ABSTRACT
Disco polo is a Polish variant of disco music with simple melodies and often unsophisticated lyrics. It is generally understood as a category suited to dance and accepted in terms of its specific social functions. Disco polo involves a catchy instrumental accompaniment to vocal pieces of pop music with readily discernable lyrics. This genre has been a source of controversy from its very beginning. While disco polo is loved by the people, the likes of journalists and music critics tend to find it irredeemable. Even if they do not openly criticize it, the disdain is implied, for example in claims that disco polo is only interesting as “a sociological phenomenon,” in other words, it is uninteresting from an aesthetical point of view. I present disco polo as a social phenomenon and bring theoretical nuance to my approach, which is twofold: (1) to depict the music within its socioeconomic context, that is, the modernization of rural Polish areas; and (2) to see it as an expression of a distinct musical language of the Polish province. I argue that the music can be approached from an “agentific” perspective, actively contributing to the modernization of the Polish province.
