rwolf@fas.harvard.edu
RICHARD KENT WOLF
Music Department, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA 02138.  Ph: +1-617-495-2791
rwolf@fas.harvard.edu

Current and Past Positions

Professor of Music, Harvard University Music Department, 7/07-present
Gastprofessur für ethnologische Nilgiriforschung, Institut für Ethnologie, University of Munich, 6/09-8/09
Professeur invité à l’École des hautes études en sciences sociales, Paris, 5/09-6/1/09
Harris K. Weston Associate Professor of the Humanities, Harvard University Music Department: 7/03–7/07
Assistant Professor, Harvard University Music Department: 7/99–7/03
Postdoctoral research on ritual drumming in India and Pakistan:  12/96–2/99
Director, Folk Arts Program, Brooklyn Arts Council:  1/96–10/96
Project Consultant and Office Manager
    Association for Cultural Equity, NY, NY (Alan Lomax, President): 12/94–7/96.
Visiting Scholar, Columbia University:
    Southern Asian Institute (6/95–5/97)
    Department of Music (1/95–6/95)

Education

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign: Ph.D., Music (Ethnomusicology): 1/97
    Master of Music: 5/89; Phi Kappa Phi: 1987.
University of Chicago, CIC Visiting Scholar: 1/90-6/90.  
Independent study, Karnatak music (India and U.S.): 1980-present.
Madurai Kamaraj University (India). Tamil Diploma: 1985.
American College (India). Tamil Certificate: 5/83.
University of Wisconsin at Madison, Language study: Tamil (1982); Telugu (1987)
Oberlin College, B.A. Mathematics: 5/84

Theses

1997    Of God and Death: Music in ritual and everyday life.  A musical ethnography of the Kotas of south India.  Ph.D. Dissertation, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
1989    Innovation, interpretation and the maintenance of tradition in the Karaikkudi style of vina playing.  Master of Music thesis, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Languages Studied

Tamil, Urdu/Hindi, Kota (Indian tribal language), Persian, French, German, Telugu. (Main field languages: Tamil, Urdu, Persian, Kota).

Field Research

Collectively, approximately six years in South India (mainly Tamil Nadu); fourteen months in North India (mainly Uttar Pradesh); fifteen months in Pakistan (mainly Panjab).  Brief field visits to China (Xinjiang), Iran (Isfahan, Tehran, Qazvin), and Ghana (Ashanti region).

Awards and Honors (since 1990)
Deutsche Forschungsgesellschaft (jointly with Frank Heidemann, Prof of Anthropology, University of Munich).  Grant for conference, “Making Indigenous Polities in India,” University of Munich, Jan 4-6 2011.
Artium Magistrum (honorary).  Harvard University, 4/08
American Institute of Pakistan Studies: grant for collaboration on music and folklore in Baluchistan 5/06-8/06
The Edward Cameron Dimock, Jr. Prize in the Humanities for book, The Black Cow’s Footprint: Time, Space and Music in the Lives of the Kotas of South India (Award for 2005); Delhi: Permanent Black, 2005; University of Illinois Press, 2006.
Presidential Leave, academic year 2004–2005, Harvard University.
Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study, Advanced Seminar: “Local Theory, Local Practice” 2/27-3/2/04
    Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study Fellowship: Manuscript preparation (9/02–6/03)
American Council of Learned Societies: Manuscript preparation (7/02–6/03)
    NEH summer stipend: Manuscript preparation (6/01–8/01).
    American Institute of Pakistan Studies: Postdoctoral Research in Pakistan (3/97–5/97)
    American Institute of Indian Studies: Doctoral research in South India (12/91–11/92).
    Fulbright-Hays: Doctoral research in South India (9/90–9/91).

    Books
The Black Cow’s Footprint: Time, Space and Music in the Lives of the Kotas of South India (Delhi: Permanent Black, 2005; University of Illinois Press, 2006.)
Theorizing the local: Music, practice and experience in south Asia and beyond, editor (New York: Oxford University Press, 2009)

Published Articles (All journals below are refereed)

