DISABILITY CULTURE AND MUSIC
\nTECHNOLOGY<\/p>\n
1995<\/p>\n
Mainstream music culture is continually
\nbeing affected by sections of society
\nwhich are made up of ‘outsiders’. It is
\nundeniable that the mainstream is reliant
\nupon the influences of ‘outsiders’ to
\nmove musical style on – Punk, Rap, South
\nAmerican drummers or blind black blues
\nsingers- whatever the culture, the
\nmainstream could not exist without them.
\nConversely it is through music that
\nartists such as Tracey Chapman, Boy
\nGeorge and Ian Drury have brought
\nattention to their communities and
\nassociated cultures, simultaneously
\nchanging the identity of the music scene
\nwhilst bringing about some social
\nawareness. As music technology becomes
\ncheaper and more widely available more
\n‘outsiders’ are going to infiltrate the
\nmainstream causing further evolution.
\nAccessible music technology means that
\nuntrained musicians have been able to
\ncompose and produce their own music,
\nproducing many exciting and original
\ninnovations without the ‘benefit’ of
\nacademic music training. In relation to
\ndisabled people, music technology not
\nonly allows control over instruments
\npreviously thought inaccessible, it could
\nalso offer opportunities to take
\nadvantage of the limitations of musical
\ninstruments.
\nJudith Robinson, a project leader for The
\nDrake Research Project (an organisation
\nat the forefront of empowering disabled
\npeople to become musicians), said that
\nshe found ‘Many chords, rifts and so on
\nare created by ‘playing around’ on an
\ninstrument and are likely to be based on
\nhand patterns which are easy to form or
\nrepeated patterns of finger movements.
\nIn the same vein, a musician who has a
\nphysical disability is likely to have very
\ndifferent kinds of movements and so
\ncome up with musical ideas other
\nmusicians would not or could not create
\n[for instance), Mark Rowland, plays his
\nkeyboard with his feet. Some of the
\ntrademarks of his live playing are note
\nclusters of up to four or five
\nneighbouring notes on a massive ‘pad’
\nsound and huge stabs and sweeps across
\nthe black notes using a distorted guitar
\nsound. Another musician who plays with
\nhis feet, Steve Knight, often plays in
\nparallel fourths – forbidden in the
\nharmony books – because this is a
\ncomfortable interval for the size of his
\nfeet.’
\nSometimes a disabled person may have to
\nuse an adaptation in order to control an
\ninstrument, as simple as a mechanism
\nthat allows several keys on the computer
\nor musical keyboard to be pressed
\nsimultaneously or as advanced as a
\n‘distance to MIDI (Musical Instrument
\nDigital Interface) converter’. Whatever
\nthe adaptation, it seems reasonable to
\nassume that the adaptations may also
\naffect the compositions created. Thus, if
\nbeing disabled is likely to have an effect
\non how music is made, one is led to ask
\nwhat evidence exists to suggest that there
\nis such a thing as ‘disability music’?
\nAs I see it, the ‘Disability Community’
\nviews ‘Disability Music’ as music that is
\nmade by a disabled person that does not
\nundermine the fundamental ideologies of
\nthe disability movement, meaning music
\nthat promotes a realistic view of
\ndisability and attempts to dismiss the
\nmyths surrounding disability. Or, to be
\nmore direct, music which makes clear
\nthat the biggest problem for disabled
\npeople is the disabling attitudes
\nlegislation and structures of society. It
\ndoes not, however, make clear that any
\nmusic made by a disabled person is
\nautomatically ‘disability music’, because
\nthat would encourage the ghettoisation
\nand patronisation of disabled people.
\nObviously, as with all ‘new’ cultures or
\nstyles of music there is a period of time
\nin which people need to get acclimatised
\nto it. With disability music, too, there is
\ngoing to be a period where a musician’s
\nphysical image, while significant, does
\nnot override their right to be commercially
\nviable. So that a singer’s wheelchair
\nwill one day become as secondary as
\nStevie Wonder’s blindness is today. While
\nsome people will feel a knee-jerk reaction
\nto dismiss these ‘new’ ideas, many will
\nrealise that it is in everyone’s own interest to
\nlisten to the opinions of the disability
\ncommunity because while it’s relatively easy
\n(unfortunately) for someone to be racist,
\nsexist or homophobic and feel they will
\nnever be the victim of their own cruelty,
\ndisability can affect everyone.
\nPeople from all walks of life can be
\naffected due to the indiscriminate nature
\nof disablement. There’s no clear physical
\nor social common denominator.<\/p>\n
Anyway back to the music…..one thing
\nthat is different to many political issue
\nbased musical cultures is the type of “form”
\nthat disability music takes. unlike single
\nfemale singer songwriters or black rap
\nartists, there is no underlying “sound” that
\ncomes from disabled people. Whilst
\nindividual disabled musicians may
\npioneer new styles it’s unlikely that others
\nwill feel obliged to use them as well.
\nHowever, if they do so, then one
\nmay find a similar situation to that found
\nin black culture where many styles exist
\nbeneath the umbrella of the term ‘black
\nculture’. For example there may develop
\na section of the disability culture whose
\nstyle is distinctive because they use voice
\nsynthesisers, (you never know!), and
\nanother who are identifiable through
\ntheir use of ‘wheelchair noise samples’
\n(O.K., I agree that’s pushing it a bit!).
\nOf course disability has already had its
\neffect on mainstream culture, albeit in a
\nsubtle way. Artists like Ian Drury, Stevie
\nWonder and many others (such as many
\nof the original blues players, many of
\nwhom were blind), have all had their
\ninfluence on the mainstream. However,
\nup until now there has not been any
\nsingle established musician or group in
\nthe mainstream who has been
\nparticularly identifiable as being
\npreoccupied with disability issues. But,
\nthanks to music technology, it is not hard
\nto believe that, in the near future, things
\nwill be different.<\/p>\n
SIMON SMITH<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
DISABILITY CULTURE AND MUSIC TECHNOLOGY 1995 Mainstream music culture is continually being affected by sections of society which are made up of ‘outsiders’. It is undeniable that the mainstream is reliant upon the influences of ‘outsiders’ to move musical style on – Punk, Rap, South American drummers or blind black blues singers- whatever the culture,…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"cybocfi_hide_featured_image":"","footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-2210","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/simonsdiary.co.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/2210","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/simonsdiary.co.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/simonsdiary.co.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/simonsdiary.co.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/simonsdiary.co.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2210"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/simonsdiary.co.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/2210\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2211,"href":"https:\/\/simonsdiary.co.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/2210\/revisions\/2211"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/simonsdiary.co.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2210"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}