Introduction to the Special Issue on Composers’ Perspectives on Music and Politics Today

This special issue presents the perspectives of five composers—Hilda Paredes, Andile Khumalo, Marisol Jiménez, Hildegard Westerkamp, and Philippe Manoury—on music and politics today. Originating in the online lecture series ‘Poetics and Politics of Twenty-First-Century Music’, presented in 2021–22 by Universität Bern, McGill University, and Université de Montréal, the articles in this issue expand the composers’ original lectures into statements on the political contexts of their music and the potential of contemporary composition to effect social change. Their works address inequality, discrimination, exploitation, and violence, as well as the global threat of irreversible climate change. Another shared theme is the legacy of colonialism, both as a driving force of these social crises and a continuing challenge for composers who must reckon with Eurocentric attitudes and assumptions. These reflections on the transformative possibilities of musical creation illustrate a wide range of strategies for political engagement and praxis.