2009    “Introduction.” In Theorizing the Local: Music, practice, and experience in South Asia and beyond, 5-26, edited by Richard K. Wolf (Oxford University Press, NY).
2009    “Varnams and vocalizations: The special significance of some musical beginnings.” In Theorizing the Local: Music, practice, and experience in South Asia and beyond, 243-302, edited by Richard K. Wolf (Oxford University Press, NY).
2007    “Doubleness, mātam, and Muharram drumming in South Asia.” In Pain and its transformation, 331-50., ed. Sarah Coakley and Kay Kaufman Shelemay. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
2006    “The Poetics of  ‘Sufi’ Practice: Drumming, Dancing, and Complex Agency at Madho Lāl Husain (And Beyond).”  American Ethnologist 33(2): 246-268.
2003    “Return to tears: Musical mourning, emotion, and religious reform in two south Asian minority communities.”  In, The Living and the Dead: Social dimensions of death in South Asian religions, 95–112, ed. Elizabeth Wilson.  Albany: State University of New York Press.
2002     “Tribal Music (Nilgiris),” pp 615–17; “Tribal Communities (S. India),” pp 611-13. In South Asian Folklore: An Encyclopedia. Eds. M. Mills, P. Claus, and S.  Diamond.  New York: Routledge.
2001     “Emotional dimensions of ritual music among the Kotas, a south Indian tribe.” Ethnomusicology 45(3): 379–422.
2000/01 “Three perspectives on music and the idea of tribe in India.”  Asian Music 32(1): 5–34.
2000/01 “Mourning songs and human pasts among the Kotas of south India.” Asian M.  32(1): 141–183.
2000    “Embodiment and ambivalence: Emotion in south Asian Muharram drumming.” Yearbook for Traditional Music 32: 81–116.
2000    “Music in Seasonal and Life-Cycle Rituals.”  In The Garland Encyclopedia of World Music, Vol 5, South Asia: The Indian Subcontinent, ed. A. Arnold, 272–87.  New York: Garland Pub., Inc.
2000    “Tamil Nadu.”  In The Garland Encyclopedia of World Music, Vol 5, South Asia:The Indian Subcontinent, ed. Alison Arnold, 903–21.  New York: Garland Pub., Inc.
1997    “Rain, God and Unity among the Kotas.”  In Blue Mountains Revisited, ed. Paul Hockings, 231–292. Delhi: Oxford University Press.
1992    “The Kotas.” In The Encyclopedia of World Cultures, vol. III South Asia, 134–38. Gen. ed.  David Levinson. Boston: G. K. Hall.
1991    “Style and tradition in Karaikkudi vina playing.” Asian Theatre Journal 8(2): 118–41.
“David Mandelbaum.” In The International Encyclopedia of Anthropologists. Compiled by LARG, gen. editor Christopher Winters. New York: Garland.

Reviews

2008    Review essay: Singing the classical, voicing the modern: The postcolonial politics of music in south India, by Amanda Weidman; From the Tanjore court to the Madras Music Academy: A social history of music in south India.  Ethnomusicology Forum 17(2): 287-292
2004    The Garland Encyclopedia of World Music, Vol 5, South Asia:The Indian Subcontinent, ed. Alison Arnold.  Ethnomusicology 48(2): 278–82
2004    “From Africa to India: Sidi Music in the Indian Ocean Diaspora.” A film by Amy Catlin-Jairazbhoy and Nazir Ali Jairazbhoy, 2003. 74 minutes.  In Asian Educational Media Service News and Reviews, 7(2): 1, 7.
2003    Time in Indian Music, by Martin Clayton.  Asian Music 34(2): 133–139.
2002    Southern India.  Dance Dramas: Kathakali, Teru Koothu, Yakshagana.  Yearbook for Traditional Music 34.
2001    Mârgam: The complete Bharatanâtyam. In Yearbook for Traditional Music 33: 200–201.
2000–01 Horse of Karbala: Muslim Devotional Life in India, by David Pinault.  New York: Palgrave, 2001.  Harvard Middle Eastern and Islamic Review 6: 123–129
2000    (Book note).  Savaging the civilized: Verrier Elwin, his tribals, and India, by Ramachandra Guha.  Religious Studies Review 26(3): 253.
1998–99 Sitar Power II, Call of the Valley, and Sankar: Raga Aberi.  Asian Music 30(1):199–203
1996    Gender, Genre and Power in South Asian Expressive Traditions, ed. Arjun Appadurai et al.  Ethnomusicology 40(2): 333–36.
1994    A Badaga-English Dictionary, by Paul Hockings and Christiane Pilot-Raichoor.  In “Chicago South Asia Newsletter” 18(1): 11.  Winter.
        Dialogues with the Dead, by Piers Vitebsky.  Cambridge: Cambridge Univ. Press.  “Chicago South Asia Newsletter” 18(2): 11. Spring.
1993    High tech Shiva, by N. Jairazbhoy. “Chicago South Asia Newsletter” 17(2): 11, Spring.
1990    Keywords and concepts: Hindustani classical music, by Ashok Damodar Ranade.  “Chicago South Asia Newsletter,” 14(3): 9. October.
1989    Classical music of South India, by Kanthimathi Kumar and Jean Stackhouse, Ethnomusicology 33(1): 175–77.
 
