Research website "Trax on the Trail", devoted to music in electoral politics, relaunches for 2020 election with new features

Trax on the Trail launches its 2020 website on January 15, 2020. Trax on the Trail, a website that tracks music used in political campaigns, has geared up for the upcoming election as it builds on the tools and features available from the 2016 election cycle.

Trax on the Trail was founded in 2015 by Dana Gorzelany-Mostak to provide a resource for scholars, students, industry professionals, and other parties interested in how music and sound shape the landscape of political elections. With an interdisciplinary team of musicologists, ethnomusicologists, political scientists, educators, and students of Georgia College, we are committed to providing comprehensive, non-partisan, and high-quality coverage of music in electoral politics. After our successful coverage of the 2016 election, we are excited to announce our relaunch for the 2020 cycle, with improved and all-new features.

The Trax database, which includes over 8,000 entries for songs used in the 2016 and 2020 election cycles, offers an improved user interface along with new features, including mapping and timeline functions. Our team updates the database weekly to track how candidates and the public employ music and sound throughout the campaign season. The website has also been redesigned for better usability and easier navigation. Finally, the updated and improved Trax on the Trail podcast offers roundtable conversations for up-to-the-minute coverage, and separate interviews with authors featuring deep dives into relevant topics and issues.

Along with these new features, Trax will continue to maintain a bibliography of articles covering music in the election cycle, and to publish essays and educational materials for all classroom levels.

Educators such as Kristen Meyers Turner, Lecturer at North Carolina State University, have praised the usefulness of these resources:

“Partnering with Trax on the Trail provided my students with an experiential learning opportunity that is rare in a music history classroom,” she said. “By writing blog posts for the site, my students learned about the professional writing process and how music historians analyze contemporary issues.”

Scholars, educators, and organizations interested in contributing to or collaborating with Trax on the Trail are encouraged to contact co-editors Dr. Dana Gorzelany-Mostak, assistant professor of music at Georgia College, Dr. Naomi Graber, assistant professor of musicology, University of Georgia, or Dr. James Deaville, professor of music, Carleton University. They can be reached at traxonthetrail@gmail.com or 478-445-8630.