Description
Book SynopsisMaurice O. Wallace explores the sonic character of Martin Luther King Jr.'s voice and how a mixture of architecture, acoustics, sound technology, and gospel influenced it.
Trade Review"
King's Vibrato provides the opportunity to listen to and hear black cultural history through the ears of Maurice O. Wallace." -- Diane Grams * Ethnic and Racial Studies *
Table of ContentsAcknowledgments ix
Introduction 1
I. Architectures of the Incantatory
1. Dying Words: The Aural Afterlife of Martin Luther King Jr. 21
2. Swinging the God Box: Modernism, Organology, and the Ebenezer Sound 43
3. The Cantor King: Reform Preaching, Cantorial Style, and Acoustic Memory in Chicago’s Black Belt 71
II. Nettie’s Nocturne
4. King’s Gospel Modernism: The Politics of Lament, the Politics of Loss 97
5. Four Women: Alberta, Coretta, Mahalia, Aretha 138
III. Technologies of Freedom
6. King’s Vibrato: Visual Oratory and the “Sound of the Photograph” 185
7. Dream Variations: “I Have a Dream” and the Sonic Politics of Race and Place 229
Epilogue. “It’s
Moanin’ Time”: Black Grief and the End of Words 273
Notes 281
Bibliography 325
Index 343
