Globalization's impact on music evolution and artistic experimentation

Globalization and Impact

Globalization is the sum and synergy of their continued presences. Thus, globalization, a process, takes on concrete historical features, rather than floating as a vague abstraction high above actual, even everyday life. 'Globalization has added new dimension to human life. Different aspects related to the human behavior and life style have amended, and the exchange of knowledge, concepts and ideas have lead towards improved and better understanding of human cultural ideology' (Negus, K. (1999). The expansion of business activities is the cause of globalization. The social and political ideology have never influenced an individual or group to seek and learn from people living on the other part of the land, however the economic motives and financial prosperity have convinced the people to dislocate and avail possible business opportunities. 'The economic prosperity further attracted the individuals and group to understand and accept the cultural and social ideology of the people' Morley, D. & Robins, K. (1995).). The set of cultural and social activities influenced the intruders, and it was observed that, economic gains can never be secured or achieved without appreciating and accepting the social and cultural affiliation of the local people. Therefore what we conclude is that, globalization was launched with ulterior motives of achieving economic gains, and ended up with the social and cultural intermingle of the people. It has to be realized that for ages the cultural element has influenced the people, people are easily motivated by culture. The culture encompasses musical and artistic activities.

MUSIC and IMPACT of GLOBALIZATION

Music is evolutionary art; it evolves, and undergoes series of transformation. The music keeps on changing; the nature of the music is never the same' (Taylor, T. (1997. Before globalization it was the local creativity and experience that altered and transformed the music. The impact of globalization has been tremendous, it is because presently it is not just certain number of people who are investing their learning and creativity on the progress of music, and rather it includes the participation of other music admirers and professionals all over the world. In the current era of globalization, the people are fonder of experimentation that was never evident before globalization. The series of experimentations have developed the music, however it is not correct to interpret that globalization has contributed towards significantly towards the development of music. We observe so many musicians performing their music, the music which in most of the case is the blend of classic and rock, however not all the performers receive the same response from the audience. It has to be understood that, globalization has undoubtedly expanded the spectrum of local music, and provided with a chance to relate with foreign music, but this has resulted in artistic introducing large number of musical work piece, and not all receive the same nature of appreciation and accolades.' In the present era, the chances of the failure of a musical work piece have increased, because not all the blend of musical forms is preferred' (Robinson, D. (1991) Therefore the musical development has taken place, but its admiration has not received great appreciation because not all the experiments are successful.

The globalization of music has been influenced by the global consumerism, the company making huge profits within certain geographical domain, have the lust to expand its services and network to increase and achieve more profitable results. The multinational companies therefore when move into other countries try to fascinate them not with the local culture, rather the company introduced itself with such campaigns in which foreign music is included to capture the interest of the local market. From this example we conclude that people do have fascination and interest towards non-local music. And it is the conduct of experiment that will result in the success and failure of the music. It has to be understood that people do not have any patriotic feeling towards their local music; music is never categorized or termed by level of patriotism, it is about the comfort of human mind. Music, irrespective of its regional affiliation, if succeeds in providing mental comfort to the listener, is a major hit. What globalization has offered is it, now the listener has many options to avail different types of music, and the musician has different music to be applied for composition. Globalization has provided the listener and musicians with different options, the listener has the option to choose the music that soothe, and musician has the option to target any particular audience it desires. Therefore globalization has contributed significantly towards the development and growth of music. The music has now been able to reach the audience for which it was composed. 'If globalization has provided an entrepreneur with an option of applying and availing the economic opportunities, it has also provided a musician with an option to apply and promote the music into an area where the musicians can expect any success and admiration' (Bennett, a. (2000)).

MUSIC and RESEARCH

The research and commercial practices have also expanded the horizons of music and its composition. Taking into account each technological mode that has contributed significantly towards the growth of the music, we observe that it is technology that supported and expanded globalization, and it is the very same globalization that has supported music. The local music of any particular region never received any opportunity of exhibition, and therefore people belonging to other regions were totally strange of the music, although previously the trade between those regions existed, but the purpose of interaction between the regions was mainly trade, the economic concerns never provided the people with chance to concentrate and research the local music of other regions. The era of globalization has realized that music is not any specific mode of entertainment; music is actually a world in itself, a world that has the power to provide spiritual and mental comfort to the people. Music itself has a history, and globalization has made people understand its significance and importance. Therefore what we presently observe is that music has evolved as a subject, and has gained popularity due to the vastness of the subject.

