My research has been meandering quite a bit, and has recently settled on festivals. For 10-15 years (all Good Music Festival, Gathering of the Vibes), and especially in the last five to ten years (Bonnaroo, moe.down, Camp Bisco), music festivals were a significant part of the jam band music segment I have been focused on. However, in the last five years, some of the “jam-world”’s largest festivals have made the mainstream jump (Bonnaroo), and other main stream or “independent”, but not jam, festivals (Coachella) have found great success. I wondered whether these festivals, were as popular in Latin America.
I was hoping to find some festivals that reflected what I have come to be used to experienceing. These features included on-site camping, and especially the erection of a brief community, or near-municipality. However, as with looking for bands with similar followings to what I am used to, the festivals I found were much more like concert series than American festivals.
I found a wealth of music festivals in Latin America. By far the most were in Argentina, including: Cosquin Rock, Pepsi Music Festival (formerly Quilmes Music Festival), Personal Fest, SAMC (South American Music Coference).
Cosquin is a folk festival, which takes place in the city of Cosquín. Along with the Buenos Aires Jazz festival, it is the only large scale festival that is not named after its top sponsor. It also seems to be the oldest festival in Argentina, dating back to 1961. Cosquin was originally conceived to bolster the tourism industry, and is scheduled for a prime vacation time.
Cosquín has developed into a full scale festival complete with folklorists, workshops, artist meet-and-greets, and workshops for people of all ages. In large part because my Spanish is so poor, I am having a hard time finding information about camping. I think it is safe to say that, because of the tourism focus, camping is at least deemphasized.
The series of corporate-sponsored rock festivals all take place in large cities, especially Buenos Aires. Personal Fest, which is sponsored by a telecom company, as well as Nokia, will be taking place this weekend. I will tune in to some of the simulcast, which is available on the festival website. The festival, like most large scale Argentinean rock festivals, includes American (non-South-American) bands, as well as Argentinean and South American bands. Though, Personal Fest seems particularly Argentinean focused, despite American and European headliners. The festival takes place over two days in a club that has both a sports and social focus.
The Pepsi festival (formerly Quilmes) seems to be almost entirely Latin American based bands this year. A seemingly official (though not as official as Personal’s personalfest.com.ar website) notes which countries foreign bands are from. Though last year seems to have featured bands like Dave Matthews Band and Kiss, this year’s mentions no American acts. Total attendance over several days is on the order of 200,000.
Going forward, I intend to spend time on youtube, looking at concert footage, and hopefully footage from outside the concerts themselves. I will also watch some of the Personal Fest live broadcast, and find interviewees, both native Argentinean and American students studying abroad.
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Steve--I like how you are trying to look at an experience that you are very familiar with, and that you seem to really love, in a different context. Something you may want to explore is why there might not be as many festivals in Latin America (is this really the case, or are there simply fewer advertised online?) and how they might be different from festivals you experience here. Why might they be different? Are people approaching musical performances in different ways? What are the most popular genres? Are there bands that play Latin American music or Latin American bands that tour the United States and have a large following? Are there festivals in the United States that feature Latin American music? Have you ever been to a 'world music' festival and heard Latin American music?
ReplyDeleteI agree - I'm glad to see you take the route of exploring music festivals because you will have what sounds like a lot of experiences to compare them to. Do you think there will be any way you can post some video from what you listen in to this weekend specifically? I think it would be really useful. Otherwise, I like that you are going to go after some more clips to post, I think that finding some specific examples may help focus in your research. I'm also looking forward to your interview excerpts - people always have crazy stories from music festivals and I hope these are no exception! Keep up the good work!
ReplyDeleteYour project sounds very interesting especially because you have such a deep understanding about how these festivals work in America. I would definitely look at the similarities and differences between the two. It may also be interesting to look at why some of these festivals are all Latin American based bands while others have bands from America and Europe. I will be looking forward to seeing some footage and hearing some material. Great work so far.
ReplyDeleteI'm glad to see you are working your way toward a focused topic, despite the challenges of working at a distance and in a second language. Have I already pointed you to the project on U.S. rock festivals from my youth cultures class last year? Some of the sources she cites could be useful for you (http://the-music-in-you.blogspot.com).
ReplyDeleteSince you can't do fieldwork in person, I'll be hoping for some close readings of video clips (including analysis of contextual reception info like YouTube comments). In fact, it could be interesting to focus specifically *on* web-based promotion and reception -- what does it mean to experience a major rock festival online rather than in person? This might prove more fruitful than just treating video examples as imaginary portals to a live fieldwork experience. I'm sure there are many fans who want to attend but can't, as in the case of any U.S. festival; you could think about how the web might be allowing them to get some taste of the festival experience from a distance. (Here the "diaspora" concept might be fruitfully applied to some kinds of fan communities.)