Michael Ahlers How Has German Gangsta-Rapper "Kollegah" Used Digital Media for Self-Marketing?
Michael Ahlers is Professor of Music Education and Popular Music at Leuphana University Lüneburg. Before this appointment, he was Professor of Music Education and Digital Media at the University of Augsburg. Among his current fields of study are empirical research on music education and popular music. He is a reviewer for a number of academic journals and institutions, including the Federal Court of Cologne on copyright issues and the Journal of the International Association for the Study of Popular Music. Since 2017 he has been a member of the scientific board of the German Society for Popular music Studies.
Area of Research
Music Education, Popular Music
since 2016
Dean of Studies
Leuphana University, Lüneburg
Faculty of Education
since 2012
Professor of Music Education and Popular Music
Leuphana University, Lüneburg
Institute of Arts, Music and Mediation
2014-2016
Director
Leuphana University, Lüneburg
Institute of Arts, Music and Mediation
2010-2012
Professor of Music Education and Digital Media
University of Augsburg (Universität Augsburg)
2008
PhD
University of Paderborn (Universität Paderborn)
- Journal of the International Association for the Study of Popular Music (IASPM)
- Die Musikforschung
- Zeitschrift für Kritische Musikpädagogik
- Beiträge Empirischer Musikpädagogik
- Archiv für Sozialgeschichte
- Praxis des Musikunterrichts
- Musik und Unterricht
- Musikunterricht und Computer
- Association for the Study of Music Business and Music Cultures (board member)
- German Society for Popular Music Studies (board member)
For music artists, the marketing possibilities of digital media have opened up new opportunities independent from the major music industry. MICHAEL AHLERS has examined this process using the German Gangsta rapper Kollegah as example. As Ahlers describes in this video, his research team conducted an interdisciplinary two-part study in focusing on Kollegah’s skill set and knowledge in one part and in the other one on the reaction of the media to Kollegah. They established diverse strategies that make the rapper both successful and controversial in his genre but also in mainstream media. This study is the first proof of concept of the success of musical self-marketing. Conducted in 2017, the results of the study don't take into account the events in the aftermath of the 2018 German Music Award "Echo".
LT Video Publication DOI: https://doi.org/10.21036/LTPUB10603
“Kollegah the Boss”: A Case Study on Appropriation, Acoustic Capital, and Virtuosity in German Gangsta Rap
- Michael Ahlers
- Popular Music
- Published in 2017
