Jeff Todd Titon

Thoreau’s ear

Abstract Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862) was the only nineteenth-century American writer of the very first rank who paid prolonged and intense attention to sound-worlds, particularly non-human ones. As a naturalist, Thoreau’s fieldwork not only involved botany but also sound-collecting. Relying on his Journal and other written work, I show how Thoreau understood music as sound, paying particular attention to his writings on ambient sound and animal sound communication in acoustic ecological niches; showing how he understood sound announces presence and enables co-presence; and pointing to his development of a relational epistemology and alternative economy based in sound. His responses to the vibrations of the environment through prolonged and deep listening, more than 150 years ago, make him valuable for sound studies today.

Worlds of Music: An Introduction to the Music of the World's Peoples

1. The Music-Culture as a World of Music. 2. North America/Native America. 3. Africa/Ewe, Mande, Dagbamba, Shona, BaAka. 4. North America/Black America. 5. Europe/Central and Southeastern Regions. 6. India/South India. 7. Asia/Indonesia. 8. East Asia/China, Taiwan, Singapore, Oversees Chinese. 9. Latin America/Chile, Bolivia, Ecuador, Peru. 10. Music of the Arab World. 11. Discovering and Documenting a World of Music.

Goin' up the Country

G . . . | . . . . | D7 . . . | C7 . . . | G . . . | . . . (sing d) . | G . . . | . . . . | . . . . | . . . I’m goin’ up the--coun-try, babe, don’t you wan-na go?---------------. | C7 . . . | . . . . | G . . . | . . . I’m goin’ up the--coun-try, babe, don’t you wan-na go?---------------. | D7 . . . | C7 . . . | G . . . | . . . I’m goin’ to some--place where I’ve never---been be-fore----------------