Forthcoming Publications (In press and under preparation)

“Music and translocation in south Asia.” (In Japanese) Published by National Institute of Humanities, National Museum of Japanese History, Sakura, Japan. In Press
“The rhythms of rāga ālāpana.”  Korean Music.  Special Issue on Sanjo and other improvisatory traditions in Asia.  Ministry of Culture.  Seoul, South Korea. In Press
“Continuity: Ranganayaki Rajagopalan.”  2 CD set, classical vina music of South India.  Scholarly notes and production, Richard Wolf.  International Council for Traditional Music/UNESCO. In Press
Entries in Encyclopedia of the Nilgiri Hills, ed. Paul Hockings. Manohar and AltaMira Press:  1. “Architecture, Kota.” pp 41-42; 2. “Funerary Rituals, Kota,” 353-64; 3. Kollimalai,” pp 478-80; 4. “Kota Culture,” 480-82; 5.  “Kota Eschatology,” 482-87 ;6.  “Kota Kinship,” 494-95; 7.  “Kota Speech,” 495-501; 8.  “Music and Performance: Kota and Tribal,” 611-18.
The voice in the drum: Music, language, and emotion among Muslims in south Asia.  Book manuscript in preparation.  Under contract with the University of Illinois Press.
“Ta‘ziyeh Transformed: Meter, melody and matam in South Asian Muharram.”  Solicited for publication (translated into Persian) for the journal Mahur, published in Tehran, Iran.
Song and Subjectivity in Modern India: Kota Lives, Laments, and Annual Cycles.  Book msc (drafted)
Kota Dictionary.  Unwritten Dravidian language of South India. Under preparation for possible publication with ILCAA, Tokyo University of Foreign Studies.

