Dr. Victor Szabo

Ph.D., University of Virginia, 2015
B.M., University of Michigan, 2007
B.A., University of Michigan, 2007

Music History and Appreciation
Music Theory
Popular Music
Electronic Music
Film Music
Music and Identity

My research fields broadly include music history (especially late 19th century to present), music theory and analysis, music composition, aesthetics, popular music, electronic music, cultural musicology, and music & psychology. I would be glad to guide any student research project within, or adjacent to, these fields.

I am currently researching and writing a book on electronic and club music DJing, with special focus on the influence of psychedelics on DJing practices and aesthetics. Research topics related to this project might involve, for example, the relationship between music and mood, the history of rave subcultures, how genres of music develop, or original electronic music productions. I would also welcome any assistance with research for the book.

Tiger Radio
Electronic Music DJing and Production

Turn On, Tune In, Drift Off: Ambient Music’s Psychedelic Past. New York: Oxford University Press, 2023.

“Pacifica Radio’s Music from the Hearts of Space and the Ambient Sound of California’s New Age.” Journal of the American Musicological Society 74.1 (Spring 2021): 43–90.

“Why Is(n’t) Ambient Music So White?” In The Oxford Handbook of Electronic Dance Music, edited by Robin James and Luis Manuel Garcia-Mispireta. New York: Oxford University Press, 2021. doi:10.1093/oxfordhb/9780190093723.013.33.

“‘What Music Isn’t Ambient in the 21^st Century?’: A Design-Oriented Approach to Analyzing and Interpreting Ambient Music Recordings.” In The Routledge Companion to Popular Music Analysis: Expanding Approaches, edited by Ciro Scotto, Kenneth M. Smith, and John Brackett. New York: Routledge, 2018.

“Unsettling Brian Eno’s Music for Airports.” Twentieth-Century Music 14, no. 2 (June 2017): 305–33.

“Between Silence and Stigma: Notes on Jamie Stewart’s Queer Performativity.” Journal of Popular Music Studies 25, no. 4 (Dec. 2013): 439–58.