A classificação automática de gêneros musicais é uma tarefa importante na área de recuperação da informação musical. Para auxiliar esta tarefa diversos recursos linguísticos de processamento de linguagem natural vem sendo utilizado sem letras de músicas. Isto é importante considerando que a classificação baseada em áudio pode ser complementada com características das letras de músicas para auxiliar na melhoria dos resultados. Este trabalho busca realizar a análise de tais ferramentas de processamento de linguagem natural aplicadas as letras de músicas em diferentes idiomas para a classificação de gêneros musicais. Além disso, foram estudadas outras técnicas para melhorar os resultados da classificação, como por exemplo, combinação de características por meio de early fusion e late fusion. Para realizar os experimentos foram criadas três bases de dados com letras de músicas em diversos gêneros nos idiomas Latinos (Português e Espanhol), Nórdicos (Dinamarquês, Norueguês e Sueco) e Inglês. Os resultados obtidos demonstram que a combinação das abordagens por meio das técnicas de late fusion através do produto da probabilidade e da técnica de early fusion proporcionaram os melhores resultados na classificação de gêneros musicais utilizando letras de músicas em diferentes idiomas. / The automatic music genre classification is an important area in music information retrieval. For assist this task many languages resources of natural language processing has been used in song lyrics. This is important considering that the classification audio-based might be comple- mented with lyrics features to improve the results. This work analyzes such natural language processing tools employed to song lyrics in different languages for the music genre classi- fication. Furthermore, we studied other techniques to improve the classification results, for example, features combination by mean of early and late fusion methods. To run the experiments were created three lyrics database in various music genres into the Latin languages (Portuguese and Spanish), Nordic (Danish, Norwegian and Swedish) and En- glish. The results obtained shown that the combination approaches by mean of late fusion with product of the probability and early fusion outperformed the other approaches in music genre classification using song lyrics in different languages.

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Humans thrive on placing everyday perceptions into discrete categories. These categories, including genres in popular music, help us understand the world around us and process new information in a relatively efficient way. But music theorists often take genre for granted, by which I mean most scholars rarely unpack how social and musical categories work together to codify and reinforce often racial and gendered lines placed between categories of people and music. In Reconceiving Genre, I address some the methodological issues around genre in popular music. This dissertation argues for a reframing of genre and what these labels can convey. Through different generic case studies in each chapter, I develop a framework for analyzing genre from multiple musical and cultural traditions. I critically examine social and commercial constructions of popularity and authenticity in relation to artist’s presentations of gender, race, class, and sexuality— positionalities that are often taken for granted in popular music analysis. This dissertation’s most distinctive contribution to both music theory and popular music studies is that it dismantles the idea that genre is only a marketing label that conveys details about an artist’s musical style, and challenges assumptions that genre is “dead” or beyond repair to be a meaningful tool. These assumptions dull the transgressive force of how we can use genre to understand issues of authenticity, popularity, and society more broadly. In short, my project demonstrates that genre categories can reveal as much about an artist’s identity as they can about a piece’s musical features. Thus, theories of genre need to account for identities like race, gender, and sexuality of artists, listeners, and even analysts in order to be fully inclusive, meaningful, and accessible.

Beyond the Binary explores the intersection of gender with cross-cultural identity in composer Reena Esmail's professional life and choral music. This intersection manifests in her musical style, which accesses the resonant spaces between Western and Indian classical music. I argue that it is through the convergence of Esmail's gender identity with her cross-cultural identity that her compositions challenge gender norms and break down perceived barriers between East and West, inviting her listeners into an intersectional feminist space. This project synthesizes musicological, theoretical, and ethnographic methods, and is meant as a starting point for choral musicians and scholars to consider cultural difference and its impact on choral music. What begins as a consideration of social themes within Esmail's life and work culminates in a practical musical analysis and performance practice guide to aid conductors in preparation of Esmail's music. The compositions discussed are I Rise: Women in Song (2016), Take What You Need (2016), TaReKiTa (2016), Tuttarana (2014), and This Love Between Us: Prayers for Unity (2016).

This qualitative study analyses gendered metaphors in selected Zimbabwean Shona songs. The study explores how musicians deploy gendered metaphors to propagate, reinforce or challenge gender views and positions held in the Zimbabwean contemporary society. The corpus of data comprised Shona popular songs released between 1988 and 2018 and down loaded from You-tube. The songs were transcribed, translated into English and metaphors identified and interpreted using a combination of the Pragglejaz Group (2007), Steen (2007) and Charteris-Black (2004) metaphor identification methods. Charteris-Black’s (2004) Critical Metaphor Analysis was adopted as the key theory and method of analysis. The analysis drew support from Lazar's (2007) Feminist Critical Discourse Analysis, Foucault (1980) and Butler's (1990) ideas on discourse and gender. The findings reveal that Zimbabwean musicians singing in Shona discursively use gendered metaphors to construct, reinforce or challenge views and positions on gender. While the metaphors describe and evaluate men and women positively and negatively for ideological purposes, the metaphors largely marginalise women more than men. The metaphors therefore, have the effect of legitimising and naturalising male dominance in the Zimbabwean society. However, the same musicians occasionally utilise metaphor discoursal power to resist, challenge and control the dominance. Metaphors become a conduit through which topical contemporary gender issues, norms and values, gender views and positions are highlighted and debated. Two contesting ideologies were noted: one ideology emphasised that women are inferior to men and men should tolerate them for their weaknesses and the second projected women as men’s equals and that men and women roles complement each other. It is the conclusion of this study that gendered metaphors in Shona song lyrics allow musicians to discursively and for ideological purposes reinforce, contest and negotiate various gender perspectives making metaphors a powerful tool for shaping views on gender. Therefore the research, recommends that stakeholders recognise and promote the critical role played by language on inculcating gender perceptions in such domains as music, to come up with language programmes that promote gender parity and equality in society. / Linguistics and Modern Languages / Ph. D. (Languages, Linguistics and Literature)