THE ORIGINS OF THE 'WORLD

MUSIC' GENRE

GRANT GODDARD

August 1998
WORLD MUSIC? The phrase is used with such regularity by the
media in recent times that you might think the term had existed
forever. But 'world music' was in fact a name artificially created by a
small group of music industry people who met monthly during 1987 in
a public house in London, England (somewhat appropriately named
'The Empress Of Russia'). 'World music' was devised as an
appropriate answer to a simple problem.

Since the early 1980's, a handful of small, independent record labels

had sprung up in Britain that were releasing music recorded in Africa,
East Europe, Asia and Latin America. These record companies were
not interested in the traditional music or quaint 'ethnic' recordings from
these continents that western record companies had dabbled in since
the earliest days of the phonograph. Instead, upstart labels such as
Earthworks, Globestyle and Sterns were interested in bringing the
vibrant, contemporary, popular music from other continents to the
attention of music fans in Europe and North America. The problem
was that record stores throughout the western world had no obvious
place to display or file such recordings in their inventory. A record-
buyer looking for an album by, for example, The Super Rail Band in
music stores had no obvious place to find it. It could be in the 'folk'
section, though it was not folk music. It might be in the soul section
("well, the musicians are black, aren't they?") but the music certainly
was not soul. So The Super Rail Band was most likely to end up in the
'S' division of the huge 'rock/pop' alphabet, lost in a sea of pouting,
preening third-rate mediocrity.

The independent record companies were frustrated by this situation

and hurting financially. The potential buyers of their releases were
failing to find these albums in record stores. And the record stores
were caught in the middle of the situation. If they ordered this type of
music product, where should they file it to maximise sales? It was a
real problem for all parties. By 1987, a label such as Globestyle had
developed an extensive catalogue of 25 album titles, and there
needed to be an obvious single point in every record store where
potential buyers could find its releases.
The result was a series of regular meetings in 'The Empress of Russia'
attended by the managers of twelve pioneering British record labels,
as well as DJ's of the few radio shows that played this music, and
representatives of record distributors that specialised in this music. By
the third meeting, the ad hoc group had agreed upon the name 'world
music' as descriptive of all their releases, and each record company
contributed £50 per album title towards a jointly funded generic
marketing campaign.

Twelve-inch plastic divider cards with the words 'WORLD MUSIC'

emblazoned across the top were distributed to every record store
across Britain, enabling each to establish a brand new section in its
display of album sleeves (this was the pre-CD era). 25,000 copies
were distributed of a single-sheet, monochrome leaflet that listed 73
albums available from the twelve record companies. Press releases
explaining and describing this new genre called 'world music' were
sent to everyone on a media list created by pooling the contacts of the
individual record companies.

The interest from all sections of the British media was overwhelming.
Many magazines and newspapers ran feature articles about the
campaign, as well as spotlights on individual artists whose recordings
were being promoted. In October 1987, the popular weekly music
newspaper 'NME' produced a special 'NME World Music Cassette'
which acted as a sampler for all the record labels' individual releases.
By the end of the year, the term 'world music' had been adopted as a
new genre of music, not only in Britain, but across Europe.

And what exactly did the phrase 'world music' mean? One of the press
releases produced in the marketing campaign explained: "Trying to
reach a definition of 'world music' provoked much lengthy discussion
[within the committee], and finally it was agreed that it means
practically any music that isn't, at present, catered for by its own
category e.g.: reggae, jazz, blues, folk. Perhaps the common factor
unifying all these world music [record] labels is the passionate
commitment of all the individuals to the music itself."
Eleven years later, the debate about the meaning of 'world music'
continues to ignite much passion, but the original campaign
succeeded beyond its participants' wildest dreams. A section of 'world
music' – whatever it is – can now be found in music stores across the
western world.

[First published in 'Toronto World Arts Scene' magazine, August

1998(??)]

© 1998 Grant Goddard

Published by Radio Books
http://www.radiobooks.org
http://www.grantgoddard.co.uk