Dr Graeme Smith
BSc DipEd (Melbourne); BA Hons, PhD (Monash)
Lecturer in Musicology
Email: Graeme Smith@arts.monash.edu.au
Phone: (03) 9905 3233
Fax: (03) 9905 3241
Location: Room 114, Performing Arts Centre, Building 68, Clayton Campus
Biography
Graeme Smith is a Lecturer in Musicology/Ethnomusicology. His main interests are in Popular Music Studies and Sociology of Music, and he has written extensively in these disciplinary approaches, particularly in the musical fields of Irish traditional dance music, Australian folk music and country music, and on the expression of community and nation in music.
He studied Ethnomusicology at Monash, where he completed a thesis on Irish traditional button accordion playing styles. He was instrumental in establishing the first Australian branch of the International Association for the Study of Popular Music in the 1980s, and since then has been part of the link between Ethnomusicology and Popular Music Studies in Australia.
Research Interests
He also embraces other ‘roots’ music styles, multiculturalism and music in Australia, and popular music singing styles. His recent book Singing Australia: A History of Folk and Country Music (2005) analysed the construction of nation and community in folk, country and multicultural and crossover music scenes in Australia. He is a member of the editorial board of Musicology Australia and music editor of the Melbourne cultural and political periodical Arena Magazine.
Teaching
MUS1100 Exploring Music (World Musics component)MUS1030 Music and Popular Culture- Asia and Australia
MUS3910 Music of Sub-Saharan Africa
MUS3390 Music Aesthetics Criticism and Sociology (with Dr Joel Crotty (coordinator) and Prof. Margaret Kartomi)
MUS4420 Research Methods (with Dr Joel Crotty (coordinator))
MUM4600 Special Research Topic
MUM5020 Directed Reading in Musicology
MUM5010 Topics in Musicology (with others)
Recent Publications
‘Folk music: movements, scenes and styles’, in Sounds of Then, Sounds of Now: Popular Music in Australia, eds. Shane Homan and Tony Mitchell. Hobart: ACYS Publishing, 2008, 151-66
‘Playing with policy: music, multiculturalism and the Boite’, Victorian Historical Journal 78/2, 2007, 152-69
‘Community and nation in folk, country and multicultural music in Australia’, in Sounds and Selves IASPM Australia/New Zealand Conference, eds. Ian Collinson and Mark Evans. Wellington and Sydney: IASPM, Australia New Zealand Branch and Perfect Beat Publications 2007, 25-30
Singing Australia: A History of Folk and Country Music. Melbourne: Pluto Press, Melbourne, 2005
‘Ted Egan: bringing it home’, in Market and Margins: Australian Country Music vol. 3, eds. Mark Evans and Geoff Walden. Gympie: AICM Press, 2005, 180-202
‘My love is in America: migration and Irish music,’ in Popular Music: Critical Concepts in Media and Cultural Studies, ed. Simon Frith. London: Routledge, 2004
‘Yodelling and vocal breaks in country music’, in Roots and Crossovers: Australian Country Music vol 2, eds. Philip Hayward and Geoff Walden. Gympie: AICM Press, 2004, 1-12
‘Celtic Australia; bush bands, Irish music, Folk music and the new nationalism’, in Celtic Modern: Music at the Global Fringe, eds. Martin Stokes and Phillip V. Bohlman. Lanham: Scarecrow Press, 2003, 73-92
For a fuller bibliography see: http://www.singingaustralian.com/biblio.htm