Performance Genres Research Articles

Selling the disciplined mind to achieve the disciplined body onlyfans, peloton and queer digital body art of the covid-era

This paper follows the figure of the ultra-healthy queer masculine subject as a unit of value across online fitness instruction and amateur netporn – two rising vernacular, digital performance genres of the Covid-era. Such performances exploit the vulnerabilities of attention to commodify a disciplined mind as a means toward selling a future-oriented, hyper-athletic, disciplined body. With Covid-19 and HIV/AIDS hovering at the edges of the frame, this paper draws on the queer politics of embodiment and digital intimacies to address disciplinary questions surrounding Performance Studies and its precipitating interrogations into digital media.

The Art of Travelling Musicians in the History of Joint Performance Establishment

The purpose of the article is to analyze the art of travelling musicians – the ancestors of the participants of the joint game; to substantiate the origins and reveal the socio-cultural prerequisites for the formation of this type of performance, which has its roots in ancient civilizations. For the optimal solution of the outlined tasks, the researcher used methods, among which the main ones are source and systematic. The research methodology is to analyze the performing arts of the Ancient and Middle Ages, most clearly represented by the syncretic works of ancient poets, kithara players and singers, as well as other travelling musicians who personified the singer, the poet, the accompanist, the storyteller, the dancer, the circus performer, which testifies to the emergence of elements of syncretic vocal and instrumental performance in their art. Scientific novelty of the research. For the first time in Ukrainian musicology, the origins and socio-cultural prerequisites for the development of joint performance, which has its roots in ancient civilizations, are substantiated and the art of travelling musicians of the Ancient and Middle Ages is characterized. Conclusions. The performance of the Antiquity and Middle Ages was represented mainly by the art of travelling musicians and was marked by their complicated relations with the socio-cultural environment of that time. At the same time, thanks to their art, joint music-making gradually emerged as a procedural form of vocal and instrumental performance with a huge potential for development. After all, their art formed some of the distinctive features of joint playing: mutual coherence of the performer’s intentions with sufficient individual freedom and at the same time the subordination of their playing to another performer. It was their creative work that became an important link between the first traditions of joint performance, albeit in a syncretic format, and its subsequent highly professional forms. Travelling musicians laid the foundations of musical art and it is from them that various genres of chamber vocal and instrumental performance take their roots.

The varying social dynamics in orally transmitted and notated vs. improvised musical performance.

Musical performance can be viewed as an intricate form of social behavior. Accordingly, the rich diversity of existing musical styles and traditions may reflect distinct modes of social interaction. To gain a better understanding of the relations between musical style and social dynamics, we have formulated a framework for dissecting different genres of musical performance according to key social criteria. In particular, we contemplate on the continuum ranging from strictly orally transmitted and notated to fully improvised music, and its relation to general compliance with social norms and structure, borrowing key concepts from tight-loose theory, a powerful paradigm for studying societal behaviors and tendencies. We apply this approach to analyze four distinct prominent musical genres, providing a detailed mapping between musical style and social dynamics. This work highlights important factors that link between musical performance and social interaction, and will enable future experimental unraveling of social aspects of musical performance as expressed by different musical styles and practices.

Matthew Hunter. The Pursuit of Style in Early Modern Drama: Forms of Talk on the London Stage

In this fine book, Matthew Hunter develops a nuanced and sophisticated set of arguments, most importantly by reversing some of the standard approaches to the topic of style. Rather than opposing style as an aesthetic category to performative speech acts and everyday interaction, Hunter makes a compelling case for considering ‘styles’ as forms of action, ways of ‘making things happen without saying so’ (25). Equal but opposite to classical speech acts, charismatic styles produced highly desired effects on the London stage, implicitly giving definition to the situations of their use as specific genres of successful social performance. Audience members, Hunter argues, could not but feel compelled to try to reproduce these performative effects in their own lives. Rather than thinking of plays as representing everyday social interaction forms, the book unveils a dynamic whereby the theatre’s more perfected interaction styles feed the aspirations and spur the imitation of playgoers seeking affirmation or even celebrity in their own lives.

