The «Problem» and Potential of Tradition

SNAP
The «Problem» and Potential of Tradition

The term tradition has often reinforced an essentialist notion of an artist’s relationship to their origins. In an essay inspired by the «One Beat» residency program, musicologist Rim Jasmin Irscheid is struck by musicians cultivating musical heritage as empowerment.

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Photo: Victor Angeleas

Reasoning with Inner City Rhythms

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Reasoning with Inner City Rhythms
Reasoning with Inner City Rhythms

This first episode of the podcast series «Modes of Listening & Sound Practices» explores the modes of listening that Maier and Kaur adopted on their sound walks through Berlin.

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Design: Mister Colfer

The Seduction of Meme Music

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The Seduction of Meme Music
The Seduction of Meme Music

Meme music went viral during the COVID-19 pandemic. Distributed via apps like TikTok, it might transform not only the way music is made, but also how it is consumed. An article about the cultural implications of an emerging digital format.

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Design: Robert Crahmer

What Public Enemy Song Would You Recommend?

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What Public Enemy Song Would You Recommend?
What Public Enemy Song Would You Recommend?

In their track «Burn Hollywood Burn», Public Enemy criticized the representation of Black people in Hollywood movies. The mentality and circumstances cultivating these issues are the same ones that indirectly disavow the humanity of minorities in technology and media today.

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Design: Eiliyas
Sound: Eiliyas

The Impossibility of «German» Music

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The Impossibility of «German» Music
The Impossibility of «German» Music

When the pandemic hit Germany’s music scenes, a group of managers called for a national music quota in order to save «domestic» music. In her essay, Melanie Schiller raises the question if music can be national in the first place.

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Design: Šejma Fere

Less Reality, More Fiction

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Less Reality, More Fiction
Less Reality, More Fiction

From a Western perspective, non-Western films are expected to be mainly driven by content, to portray the «misery» of the Other. Formal experiments are still rarely appreciated. Read an essay about the need to depart from so-called authenticity towards new stories.

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Design: Šejma Fere

5 Video Clips from Colombia: Machines of Resistance

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5 Video Clips from Colombia: Machines of Resistance
5 Video Clips from Colombia: Machines of Resistance

Since April 28 2021, Colombians have been on a national strike to tackle inequality, poverty and historical exclusion. This video list is a short trip through audiovisual utopias in which machines become vehicles of resistance.

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Design: Umbra
Remix: Bitterbabe

«Listening Is at the Heart of What I Do»

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«Listening Is at the Heart of What I Do»
«Listening Is at the Heart of What I Do»

In this interview, sound artist, composer, and anthropologist Hadi Bastani talks about his listening habits; his earlier research on noise music, glitch, and computer music; and the effect that online fieldwork has had on his collaborative works.

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Our Homeland

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Our Homeland
Our Homeland

In the German Democratic Republic, the song «Unsere Heimat» (Our Homeland) became an anthem that glorified the idea of a socialist homeland. After the fall of the Berlin wall, the song disappeared from public memory. At least this was what our author thought.

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Lass mich mit Hass nicht allein

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Lass mich mit Hass nicht allein
Lass mich mit Hass nicht allein

In dem Gedicht für sein gleichnamiges Lied beschreibt der iranische Schauspieler und Dichter Ali Kamrani seine Erfahrungen als Einwanderer in Deutschland.

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Sound: Mohammad Shams

Collaborations Instead of Hierarchies

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Collaborations Instead of Hierarchies
Collaborations Instead of Hierarchies

In this essay, the conductor, researcher, and performer Yalda Zamani makes a case for more interdisciplinarity in the conductor’s practice. The search for new methods of collaboration and exchange could inspire new and progressive concepts of leadership in musical practice.

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