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Distributed for Intellect Ltd

The Intellect Handbook of Popular Music Methodologies

An extensive overview of popular music methodologies.

The Intellect Handbook of Popular Music Methodologies attempts a comprehensive overview of methodological approaches within the field of popular music studies. Alongside contributions from key thinkers already established in popular music studies, the strength of the collection lies in its inclusion of many new and emerging writers in the field. Therefore, the collection incorporates a wide range of practitioners, pedagogues, and academics from across the disciplines, and thus draws from a diversity of methodological approaches. As a result, this will be the first comprehensive handbook of popular music methodologies.

700 pages | 6.69 x 9.61 | © 2025

Education: Education--General Studies

Music: General Music


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Table of Contents

Foreword
Derek B. Scott

Introduction: Mapping the Field: Explorations in the Study of Popular Music
Shara Rambarran, Mike Dines and Gareth Dylan Smith


PART ONE: FOUNDATIONAL APPROACHES TOWARDS A MUSICOLOGY OF POPULAR MUSIC
1. Critical Popular Music Studies: Interrogating the Methodological Meanings and Discursive Politics of ‘Critical’ and ‘Popular’
Runchao Liu and Jessica A. Schwartz

2. Methods for the Twenty-First Century: Artistic Research as a New Research Paradigm in Popular Music Studies
Michael Kahr and Wolf-Georg Zaddach

3. Theorizing Aesthetics in a Practical Musicology
Simon Zagorski-Thomas

4. Biographical Method and Interview as Techniques in Brazilian Communication and Music Studies
Caroline Govari and Adriana Amaral

5. Beyond Popular Song: Analysing Persona–Environment Relationships in Contemporary Musical Theatre
Nick Braae

6. The Cultural Imagination and Its Role in Researching Popular Music
Eleftherios Zenerian

7. Semiotics as a Mode of Popular Music Analysis and Interpretation
Brian Andrew Inglis

8. Form and Function: Deconstructing Music Graphics
Russ Bestley


PART TWO: BACK TO THE FUTURE: ARTEFACTS, ARCHAEOLOGY, ARCHIVE AND HERITAGE
9. Do-It-Together: Punk Methodologies for Researching the Heritage of Popular Music
Sarah Baker, Zelmarie Cantillon, Jennifer Chubb, Paul Graves-Brown, Suzy Harrison, Brett Lashua, Liam Maloney, Jack McNeill, Raphaël Nowak, Hilary Orange, Yorgos Paschos, John Schofield and Aleen Stanton

10. Records, Subjects and Agents: Exploring Archives of Popular Music through Critical Archival Studies
Kirsty Fife

11. Issues in US Forensic Musicological Analysis of Popular Music

Dana DeVlieger

12. The Cover–Version Spectrum: Reframing the Relationship between Imitation and Transformation in Pop-Punk Cover–Versions
Rob Upton

13. Digging in the Takes: Using Archaeological Approaches to Study Popular Music History
Paul Thompson and Barkley McKay

14. Focused Musical Artefact Analysis
Carsten Wernicke and Michael Ahlers


PART THREE: EXPLORING ETHNOGRAPHIC APPROACHES IN POPULAR MUSIC STUDIES
15. Adele Clarke’s Situational Analysis and Its Potential for Popular Music Studies
Daniel Suer and Florian Heesch

16. Cosmopolitan Hubs: Glocalization and Non-Native Culture Brokers in the Globalization of Popular Music Cultures
Tenley Martin

17. Art Gallery Drum Kit Solos, Spirituality and Practical Musicology
Gareth Dylan Smith

18. Ethnographic Methods and Ethics for Online Cultures of Popular Music
Raquel Campos Valverde

19. Internet Pop Reception as Sonic Autoethnography: Circulating Music, Story and Self Online
Iain Findlay-Walsh


PART FOUR: SEXUALITY, RACE AND INTERSECTIONALITY IN THE STUDY OF POPULAR MUSIC
20. Is It Drag? Trans Perspectives on Queering Popular Music Research
Sadie Hochman-Ruiz

21. Staying in the Field: Emotional Labour and Trauma in Popular Music Ethnography
Ryan J. Lambe

22. Representing Power through China Wind Music: The Soft and Hard Masculinities of the Nation
Na Li

23. The Conferralist Framework: Method and Application in Popular Music Studies
Hussein Boon

24. When ‘Up for It’ Is Not for Everyone: From Content Analysis to the Music Analysis of Sexualization Model (MAS-Model): An Approximation of Contemporary Music from a Decolonial Lens
Priscila Alvarez-Cueva


PART FIVE: APPROACHES TOWARDS A POPULAR MUSIC PEDAGOGY
25. Person-Centred Popular Music Education: Negotiating Gender, Community and Industry Expectations
Sini Timonen

26. Popular Music Education Methodologies in the United States: An Overview
Bryan Powell

27. Process-Based Pedagogies for Creative Practice Studies
Chris Whiting

28. Reflective Piano Pedagogy: Improvisation and Composition in Classical and Contemporary Repertoires
Alethea de Villiers

29. Popular Music Production: Rethinking Recording Studio Labels
Pat O’Grady


PART SIX: POPULAR MUSIC AND CONNECTEDNESS: RECOVERY STUDIES, MUSIC AUDIENCES AND SPIRITUALITY
30. Exploring Post-Subcultural Participation through a Practice-Centred Approach: The Case of the Vaporwave (Virtual) Scene
Simone Tosoni and Alessandro Ricotti

31. Recovery Studies and Pop Musicology: The Twelve Steps as Lyrical, Visual and Sonic Rhetoric
Adam J. Goldwyn

32. When Is a Music Audience? The Challenges of a Sociological Perspective of Music Audiences in the Platform Age
Jo Haynes and Raphaël Nowak

33. Studying Religion and Popular Music
Marcus Moberg and Christopher Partridge

34. In Search of Krishna: Narrative Enquiry and the Trajectory of the Spiritual in Krishnacore
Mike Dines


PART SEVEN: THINKING AHEAD: EMERGING METHODOLOGIES IN POPULAR MUSIC STUDIES
35. Confronting Climate Change in Popular Music Texts: Nostalgia, Apocalypse, Utopia
Tore Størvold

36. Do Meat-Eaters Dream of Vengeful Sheep? Towards a Methodology for Animal-Oriented Music Criticism
Marc Brooks

37. An Ecosemiotic Approach to the Analysis of Timbre
Maria Perevedentseva

38. Research Methods in Live Electronic Music and Audio-Visual Performance
Kirsten Hermes

39. Technology, Creativity and Pop Music Production: The Case of Cantopop
Hon-Lun Helan Yang and Edmond Tsang Yik-Man

40. Studying Playlist Cultures with Qualitative Digital Methods
Alessandro Gandini and Maurizio Corbella

41. Popular Music in Esports, On and Beyond the Stage
Eulalia Febrer-Coll


Notes on Contributors

Index

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