The term "world music," meaning folk music from around the world, has been credited to ethnomusicologist Robert E. Brown, who coined it in the early 1960s at Wesleyan University in Connecticut, where he developed undergraduate through doctoral programs in the discipline. To enhance the learning process (John Hill), he invited more than a dozen visiting performers from Africa and Asia and began a world music concert series.[1][2]
The term became current in the 1980s as a marketing/classificatory device in the media and the music industry.[3] There are several conflicting definitions for world music. One is that it consists of "all the music in the world", though such a broad definition renders the term virtually meaningless.[4][5]
The term also is taken as a classification of music that combines Western popular music styles with one of many genres of non-Western music that are also described as folk music or ethnic music. However, world music is not exclusively traditional folk music. It may include cutting edge pop music styles as well. Succinctly, it can be described as "local music from out there",[6] or "someone else's local music".[7] It is a very nebulous term with an increasing number of genres that fall under the umbrella of world music to capture musical trends of combined ethnic style and texture, including Western elements.
- ^ Williams, Jack. "Robert E. Brown brought world music to San Diego schools | The San Diego Union-Tribune". Signonsandiego.com. Retrieved 2010-04-24.
- ^ "World Music and Ethnomusicology". Ethnomusic.ucla.edu. 1991-09-23. Retrieved 2013-04-22.
- ^ "What Is World Music?". people.iup.edu. December 1994. Retrieved 2014-10-27.
- ^ Bohlman, Philip (2002). World Music: A Very Short Introduction, "Preface". ISBN 0-19-285429-1.
- ^ Nidel 2004, p.3
- ^ fRoots magazine, quoted in N'Dour 2004, p. 1
- ^ Songlines magazine
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