“As For Me and My House”: Christian Music Executives Roundtable
Publications, Articles, Roundtables Andrew Mall Publications, Articles, Roundtables Andrew Mall

“As For Me and My House”: Christian Music Executives Roundtable

Journal of Popular Music Studies (2020). At the 2018 IASPM-US conference in Nashville, I organized a roundtable of Christian music executives. This was a unique opportunity to hear Christian music executives discussing the unique challenges and issues they face in a popular music market for which religious identity is necessarily a core component. Roundtable participants have worked in A&R, executive leadership, higher education, music ministry, music super- vision, production, publishing, radio promotions, and recording, among other roles, and represent more than 100 years of cumulative experience as music industry professionals.

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“As for me and my house”: Nashville, the Home of Christian Music
Conferences, Roundtables Andrew Mall Conferences, Roundtables Andrew Mall

“As for me and my house”: Nashville, the Home of Christian Music

IASPM-US roundtable (2018). For this roundtable, current and former Christian music professionals who have worked in A&R, executive leadership, higher education, music ministry, publishing, and radio promotions, among other roles, address the unique challenges that face Christian music. With many combined decades of experience in organizations large and small, our panelists are well-attuned to the city’s centeredness to the Christian music industries. We consider how Christian music has impacted Nashville, address the difficulties of maintaining a profitable business while conducting a ministry, and consider the boundaries of Christian music—increasingly porous as they are—in the broader contexts of globalized entertainment.

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Sound as Religion
Conferences, Roundtables Andrew Mall Conferences, Roundtables Andrew Mall

Sound as Religion

AAR conference roundtable panelist (2017). While interdisciplinary interest in the phenomenon of sound has been growing apace, understanding the diverse ways in which sound is implicated in religious practice and spiritual experience remains under-researched in the field of religious studies. This lacuna can be attributed in part to the dominance of textual, visual, and liturgical paradigms in the field, but also the challenges of conducting research on sound (including music), noise, and silence. At this juncture, we feel the need to team up and share resources in order to promote more research and theoretical reflection on the auditory and acoustic dimensions of religion.

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Conferences, Roundtables Andrew Mall Conferences, Roundtables Andrew Mall

The Ethnomusicology of Religion: Fieldwork Methods and Ethics

SEM conference roundtable panelist (2017). Ethnographic fieldwork is often shaped by logistical issues including access, documentation, rapport, and fluency (both cultural and linguistic). Ethnomusicologists researching musics within religious or sacred contexts, however, face additional challenges. For example, moments of spiritual transcendence complicate participant-observation, both for ethnographers who belong to the faith tradition they are researching and for those who do not. Similarly, the varied expectations of the researcher’s audiences problematize documentation and representation. In this roundtable, participants consider these and other issues, addressing the ethical and methodological challenges of fieldwork posed by the ethnomusicology of religion.

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