In the mid-1960s, the mozambique, a popular Cuban dance rhythm, rose to prominence with the support of Cuban authorities as the sound of a new, revolutionary nation and an alternative to U.S. rock and roll. In the U.S., the music and its significance remain muted, as the fraught political relationship between the two countries has produced a specific, limited sound of “Cuba” made available general audiences, which (not incidentally) also limits its potential meaning. In this paper, I discuss the mozambique in the context of 21^st-century late capitalism and tourism in the circum-Caribbean, specifically in and between Havana and New Orleans, arguing for its continuing value as a robust popular art, despite its relative abandonment in popular culture. I do so through my work (as student and researcher) with Leandro Moré, a lifelong percussionist and resident of Havana who participated in the rhythm’s rise and dissemination in Cuba and abroad, and who still teaches it today. Our collaborative plan for a public-facing project that would bring the mozambique to New Orleans – a city that trades on its Caribbean connections – has thrown into new relief issues integral to the mozambique itself, including the value and meaning of participatory musicmaking and “cultural exchanges” as well as music’s relationship to place. The hurdles faced by the project continue to highlight the specific ways that potential audiences understand music and its value while also exposing the precarity of life and culture in cities oriented towards tourism.

Dammam drumming, or sinj-o dammam, is a collective musical performance central to Shia mourning ceremonies in southern Iran, particularly in the port city of Bushehr. Performed in public processions, this percussive tradition shapes the acoustic and spatial dynamics of urban mourning rituals, creating an immersive rhythmic and physical experience. Beyond its religious significance, dammam drumming is deeply intertwined with the Indian Ocean legacy of slavery in the Gulf, reflecting histories of migration and labor. While embedded in local identity, the practice resists fixed interpretation, continually shifting between religious, historical, and political meanings. This experimental documentary, Arba’in 1401, emerged from reimagining how the second episode of Nasser Taghvayi’s pioneering 1974 film, Arba’in—the earliest known audiovisual record of dammam in Bushehr—might look if made in the 2020s. Conceived in dialogue with Taghvayi’s work, Arba’in 1401 draws on my audiovisual recordings and interviews from my PhD fieldwork (2022–2023) to explore the sensory dimensions of dammam drumming. Approaching this tradition from my perspective as a woman in a historically male-dominated performance space, the documentary also situates dammam within the political context of the Woman, Life, Freedom uprising, which began in late September 2022.

This paper investigates how âşık/Alevi musicians transitioned from traditional cultural roles as transmitters of Alevi religious principles to urban public intellectuals who shaped political and cultural critiques in Turkey between 1960 and 1980. It argues that the âşık/Alevi musicians secured a significant cultural role by (re)articulating the political ideologies of the left, actively participating in leftist cultural debates and, engaging with the popular music genres and artists of urban settings. Following the Second World War, many âşık/Alevi musicians who had long held intellectual authority in their communities due to their role in preserving and transmitting the religious principles of the historically oppressed Alevi community migrated to major cities alongside their communities. Therein, they fused the political foundations of the Turkish left with the rebellious traditions of the Alevi community through their music, reaching beyond the Alevi community to engage the broader Turkish public. Through their music, speeches and writings in influential periodicals, these âşıks also involved in the ongoing debate between modernism and (socialist) realism in an effort to set aesthetic standards of an emancipatory cultural agenda to the socialist movement. Additionally, many collaborated with leftist-affiliated popular musicians and competed with pioneering artists from other genres -such as arabesk- actively engaging in the aesthetic struggles over identifying “authentic” music. As a result, they secured a public recognition as intellectuals and earned a position of authority to establish the standards of the folk music worlds in the urban sphere.

This paper presents an analysis of Stars Gathering (Qunxing hui), Taiwan’s first and longest-running musical program, which aired on Taiwan Television from 1962 to 1977. The program primarily featured performances of Mandarin popular songs and played a pivotal role in shaping Taiwan’s music scene during that era. Its eclectic blend of foreign song adaptations and hybrid musical arrangements exemplified a unique form of musical cosmopolitanism, deeply tied to Taiwan’s geopolitical position during the Cold War—a connection often overlooked in existing scholarship (e.g., Shen, 2016; Hsu, 2019). Drawing on archival research and prior studies, this paper investigates how Stars Gathering’s musical cosmopolitanism was intertwined with Cold War coalition politics. The lack of audio-visual recordings and limited access to artist interviews presented challenges, which were mitigated by utilizing alternative sources such as TTV Weekly magazine, producer manuscripts, LP records, and secondary interviews. Using Martin Stokes’ (2008) theory of musical cosmopolitanism, which views music as a medium for creating new cultural worlds, and Shih Shu-mei’s (2007) concept of “multiply mediated cosmopolitanism,” which examines how Taiwanese cultural creators navigate multiple cultural references within the hegemonic frameworks of global superpowers, this paper argues that Stars Gathering reflected Taiwan’s alliances with the West and the pervasive influence of American culture. Simultaneously, it resisted U.S. cultural hegemony by incorporating elements from other allied nations and rebuilding cultural ties with Japan despite Kuomintang restrictions. Thus, Stars Gathering not only mirrored but actively engaged with Cold War coalition politics, illustrating the agency and cultural impact of its participants.