Langgam is a vocal genre that emerged on the Javanese island during the years of Indonesia's struggle for independence in mid-twentieth century and has since gained increasing popularity. It originated from radio experiments and the work of renowned composers whose names still resonate in public and private spaces throughout Indonesia. The genre represents a meeting point between the sophisticated classical music of the courtly centers of Central Java (gamelan) and the popular and transcultural music (kroncong) that circulated among revolutionary groups and in both urban and rural contexts. This article presents an analytical study of the lyrics and vocal melodies of some of the most widely circulated langgam. The aim of this linguistic-musical analysis is to highlight the elements that position these songs within the `high tradition' in contemporary times and to explore how stylistic traits of a musical genre can contribute to the self-representation of national unity.
The main goal of the ERG AdG LAUDARE, hosted by the University of Trento and the Gran Sasso Science Institute in L'Aquila (Italy), is the creation of a database of Italian lauda texts and music from 1200 to 1550. This article provides a conceptual framework for this task. The authors start from an analysis of the sources and their variety and consider strategies for creating a relational database to represent such a heterogeneous repertory in an organized way, without hiding its intrinsic complexity. A point of departure is the `weak' philological status of the genre, continuously subject to alterations by copyists and performers. For this reason, the authors suggest that the database comprises a series of lauda occurrences drawn from each source, instead of attempting to reconstruct more abstract textual and musical identities. The task of representing the historical connections among texts, music, sources, and actors of the repertory is given to the analytical tools and indexes of the database.
Since its launch in December 2006, the New York Metropolitan Live in HD series, the satellite broadcast of high-definition live opera performances to movie theaters in various countries around the globe, has given rise to a heated debate in musicology, predominantly Anglo-American. Issues related to the production, dissemination and especially fruition of what has become a hybrid audiovisual product are at the center of attention. During the release of Puccini's Tosca under David McVicar's direction (2018), a survey on the audience's habits, tastes and approach to opera on video was distributed in Italian movie theaters. Through the analysis of the data obtained and the topographical and socio-cultural study of the areas of reception, the present article aims not only to trace the characteristics of the Italian opera viewers at the cinema, but also to understand how spaces that welcome a phenomenon of global scope, contribute to redefine and recontextualize it in a local key
