Andrew Mall 2/6/25 Andrew Mall 2/6/25

The State of DIY Music: A Roundtable Discussion

The State of DIY: A Roundtable Discussion was a public event held August 4, 2024, at the Lilypad in Cambridge, Mass.

Andrew Mall 4/13/24 Andrew Mall 4/13/24

Hardcore Community at Furnace Fest

IASPM-US conference panel (2024). In 2023, our six-member team was on site in Birmingham, Alabama for five days, building upon over two years of prior research in 2021 and 2022. In this panel, four fieldwork team members share their findings along distinct themes. Together, we explore the ways in which community is substantiated and maintained at Furnace Fest.

Andrew Mall 11/15/23 Andrew Mall 11/15/23

Author Meets Critics: Andrew Mall’s God rock, Inc.

AAR (2023) “author meets critics” panel on God Rock, Inc. Panelists will consider how Christian music as a niche business shapes religious communities in the United States (and beyond), as well as how its many genres and subgenres - pop, rock, metal, rap, hip hop, praise and worship, etc. - reflect and shape evangelical Christian politics, practice, and theology.

Andrew Mall 3/4/22 Andrew Mall 3/4/22

Ethnographic Research and the Study of Christian Music

SCSM conference roundtable panelist (2022). The recent turn to ethnography in various disciplines has prompted renewed reflection on the basis of knowledge for scholars of religious music. Join us for a rousing conversation on the role of ethnomusicology and both its contributions and limitations in the study of religious musicking.

Andrew Mall 7/15/21 Andrew Mall 7/15/21

Recent Books on Christian Music

Popular Music Books in Process roundtable presentation (2021). Nathan Myrick, Marcell Silva Steuernagel, and myself discussed our recent books in conversation with each other as part of the PMBiP series of author talks, co-sponsored by IASPM-US, JPMS, and the Popcon.

Andrew Mall 4/29/21 Andrew Mall 4/29/21

“Lift Each Other Up”: Punk, Politics, and Secularization at Christian Festivals

IASPM-US conference presentation (2021). When the members of Flatfoot 56, a Celtic punk band from Chicago, speak of “brotherhood” at AudioFeed, a Christian music festival, they refer to congregational cohesion; at a secular punk venue, however, scene unity is just as likely an interpretation. Whereas Christian punks sacralize secular places, such as the bars and nightclubs where they often perform, this paper suggests that bands like Flatfoot 56 might be thought to secularize sacred places (i.e., Christian festivals) by decentering U.S. evangelicalism’s most controversial public positions. Through an ethnographic analysis of Flatfoot 56 performances, considering what is sung/spoken aloud and what is not, this paper argues for a nuanced, mediating perspective that recognizes an ambivalence about identity politics among many evangelical subculturalists moving between secular and sacred spaces.

Andrew Mall 10/30/19 Andrew Mall 10/30/19

The Future of Pop: Big Questions Facing Popular Music Studies in the 21st Century

AMS pre-conference symposium (2019). Despite the normalization of popular music studies over the last 50 years, complex questions linger about the state of the field and the directions it will take. “The Future of Pop” fostered interdisciplinary collaborations between scholars of different ranks and diverse backgrounds by encouraging conversations about the future of popular music studies.

Andrew Mall 3/9/18 Andrew Mall 3/9/18

“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.

Andrew Mall 11/20/17 Andrew Mall 11/20/17

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.

Andrew Mall 11/19/17 Andrew Mall 11/19/17

Resistance, Renewal, and Congregation at Christian Music Festivals

AAR conference presentation (2017). Based on interviews with festival staff and attendees, historical research, ethnographic fieldwork at Cornerstone in 2009–2012 (including two summers volunteering as festival staff), and fieldwork at AudioFeed and Wild Goose in 2017, this paper examines the production of space, place, and community at Cornerstone, AudioFeed, and Wild Goose.

Andrew Mall 3/24/17 Andrew Mall 3/24/17

Festivals and Musical Life

SAM seminar (2017). In this seminar, we examine the multiple ways in which festivals—understood as music communities (or scenes) concentrated into limited temporal and geographic frames—affect musical life in the Americas at the micro and macro levels, both historically and in the ethnographic present. Seminar participants should be prepared to present case studies that investigate and discuss the cultures, histories, values, and spaces developed in music festivals in the Americas.

Andrew Mall 2/12/16 Andrew Mall 2/12/16

Worship Capital, Evangelicalism, and the Political Economy of Congregational Music

SCSM conference presentation (2016). Building upon the works of Pierre Bourdieu, analyses of music industries, and contemporary discourses of intellectual property, this paper outlines a theoretical framework for the political economy of worship music and considers barriers to integrating this framework into our scholarship and practice. This research emerges from several years of ethnographic fieldwork at the Anchor Fellowship, a non-denominational evangelical church in Nashville, Tennessee, and advances the concept of “worship capital” to capture the various ways in which individuals and institutions invest in worship.

