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New chair in traditional music
Music to our ears
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| Dr. Beverly Diamond |
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Dr. Beverly Diamond was awarded the Canada Research Chair position in traditional music/ethnomusicology. Dr. Diamond, an internationally renowned ethnomusicologist, will direct and stimulate activity in the further development of the already-rich musical collections of the Memorial University of Newfoundland Folklore and Language Archives (MUNFLA) and will serve as mentor to colleagues and graduate students at Memorial. She will also assume a leadership role in the development of graduate studies in ethnomusicology in Memorial's School of Music.
"Dr. Diamond's appointment marks a new era for traditional music in Newfoundland and Labrador, an era heralded by the progressive thinking of Dr. Tom Gordon at the School of Music," said Anita Best, traditional singer and president of Newfoundland Voices, a company that presents the music and writing of Newfoundland and Labrador artists in unusual locations. "Having this scholarly attention focused on our musical traditions and tradition-bearers will create greater public awareness and appreciation of what many of us consider to be the backbone of our rich and diverse culture."
Dr. Diamond, formerly a professor at York University, Ontario, received her PhD from the University of Toronto. She has co-authored and co-edited several publications on ethnomusicology and indigenous Canadian music, including, Visions of Sound: Musical Instruments of First Nations Communities in Northeastern America, Canadian Perspectives in Ethnomusicology, and Canadian Music: Issues of Hegemony and Identity. She has received major research funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC). Her ethnomusicological fieldwork has taken her to the high Canadian arctic, to the Innu communities of Labrador and recently, to the Saami people of Finland.
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