Roundtable

Placing music in dialogue with state power and civic authority through the medium of the moving Soviet body, this roundtable foregrounds mainstream musics not often privileged in musicological studies of the Soviet Union. Whether through the deliberate censorship of “degenerate jazz” in the ‘30s or the curated presentation of “communist breakdancing” in the ‘80s, Soviet cultural authorities took special interest in controlling the bodies of the nation. Sometimes prohibited and other times encouraged, dance music was almost always regulated: the Soviet government understood how powerful the body could be as a site for an affective politics. At the same time, as evidenced through the circulation of contraband records, stilyagi, and underground nightlife, so too did ordinary individuals assert their own authority and agency through dance music. Allison Brooks-Conrad will discuss questions of ethnicity, identity, and aesthetics in Soviet-Kazakh musician Roza Rymbaeva’s disco-inspired synthpop. Gabrielle Cornish explores the late Soviet techno and breakdancing youth cultures in Moscow and Leningrad, while Kevin Karnes will look at new wave and post-punk scenes in Riga clubs. Maria Sonevytsky will speak about young musicians and efforts to discipline children’s bodies in the Song and Dance Ensemble of the Kyiv Palace of Pioneers. And lastly, Destiny Meadows will share reflections on aerobics, audiocasette circulation, and identity in the Soviet Union in the 1980s. Together, we ask how dance music, often intended to cultivate joy, ecstasy, or release, offers perspectives on both state efforts to discipline the Soviet body and the everyday experience of musical affect.