The music of White South African composer Kevin Volans provides a case study for the deconstruction of the Western separation of art and politics. The idea that music is only a formal object is rooted in high modernism, but cultural theory can provide ways to read politics in music. After studying composition in Germany, Volans became interested in integrating Black South African musics into his work, leading to a series of compositions he called “African Paraphrases.” In his 1987 string quartet Hunting: Gathering, Volans incorporates a Hamar song from Ethiopia, Aeke gadi (“song of the ancestors”). The song is transcribed (and slightly altered) from a 1974 recording and constitutes large sections of quartet. While his use of the song can be read as musical appropriation, Volans was sensitive to the political consequences of his music and sought to elevate the status of Black South African music through international recognition. However, the primacy of the composer in Western culture tends to override such cross-cultural aims. Volans eventually shifted his opinion on the political aspects of his compositions. While he was composer-in-residence at Princeton University in 1992, Volans emphasized the formal aspects of his music, disavowing the “African paraphrase” label in favor of a “universal” musical identity. Volans’s 1987 Movement for String Quartet, written shortly before Hunting: Gathering but published after, is an example of a piece without intended political meaning. The main motive is derived from his 1986 percussion solo She Who Sleeps with a Small Blanket and is similar in character to African melodies in Hunting: Gathering. Unlike in Hunting: Gathering, Volans transforms and manipulates the motive, effectively hiding its “African” character. Volans’s change in approach can be explained in part by the renewed attitude of depoliticization under Thatcherism. The changes in Volans’s approach to music demonstrate that music is not objective, and therefore more than just objective methodologies are needed to study music’s formal, political, and personal meaning.

Works: Kevin Volans: Hunting: Gathering (512-14), Movement for String Quartet (520-22).

Sources: Traditional: Aeke gadi (512-14); Kevin Volans: She Who Sleeps with a Small Blanket (520-22).

Index Classifications: 1900s

Contributed by: Matthew Van Vleet