Choral Voices: Ethnographic Imaginations of Sound and Sacrality is about sacred and secular choirs in Goa and Shillong across churches, seminaries, schools, auditoriums, classrooms, reality TV shows, and festivals. Voice and genre emerge as social objects annotated by tradition, nostalgia, and innovation. Piety literally and metaphorically shapes the Christian lifeworld, predominantly those belonging to the Presbyterian and Catholic denominations. Indigeneity structures the political and cultural motifs in the making of the Christian musical traditions. Located at the intersection of Sociology, Anthropology, and Ethnomusicology, the choral voices emplace ‘affect’ and the visual-aural dispatch. Thus, sonic spectrum holds space for indigenous and global musicality.
This ethnographic work will be useful for scholars researching music and sound studies, religious studies, cultural anthropology, and sociology of India.
ListofIllustrations Prologue: Warming Up 1 Introduction: Choral beginnings: Inside the chapel and a home studio 1.1 A biography of community- delineating the Sacred and the Heritage 1.2 Establishing a musical cadence 1.3 Framing choral music within Christian landscapes 1.4 Aural Intentions: Summary of chapters 2 Making of the Indigenous 2.1 Interrogating the Indigenous 2.2 Emplacing the Indigenous 2.3 Understanding Indigeneity, Inculturality and Decoloniality 2.4 Music and Decoloniality 2.5 Exploring the relationship between Indigeneity and Sacrality 2.6 Indigenous Possibilities in curricula and performance: Field narratives 2.7 Towards Sonic Interculturality 3 From Loft to the Recording Studio: Shillong Diaries 3.1 What brings you to Shillong? Introduction 3.2 Cusp of Sacrality, new Technologies and Creative Processes 3.3 Choral Voices as ethnographic objects 3.4 Short Historical Snippets about Christianity and Musicality in Khasi and Lushai Hills 3.5 Discussing Genre, Intertextuality and Territorialisation 3.6 Shillong Chamber Choir 3.7 Repertoire- Medleys/Crossovers 3.8 Beyond performance 3.9 Aroha Choir 3.10 Conclusion 4 The Language of Music: Notes from a Goan Seminary 4.1 Inhabiting the Seminary 4.2 Outlining Goan Sacred Music 4.3 A brief history of music and language in Goa 4.4 Entering the field site 4.5 Rachol Seminary 4.6 Introducing the seminarians 4.7 Syncretic musical experimentations in Goan Sacred music 4.8 Goan Sacred music- Motets 4.9 Conclusion 5 Mapping Choral Voices: Role of People and Places 5.1 Introduction 5.2 Hierarchization of voices 5.3 Indigeneity and Christian Music Tradition 5.4 Music Performance 5.5 Conclusion 6 Tutti: Concluding Section 6.1 The Musical Clef Notating Certainty- Uncertainty 6.2 Positing the Vocal Phrasing Acknowledgments Bibliography Glossary Appendix Documentary – Da Capo Index
Sebanti Chaterjee is a sound anthropologist and a senior academic fellow at National Law School India University, Bengaluru. She is a recipient of India Foundation of Arts Research Grant, the Ryoichi Sasakawa Young Leaders Fellowship Fund (SRA FY 2016), the Indian Council of Social Science Research fellowship, and former editorial member of Serenade Magazine.
Reviews for Choral Voices: Ethnographic Imaginations of Sound and Sacrality
Choral Voices is fantastic! In destabilizing notions of culture, colonization, and sound, Sebanti Chatterjee weaves a compelling story of belonging and faith. Through aural participation and multi-site ethnography readers are transported to the overlooked arenas of identify and indigeneity in contemporary India, with crucial insights for worlds beyond. * Duncan McDuie-Ra, Professor of Urban Sociology, The University of Newcastle, Australia * Choral Voices is an important addition to the growing body of work that challenges fondly held notions of 'East' and 'West.' * Naresh Fernandes, author of Taj Mahal Foxtrot: The Story of Bombay's Jazz Age *
