This paper analyses the title track of the 2002 CD Lake Effect, as composed by Chicago
fiddle player Liz Carroll and arranged
by Evan Price (featuring the Turtle Island String Quartet), positing the
degree to which it is suggestive of “post-ethnic” identification (Bohlman 2004;
Hollinger 2005). Beginning with a nuancing of the various identities performed
and negotiated by Liz Carroll the musician and first generation Irish American
and Chicagoan, ‘Lake Effect’ is
ultimately understood in terms of its transgressive and transformative features. Generated from melodic and rhythmic motifs
that the composer identifies as “Irish,” or “American,” or “jazzy”, ‘Lake
Effect’ juxtaposes and interpolates sonic indices of different identities in a
hybrid, cosmopolitan and potentially post-ethnic structure.