Item Details

Pompey Pop: A case study of a local music archive

Issue: Vol 12 No. 1 (2019) Special Issue: Lost Musical Histories— Curating and Documenting Local Popular Music-Making in the UK

Journal: Popular Music History

Subject Areas: Popular Music

DOI: 10.1558/pomh.39553

Abstract:

This article provides a retrospective account of the author's long-time involvement with 'PompeyPop', a project uncovering the somewhat neglected history of the impact of popular music inPortsmouth. The article demonstrates how the dedication of the author, a retired employeeof Portsmouth University, to this community initiative has established the importance of popularmusic to this working-class city and, most importantly, how it has challenged notionsof 'mainstream' history. After describing the growth of light entertainment in post-SecondWorld War Portsmouth, it challenges a number of preconceptions, ranging from notions ofnew styles 'sweeping away' their predecessors, to tokenized histories of the post-war periodalways being 'depressed', to notions of the swinging sixties being centred exclusively in certainparts of London. Regarding the latter, the article outlines a methodological problem, wherewriters such as Dominic Sandbrook are regarded as focusing exclusively on archival research, asopposed to also including the oral histories of ordinary people who lived through the period.

Author: Dave Allen

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