Matthew Lim Matthew Lim

A Case for Musical Privacy

In exploring the intersection of technology and music, one area that raises questions in my mind is how music is distributed and consumed today. In his essay A Case for Musical Privacy, Richard Randall examines streaming music services (“SMuS”), the economic model they rely on, and what that means for users of those services - the listeners.

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Matthew Lim Matthew Lim

Music in the Workplace in the Digital Age

I recently started reading a collection of papers on how technology is shaping music and culture. “21st Century Perspectives on Music, Technology, and Culture: Listening Spaces (Pop Music, Culture and Identity)”, edited by Richard Purcell and Richard Randall explores how advances in technology are impacting how people interact with music and each other.

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Matthew Lim Matthew Lim

Asian American Identity and Classical Music as Cultural Capital

This week I read a fascinating paper by Grace Wang “Interlopers in the Realm of High Culture: ‘Music moms’ and the Performance of Asian and Asian American Identities,” about the role Asian and Asian American parents play in their children’s participation in classical music. 

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Matthew Lim Matthew Lim

Redefining Music: Context and Labels

Digging further into the idea of how music is labeled, I read an essay by Emily Yun Wang (Wang, Yun Emily. “Doing Tai Chi with ‘American Music.’” American Music 40, no. 4 (Dec. 2022): 576–82), which explored the importance of how music is used and whether that can impact how we label it.

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Matthew Lim Matthew Lim

Labeling Music: Context and Culture

Digging further into the idea of how music is labeled, I read an essay by Emily Yun Wang , which explored the importance of how music is used and whether that can impact how we label it.

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Matthew Lim Matthew Lim

The History and Impact of Asian Participation in Classical Music

Over the past few weeks, as I’ve dug into my summer project, I ran across an article by Mina Yang, titled “East Meets West in the Concert Hall: Classical Music, Imperialism, and Asian Identity,” that provides some context for why so many Asians and Asian Americans are involved in classical music.

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Matthew Lim Matthew Lim

Bossa Nova’s Role in Political Expression

When thinking of Bossa Nova, often the first things that come to mind for most are the romantic and idyllic lyrics from Frank Sinatra’s and Tom Jobim’s 1967 hit “The Girl From Ipanema”. However, there is much more meaning to the Brazilian Jazz genre than most might suspect.

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Matthew Lim Matthew Lim

Music in Political Movements

On Christmas, I watched a movie on Netflix called “I Am Woman”. It’s based on the life of Helen Reddy, an Australian born singer-songwriter from the 1970’s who created the hit song “I Am Woman”, which topped the Billboard 100 in 1972 as the number one hit single.

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Matthew Lim Matthew Lim

Music and Memory

This past weekend, I had the opportunity to perform a piano recital at Serenades, a memory care facility just outside Orlando, Florida. Most of the people who came were residents with different levels of memory loss.

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