Nostalgia, Song and the Quest for Home

What does it mean to evoke a sense of home through song, or intentionally utilize nostalgia in songwriting?
This book explores a neglected aspect of scholarship surrounding the study of song-its relationship with nostalgia and notions of 'home,' in the broadest sense. Each essay in this collection studies these factors from the perspective of 'production', 'text' and 'reception,' either individually or in combination. Making use of frameworks such as Marxism, critical theory and hauntology, this is a propulsive study of the global cultural phenomena of nostalgia music.
From the perspective of 'production,' authors explore nostalgia as technique and the commercialization of nostalgia. The section focused on 'text' features case studies of nostalgic songs or albums about home and musicological analyses of the nostalgic trends of songwriters, songs, albums. Finally, the 'reception' essays facilitate examination of nostalgic narratives from the subjective and varying perspectives of audiences or listeners.
Whether identifying with Bruce Springsteen or ABBA, or hailing from Ukraine or New Zealand, the featured music speaks to a listener's sense of home and self. From music of the Serbian diaspora and Country 'n' Irish music, which speak of a nostalgia for a homeland (or time) to which one cannot return, to a song performed in the Wuhan dialect for listeners who could not leave their homes during COVID containment, these collected essays feature the music of artists whose audiences have found and clung to a version of themselves.

Paul Carr is Professor Emeritus in Popular Music Analysis at the University of South Wales, UK. His research interests focus on musicology, the music industry and pedagogical frameworks for music related education. His most recent publications include co-editing The Bloomsbury Handbook of Rock Music Research (2020), an economic assessment of the Welsh Music Industry (2022) and editorship of a special double edition of the Journal of World Popular Music on the impacts of Covid-19 (2022). He is also an experienced performing musician, having toured and recorded with artists as diverse as The James Taylor Quartet and ex-Miles Davis saxophonist Bob Berg.

Acknowledgements
List of Contributors
Introduction
1. Home, Song and Nostalgia
Paul Carr (University of South Wales, UK)
2. History, Postmodernism and the Music Industry
Paul Carr (University of South Wales, UK)
3. Production, Text and Reception
Paul Carr (University of South Wales, UK)

Part 1: Production
4. 'Tales from the Surrey Countryside': Paul Weller's Wild Wood and Modernist Nostalgia as Hypochondria of the Heart
Peter Hughes Jachimiak (University of South Wales, UK)
5. Navigating the Ties That Bind: Nostalgia, Bruce Springsteen, and the "Long Walk Home"
Carlee Migliorisi (Monmouth University, USA)
6. A Lifetime, One Day: Nostalgia and Dream in the Latest Album of Silvia Pérez Cruz
Julia Escribano Blanco (University of Valladolid, Spain)
7. Nostalgia of the Frontier: Baja Mali Knindza and the Songs of Serbian Diaspora
Ondrej Daniel (Charles University, Czech Republic)
8. Sound Resignifications and Technostalgic Incursions: the Revival in Music Production
África González (Universidad Complutense de Madrid, Spain)
Part 2: Text
9. When You Come Back Home: The Front Lawn and their Dream Home in New Zealand
Matthew Bannister (Wintec University, New Zealand)
10. Narrating home in times of war: Ukrainian Popular Music after the Russian Full-Scale Invasion
Anna Glew (University of Liverpool, UK)
11. Hanyangmen Garden: Nostalgia and solace in dialectal folk song during Covid-19
Yangke Li (Humboldt University of Berlin, Germany)
Part 3: Reception
12. Back Where We've Never Been: Daniel O'Donnell and the Country 'n' Irish Imaginary
Stan Erraught (University of Leeds, UK)
13. 'Let's Win Another Trophy Like We Did in '55': Representations of the North East throughout Makina Music
Chris Inglis (BIMM Bristol, UK)
14. "Abba Were my Constant and my Saviour": How Nostalgia, Memories, and Notions of 'Home' Shape Peoples Favourite ABBA Songs
Shanika C.S Ranasinghe (Royal Holloway, University of London, UK)
Index