Queering the Popular Pitch

Queering the Popular Pitch is a new collection of 19 essays that situate queering within the discourse of sex and sexuality in relation to popular music. This investigation addresses the changing debates within gay, lesbian and queer discourse in relation to the dissemination of musical texts -performance, cultural production and sexual meaning - situating music within the broader patterns of culture that it both mirrors and actively reproduces.

The collection is divided into four parts:
queering borders

queer spaces

hidden histories

queer thoughts, mixed media.

Queering the Popular Pitch will appeal to students of popular music, Gay and Lesbian studies. With case studies and essays by leading popular music scholars it provides insightful discourse in a growing field of musicological research.

Queering the Popular Pitch is a new collection of 19 essays by leading scholars on popular music. Following Routledge's landmark 1994 collection, Queering the Pitch, these scholars aim to situate queering within the discourse of sex and sexuality in relation to popular music. This investigation addresses the changing debates within gay, lesbian and queer discourse in relation to the dissemination of musical texts--performance, cultural production, sexual meaning--situating music within the broader patterns of culture that it both mirrors and actively reproduces.
The collection is divided into four parts. The first part, "Queering Borders," moves queer theory into some neglected histories of African American and Latino Musics, including jazz, rap, and bolero. Part Two, "Queer Spaces," looks at areas of popular music where queerness has played a role, from cabaret to songs about the AIDS crisis. Part Three, "Hidden Histories," offers three case studies of gender, generation, race, community, and sexuality. Finally, Part Four, "Queer Thoughts, Mixed Media," explores how music/queering is mediated by visual culture and videos.
Queering the Popular Pitch will appeal to students of popular music and Gay/Lesbian studies. Like its predecessor and companion, Queering the Pitch, it promises to establish a new level of discourse in a growing field of musicological research.

Sheila Whiteley is Chair of Popular Music at the University of Salford. She is the author of Sexing the Groove: Popular Music and Gender ,Women and Popular Music : Sexuality, Identity and Subjectivity and Too Much Too Young: Popular Music, Age and Identity all published by Routledge.
Jennifer Rycenga is Coordinator of Women's Studies at San Jose State University in California. She coedited Frontline Feminisms: Women, War, and Resistance with Marguerite Waller (Garland 2001). She has written for repurcussions, The Encyclopedia of Women and World Religion, The Garland Encyclopedia of World Music and The Encyclopedia of Popular Music of the World..