Papers Delivered (or to be delivered)
“Tribal and Modern Voices in South Indian Kota Society.” Conference on “Ritual, Art, and Language: Making Indigenous Polities in India,” University of Munich, Jan 4-6 2011.
“The voice in the drum: hidden pleasures (and pains) of sounds in south Asian Islam.” Department of Anthropology Seminar, Harvard University, Dec. 6 2010.
“Muharram and Music in a Sufi Context: Shiahs, Nizamis, and Indian Partition.” Seminar on Islam in Asia.  Asia Center, Harvard University, Nov 17, 2010
“The voice in the drum across south Asia.” Annual meeting of the Society for Ethnomusicology, Los Angeles, Nov. 10, 2010
“Prosody on musical instruments in south Asia.” Radcliffe Exploratory Seminar on Prosody and Dialog in Language and Music.  Radcliffe Institute of Advanced Study, Harvard University. Nov 5-6, 2010.
“Perspectivity and music in the Muharram rituals of south Asia.”  Class of 1960 Distinguished Lecture.  Williams College, Williamstown, MA. 3/15/10
“Kota Music.”  Invited lecture and demonstration (with Kota musicians).  The Music Academy of Madras. Chennai, Tamil Nadu, 12/17/09
“The rhythms of rāga ālāpana in south Indian music.” 2009 New York Sanjo Festival and Symposium: Korean Sanjo and Other Improvisational Traditions in Asia. The Graduate Center of the City University of New York. October 19, 2009
“The manifest and the hidden: Agency and loss in Muslim performance traditions of south and west Asia.” Diaspora, Cosmopolitanism, Islamism; fourth workshop of AHRC/ESRC Religion And Society Programme, Network /Workshops Research Project (2008-2009) director: Kamal Salhi. Performance, politics, piety: music as debate in Muslim societies of North Africa, South Asia,West Asia and their diasporas, University of Leeds, Oct. 10, 2009
“Music and visual time and space among the Kotas of South India,” Institut für Ethnologie, University of Munich, 6/22/09
“The ‘Anchor Point’ Theory of Action: Music, time and space among the Kotas of South India.” Institut für Ethnologie, University of Munich, 6/ 22/09
“The Shi‘i faces of Nizamuddin: Nizami drumming and texts in Delhi and Karachi” (revised).  Conference, Tellings, Not Texts: Singing, story-telling and performance. School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, 6/9/09
“Emotionality in the music of South Asia,” l’École des hautes études en sciences sociales, seminar of Emmanuelle Olivier “Enjeux et pratiques de l’ethnomusicologie.” 5/28/09
“Music in Shrine Sufism of Pakistan,” Research group on Sufism and History in the Indus Valley at Centre d'Etudes de l'Inde et de l'Asie du sud (EHESS-CNRS), 5/28/09
“The rhythm of raga: pulse, gesture, and time in ‘free rhythmic’ music of south Asia,” l’École des hautes études en sciences sociales, seminar of Emmanuelle Olivier “Enjeux et pratiques de l’ethnomusicologie.” Paris, 5/14/09
“Song and Subjectivity in Modern India: The Kotas of the Nilgiri Hills,” CREM: Centre de recherche en ethnomusicologie, Nanterre University, Paris, 5/11/09,
“Musical and other social ‘beginnings’ in South Asia and beyond.” l’École des hautes études en sciences sociales, seminar of Francis Zimmermann, “Des ornements du discours aux mises en scène de la voix.”  Paris, 5/7/09
“The Shi‘i faces of Nizamuddin: Nizami drumming and texts in Delhi and Karachi.” l’École des hautes études en sciences sociales, seminar of Nalini Delvoye, "Culture indo-persane : textes et contextes," Paris, 5/6/09
 “Music and translocation in south Asia.” National Institute of Humanities, National Museum of Japanese History, Sakura, Japan, 3/29/09
“The Shi‘i faces of Nizamuddin: Nizami drumming and texts in Delhi and Karachi.” (15 minute version) Conference on India and the World: The performing arts. Amsterdam, 11/22/08
“Singing and Drumming Texts: Ecumenism in the Nizami traditions of post-partition Delhi and Karachi.” British Forum for Ethnomusicology, One-Day Conference, Aberdeen. 11/15/08
“Responding to the sounds of Shi‘ism in greater south Asia.”  Syracuse University, 4/19/2008
 “‘Pakistani music’ and ‘the music of Pakistan.’”  Roundtable: Pakistan at 60.  Harvard University 11/16/07
“Searching for common ground beyond India:  Shi‘i voices in south and west Asia.” Society for Ethnomusicology, Columbus, OH 10/25/08.
“Religious music in Iran and south Asia: Voices of the mourner” Conservatorio di Musica di Vicenza “Arrigo Pedrollo.” Vicenza, Italy.  June 16, 2006.
“Voices of the ‘Azādār in Iran and south Asia”: many versions: U. of Fl.  3/30/06; Wesleyan 10/4/06; U. of Chicago, 1/12/07; ICTM, Vienna, 7/9/07; S. Asia Institute, U. of TX, Austin, 7/7/07. Harvard 2/11/06.
“Video feedback and the poetics of interaction at a Sufi shrine in Lahore.” Harvard Music Dept. 3/20/06
“The poetics of Sufi music and dance at the shrine of Madho Lāl Husain in Lahore.” Tokyo University of Foreign Studies.  Tokyo, Japan.  March 16, 2006.
“Ta‘ziyeh transformed: Meter, melody and mātam in south Asian Muharram.”  (translated into Persian) The Conference on the Music of Khorasan and Transoxiana. Tehran, Iran.  1/4/06.
“Multileveled mimesis: Musical poetics at Madho Lāl Husain in Lahore.” SEM, Atlanta. 11/20/05.