ЕТАПИ РОБОТИ НАД ЯКІСТЮ ТЕМБРОВОГО ЗВУЧАННЯ ВОКАЛЬНОГО АНСАМБЛЯ

The article is devoted to the problem of organizing the teacher's methodical work on the quality of timbre sound of the vocal ensemble, depending on the level of development of the singers' vocal skills. Nowadays, solo and ensemble singing are popular genres of musical performance and have a huge impact on the consciousness of listeners, their feelings and interests, and for performers it is a means of developing the creative qualities of the individual. Today, vocal art occupies a large space in the musical life of society, so the interest of scientists in this phenomenon is so constant, in connection with which there is an urgent need to study the processes of formation and development of ensemble vocal art, the specifics of vocal performance and vocal pedagogy. Only under these conditions will the study of vocal-performance and professional-pedagogical features of vocal ensemble singing be most complete. The main purpose of classes in the vocal ensemble class is the formation of students' singing culture, the development of aesthetic taste, vocal and auditory skills, musical abilities, emotional sphere, artistry, skills of emotional expressiveness of performance, education of the need and readiness for pedagogical and concert performance activities, etc. The method of training a future teacher of musical art to lead vocal ensembles at a higher education institution is carried out in the process of mastering the professional direction of the disciplines of voice production and conducting and choral disciplines. In the process of this work, students acquire professional competences necessary for working with professional, educational and amateur vocal ensembles, namely: – master the professional requirements for the head of a vocal ensemble; – get acquainted with the specifics of the professional activity of the leaders of vocal ensembles; – study the basic principles of organization and professional activity of professional, educational and amateur vocal ensembles; – master the technique of working on vocal works for ensemble performance; – model the professional activity of a vocal ensemble leader; – master the skills and abilities of independent work with scientific and methodical literature; – develop the ability to select and systematize vocal and technical material, educational and concert repertoire for vocal ensembles; – develop research skills in the process of performing voice production tasks, etc. The author believes that the vocal abilities and skills formed by singers at the previous stages of training require consolidation in the process of constant training and improvement in further independent and professional activities.

The Epic of Survival

Traditional performance genres are inadequate to represent the climate crisis, whose proper narrative form is the epic. Using epic genres instrumentally can help create the cultural imaginaries that will move people to call for the revolution of our planet-destroying economic system, although at the same time it will be necessary to isolate and neutralize the ways that epic modes in popular entertainment entrench the power of fossil-fuel interests and normalize incipient ecofacism.

Curatorial Directing and Actor Agency

In lieu of an abstract, here is an excerpt: 
 recognition that digital performance will remain as a practice far beyond the pandemic, and in response to Rikard and Pace’s call for theatre educators to reconsider what consent looks like in on-camera classrooms, this article engages with the genre of digital performance that W.B. Worthen’s analysis of performances created during the pandemic names as “Zoom Theatre” (2021). Worthen highlights Zoom Theatre as “the defining genre of theatre during the pandemic,” describing this genre as that in which “actors in different places all perform live, but remotely, typically from their homes, gathered on a screen” (183). Due to this merging of liveness and digitally captured performance, intimacy practitioners engaging with this form of performance need to consider ways in which intimacy choreography and intimacy coordination must merge. This article focuses on the ways in which the framing of Zoom Theatre can complicate Laura Mulvey’s concept of the Male Gaze (1975), introducing the concepts of agentic framing and curatorial directing as tools for creating consent-based performance within the unique contexts of Zoom Theatre.

