Monday, July 20, 2015

Music news round up #2

This week, here are some more music articles that I found interesting to read:

1. An article about a scientific study looking for the universalities in music across disparate cultures. The result? Small scales, arching or descending melodies, rhythms based two or four beats, and men singing. Of course, there are many outliers, and this article is dumbed down from the actual research. And I wonder if the focus on men might be a bias by the people who put together the body of work they analyzed, the Garland Encyclopedia of World Music, though probably not.

2. An article about the lack of transparency in the music industry about where the money goes. "Anywhere from 20-50 percent of music payments don't make it to their rightful owners." You can hear a somewhat related story in a recent Planet Money podcast about manufacturing the song of the summer (rebroadcast from 2011) and how much money the industry gambles on making a hit.
 
3. An article about rape and abuse of teenagers by people in Rock & Roll. If you weren't aware already, an industry focused on sex can have some really bad side effects. Eye-opening and horrifying, perhaps, but not surprising. (P.S. unlike the other two, this article doesn't have a picture of Taylor Swift).

Happy reading and/or listening!

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