“Varṇams and vocalizations: The special significance of some musical beginnings.”  Local Theory/Local Practice: Musical Culture in South Asia and Beyond.  Radcliffe Advanced Seminar and Colloquium of the International Council for Traditional Music, Feb 28, 2004.  Cambridge, MA
“Interpreting ‘Sufi’ practice: Drumming, dancing, and complex agency at Madho Lāl Husain (and beyond).”  Columbia University, Barbara Stoller Miller Conference, Feb. 21, 2004
“Sufi drumming: a view from Lahore.” The Ohio State University.  Spring 2003; Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study. Spring 2003.
“Ruminations on a Black Cow’s Footprint” 10/16/03.  Department of Anthropology, Yale University
“Sufi drumming: a view from Lahore.” (substantially different from Ohio State paper).  Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study. Spring 2003.
“Memory conduits and identity labels: King, tribe, doyr.”  Southern Asian Institute.  Columbia University.  4/18/01
“A musical window into ritual mourning: A case study from south India.”  Invited lecture for Religion and music, 40th anniversary colloquium series: Teaching the world’s religions at Harvard.  Harvard Divinity School.  4/12/01
“Anchor points in Kota ritual and musical time.”  Society for Ethnomusicology, Toronto, 11/2/00
 “Affect and meaning in the funeral music of a south Indian tribe,” delivered at:
    Harvard University, Music Department, 2/10/00;
    South Asia Institute, Heidelberg, Germany, 5/00
    Institut für Ethnologie und Afrikanistik, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität, Munich, 5/00
“Doubleness, mātam, and Muharram drumming in south Asia.”  Response paper at Pain and its transformations: The interface of Biology and Culture.  Houghton Mind/Brain/Behavior Colloquium, Harvard University, 5/20/00.
“Dimensions of Feeling and Emotion in Ritual Music of the Kotas, a South Indian Tribe.” Society for Ethnomusicology. Austin, Texas.  11/20/99
“The aesthetics of drumming in ritual mourning.” Annual Conference on South Asia, Madison WI. 10/16/99
“Return to tears: Musical mourning, emotion, and religious reform in two south Asian minority communities,” delivered at:  
    Department of Music, Harvard University, Cambridge MA.  12/14/98.  
    University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Musicology Colloquium, 12/1/00
“Ritual drumming in Islamic south Asia.”  The Henry Martyn Institute of Islamic Studies. Hyderabad, Andhra Pradesh. 10/31/97.
“Song and ritual among the Kotas: Religious observance within a Nilgiri hill tribe.” The Henry Martyn Institute of Islamic Studies. Hyderabad, Andhra Pradesh. 10/29/97.
“Devr” (“God”), a video, taped and edited in collaboration with the Kotas (1990–92). Lecture and screening at:
“The Ethnography of Musical Performance,” an ethnomusicological training workshop, Delhi, 12/1/96
    Archives and Research Center for Ethnomusicology. Delhi, 9/14/92.
“Kota music, ritual and tribal identity.” Institute for Ethnology, Free University, Berlin. 11/18/96.
“Performing Arts, Homelands and the Consolidation of Identities among Indo-Caribbeans and Garinagu in NY City,” 11th Annual NY State Folk Arts Roundtable, Syracuse, NY, 5/10/96.
“Musical traces of ethnic identity formation in the Nilgiri hills of south India,” American Society for Ethnohistory, Kalamazoo, MI, 11/ 5/95.
“Musical definitions of a tribal area: The Nilgiri hills, south India,” Society for Ethnomusicology, Los Angeles, CA, 10/20/95.
“Genre, style and cultural values.” Ohio State  4/26/95.
“Mourning songs and human pasts among the Kotas,”  Columbia Univ. 1995; Conference on South Asia, Madison WI. 11/5/94; Society for Ethnomusicology, Columbus, 4/94.
“Rain, god and unity among the Kotas.”  Delivered at:
    Columbia University, Ethnomusicology colloquium, Music Department,  Fall 1995.
    University of Chicago, Ethnomusicology colloquium, Music Department, 1/12/94.
“Ritual and music among the Kotas.” Lecture series on India.  Indiana University, Bloomington. 3/29/94.
“Music in the constitution of god and corpse among the Kotas of the Nilgiris, South India.” Society for Ethnomusicology, Oxford, Mississippi, 10/30/93.
“Instrumental music among the Kotas, South India.” University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, School of Music, 9/93
“The apotheosis of a musical repertoire: The god tunes of the Kotas, South India.”  Society for Ethnomusicology, Ann Arbor, 3/93.
“Numinous and funerary in Kota performance.” South Asia seminar, University of Chicago, 2/93.
“Musical meaning and Kota instrumental music,” delivered in September 1992 at
    Central Institute of Indian Languages, Mysore, Karnataka
    Anthropology Department, University of Madras
    Indian Music Congress, Jaipur, Rajasthan.
“Ritual, place, and identity in a south Indian tribe: The Kotas of the Nilgiri hills.” University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, South Asia lecture series, 11/19/91.
“Rain ceremonies of the Kotas: A report from the field.” Annual Conference on South Asia, Madison, WI 11/2/91.
“Ceremony and music of the Kotas of south India.” Annual Conference on South Asia, Madison, WI 10/31/91.
“The maintenance of tradition in Karaikkudi vīṇā playing,” Annual Conference on South Asia, Madison, WI 11/4/88.
“Indicators of change,” (in the Karaikkudi vīṇā style).  Society for Ethnomusicology, Bowling
    Green, Ohio, 3/12/88.

