ABSTRACT
The starting point of this chapter is the question, to what extent do musical structures and practices reflect, model, or resonate with the identities, experiences, or structural positions of social classes, and gendered and ethnic groups? This issue is a vast one, encompassing an impressive and imposing literature going back almost thirty years and begging some major questions in social and cultural theory. It is an issue to which I contributed during the 1970s and 1980s. My intent in this chapter is to explain why I think this issue and its exploration were important to the development of the cultural study of music during this time; why the work that resulted was superseded by other, more sophisticated work; and why the legacy of some of the thinking that occurred during the 1970s and 1980s might remain pertinent as an emergent paradigm for the cultural study of music is contemplated. This chapter is thus tinged with an element of intellectual autobiography.
