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Tell Tchaikovsky the News: Rock ’n’ Roll, the Labor Question, and the Musicians’ Union, 1942–1968
- Author(s): Michael James Roberts
- Published: 2014
- Pages: 272
- Illustrations: 9 illustrations
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- Preface ix
- Acknowledgments xiii
- Introduction. Union Man Blues 1
- 1. Solidarity Forever? The Musicians' Union Responds to Radio and Records 19
- 2. Have You Heard the News? There's Good Rockin' Tonight: Hepcats, Wildcats, and the Emergence of Rock 'n 'Roll 41
- 3. If I Had a Hammer: Union Musicians "Bop" Rock 'n ' Roll 113
- 4. A Working-Class Hero Is Something to Be: The Musicians' Union Attempt to Block the British Invasion 167
- Epilogue. Tuned In, Turned On, and Dropped Out: Rock 'n' Roll Music Production Restructures the Music Industry along Non-Union Lines 201
- Notes 209
- Bibliography 233
- Index 243
- Photo gallery follows page 112
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"In this lively study of the remarkable victories and disheartening failures of the American Federation of Musicians, Michael James Roberts presents a strong case that union culture played a central role in the decline of the U.S. labor movement. Focusing on the union's dismissal of rock 'n' roll, Tell Tchaikovsky the News explores how class cleavages—conflicts over what count as culture, taste, talent, skill, and proper expressions of working-class resistance—undermined solidarity among workers. This wonderfully engaging analysis of the class textures of popular music and the cultural politics of the labor movement is a must-read."—Kathi Weeks, author of The Problem with Work: Feminism, Marxism, Antiwork Politics, and Postwork Imaginaries
"In this book Michael James Roberts has succeeded in breaking down the categories of labor studies and aesthetics. Not only has he written a superb account of how the Musicians Union lost its bargaining power with the record industry. He shows that its refusal to recognize the musical value of popular music of the past forty years led to its narrowing and ultimate reduction of influence over the most vital section of the music industry. The book is vividly written, conceptually strong and instructive about the growing complexity of labor relations in the entertainment industry."—Stanley Aronowitz, author of Taking It Big: C. Wright Mills and the Making of Political Intellectuals
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Description
For two decades after rock music first emerged in the 1940s, the American Federation of Musicians, (AFM), the oldest and largest labor union representing professional musicians in the United States and Canada, refused to recognize rock 'n' roll as a legitimate music or its performers as skilled musicians. The AFM never actively organized rock 'n' roll musicians, although recruiting them would have been in the labor union's economic interest. In Tell Tchaikovsky the News, Michael James Roberts argues that the reasons that the union failed to act in its own interest lay in its culture, in the opinions of its leadership and elite rank-and-file members. Explaining the bias of union members, most of whom were classical or jazz music performers, against rock music and musicians, Roberts addresses issues of race and class; questions of what qualified someone as a "skilled" or professional musician; and the threat that records, central to rock 'n' roll, posed to AFM members who had long privileged live performances. He contends that by rejecting rock 'n' rollers for two decades, the once formidable American Federation of Musicians lost their clout within the music industry and contributed to the demise of a viable labor movement in the United States.
About The Author(s)
Michael James Roberts is Associate Professor of Sociology at San Diego State University.