Creating the Nashville Sound: A Case Study in Commercial Culture Production (Tennessee)

The thesis is an interpretive analysis of country music production in the 1950s and early 60s. It explains the change in the music during the period as the result of symbolic negotiation within the country music industry. The Nashville Sound is seen as the resolution of a struggle to construct a form of music that was considered country, but was acceptable to a wider audience. The analysis is based in a developed "interpretive approach" to commercial culture production. It examines the history and nature of country music, the changing radio/record relationship in the 1950s, the tension in Nashville between the values of the Grand Ole Opry and those of the developing Music Row. It uses Patsy Cline's recording career to illustrate how the music served as an arena in which values and beliefs were negotiated. It concludes with an analysis of how change in a cultural form affects the ability of symbolic material to articulate a social group.

Name thesis:degree_name

Ph.D.

Level thesis:degree_level

Dissertation

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Speech Communication

Grantor

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Year dc:date

1984

Author dc:creator

• Jensen, Joli Kathleen

• Mass Communications

Language dc:language

eng

Identifier

(UMI)AAI8422090

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:www.ideals.illinois.edu:2142/77275