American bands. Jill Sullivan and her contributors have filled the void of womens mostly forgotten contributions to American bands, and indeed their contributions to music and our culture in general. Understanding these unique contributions is necessary to fully comprehend the role of bands in our society. Bravo to all of the authors, and especially Dr. Sullivan, for telling these amazing stories! -- Steven N. Kelly, Florida State University
Womens Bands in America provides a fascinating, well-researched and compelling history of women forming bands dating back to 1876. Kudos to Jill Sullivan et. al. for recognizing the women whose talents and accomplishments might otherwise never have been brought to light. I am amazed and empowered by the life stories herein! -- Paula A. Crider, Professor Emeritus, The University of Texas

Author Bio

Jill M. Sullivan is associate professor of Music Education at Arizona State University and author of Bands of Sisters: U.S. Women's Military Bands during World War II (Scarecrow Press, 2011)