4th Critical Review

Buchanan 1995

Buchanan discusses the history of Bulgarian folk music and how it was influence under the socialist regime since the early 20th century. Traditional Bulgarian folk music was called narodna muzika, and was generally a melody played or sang by a single person. But amongst the emergence of the socialist regime, musical professionalism began to develop. This explains how the government altered traditional music to popularize it for political and economic gain. As Bulgaria took part in the Warsaw pact and aspired to be part of the European economic community, the Bulgarian government wanted music to be more pleasing to the Western ear, and they wanted to make more money.

Indigenous musicians began to be seen negatively because they symbolized moral and financial impoverishment. While I understand that the government wanted to integrate itself, I do not understand how it could so blatantly sacrifice tradition amongst their own country. This seems like a sort of anti-nationalist move, trying to rid the country of and look down up tradition Bulgarian folk music. Instead, they encouraged the growth of Western style by abandoning solo performance and encouraging ensembles, standardizing instruments and tuning, and requiring musicians to go through certain training that taught Western ideals such as notation.

I thought reading about Bulgarian history really gave me insight as to how their music had developed over the nineteenth century. This is a perfect example of how historical/social context is necessary in order to understand growth. It is easy for one to say, the Bulgarians started succumbing to Western influence, but it is really not that simple. They specifically altered their musical style in order to gain some kind of political and economic power. But when does the government have the right to step in? Is power ever an excuse to abandon your identity as a country or a community?