POPULAR MUSIC AND SOCIETY

Call for Submissions

Special Issue on Amateur Music and Television

The tradition of amateur musicians and talent contests in the mass media
precedes the advent of popular television, yet in recent years,
particularly in the form of the various national Idol programs, amateur
music-making on television has seen staggering growth in popularity and
profitability. This issue of Popular Music and Society seeks
contributions that consider this boom from a range of perspectives.

Along with a host of other social types and narrative contexts familiar
to pre-WWII radio audiences, the amateur musician and the talent contest
migrated to television in the new medium's earliest days. In recent
decades the amateur genre has been one of undistinguished ratings and
negligible impact on the entertainment industry, despite the role of US
shows like Ed McMahon's Star Search in boosting the occasional singer or
model into the industry. In the last five years, however, the worldwide
media phenomenon initiated by Great Britain's Pop Idol television show
has brought the amateur into the lives of TV viewers in unprecedented
ways, forcefully suggesting the extraordinary contemporary relevance of
amateur music contests on television. Additionally, the Eurovision Song
Contest is beginning to receive academic attention as international
popular music and cultural studies conferences increasingly feature
panels on national identity and nationalism in this competition.

In the United States, the synergistic multimedia success of American
Idol has been unprecedented. The Fox network show has generated
staggering ratings across audiences of all age groups. First American
Idol winner Kelly Clarkson's debut single rose faster in the pop charts
than any other song in chart history--outpacing the previous record
holder, the Beatles'

1964 hit "Can't Buy Me Love," by a wide margin. The popularity of the
"democratic" principle of audience telephone voting was such that
network programmers considered spinoff shows along the lines of American
Presidential Candidate-Idol.

These and other issues within the amateur musician/television nexus
warrant further analysis. Is this merely the discovery, as American
Idol/Pop Idol judge and executive producer Simon Cowell would argue, of
a radically effective new cross-platform marketing strategy? Or is there
more to understanding the contemporary success of this form? The Guest
Editor of this Special Issue seeks submissions that will help scholars
understand the phenomenal international success of amateur music on
television today. The following topics are exemplary but are by no means
the limit of the kinds of submissions that would be welcomed:

* International and non-anglophone programming and perspectives

* Performance of nationalism and national identity

* Local amateur music programming

* The political economy of amateur music on television

* The aesthetics of amateur music on television

* The relation of amateur music on television to the music industry

* Historical accounts of amateur music on television

* Amateur music and globalization, neoliberalism or neoconservatism

* Relation of amateur music on television to social, political,
cultural,

or economic change

* Amateur music on television and the public sphere and/or cultural
policy

* The meaning of the contestant and/or judge and/or voting demos in

musical talent contests

The issue is tentatively scheduled for publication in May 2008.

Deadline for receipt of submissions is July 31, 2007.

Please e-mail submissions to Matt Stahl at mastahl@weber.ucsd.edu or
mail them to:

Matt Stahl
Department of Communication, 0503
University of California, San Diego
9500 Gilman Dr.
La Jolla CA 92093
USA

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