Guest (classroom) Lectures

2010    “Karnatak Music. Raga and svara.” Williams College, Music Department. 3/15/10
2009    “Karnatak Music.  Sarasiruhasanapriya.”  Tufts University, Music Department. 11/8/2009
2006    “Karnatak Music: The vina,” World Music, University of Florida, Gainesville, Prof. Welson Tremura, March 31, 2006
2006    “Muharram drumming,” History and Culture of Lucknow, University of Florida, Gainesville, Prof. Amy Bard, March 30, 2006
1999–present     Miscellaneous guest lectures at Harvard
2001    “Units of temporal organization in south Asia,” Musical Theories and Structures, Columbia University, Prof. Dieter Christensen, 4/18/01
“Karnatak Music,” Asian Music Humanities, Columbia University, Prof. Dieter Christensen, 4/19/01.
“Musical cultures of the Nilgiri Hills in South India.”  Music of India.  Amherst College, Prof. David Reck. 4/17/01
2000    “Karnatak Music: A close listening,” Asian Music Humanities, Columbia University, Prof. Dieter Christensen. 4/18/00
1997    “Anthropological Methodology.” Henry Martyn Institute, India 11/31/97
1995    Syracuse University, Anthropology Dept, Prof. Pramod Parajuli, 11/15
    “Theory and practice in Karnatak music.” Theories and Structures, Columbia University. Profs.
        Dieter Christensen and Daniel Ferguson. 9/21/95
    Lecture demonstration on Karnatak Music. Asian Music Humanities. Columbia University.
        11/2/95
        “Karnatak Music,” Indian Music, New York University. Prof. Peter Manuel. 3/31/95
1994    “What African music can teach us about African History: Three approaches,” World History, Anderson University, Anderson, IN.  Prof. Nandita Uppal.
1993&4    “Non-Western Conceptions of Time and Musical Time,” 20th Century Music, Columbia
         College (Chicago).  Prof. McCarthy.
1993    “Conceptions and Origins of music,” 2 lectures for Anthropology of Music, University of Illinois     at Urbana-Champaign. Prof. Bruno Nettl.
1991    “The use of videography in fieldwork,” Ethnographic film. Columbia College (Chicago). Prof.     Joan Erdman
1990    “Improvisation,” a series of three lectures, Indian Music, University of Chicago. Prof. Philip
            Bohlman
1987–9     Miscellaneous Classroom Lectures and Demonstrations, Indian music and Renaissance Lute, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

Other Current Work

Collaboration with Phonetician Peri Bhaskar Rao (ILCAA, Tokyo Institute of Foreign Studies) on the songs of the Todas of South India; based on our individual ongoing work since 1990.  Initiated in Tokyo, March 10-19, 2006.

Ongoing rehearsals with David Nelson (mridangam player, music faculty, Wesleyan University) and Umayalpuram Mali (mridangam player, Chennai, India)

Persian study, analysis of Iranian field materials, research and performances with Iranians in Boston area.

Other Professional Activities

Executive Committee member, The American Institute of Pakistan Studies, 10/1/06-9/1/09
Member of Board of Trustees (representing Harvard University) for The American Institute of Pakistan Studies: 2001-present
South Asia Book Review Editor (with Amy C. Bard) for the Journal of Asian Studies, 7/03-4/08
Editorial Board for EVIA (Ethnomusicological Video for Instruction and Analysis) Digital Archive
Chair, Book Prize Evaluation Committee, American Institute of Pakistan Studies, 2008, 2009
Chair, Book Prize Development Committee, American Institute of Pakistan Studies, 2008
Granting committee, American Institute of Pakistan Studies, 2009
Board of directors (Ethnomusicology), Iranian Journal of Anthropological Research (IJAR), Tehran

Affiliations
Associate Member, Institute of Cross-Cultural Studies, United International College, Zhuhai, China, 2004-2009
Dipartimento di Studi Asiatici, Università Degli Studi di Napoli, “L’Orientale.” (May 20-Aug 10 2006)
Research group on Sufism and History in the Indus Valley at Centre d'Etudes de l'Inde et de l'Asie du sud (EHESS-CNRS), 2009-present

Rapporteur (invited):
Panel: “Diaspora and Music: Retention and Renovation in Music.”  At Seminar,  Remembered Rhythms, Archives and Research Centre for Ethnomusicology, American Institute of Indian Studies, New Delhi, Feb. 6, 2005.

