The hubbub in the cities
Even in times gone by, people felt annoyed by noise, by music in public spaces. These essays shed light on aspects of musical culture that have received little attention to date.
Who the title Popular music in the urban soundscape you will probably think of open air festivals or Bob Dylan performers in the pedestrian zone. Not far off the mark. But this fascinating anthology of ten essays is not about today, but about yesterday, about the pop of times gone by, so to speak. London's Vauxhall Gardens in the mid-18th century are discussed, as are Hamburg brass bands in the 19th century and the huge sound systems from the early days of the last century.
So what was pop around 1800? The musicologist Martin Thrun was interested in the public concerts in London's Vauxhalls - those amusement parks where fireworks took place, where paintings hung, statues stood, where people ate or sat. In 1764, Leopold Mozart praised the "beautiful music" of the Vauxhall concerts; around 1794, Joseph Haydn noted that the music in London's parks was "quite good". Thrun's finding that a change in repertoire occurred precisely with Beethoven as the representative of absolute music is impressive. While Joseph Haydn and George Frideric Handel were still often on the program until 1803, the focus was now more on marching and dance music, waltzes, quadrilles and brass music for military bands. The result: in 1815 the German trade press reported "very mediocre concerts", in 1834 German critics judged the "march and dance music" as "light, insubstantial stuff".
There are many other interesting findings when musicologists and cultural historians distance themselves from the elitist canon of high culture. Today, there is talk of "acoustic pollution". But it already existed in the 19th century, when German street bands were successful in London and even New York, but at the same time met with less approval due to their loudness. Musicologist Sonja Neumann addresses the political dimensions of public sound reinforcement in her article "The beginnings of electro-acoustic sound reinforcement in urban areas". So-called mushroom loudspeakers from the Telefunken company were used at the commemoration of the Hitler Putsch on 9 November 1935 on Munich's Königsplatz; the music program of the procession on the Day of German Art in 1937, which consisted of fragments of music by Richard Wagner, Georg Friedrich Handel and Anton Bruckner, was also electrically amplified. The fact that the din of electric amplification, 86 fanfares and 38 kettledrums was certainly questionable from an artistic point of view does not alter the fact that the consideration of music in public spaces is at least as important as that of concert hall music. Musicology has neglected a lot here - but now has a lot to work on.
Popular music in the urban soundscape. Cultural-historical perspectives, edited by Tobias Widmaier and Nils Grosch, 216 p., € 34.90, Waxmann, Münster 2014, ISBN 978-3-8309-2261-2