Educational and entertainment video (comic episodes of performance genre of manzai) as a modern method of Japanese teaching

One of the popular and efficient technologies of teaching foreign languages and cultures in recent time is edutainment technology. It’s been considered as the one which brings positive results having as its elements learning, media and play / entertainment. The purpose of this article is to research educational and entertainment videos of the Japanese comic performance genre of manzai as an edutainment technology which effectively helps forming communicative and also linguo-sociocultural competence among students of the beginner level particularly majoring in translation. Also our target is toshow the main features of mentioned technology and its merits among other ones. Methods. Various researches on technology of edutainment have been overviewed to present its representative features. Results. In this research educational and entertainment video (comic episodes of the Japanese performance genre of manzai) has been analyzed from the point of view of its structure and linguistic peculiarities and evaluated as a considerable technology to present and to broaden vocabulary of the Japanese language in humoristic non-formal way which makes learning more efficient and interesting. It’s been also shown as a source to deepen the comprehension of mentality and communicative behavior of the Japanese which helps to form linguo-sociocultural competence. Conclusion. Having considered various merits of mentioned above technology we estimate it as the one which is warrant attention during the classes of the Japanese language at the beginner level in particular.

Thermotemporalities, thermomasculinities: Uptime, downtime, and server heat in the digital Anthropocene

Amid a warming planet and a surge in digital activity precipitated by COVID-19 lockdowns, the ecological impacts of cloud infrastructures are of increasing interest to scholars and publics. Deemed “essential workers,” data center operators maintain server uptime by keeping equipment cool (via air conditioning). Failure results in overheating and a state of service interruption called downtime. Drawing on ethnographic research in data centers, this article introduces the concept of thermotemporalities to illustrate how time, temperature, and expertise converge in novel formations. By attending to the embodied practices and discursive pronouncements of data center operators, I reveal how uptime (cold) and downtime (hot), a binary opposition, are performative genres rather than discrete referents. Emerging out of this dyadic interplay, I locate a species of aspirational identity I call thermomasculinities.

Interlinguistic Intertwining in Songs: Dāstān in the Repertoire of the Bards of Iranian Khorasan

Centuries of intense cultural exchange between speakers of Turkic and Iranian languages have made northern Khorasan, a region in north-eastern Iran, a significant field for the study of interlinguistic intertwinings in songs. In this article, I examine multilingualism in an important performance genre called dāstān or hekāyat (“story” or “tale”) which plays a central role in the repertoire of Khorasan bards known as bakhshi. These performers are trilingual and sing in Persian, Khorasani Turkish, and Kurmanji Kurdish, the languages of the various ethnic groups living in the area for centuries. In performing a dāstān, the bakhshis alternate sections of spoken prose (in Persian, Khorasani-Turkish, or Kurmanji Kurdish, depending on the audience) with verses (usually in Khorasani-Turkish) sung to their accompaniment on the dotār (a long-necked lute with two strings). I will observe several performances of the dāstān “Shāh Esmā’il and Golzār Khānum”.

Between visibility and elsewhere: South Asian queer creative cultures and resistance

ABSTRACT This article draws on existing interviews and creative material from LGBTQ + South Asians who have lived and spent significant time in the UK as part of the Cross Border Queers project. It begins by considering creative forms of diasporic activism and creativity in the UK that have emerged from South Asian LGBTQ + communities and individuals. We discuss the ways in which South Asian LGBTQ + diasporic organising was formed through a sense of shared racial and class solidarity and especially under the umbrella of political Blackness. We then move on to the role played by cultural activism to see how artists have used culture as a way to advance social change and increase the visibility of South Asian LGBTQ + communities in the UK. We place different genres of visual culture, curation, performance and oral history to evoke how South Asian queer migrants articulate a distinct form of subjectivity and aesthetic practice.