Conference Chair:            
International Society for Traditional Music Colloquium, 2004: Local Theory, Local Practice: South Asian Music.  Harvard University.
Society for Ethnomusicology, Middle Atlantic Chapter, 1996

Panel Chair:
“Poetics of Musical Practice,” 11/20/05.  Society for Ethnomusicology, Atlanta.
“Cultural constructions of time in South Asian Musical Cultures.”  Society for Ethnomusicology, Toronto, 11/2/00
“Laments and related genres.”  Conference on South Asia, Madison WI, 11/99
“Music and the idea of tribe in India,” Society for Ethnomusicology, Los Angeles, CA 10/20/95
“Memory, history, and the management of ideologies in four traditions of musical performance in India,” Conference on South Asia, Madison, WI 11/5/94

Service to the Society for Ethnomusicology
Program Committee, Annual Meeting, 2003
Vice-President, Middle Atlantic Chapter, 3/95–9/96

Grant/Fellow Referee:
American Council of Learned Societies New Faculty Fellows Program (2009)
American Institute of Pakistan Studies (ongoing to present)
UNESCO Proclamation of Masterpieces of Intangible Heritage
Sastri Indo-Canadian Fellowships
American Institute for Sri Lankan Studies
Folk Apprenticeship, New Jersey State Council on the Arts (1996)

Manuscript Referee:
American Ethnologist
Asian Anthropology
Oxford University Press
Ethnomusicology
Ethnomusicology Forum
Asian Music
Yearbook for Traditional Music
Visual Anthropology
Musical Quarterly
Ethnomusicology On-line

Recording Referee: International Council for Traditional Music/UNESCO (several occasions)

Ad Hoc Teaching:
Private vīṇā instructor:  New York City and Chicago IL.  1988–1996
Lecture series on Religion, Culture and Music of India.  Organized lecturers and delivered lectures on a variety of topics to prepare tourists for an educational tour of India. Dec. 1995

Musical Performance and Study

Award:  Jon B. Higgins Memorial Scholarship for the study of Indian classical music, Raga Mala Performing Arts of Canada, 1987 and 1988.

Instruments:
Tār: Mohsen Abtahi, Newton MA, 6/99–intermittently
Vīṇā: Karaikkudi Lakshmi Ammal (Madurai, South India) 1982–3, 1984–5. Dr. K. S. Subramanian (Wesleyan U. and Madras) 1983, 1985. Smt. Ranganayaki Rajagopalan (Madras) 1983, 1985–6, 1990–92 and intermittently to present.
Mridangam: Ramnad V. Raghavan (Oberlin College) 1980–2, 84. Madurai Srinivasa Iyengar (Madurai), 1982–3.
Karnatak Vocal Music: T. Viswanathan, summer 1986; Kamala Ramamurthy (Madurai) 1984–86.
Mbira:  Sherry Sparks (Seattle), summer, 1990.  Patricia Sandler (Univ. of Illinois) 8/93–12/93.
Kora:  Morikeba Kouyaté (Senegalese Griot). 1/94–12/94
West African Drums: Ewe and Dagbamba traditions of Ghana (1993-94 with Gideon Alorwoyie, Abubakari Lunna, and mostly with a group of their American students in Chicago).
Javanese Gamelan: Pat Sri Djoko Roharjo (Oberlin College) 1983–4.  Misc. instructors, University of Illinois, 1987–88. Univ. of Wisconsin, Madison, summer 1987.
Renaissance Lute: Michael Manderen 1980–81. Dr. Loris Chobanian (Oberlin and Baldwin-Wallace) 1981–2; 1983–4.
Classical Guitar: American Conservatory of Music, Chicago, 1979–80.

Professional vīṇā concerts:

2010    June 28.  Gurukulam.  Subhiksha Mira.  33/17 3rd St. East Abhiramapuram.  Chennai. Accompanied by Umayalpuram Mali

    April 10.  Paine Hall. Harvard University. Cambridge, MA. Accompanied by Umayalpuram Mali

2009    Aug 17 House concert, Chennai (home of V.V. Sundaram). Accompanied by Umayalpuram Mali
    Aug 19: Shri Natesan Vidyasala Matriculation Higher Secondary School, Mannivakkam, Chennai. Accompanied by Umayalpuram Mali

1990     University of Chicago (spring).
        Rāga-māla Performing Arts of Canada, Saskatoon, Saskatchewan (spring).

1989    Eastern Illinois University (spring).
        University of Wisconsin, LaCrosse (spring).

1987    Festival of India, Spring Green, Wisconsin (summer).
        Televised appearance on Chitrahar show, channel 26, Chicago (summer).

