Tafel Talks: Music as Resistance
Panelists
Torquil Campbell, member of the band Stars; co-host of Soft Revolution podcast
Kate Helsen, Assistant Professor, Don Wright Faculty of Music at the University of Western Ontario; member of Tafelmusik Chamber Choir
Reginald Mobley, countertenor; programming consultant for Handel and Haydn Society
Moderator
Raha Javanfar, musician, theatre performer, creator, theatre lighting designer, and educator, currently teaching at Ryerson University
MUSIC AS RESISTANCE: Beyond protest songs
A conversation that explores how music has given voice to resistance over the centuries, whether political, religious, social, or economic. Music is a concise, effective, and universally understood way to convey the complexity of human existence. Music is easily passed down and internalized.
Throughout history, music has been a means of expressing resistance against the status quo, either openly or covertly. From Bach’s struggles with Leipzig town councillors to prioritize art over ideology, to Billy Bragg and the Red Wedge movement in Thatcher-era England, and from cloistered 17th century nuns whose music challenged papal authority, to the rise of Black gospel music during the Civil Rights movement, music has done the heavy lifting when words alone failed.