Introduction
Many people across the world listen to music daily without necessarily knowing its genre. In 1999, David Byrne, in one of his articles, highlighted how people confuse the different music categories. Being a versatile and prominent person in the entertainment sector, Byrne begins by pointing out that what many residents in western countries perceive to be world music is not the true definition (Byrne). Conversely, Ammar Kalia highlights the inability of most music lovers to differentiate the genres they listen to. Further, he compares the vagueness of world music and jazz and how the two have lost meaning in the modern era (Kalia). This paper highlights the relevance of the term world music and compares the thoughts of the two authors by looking at the similarities and differences between their articles.
World Music
According to Byrne, world music is synonymous with indigenous melodies. Further, he asserts that they are treated obscurely and with ambiguity by listeners who fear to venture and discover new types that might be unusual (Byrne). On the other hand, there is concurrence with Byrne’s view. Kalia expounds that according to the founders of world music, it is a summation of anything that was deemed not to originate from the American tradition and Europe (Kalia). However, the label has no use in modern society. Instead, it should be replaced with non-western music.
Further, major world institutions promoting music like the Grammys should continue having a different category for world music since there are many melodies, which needs special consideration. However, the categorization of world music leads to the separation of listeners (Kalia). Although the articles were written in different periods, they carry the same ideas, both agreeing that listening to this music enables people to change their worldview on culture.
Conclusion
In conclusion, there is concurrence on the term as it is associated with the ghetto and represents people’s heritage. Further, world music is vague to many listeners as they fail to underpin the significance of diversity outside their cultural enclaves. However, the two writers differ on one front where Kali highlights that the term should be replaced with a modern name while Byrne argues that it is authentic and should not be changed according to the western consumers’ stereotype mentality.
Works Cited
Byrne, David. “MUSIC: Crossing Music’s Borders in Search of Identity; ‘I Hate World Music’.” The New York Times Web Archive, 1999.
Kalia, Ammar. “‘So Flawed and Problematic’: Why the Term ‘world Music’ is Dead.” The Guardian, 2019.