From ‘Jamming-jamming lang’ to Stage Gigs: Musical Practices and Transcultural Differences
摘要
This chapter critically examines the characteristics and socio-musical practices of Filipino musicians that enable them to get gigs, expand their networks, and develop their musicality further. In this chapter, I show how these characteristics, skills, and circumstances are reflective of Filipinos’ identities as migrants in multicultural Australia. Beyond ‘mimicking’, Filipino musicians embody creativity through their agency and identity. Furthermore, I discussed the implications of these skills for their migration and musical careers, and in the broader sense of migration, their transnationalism and transculturality. Filipino musicians have brought with them various musical skills from the Philippines, and they have further enhanced these in the diaspora. This chapter also presents cultural, linguistic, and musical differences related to musical practices, lifeways and viewpoints that affect Filipino musicians in accessing further opportunities and interactions outside of the Filipino community. More than a site of collective cultural identity and memory, the musical performance of cover music becomes a way for Filipinos to affirm their place in Australia and create a channel to confront their invisibility in the industry and the wider foreign environment they are in.