Dr. Kyle Barnett, associate professor of media studies, will deliver one of two keynote
presentations at a prestigious music history conference in Helsinki, Finland, in June.
Barnett was invited to speak at 鈥淢usica Mercata: Finance, Commodity and the Music
Industry from Antiquity to the Present,鈥� the University of the Arts Helsinki鈥檚 7th
Sibelius Academy Symposium on Music History.
The symposium, which will be held June 5-7, 鈥減rovides the opportunity for music-history
scholars all over the world to interrogate issues around finance, commodity and the
music industry in the history of music from antiquity to the present and in all parts
of the globe,鈥� according to its website.
Barnett was invited to speak because of his longstanding expertise in the field of
recorded music, said Dr. Ingeborg Zechner, a member of the conference鈥檚 organizing
committee.
鈥淭he rise of music recording and distribution technologies in the twentieth century
brought massive changes to the music industry,鈥� Zechner said. 鈥淭hese changes and their
massive impact on the commodification on music and the sociocultural surroundings
in which music is received are highly relevant to reflect music and its business in
larger historical contexts. Kyle Barnett鈥檚 expertise will no doubt provide an important
perspective in our scholarly exchange in Helsinki.鈥�
The other keynote speaker is Gundula Kreuzer, professor of Music History and chair
of the Department of Music at Yale University.
Barnett said he was 鈥減leasantly surprised鈥� to be invited. 鈥淪ome of the most prestigious
scholars in music, media and culture have spoken at this conference over time,鈥� he
said. 鈥淚鈥檓 proud to represent Bellarmine and thrilled to be speaking with and learning
from scholars from across Europe and beyond.鈥�
He will be speaking about work that began with his 2020 book, Record Cultures, on popular music鈥檚 circulation in media during the expansion of the recording industry
between the two world wars.
鈥淧reviously, record companies on the East Coast (Victor, Columbia, Edison) controlled
the business, but now upstart labels, largely based in the Midwest, were defining
new market niches,鈥� he said. 鈥淭hose niches would become jazz, blues and country. In
the process, music-as-media became increasingly tied to both radio and film, leading
to the first major conglomerations of entertainment media in the twentieth century.鈥�
Barnett, whose work focuses on popular music, media history and sound cultures across
media, has been published in the Journal of Popular Music Studies; Music, Sound and
the Moving Image; and the Journal of Material Culture. He has co-edited issues of
Creative Industries Journal and the Velvet Light Trap, while also contributing media
and music columns for Flow, Antenna, and In Media Res.
Record Cultures: The Transformation of the U.S. Recording Industry, published by University of Michigan Press, is his first book. It won the 2021 Association
for Recorded Sound Collections鈥� Award of Excellence for Best Historical Research on
Record Labels.
鈥淭hat鈥檚 one of the great aspects of making something like a book鈥攖he work, once published,
gets up and walks away, and who knows where it ends up,鈥� he said. 鈥淪omeone at Helsinki鈥檚
University of the Arts found Record Cultures and then found me.鈥