ABSTRACT
Music is available in more formats and through more channels than ever before, and people engage in multi-layered musical conduct – the use of a wide selection of musical styles and genres – in different ways and for a variety of individual and social purposes. In this chapter I discuss sociological frameworks pertinent to capturing, interpreting, and understanding such conduct, with an emphasis on concepts such as parallel musical identities, musical agency and cultural omnivorousness. Each framework, and its related concepts, is examined with respect to its underlying assumptions about how and for what reasons multi-layered musical conduct takes place, and about the modes through which such conduct can best be investigated. Drawing on empirical research conducted during the past one and a half decades, and through the theoretical lenses of the sociological frameworks described in the chapter, I will show actual examples of individual and collective strategies for multi-layered musical conduct as well as some of its functions, ranging from the level of the single music listener and up to that of institutions for higher music education. The overall aim of the chapter is to provide tools for investigating and understanding the meanings of music in times characterised by musical super-diversity.
