AMERICA’S MUSIC PART FOUR

SINCE WORLD WAR II

T

h e years immediately after World

War II marked a period of separa-

tion between classical and popu-

lar spheres. A widening gulf stood

between the cerebral music of post-

war academic composers and the

earthy joys of rock and roll. By the beginning of the

twenty-fi rst century, however, popular DJs were cre-

ating remixes of music by contemporary composers

such as Steve Reich. Somewhere during the inter-

vening decades, the popular and classical spheres

had moved closer together and found common

ground. The site for that merging was the recording

studio, an increasing important workplace for musi-

cal creativity.

In the meantime, musicians in the traditional

sphere found new ways to assert their core value

of continuity with the past in an accelerated, frag-

mented postwar world. Folk musicians in the late

twentieth century were as likely as not to have fi rst

encountered the music either on records or at

e DJ Spooky is a hip-hop artist who has collaborated with Baroque music

specialists, performance artist Meredith Monk, and heavy metal band Metallica.

multi-ethnic folk festivals. Around the end of the

second millennium, “roots music” for most fans was

an emblem of a cultural past that existed mostly in

the collective imagination, a symbol of an elusive

authenticity hard to fi nd in the mediated world of

television, instant communication, and Internet.

But if the new communications media made

the continuation of traditional music more diffi cult,

it made other forms of music making easier. After

the year 2000, a laptop computer could offer more

sophisticated music recording and editing capa-

bilities than the most expensive recording studios

of earlier days. For both professional and amateur

musicians, digital technology opened up new outlets

not only for the creation of new music but also for

reworkings of existing music. By the second decade

of the twenty-fi rst century, those possibilities were

being manifested in remixes, mash-ups, and a host

of other musical forms that turned listeners from

passive consumers to active participants in the pro-

cess of creating today’s dynamic music culture.

1976 An updating of the 1909 Copyright Act extends

copyright protection and codifi es fair use

1979 The Sugar Hill Gang, “Rapper’s Delight”

1981 Music Television (MTV) goes on the air

1983 Wynton Marsalis wins his fi rst two Grammy

awards, one in jazz and one in classical music

1987 Founding of the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra

1997 Pulitzer Prize in music goes to Wynton Marsalis’s

Blood on the Fields

1998 The Digital Millenium Copyright Act (DMCA)

restricts the concept of fair use

1998 The Sonny Bono Act extends copyright protection

to nearly a century after a work’s creation

1999 Shootings at Columbine High School lead to

public outcry against Marilyn Manson and other violent

rock bands

2001 A court decision in favor of the Recording

Industry Association of America (RIAA) shuts down

Napster, founded two years ealier

2001 Apple introduces iTunes

2006 The Metropolitan Opera introduces “Live in HD”

video broadcasts

2009 “We Are One” concert at the Lincoln Memorial

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