The Witch in Flight

The Witch in Flight

The Devil and the Mullah: Satirical Personae in the Pre-Revolutionary Press of the South Caucasus

Abstract Oskar Schmerling (1863–1938) was a Tbilisi-based artist best known for his illustrations and caricatures in Armenian, Azeri, Georgian, and Russian-language satirical periodicals during the Russian Empire’s post-1905 “press boom.” His work provided a powerful visual component to hotly debated issues of the day, including language policy, ethnic conflict, educational reform, religious practices, Russian cultural and political hegemony, and more. In this article we analyze Schmerling’s use of two satirical personae—the titular devil from the Georgian journal eshmakis matrakhi (Devil’s Whip) and the mullah from the Azeri journal Molla Näsräddin—in light of the diverse cultural and religious communities that comprised his readership and intellectual milieu. Drawing from scholarship on trickster figures in oral, print, and performative genres around the world, we investigate the ways Schmerling used the personae of the devil and the mullah to simultaneously represent the world from more than one perspective, and to speak to communities with varying political agendas in the midst of a collapsing empire. We argue that Schmerling’s work reveals cross-cultural artistic and intellectual connections that contributed to significant political and cultural change in the South Caucasus, culminating in revolutionary activity and the rise of nationalist movements.

Formats and Potentials of Local Small Arts (Kleinkunst)

The article focuses on the phenomena, developments and potentials of small arts (Kleinkunst) in the Slovenian space. Small arts are a form of artistic response that, through diverse performance genres – such as cabaret, new burlesque, improvisational theatre, stand-up, interventions in public space, contemporary circus, drag, queer and LGBTQI+ stage events – provides a social commentary on the existing traditionalist, heteronormative, patriarchal and capitalist society. The article elaborates the term small arts and its artistic and social elements and tries to identify it concretely in the local space. This broad umbrella term is characterised by the heterogeneity of its themes and aesthetics. In Slovenia, it has an even more specific undertone and position, as its development and influence are hampered by a small population. When selecting the creators of small arts, the author focused mainly on those working in the sphere of the non-governmental sector, who create continuously, have artistic credibility and are not market-oriented.

А. Vivaldi’s Serenade «Gloria e Imeneo»: genre‑performing analysis

Formulation of the problem. The article is devoted to the serenade genre, popular in the 17th–18th centuries, which is an example, on the one hand, of a composition that was written «on demand», for the occasion, and, on the other hand, it is an intermediate genre between a cantata and a small opera. In terms of genre and specifics of performance, an analysis of one of the examples of the genre of baroque serenade is offered – that is of Antonio Vivaldi’s «Gloria e Imeneo» RV687. Analysis of recent research and publications. The article includes studies of the solo cantata genre (G. Omelchenko Aghai-Kuhi), the development of the serenade genre in Venice of the 18th century (Tabolt), Rome (Tcharos), at the court of the Austrian Habsburgs (Tabulina); the problems of baroque art, opera and creative work of A. Vivaldi (Durante, Martelotti), the principles of baroque figurative singing (Machinni; Tosi). Kintzel’s article and A. Borin’s preface and annotations to the score (Ricordi edition) are directly devoted to A. Vivaldi’s serenades. The purpose of the article is to formulate the basic principles of the baroque serenade genre and to define typical and individual features on the example of «Gloria e Imeneo» by A. Vivaldi. The scientific novelty is connected with an attempt to trace the development of the serenade genre of the Baroque era in Italy (Rome and Venice) and the formulation of the genre-stylistic and performing parameters of the serenade in the creative work of A. Vivaldi using the example of «Gloria e Imeneo». The research methodology combines genre-intonation and performing types of analysis. The results of the study contain a detailed analysis of the relationship between the text-instrumental accompaniment and the vocal part, which allows us to identify the individual features of A. Vivaldi’s style, which were used by him in operas. The duality of the genre features of the serenade is emphasized: from the opera, it can have a simple plot, images of the heroes of the compositions, from the cantata – a small instrumental composition and the basic «static» of the characters (while the opera is characterized by dynamics according to the plot action). The main genre principles are formulated in the conclusions, including: a small orchestra composition, a small number of performers, alternation of arias (according to the principle of contrast), recitatives and duets. It is indicated that the main form in which arias are written is da capo, within which A. Vivaldi demonstrates the sophistication of the melody, emotionality, character, which gives the genre the desired individualization. From the point of view of performance (the analysis was carried out on the example of Gloria’s part), virtuosic technique, the presence of various types of melismas, the need to master the breathing technique (necessary for performing long phrases), the ability to use the necessary timbre of the voice (vocal plasticity) have been singled out. From a communicative point of view, the attractiveness of serenades for today’s listeners is marked by the fact that they are a fairly mobile genre and excite with vocal technique on a par with baroque opera, although they do not require large resources for staging.