At Harvard University
Courses:
Foreign Cultures 79 (cotaught with Mark Elliott, Sp. 2007 & Sp 2008): Historical and Musical Paths on the Silk Road
Music 194r (Undergrad and Grad): Gamelan in Performance and Composition
Music 190r (Undergrad and Grad): Music and Islamic Contexts: South Asia, Iran, West Africa
Music 190r (Undergrad and Grad): Music and Islamic Contexts: South and West Asia
Music 190r (Undergrad and Grad): Music of Iran
Music 190r: Vernacular Music of South Asia (Undergrad and Grad)
Music 190rr: Music and Mediation in South Asia (Undergrad and Grad)
Music 207r: Ethnomusicology of Space and Time (Grad Seminar)
Music 207rr: Music and Mourning (Grad Seminar)
Music 207r: Theory and Structure of South Indian Classical Music (Grad Seminar)
Music 201: Current Methods (Grad seminar)
Music 207r: Music and Ritual (Grad seminar)
Music 190r: Classical Music of South India (Undergrad and Grad)
Music 178r: Music Systems, Contexts, Performance (Undergrad)
    Hands-on performance as a point of departure for understanding musical systems.  In 2000, 3 musical systems examined:  Karnatak, Shona mbira, and Persian classical

Student Musical Performance:
Coordinated student studies with Persian musician Mohsen Abtahi and participated with class in musical performances for events in the Iranian community in Dec–Jan 1999–2000, Dec. 22, 2001.
Course Innovation:
Applied for and received course innovation funding from the Dean for Undergraduate Education for the development of the Ethnomusicology Instrument Collection, ancillary hands-on instruction for students, guest lectures, and demonstrations/concerts. (1999-2002)

Music Department Service:

Graduate Adviser (2007-2008, 2009-2010)
Mentorship Committee (2009-2010)
Composer Search Committee (2008-2010)
Tenure-track Faculty review committee for Suzanna Clark (2009-2010)
Curriculum Committee (2007-2009)
Scholarship Committee (2007-2010)
Undergrad thesis adviser (Dennis Sun and Rachel Carpentier 2009-2010)
Undergrad thesis adviser (Laurence Coderre 2006-2007)
Chair and presenter of Alumni Day panel on performance in ethnomusicology (4/07)
Music theory curriculum committee (2005-2006)
Assistant Head Tutor (2001–2002)
Coordinator of Ethnomusicology Lab and Musical Instrument Collection (1999–Present)
Junior Musicology Search Committee (1999–2000)
Musicology Admissions Committee (1999–Present)
Publications Committee (1999–2000)
Senior Thesis Reader (various years)
Participant in Graduate Music Forum’s “Professional Development Day”
Panel chair in Graduate Music Forums conference, “Un-Music”

Miscellaneous University Service and Activities:
Board of Freshman Advisers (2005-2006)
Participant in “Community Conversations” (2005)
Participant in GSAS Alumni Day panel on music (presented research entitled “Kota Culture and Space-time studies”) April 5, 2003, Faculty Club, Room 4.
Kirkland House Senior Common Room (1999–2002)
Mather House Senior Common Room (Present)
Student Faculty Judicial Board (1999–2000)
Ethnomusicology Seminar co-chair, Humanities Center (1999–2007)
Faculty Advisor for “Sangeet” (Student Indian Music Group) (2005-present)
Faculty Advisor for Chinese Music Student Group (2005-2007)
Faculty Advisor: Student Indian Music Group (Mallika Mundkur) (2001–2002)
Senior Thesis Reader, Special Concentrations
Senior Thesis Advisor, Special Concentrations (Jon Natchez); Music (2 students 2006-07)
Graduate Student and Faculty Workshop: South Asia: Culture, Religion, Arts (2000–2002)

University Committees:
Standing Committee on Middle Eastern Studies (2008-present)
Standing Committee on Inner Asia and Altaic Studies (2009-present)
Council on Asian Studies (2008-present)
University Committee on Rights and Responsibilities (2004–2007)
South Asia Initiative Undergraduate Grants Committees (4/08, 4/09)
Asia Center Undergraduate Grants Committee (4/04, 4/08)
Faculty Council (7/03–6/04)
Special Concentrations (1999–present)
Standing Committee on South Asian Studies (1999– present)
GSAS Fellowships Committee (1999–2000)
Dissertation Completion Awards Selection Committee
Hoopes Prize Committee (1999–2004, 2006-present)
Standing Committee on African Studies (2000–2008)
Committee on the Study of Religion (2001–2002)