Charles Edward Hamm (April 21, 1925 – October 16, 2011) was an American

musicologist Musicology (from Greek μουσική ''mousikē'' 'music' and -λογια ''-logia'', 'domain of study') is the scholarly analysis and research-based study of music. Musicology departments traditionally belong to the humanities, although some mu ...

, writer,

composer A composer is a person who writes music. The term is especially used to indicate composers of Western classical music, or those who are composers by occupation. Many composers are, or were, also skilled performers of music. Etymology and Defi ...

, and music educator. He is credited with being the first music historian to seriously study and write about American

popular music Popular music is music with wide appeal that is typically distributed to large audiences through the music industry. These forms and styles can be enjoyed and performed by people with little or no musical training.Popular Music. (2015). ''Fun ...

. He also was one of the founders of the

International Association for the Study of Popular Music The International Association for the Study of Popular Music (abbreviated IASPM) is an international learned society dedicated to the scholarly study of popular music. It was established in September 1981, with Charles Hamm and Simon Frith as two ...

(IASPM). Born in Charlottesville, Virginia, Hamm graduated from the

University of Virginia The University of Virginia (UVA) is a Public university#United States, public research university in Charlottesville, Virginia. Founded in 1819 by Thomas Jefferson, the university is ranked among the top academic institutions in the United S ...

in 1947 where he was a member of the

Virginia Glee Club The Virginia Glee Club is a men's chorus based at the University of Virginia. It performs both traditional and contemporary vocal works typically in TTBB arrangements. Founded in 1871, the Glee Club is the university's oldest musical organization ...

Zachary Woolfe Zachary Woolfe is an American music critic who specializes in classical music. Since 2022 he has been chief classical music critic for ''The New York Times''. Education and career Woolfe studied at Princeton University. Although he "had wr ...

wrote in ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

'' that "Mr. Hamm was one of the first scholars to study the history of American popular music with musicological rigor and sensitivity to complex racial and ethnic dynamics, and both oral and written traditions. He traced pop’s history not just to its full recent flowering in the 1950s or to the 19th century and

Stephen Foster Stephen Collins Foster (July 4, 1826January 13, 1864), known also as "the father of American music", was an American composer known primarily for his parlour music, parlour and Minstrel show, minstrel music during the Romantic music, Romantic ...

, but also to the colonial-era compositions that created the context for all that followed." In 2002 he was awarded a Lifetime Achievement Award by the

Society for American Music The Society for American Music (SAM) was founded in 1975 and was first named the Sonneck Society in honor of Oscar George Theodore Sonneck, early Chief of the Music Division in the Library of Congress and pioneer scholar of American music. The S ...

. He died of

pneumonia Pneumonia is an inflammatory condition of the lung primarily affecting the small air sacs known as alveoli. Symptoms typically include some combination of productive or dry cough, chest pain, fever, and difficulty breathing. The severity ...

, leaving 3 sons.

Works

*''Yesterdays: Popular Song in America'' (1979) *''Music in the New World'' (1983) *''Putting Popular Music in its Place'' (1995) *''Irving Berlin: Songs From the Melting Pot'' (1997) *''Graceland Revisited''

References

External links

* Collection guide to Charles Hamm Recordings, University of Pittsburgh {{DEFAULTSORT:Hamm, Charles 1925 births 2011 deaths University of Virginia alumni 20th-century American musicologists 21st-century American musicologists People from Charlottesville, Virginia Du Fay scholars