Music and Intermediality in Trans-Border Performances: Ecological Responses in Patachitra and Manasamangal

Climate crisis has emerged as an important theme in the performances of patachitra or scroll painting in West Bengal. Besides depicting contemporary subjects, the scrolls also tell traditional stories, such as that of the Manasamangal, through songs and visuals. Across the border, in Bangladesh, the Manasamangal narrative finds numerous embodiments in living traditions, thus closely highlighting a human–nature connection. This paper considers several such performance genres and studies them through the intermediality of printed literature, visual depictions, sound recordings and performance practices in curated spaces. In doing so, it challenges the land-centric frameworks of disciplines and instead understands them through a liquescent methodological approach.

Performing sex: The representation of male and female musicians in three genres of music performance

In this article, the representation of male and female musicians is compared between three major genres of music performance and across three geographical regions: the United Kingdom, Europe, and the United States. Relevant data of artists from 40 world-class orchestras, 40 competition brass bands, and 40 top-selling recorded popular music groups were obtained from the websites of the respective organizations and from other authenticated sources. Information collected included the instruments played by each artist, the artist’s status in the ensemble (e.g., principal/section leader/rank and file player). The membership of each instrumental section was then analyzed for balance of sex representation. Overall, across all three genres, male musicians considerably outnumbered females, but this imbalance was moderated by genre and regional differences. The lowest level of imbalance of sexes was observed in orchestras, with males occupying 60% of orchestral chairs compared with females 40%, but principal chairs/section leaders were found to be predominantly male. In brass bands, males predominated by a ratio of 76% males to 24% females, and section leader chairs were almost invariably occupied by males. In the genre of popular music, male performers massively outnumbered females by 85%–15% in every aspect of performers and group leader roles by 90% to 10%. Possible causes of these imbalances are explored for each genre. In all three genres representation of males and females was found to be closely related to the instruments played, for example, many more females than males were harpists, and many more males were trombonists and tuba players than were females. Reasons for these differences are explored with particular reference to differential patterns of education and musical training and to underlying historical and sociological issues.

Prince(ss) Charming of the Japanese Popular Theatre

Prince(ss) Charming of the Japanese Popular Theatre

Song in the Sumatran Highlands

Song in the Sumatran Highlands

Devotional contextures: the māla songs and Muslim ethical formation in contemporary Kerala

ABSTRACT This article explores how a devotional performance genre called the māla in Arabi Malayalam continues to fashion devotional piety for many Mappila men and women in contemporary Kerala. My analysis will focus on the practices of Mappila literary culture – especially that of reciting literary texts composed in Arabi Malayalam. Highlighting the performative dimensions of two māla songs, the early seventeenth century Muhyiddin Māla and the early twentieth century Nafisat Māla, I map out, in ethnographic detail, how these devotional song-poems punctuate everyday life for many contemporary Mappilas, thereby helping shape and hone these Mappilas’ affects of piety and their larger ways of being and acting in the world. In so doing, my aim will also be to underscore the social life and tone of Mappila literary culture and to reiterate that literary genres are not mere ideas but also constitutive practices that are highly consequential for the practitioners’ self-fashioning and ethical formation. The article urges a contextural approach to the study of devotional literature whereby due attention is paid to both the ‘context(s)’ and ‘texture(s)’ of genre and literary cultures.