Abbey Ellis uses the theremin as an example
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Paradoxes of a musical nature also abound in the work of Clara Latham, Martin L. and Sarah F. Leibowitz Member and Edward T. Cone Member in Music Studies in the School of Historical Studies. The contradictions that inspire her work surround the perceptions of musical labor, with particular reference to music technology. Broadly speaking, Latham is intrigued by the dualities in the perception of music as both a pastime, a source of fun and emotional fulfillment, and an activity that requires intense effort to perfect.
The association of music and leisure often causes the labor involved in acquiring musical skill to be overlooked. To explain this, Latham gives an example from her experiences in musical conservatory. In such settings, students spend up to 10 hours a day in a practice room, and yet, Latham tells us, “Friends and family will still urge them to get out their guitar in social settings, saying something like, ‘don’t you want to play for us?’” She contrasts this with attitudes to other enterprises such as cooking: “The same people who urge a musician to pick up their instrument would certainly think twice about saying to someone who owns a restaurant, ‘Oh, would you like to come and cater my party for free, just because you love cooking?’”
Because music is often perceived as a passion, something that a performer feels driven to do, there is a pervasive assumption that it does not count as work. Latham describes falling into this fallacy herself during her career as a musician: “When I was 20, before I went on my first tour, I had mental images of our band just rolling up on a bus and having all these people at the ready, setting up our stuff. In reality, it was me and 8 guys in 2 small rental cars driving 10 hours a day, sleeping on strangers’ couches. It was hard! Those experiences definitely inspire the question of ‘why do people always assume that music is not work?’”
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