Första klass mot framtiden. En musiksociologisk studie av Blå Tåget

Abstract

This doctoral thesis will examine and highlight the factors, driving forces and conditions that led to the band Blå Tåget being formed in the late 1960’s, and the role they played in forming the Swedish progressive music movement. A fundamental issue is in what social climate and in what era the Blå Tåget emerged and what significance this had for the creative activities of the band. In the thesis, I will deepen the understanding of what characterized the Blå Tåget as a music group. The focus will be on the characterization of the music, lyrics and live performances of the Blå Tåget and whether it is possible to discern a change over time. This provides the basis for a further characterization by comparing Blå Tågets’s music and activities with two other leading bands in the Swedish progressive music movement: Hoola Bandoola and the Nationalteatern. In Sweden in the 1960's there was new and great interest in ”visa” (a sort of singer-songwriter ballad), often with fairly clear political messages following a general rise in the politicisation of cultural life in the 60s. In a comparison, I will investigate Blå Tåget’s relationship to the period known as ”visvågen”. Two significant and parallel trends in the Swedish popular music scene during the 1960’s, where leftist political currents were in the foreground. A parallel and fundamental aim of the thesis is to investigate the importance of the material and cultural conditions of creativity and artistic production through the specific example of Blå Tåget. An underlying but central question relevant to this aim is: what significance did the group's social and cultural backgrounds have? It is this aspect of the thesis which informed my decision to use Pierre Bourdieu's sociological framework, and to complement it with Richard Florida's theories about the creative class and the importance of whether the place (city / town) offers opportunities for these people to live a stimulating life.