Bollywood Sounds

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The vast majority of films produced by Mumbai's commercial Hindi language film industry - known world-wide as Bollywood - feature songs as a central component of the cinematic narrative. While many critics have addressed the visual characteristics of these song sequences, very few have engaged with their aurality and with the meanings that they generate within the film narrative and within Indian society at large. Because the film songs operate as powerful sonic ambassadors to individual and cultural memories in India and abroad, however, they are significant and carefully-constructed works of art. Bollywood Sounds focuses on the songs of Indian films in their historical, social, and commercial contexts. Author Jayson Beaster-Jones walks the reader through the highly collabora

Jayson Beaster-Jones is Assistant Professor of Music and Performance Studies at Texas A&M University. He has conducted several years of ethnographic research on music, commodities, and value in the North Indian music industry. He has published his research in the journals Ethnomusicology, Popular Music, and South Asian Popular Culture and has contributed chapters to several edited volumes.

- Preface
- Chapter 1: Bollywood Sounds
- Chapter 2: Film Songs at the End of the Colonial Era and the Emergence of Filmi Style
- Chapter 3: 'But My Heart is Still Indian:' Film Songs of the Early Post-Colonial Era
- Chapter 4: The Language and Lyrics of Hindi Films
- Chapter 5: Songs in the Key of the Angry Young Man and the Cabaret Woman
- Chapter 6: Liberalization, Family Films, and the Rise of Bollywood
- Chapter 7: Film Songs in the Era of the Multiplex and YouTube
- Chapter 8: Concluding Thoughts on the Art and Commerce of Hindi Film Songs
- Appendix A: Timelines of Key Figures
- Appendix B: Recommended Listening and Viewing
- Glossary
- Bibliography
- Filmography
- Discography