Abstract
This chapter focuses on different understandings of space in music. Given the science fiction dimension of Afrofuturism, the relation to outer space is crucial, and this space is given sound by some artists. This chapter, however, focuses first on Nicole Mitchell’s musical adaptations of Octavia Butler’s literature (thus a concrete “translation” from literature to sound) and second on Ras G and the Afrikan Space Program’s musical references to space, both outer and inner. Mitchell’s music is primarily acoustic, whereas Ras G’s is primarily electronically produced; thus the chapter highlights different strategies for producing sonic spaces.
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Notes
- 1.
It should probably be added that there are many other performances within Sun Ra’s oeuvre where the saxophone players, among them John Gilmore, sound more like Coltrane—or are in a similar vein of jazz saxophone as Coltrane.
- 2.
- 3.
“Like Sun Ra, he upholds ancient Egypt as a symbol of great black civilization ” (Lock 1999, 165).
- 4.
Mitchell, “Composer Notes,” found on the Bandcamp page of Intergalactic Beings https://fperecs.bandcamp.com/album/intergalactic-beings
- 5.
This is not to claim that reggae is the only musical genre referencing vibrations , but it is one of the genres with a tradition for such a reference.
Discography
Flying Lotus. 2008. Los Angeles. Warp.
Mitchell, Nicole. 2004. Hope, Future and Destiny. Dreamtime.
———. 2008. Xenogenesis Suite. Firehouse 12.
———. 2010. Intergalactic Beings. FPE.
Ras G. 2011. Down 2 Earth (The Standard Edition). Leaving Records.
———. 2013. Back on the Planet. Brainfeeder.
———. 2014. Down To Earth Vol 2 (The Standard Bop Editon). Leaving Records.
———. 2016. The Gospel of the God Spell. Street Corner Music.
Sun Ra. 1972. Space is the Place. Impulse.
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Steinskog, E. (2018). Interstellar Space, Outer Space and Inner Space. In: Afrofuturism and Black Sound Studies. Palgrave Studies in Sound. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-66041-7_5
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