Andrew Mall 12/6/15 Andrew Mall 12/6/15

Music Festivals as Scenes: Producing Ephemeral Space Annually at Cornerstone Festival

SEM conference presentation (2015). Based on interviews with festival staff, historical research, and ethnographic fieldwork in 2009–2012—including time working on the festival’s setup, stagehand, and teardown crews—this paper examines the production of space and place at Cornerstone Festival. In doing so, it contributes a vital link between scene theory and the growing ethnomusicological literature on festivals.

Andrew Mall 6/24/13 Andrew Mall 6/24/13

“Last Year’s Lineup Was Better”: Shifting Social Geographies and Collectivities at Chicago Music Festivals

IASPM conference presentation (2013). Drawing on many years of ethnographic research in Chicago, Illinois, this paper compares and contrasts several civic and commercial popular music festivals, such as Blues Fest, Cornerstone, Jazz Fest, Lollapalooza, and Pitchfork. I use mutable, multi-dimensional center-periphery theory to illustrate and explain the social flows within festival spaces, the differentiating strategies of festivals, and the compromises that emerge when organizers reconcile their needs with their audiences’ expectations. In examining the intersecting and overlapping representations of mainstreams and undergrounds at music festivals, my paper contributes to research on the political economies, social geographies, and taste communities of popular music events.

Andrew Mall 11/4/12 Andrew Mall 11/4/12

“We Are Called Here to Worship Together”: Ethnographic Outsiderness and Insiderness in Religious and Popular Culture

SEM conference presentation (2012). In this paper, based on several years of ethnographic research at the Anchor Fellowship, I address the challenges of fieldwork as a religious outsider and cultural insider. In constructing a rich description of an Anchor worship service based on my observations, those of church-goers, and formal interviews of Anchor pastors, this paper confronts the multivalence of experience and the interpretation thereof, demonstrating the importance of phenomenology to ethnography of religious and popular cultures.

Andrew Mall 11/17/11 Andrew Mall 11/17/11

The Price of Profit? Changing and Challenging Priorities in the Christian Recording Industry

SEM conference presentation (2011). In this paper, I examine EMI Christian Music Group (CMG), a major Christian record label (and division of EMI Ltd.), headquartered near Nashville, Tennessee. I provide a value-neutral analysis of the intersections of commerce, aesthetics, and theology. As with Keith Negus’s (1992, 1999) ethnographic research within the recording industry, my study illustrates that major record label practices and priorities are more nuanced than may be visible to outside observers.

Andrew Mall 11/22/09 Andrew Mall 11/22/09

Lost in the Sound of Separation: Mainstreams and Alternatives at a Christian Rock Festival

SEM conference presentation (2009). How do the performers, mediators, and listeners of alternative Christian rock negotiate these multiple tensions? How can their negotiations contribute to existing conceptions of mainstreams and alternatives? Describing the lived experiences of Cornerstone participants requires a perspective more subjectively nuanced than the strict dichotomies of previous models. In working through these ideas, this ethnography studies the ways in which Cornerstone contributes to participants’ self-conception of their Christian lifestyle: mainstream, alternative, and in-between.

Andrew Mall 5/31/09 Andrew Mall 5/31/09

“Never Mind What’s Been Selling, It’s What You’re Buying”: Capital Exchange in Buying, Collecting, and Selling Vinyl Records

IASPM-US conference presentation (2009). Who holds the upper hand at record fairs? The dealers sell the commodities, yes, but the collectors decide what to buy, from whom, and (often, via bargaining) for what price. While dealers frequently self-identify as collectors, interactions between dealers and collectors necessarily rely upon the commodity status of music recordings and their role in the exchange of economic, cultural, and social capital. Through ethnographic research at Chicago-area record fairs, I explore the tensions between record dealers and record collectors, and investigate the ways in which capital and exchange contribute to musical meaning.

Andrew Mall 11/19/06 Andrew Mall 11/19/06

Steady Diet of Nothing: Affinities, Sacrifices, and Change at Record Fairs

SEM conference presentation (2006). Building on Will Straw’s confluence of cosmopolitanism (“attentiveness to change occurring elsewhere”) and connoisseurship in his study of communities within popular music, this paper explores issues of everyday practice and changing identity through an ethnography of record dealers—individuals who act both as mediators and audience members within popular music exchange—using record fair events as the primary public cultural space.