025.431: The Dewey blog: Contemporary Styles of Music

There are several areas of difficulty that plague classifiers when approaching 780 Music:

The citation order is complex; its implementation, via a class-with-the-last policy, is hard to grasp.
Not all cultures recognize a distinction between folk music and popular music.
The evolution of music styles muddies everything!

We are proposing several sets of changes in the 780s to address these difficulties, which especially affect the classification of contemporary music. The changes aim to:

Make clear that the classification of (contemporary) folk and popular music follows the same principles that govern all of the 780s
Accommodate contemporary developments in musical styles
Make the classification of contemporary music less volatile (i.e., less subject to change over time)
Make the classification of contemporary music more expressive

A few examples will provide a taste of the problems addressed and the solutions proposed. Consider, for example, kwaito, which one source describes as “a mixture of all that 1990’s South African youth grew up on: South African disco music, hip hop, R&B, Ragga, and a heavy, heavy dose of American and British house music.” Several issues are evident here: (1) Should kwaito be treated as folk music (781.62) or as popular music (781.63-781.66)? More generally, is there a way to distinguish reliably between 781.62 Folk music and 781.63-781.66 Popular music? (2) If treated as popular music, should kwaito be seen as non-western popular music (781.63) or, given the western basis of many of its underlying influences, as western popular music (781.64-781.66)? (3) If treated as western popular music, should kwaito be classed in the number coming first, the number coming last, or the number of the most prominent genre? That is, how should hybrid music styles be treated? (4) If classed with house music (arguably its most prominent genre), where should kwaito be classed? That is, where does electronica belong?

Our answer to question (1) is based on a new scope note proposed for 781.62 Folk music: Music originating within and associated with an ethnic or national group. The criteria in the scope note are meant to be not only necessary--a musical style should not be classed in 781.62 if (a) it originated within an ethnic or national group, but is not longer associated with them or (b) it is associated with an ethnic or national group, but did not originate within them--but also sufficient; that is, if the two criteria are met, the musical style should be classed in 781.62 (but see the exception in the paragraph below). The sufficiency of the criteria is meant to be communicated by notes at 781.63 ("Class popular music originating within and associated with an ethnic or national group in 781.62") and 781.64 ("Class western popular music originating within and associated with an ethnic or national group in 781.62"). We recognize that adhering to these criteria may result at times in classing a style under 781.62 for which "popular music" is a better label than "folk music."

But does kwaito meet the exception given at 781.62 ("Class a specific style of music provided for in 781.64-781.66 with the style, e.g., reggae 781.646, Afro-Cuban jazz 781.6572687291")? This is a trickier question, because it is more subjective. What does it mean to be a specific style of, for example, hip-hop? Our intent is to include in "specific style of X" only those styles that are considered solely "a kind of X" (rather than being considered, say, a blend of X and Y). The case with kwaito is intriguing: some sources describe it as a kind of house music; other sources refer to it as South African hip-hop. That both claims are made is evidence that kwaito is not simply a kind of house or a kind of hip-hop.

Fortunately, there is agreement that kwaito originated within South Africa and is currently associated with South Africans; it thus accords with the scope note at 781.62. This means kwaito would be classed in 781.62968 South African folk music (built with 781.62 Folk music, plus T5—96 African, following instructions in the add table under 781.621–781.629, plus notation 8, from T2—68 South Africa, following instructions at T5—966–968).

Answering the first question as we did makes the other questions moot for kwaito, but the other questions—especially the third and fourth questions—have significant generality beyond kwaito. We have struggled with deciding how to handle styles of music based on two or more previous styles. Using Grove Music Online as our source (supplemented by information on styles of popular music at allmusic.com), we propose to distinguish between styles that are essentially specializations of an existing style (as rockabilly is a kind of rock style) and hybrid styles, in which two or more styles have fused to form a new style (as folk rock is a blending or fusion of folk music and rock music). Styles that are specializations of an existing style would class with that style; indeed, we propose to add a class-here note for specific styles (e.g., Class here specific rock styles at 781.66), resulting in specialized styles approximating the whole of the number where they are classed. Thus rockabilly would be classed in 781.66 Rock (Rock ‘n’ roll). Hybrid styles would class with the number coming last (following the policy enunciated under 780), to which newly proposed notation 17 from the table under 781.63-781.69 could be added, so a prominent other style could be expressed. Thus folk rock would be classed in 781.661762 (built with 781.66 Rock (Rock ‘n’ roll), plus notation 17 Hybrid styles from the add table under 781.63-781.69, following the footnote instruction at 781.66, plus notation 62 from 781.62 Folk music, following the instruction at the add table notation).

As for question 4, where in the world is (Veronica) Electronica?—OK, so you gotta know the game Where in the World is Carmen San Diego? to appreciate that clever turn of phrase—we are proposing an expansion for electronica at 781.648.

What about existing styles whose treatment may not accord with these principles? Take, for example, reggae, which meets the newly proposed folk music criteria: reggae clearly originated in Jamaica and typically is still associated with that country. We have decided, however, not to move any styles that have already been developed in the schedules, so reggae stays at 781.646, rather than moving to 781.629697292 Jamaican folk music (built with 781.62 Folk music, plus T5—969 African (outside Africa), following instructions in the add table under 781.621–781.629, plus notation 7292, from T2—7292 Jamaica and Cayman Islands, following instructions at T5—969).

A detailed discussion of the changes being proposed can be viewed here.

We invite your feedback on the proposed changes, either posted as a comment to this blog entry or sent directly to dewey@loc.gov. Feedback is requested by April 15, 2009.