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'Shaboman' is an ironic self-designated nickname, used by young male band musicians who rush from one gig to another in Accra, Ghana. Being active in diverse musical genres (gospel, highlife, brass, neo-traditional, [afro-]pop), they pursue professional aspirations with dedication, favor wistful romantic love songs, and train girls how to play musical instruments. As these young men present a contrast to dominant narratives on young African men, this paper aims to disrupt and complexify such masternarratives by documenting various facets of masculinities the instrumentalists (aged between 20 and 32) perform in their music practice. In the process, microprocesses of gender production in popular music are traced. Based on extensive ethnographic work in Accra between 2013 and 2018, the analysis draws on two distinct bodies of theoretical work: on cultural performance and performativity of gender in music (Butler; Madison and Hamera 2005; Livermon 2014a, 2014b); and on insights from studies on gender and masculinities in Ghanaian popular music (Asante-Darko and Van der Geest 1983; Adomako Ampofo and Asiedu 2012; Shipley 2013a). Contextualizing the shabomen's staged masculinities among a variety of other manly ideals in Ghanaian popular culture, I highlight how acts of maintaining and subverting gender conventions are intertwined in popular music practice. Furthermore, I depict how gender performances are linked to age group, and to place and belonging at the same time. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This special issue, arising from a symposium in Helsinki in 2019, presents contributions from a diverse group of practitioners, representing a broad range of approaches in the making, thinking and writing about digital musical instruments. The authors consider the socio-cultural role of technology in current and emerging digital music practices with changing social roles, historical and critical reflections. This introduction explains the context and motivation for the issue and summarises the contribution of each of the eight articles. Together they provide what we believe is a unique contribution to the research of new interfaces for musical expression and related areas. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Tonal consonance theory assigns a level of dissonance to any pair of pitches played simultaneously. This theory connects timbre with tuning and proposes that tunings must use local minima of dissonance. The timbre of the marimba de chonta produces a broad minimum, a sharp maximum, and some sharp minima of dissonance. Here we show that the combined effect of the traditional tunings and the musical practices of this instrument only allows the use of the broad minimum, leading to special features of this music as a transposition practice that keeps geometrical distances instead of musical intervals. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The 'Performance without Barriers' research group (PwB), based at the Sonic Arts Research Centre at Queen's University Belfast has been exploring the potential of sonic arts practices and music improvisation for enhancing social inclusion. To date, the group has focused primarily on research activities related to the inclusive potential of providing access to music improvisation for people with physical disabilities via the use of digital technologies. In this paper we discuss the critical thinking behind our work which draws together the social and connective functions of music making, the open and relational practice of music improvisation, and technological solutions utilising open, adaptable and accessible digital technologies. Three case studies, taking place between 2015 and 2018, are discussed. In this article we argue that activities in music improvisation have inclusive potential for opening constructive dialogues between performers, their instruments, and people of different backgrounds and abilities. Furthermore, as we have approached our research activities reflexively, we ponder the contradictions, dilemmas and points of learning we have discovered when engaging in inclusive improvisation work between university researchers and musicians with diverse abilities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we look at the user interface of a successful musical appliance. We discover that the user interface is difficult and inconsistent. The appliance is very hard to use, yet, people are willing to spend hundreds of hours learning it. This phenomenon cannot be wholly explained by saying that the experience of using the appliance is, in itself, enjoyable. My proposition (Heckel’s law) is that user interface design is not of primary importance as a factor in the adoption of an appliance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article focuses on the relationship between amount of instrumental practice and instrumental achievement. The context of the study is a conservatoire of music. The result from a quantitative study indicates a positive relationship between current practice time and instrumental achievement. This is discussed in relation to expectations from expertise theory and research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article, the author reflects on the connection between choir singers and community, and mentions that the singing community gathers to play on their musical instrument along with augmentation of the individual voice to a choral instrument. Topics discussed include practicing music, achieving degree of mastery that will always be a repeating cycle of play and practice, and recognition of singers.