UCLA ethnomusicology graduate student Ryan Koons plays the nyckelharpa, which is a traditional Swedish string instrument. He performs “Harppolska,” a song composed by Olov Johansson.
Category Archives: Music
Graduate student musician carries on childhood folk music roots
Ryan Koons removes the nyckelharpa from its case leaning against the wooden wall of his family’s cabin in Maryland. As his fingers climb the small keys along the side of the instrument, his parents join in on the folksy tune and music fills the small, dimly lit room. Outside the dining room walls of his […]
Student musician captures momentary emotions with R&B, verse
An unfamiliar and haunting melody snuck up on Chris Pree the same way it always did. He would be walking to class, talking to friends or trying to do his homework when a tune would tangle itself around his thoughts. His instincts told him to get the melody down from the nebulous space of his […]
Q&A: Musician from student jazz band Swingers on musical reinvention, performance
The Swingers looked up to jazz artists like Freddie Hubbard and Charlie Parker, yet never replicated their performances exactly. The members of this seven-piece student jazz band used their love for classic jazz music to reinvent it in their own unique way. Joseph Kwon, a second-year jazz ethnomusicology student and organizer of the group, practices […]
Student finds voice through radio show hosting, radio-charity program
Samantha Stewart returns to her dorm room at the end of the day, picks out one of the four blankets laying on her bed, then proceeds to her desk. With her microphone plugged into her laptop, the third-year psychology student opens a recording software and throws the blanket over her head and computer screen to […]
UCLA professor displays the Turkish ud
Assistant professor of ethnomusicology Münir Beken exhibits the Turkish ud, a pear-shaped string instrument resembling a guitar. Watch this video as Beken’s extensive experience shows in his expert handling of this stringed instrument.
Middle Eastern music concert celebrates harmony, humanity
BY KAYLA HAUSMANN A&E contributor khausmann@media.ucla.edu Farzad Amoozegar straddled two cultures, North American and Iranian, throughout much of his childhood. Before he was 9, the Persian language, culture and food had begun to shape his identity as an Iranian; after moving to Canada and then to America, he discovered music to bridge the gap between […]