Comments Response

Christie, I'm glad that you pointed towards Yoni's comments about politics. I'm going to go back and relisten to the interview, and likely follow up with him, about his point about politicization of such events in Argentina. This will be useful in looking at Cosquin, which has such a strong meaning for national identity. I've not yet found much evidence of explicit politicization, though I think the subtleties will be the most important part.

I think I have a reasonable sense of what Argentinean festivals aside from Cosquin look like, and I've been really amazed by all the different varieties of festivals there are- both in Argentina, and as I try to compare Argentinean festivals to those in America. I don't know that American cities have for profit concert series on the scale of those in Buenos Aires. I think that that this question is as much a business and economics discussion as an ethnomusicology discussion, though. Cosquin drew me in because I don't think that any event means as much to American culture as Cosquin seems to mean to Argentinean folk culture (though I can't help but draw some comparisons to the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival).

Kiri, my final, if unpublished, field notes analysis will be one of comments on youtube videos. I neglected to include them on my most recent post, but I do think they'll be quite helpful, where available.

On that note, I've been underwhelmed by the English-language body of information on Cosquin. Considering both America's particular interest in Argentina (relative to many other South and Central American countries) and Cosquin's importance to Argentinean heritage, I would have thought there would be considerably more scholarly work.