ROLE of ELECTRONIC MEDIA

The role of the media, broadly understood to include all forms of telecommunications, the Internet and computers, print and tele-visual journalism, the music industry and all forms of visual media, in the era of globalization, has resulted in development and popularity of music. Various forms of media from the point-of-view of an increasingly mobile population have used local, national, and international media networks in very many different ways towards the development of music. 'Internet offers different schemes and services that provide user with an opportunity to gather info about latest music and sound tracks' (Sharma, S, Hutnyk, J., Sharma, a. (1997)). Different web links offer free music download, the user has the option to choose and select different songs, from different countries, of different singers.

Music has turn out to be money making industry, earlier it was only a source of entertainment, but now it is a source of livelihood for millions around the world. The globalization has been a source of international promotion of local popular artist musicians and vocalist. Many musicians from east and west conduct their live concert throughout the world; this has not only resulted in the world wide popularity of the musicians, but has provided financial rewards to the musicians, composers and all those who have been related with the promotional campaign. Those who offer services of music download for free, in actual are earning a lot because their fee downloads are supported by advertisement of different international and regional brands. Radio and Television channels are started to attend worldwide calls from the viewers, and are provided with an opportunity to watch and listen to their favorite songs. The musicians and vocalists are involved in television commercial, this never happened before globalization, the vocalist even sing of the brands. Vocalists and musicians are interviewed, and in many of the cases the top class musicians are given media coverage around the clock, this include the example of Elton John, Shakira, Amithab Bachacan, and many others. The music industry has commercialized much because of people's likeness and admiration towards quality music. Globalization has also taken into account the services and contribution of those who expired before, famous of all Elvis, the singer has received international popularity after his demise, only because the television, radio and internet media offered different polls, and free downloads of Elvis hits, the musicians who was earlier strange for the people to the people in Asia, is now very common, and in fact is among the favorites, the popularity graph of Elvis is climbing day by day, and all this is because the media has been successfully in reflecting his contribution. Of course media conducted this exercise, not only to pay tribute to the music legend; but also because the media expected to make profit out from his hits. The media was successful in achieving the results; it attained rewards through commercial promotion of Elvis.

The contemporary revolution in communication technology has had a dramatic impact in the arena of popular music. Information technology enables a wide diversity of local popular music to develop and reach a larger audience. For example, "world music" has developed a major international audience. Old and new musical traditions that a few years ago were limited to a small local audience are now playing on the world stage. On the other hand, globalization has increased transmission of popular music easily and inexpensively from the developed countries of the North throughout the world. Consequently, despite efforts of nationally-based media to develop local television, movie, and video programs, many media markets in countries of Africa, Asia, and Latin America are saturated with productions from the U.S., Europe and a few countries in Asia (especially Japan and India). Local critics of this trend lament not only the resulting silencing of domestic musical expression, but also the hegemonic reach of Western, alien music and the potential global homogenization of values and musical taste.

The past two decades have seen an internationalization of information services involving the exponential expansion of computer-based communication through the Internet and electronic mail' (Schiller, H. (1989)). On the one hand, the electronic revolution has promoted the diversification and democratization of information as people in nearly every country are able to communicate their opinions and perspectives on issues, local and global, that impact their lives. Music fans from different regions have effectively used information technology to promote their perspectives and movements. On the other hand, this expansion of information technology has been highly uneven, creating an international "digital divide" (i.e., differences in access to and skills to use Internet and other information technologies due predominantly to geography and economic status). Often, access to information technology and to telephone lines in many developing countries is controlled by the state or is available only to a small minority who can afford them. In recent years there has been a significant shift in the transmission and reporting of entertainment news with the rise of a small number of global news services. Only certain agencies have the power to construct and disseminate entertainment highlights.