Uploaded July 2019 | Updated September 2026, 1 hour ago
crosstowntraffic2018.wordpress.com
This presentation took place as part of the conference Crosstown Traffic: Popular Music Theory and Practice, which was hosted by The University of Huddersfield from September 3 - 5 2018. This event combined the IASPM UK&Ireland Biennial Conference, the 13th Art of Record Production Conference (ARP), an ISMMS conference, and the additional participation of Dancecult.
A recurrent theme within popular music studies has been discussion of how the field can integrate different disciplines and professions, for example exploring both music and its context; involving both practitioners and researchers; and encouraging interdisciplinary and collaborative work. Many different issues make such approaches challenging, and various different popular music focused subject organisations have developed somewhat independently of one another. This conference brought four such groups together, to exchange knowledge, collaborate, and encourage crosstalk.
/// SUPPORT
Popular Music Studies Research Group (PMSRG), University of Huddersfield research.hud.ac.uk/pmsrg/#
Centre for Music, Culture and Identity (CMCI), University of Huddersfield
research.hud.ac.uk/institutes-centres/cmci
The International Association for the Study of Popular Music UK and Ireland Branch (IASPM UK & Ireland)
iaspm.org.uk
Association for the Study of the Art of Record Production (ASARP)
artofrecordproduction.com
Dancecult Research Network (DRN) studies into electronic dance music culture
dancecult-research.net
International Society for Metal Music Studies (ISMMS)
metalstudies.org
/// ORGANIZERS
IASPM UK&I: Rupert Till
ARP: Katia Isakoff, Shara Rambarran
ISMMS: Karl Spracklen
Dancecult: Graham St. John
University of Huddersfield: Jan Herbst, Austin Moore, Lisa Colton, Toby Martin, Catherine Haworth, Mark Mynett
/// CREDITS
This online project was edited, collated, and made available online by Chris McConnell, Jack Zissell, and Colin Frank.
/// PRESENTATION DETAILS
Phonography, Mediation, and the Challenge of Audiophile Aesthetics
Dr Peter Elsdon, University of Hull
Email: p.s.elsdon@hull.ac.uk
/// ABSTRACT
For all of the recent contextualisation of sound recordings through an emphasis on the social, technological, and cultural dimensions of their production, the role of the technologies we use to listen to such recordings tends to be largely absent from such discourses. Theories of music’s mediation, such as those of Georgina Born (2005), emphasise the complex networks that render music not as a thing, but distributed through social, technological, and cultural interactions. One of those interactions, when sound recording is involved, implicates playback technologies as part of our experience of music. But what might be the implications of focussing attention on such technologies?
Traditionally, concerns with playback technologies have been labelled as the domain of audiophilia, and characterised as eccentric and excessive – in essence far from a typical or healthy way of engaging with recorded music. I suggest that an engagement with audiophile aesthetics might lead to some interesting challenges. In this paper I draw from a range of positions, including Thomas Porcello’s ‘technoustemology’ (2005), to explore the implications of a broadly-based idea of phonography that includes the technologies that mediate music through playback.
crosstowntraffic2018.wordpress.com
This presentation took place as part of the conference Crosstown Traffic: Popular Music Theory and Practice, which was hosted by The University of Huddersfield from September 3 - 5 2018. This event combined the IASPM UK&Ireland Biennial Conference, the 13th Art of Record Production Conference (ARP), an ISMMS conference, and the additional participation of Dancecult.
A recurrent theme within popular music studies has been discussion of how the field can integrate different disciplines and professions, for example exploring both music and its context; involving both practitioners and researchers; and encouraging interdisciplinary and collaborative work. Many different issues make such approaches challenging, and various different popular music focused subject organisations have developed somewhat independently of one another. This conference brought four such groups together, to exchange knowledge, collaborate, and encourage crosstalk.
/// SUPPORT
Popular Music Studies Research Group (PMSRG), University of Huddersfield research.hud.ac.uk/pmsrg/#
Centre for Music, Culture and Identity (CMCI), University of Huddersfield
research.hud.ac.uk/institutes-centres/cmci
The International Association for the Study of Popular Music UK and Ireland Branch (IASPM UK & Ireland)
iaspm.org.uk
Association for the Study of the Art of Record Production (ASARP)
artofrecordproduction.com
Dancecult Research Network (DRN) studies into electronic dance music culture
dancecult-research.net
International Society for Metal Music Studies (ISMMS)
metalstudies.org
/// ORGANIZERS
IASPM UK&I: Rupert Till
ARP: Katia Isakoff, Shara Rambarran
ISMMS: Karl Spracklen
Dancecult: Graham St. John
University of Huddersfield: Jan Herbst, Austin Moore, Lisa Colton, Toby Martin, Catherine Haworth, Mark Mynett
/// CREDITS
This online project was edited, collated, and made available online by Chris McConnell, Jack Zissell, and Colin Frank.
/// PRESENTATION DETAILS
Phonography, Mediation, and the Challenge of Audiophile Aesthetics
Dr Peter Elsdon, University of Hull
Email: p.s.elsdon@hull.ac.uk
/// ABSTRACT
For all of the recent contextualisation of sound recordings through an emphasis on the social, technological, and cultural dimensions of their production, the role of the technologies we use to listen to such recordings tends to be largely absent from such discourses. Theories of music’s mediation, such as those of Georgina Born (2005), emphasise the complex networks that render music not as a thing, but distributed through social, technological, and cultural interactions. One of those interactions, when sound recording is involved, implicates playback technologies as part of our experience of music. But what might be the implications of focussing attention on such technologies?
Traditionally, concerns with playback technologies have been labelled as the domain of audiophilia, and characterised as eccentric and excessive – in essence far from a typical or healthy way of engaging with recorded music. I suggest that an engagement with audiophile aesthetics might lead to some interesting challenges. In this paper I draw from a range of positions, including Thomas Porcello’s ‘technoustemology’ (2005), to explore the implications of a broadly-based idea of phonography that includes the technologies that mediate music through playback.
