i-say-high-you-say-low-the-beatles-and-cultural-hierarchies-in-1960s-and-1970s-britain.pdf (420.58 kB)
‘I say high, you say low’: the Beatles and cultural hierarchies in 1960s and 1970s Britain
The debate over the cultural value of the Beatles was as vehement as it was significant in 1960s and early 1970s Britain. Lennon and McCartney's early compositions received some early critical plaudits, Sgt. Pepper sought to blur distinctions between high and low culture and the band members’ side projects forged links with the avant garde. To accept the Beatles as artists, however, required critics to rethink how art was created, disseminated and evaluated and how it interacted with contemporary social, economic and technological change. This article makes extensive use of contemporary journalism, scholarship and fan literature, much of it unstudied, to demonstrate that the rethinking process was contested and protracted. No consensus emerged. Claims made for their artistry, which contributed to a wider discourse elevating ‘rock’ over ‘pop’, were countered by cultural conservatives who defended their own status as artists and intellectuals by exposing the Beatles as kitsch.
History
School
- Social Sciences and Humanities
Department
- Politics and International Studies
Published in
Popular MusicVolume
39Issue
3-4Pages
401 - 419Publisher
Cambridge University Press (CUP)Version
- VoR (Version of Record)
Rights holder
© The AuthorsPublisher statement
This is an Open Access Article. It is published by Cambridge University Press under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International Licence (CC BY 4.0). Full details of this licence are available at: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Acceptance date
2019-12-11Publication date
2021-03-19Copyright date
2021ISSN
0261-1430eISSN
1474-0095Publisher version
Language
- en
Depositor
Dr Marcus Collins. Deposit date: 10 July 2020Usage metrics
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