Description
This fellowship, endowed in honor of Adrienne Fried Block, shall be given to support scholarly research leading to publication on topics that illuminate musical life in large urban communities. Preference shall be given to projects that focus on the interconnections among the groups and organizations present in these metropolitan settings and their participation in the wide range of genres that inform the musical life and culture of their cities.
No more than one award will be offered in each cycle. The amount of the award each cycle will vary depending on the interest generated by its endowment. The maximum award is $3,000.
Eligibility
Applicants must be members in good standing of the Society for American Music.
Application Requirements
In addition to the application form, please provide the following materials:
- Narrative of no more than four double-spaced pages, not including an optional bibliography. The narrative should describe the scope and significance of the project, including how it illuminates musical life in large urban communities, as well as its expected outcomes (dissertation, book, article, talks, etc.)
- A detailed budget document that describes all expenses as well as any other sources of funding that have been received or for which additional applications are pending.
Deadline
October 15
Past Fellows
| Year | Winners |
|---|---|
| 2026 | Scott Spencer, Never Forget--Piping for the Fallen |
| 2025 | Kristie Soares, "Macho Man: Performances of Latinidad in Disco Music" |
| 2024 | Leo Sarbanes "Listening Back to Look Forward: Historicizing Orchestra-Community Relationships in the United States" |
| 2023 | Kimberly Hannon Teal, “Out to Play: Jazz Festivals, Race, and Place” |
| 2022 | Co-winners: Aimee E. González “Reviving, Reimagining, and Reclaiming Cuba’s Colonial Musical Past, 1990–Present” Jasmine A. Henry “Jersey Club: Race, Place and Black Club Culture in Newark, New Jersey” |
| 2021 | Co-winners: Cesar Favila, "Immaculate Sounds: The Musical Lives of Nuns in Colonial Mexico City and Puebla" Victoria Mogollón Montagne, "The Vehemence of Sound: Affect and Violence in Venezuelan Espiritismo Marialioncero" |
| 2020 | Co-winners: Emily Ruth Allen, “Home of the ‘Original’ U.S. Mardi Gras: Mobile, Alabama and its Brass Bands” Kyle DeCoste, “Popular Music and the Politics of Black Childhood |
| 2019 | Co-winners: Matthew Joseph, “Syncopating Segregation: Musical Cross-Pollination in Post World War II New York City” Andre Fludd, “Indian classical music in New York City: The Birth of an Independent Ecosystem” |
| 2018 | Co-winners: Jessica Hajek, “The Capital of Carnival: Alibabá Carnival Music and Dance in Santo Domingo and New York City as Social Enterprise and Performance Complex” Craig Jennex, Music Culture, Liberation Politics, and the Promise of Queer Collectivity in New York City |
| 2017 | Co-winners: Austin Richey, “Musical Expression in the African/Zimbabwean Diaspora” Christopher J. Wells, “ ‘Feeling Every Note’: Embodiment, Community, and Precarity at Jazz 966” |
| 2016 | Lauron Kehrer, “Beyond Beyoncé: Intersections of Race, Gender, and Sexuality in Contemporary American Hip-Hop (ca. 2004–2014)” |
| 2015 | Davide Ceriani, “Defining Italian Cultural Identity in New York City through Opera: The Years of Mass Migration (1879–1924)” |
| 2014 | Kate Galloway, “From Cityscapes to Landscapes: Collaborations and Collisions between Natural and Built Environments in Hildegard Westerkamp’s Soundscape Compositions” |
| 2013 | Marianne Betz, “G. W. Chadwick’s The Padrone (1913) or: Opportunities and Obstacles for Opera in Boston” |
| 2012 | Carolyn Guzski, “Race at the Opera: Artists of Color at the Metropolitan, 1916–1926” |
| 2011 | Deniz Ertan, “Transit and Difference in Musical America, 1908–1923” |
| 2010 | Patrick Warfield, “Sousa’s Washington” |