Dr. Chris Scales

Biography

Chris Scales is a Professor of Ethnomusicology at the College of Music and an affiliated faculty member in the American Indian and Indigenous Studies Program at Michigan State University. His research and teaching interests encompass North American Indigenous music and dance, southern Appalachian music, technology, intellectual cultural property, and the North American popular music industry. He authored the book "Recording Culture: Powwow Music and the Aboriginal Recording Industry of the Northern Plains" (Duke University Press, 2012), which delves into contemporary Northern powwow culture and the musical creation occurring at powwow grounds and Aboriginal recording studios, focusing on the effects of technology and mass mediation on powwow performance aesthetics. His work has appeared in various journals, including Ethnomusicology Journal and World Music Journal, as well as in edited volumes, including a well-known undergraduate world music textbook titled "Worlds Music: Introduction to Music of the World’s Peoples" (ed. Jeff Todd Titon, Schirmer/Cengage Learning, 2016). Professor Scales is also active in collaborating with Native musicians and has produced and recorded commercial powwow music projects, expanding his work to include traditional, folk, and popular music genres from performers and groups in the Lansing and greater mid-Michigan area. An active musician himself, he performs traditional southern Appalachian and Irish music using instruments such as fiddle, banjo, guitar, mandolin, and the Shona mbira from Zimbabwe.

Research Interests