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Culture High and Low: When Jazz Entered the Concert Hall

Steve Waksman at Smith College

by: Casey GilmanDecember 27, 2016

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Steve Waksman, Professor of Music and American Studies at Smith College, gave a historical view of the movement of jazz from “lowbrow” popular music, to “highbrow symphonic art”. Waksman focused on the people that influenced this movement, and how it changed cultural perceptions and expectations of jazz.

Waksman is the author of “Instruments of Desire: The Electric Guitar and the Shaping of Musical Experience” and “This Ain’t the Summer of Love: Conflict and Crossover in Heavy Metal and Punk”. Waksman was the keynote speaker at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame’s American Music Masters event honoring the legacy of musician and inventor Les Paul in 2008.

This talk was recorded on December 13, 2016 in Seeyle Hall at Smith College.

[gtalert title=”Note” title_color=”#699bb1″ close_button=”no” border_style=”none” border_radius=”4″]AudioFiles is a production of New England Public Radio. The interviews, anecdotes, and oral histories recorded for AudioFiles are designed to build a public audio library of the western New England experience, and are not intended as news content, or endorsements by NEPR’s staff or Board. For more information, contact AudioFiles producer, J Kyle Sullivan.[/gtalert]

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