Ian Brennan

Ian Brennan is a Grammy-winning music producer who has produced three other Grammy-nominated albums. He is the author of four books and has worked with the likes of filmmaker John Waters, Merle Haggard, and Green Day, among others. His work with international artists such as the Zomba Prison Project, Tanzania Albinism Collective, and Khmer Rouge Survivors, has been featured on the front page of the New York Times and on an Emmy-winning 60 Minutes segment with Anderson Cooper reporting. Since 1993 he has taught violence prevention and conflict resolution around the world for such prestigious organizations as the Smithsonian, New York’s New School, Berklee College of Music, the University of London, the University of California–Berkeley, and the Accademia Nazionale delle Scienze (Rome).

• Book events
• Reviews
• More from Ian

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Praise

“Ian Brennan‘s Muse-Sick is a passionate, thought-provoking chronicle of traveling beyond the mainstream to listen to unheard music created by the unsung.”
—Maureen Mahon, NYU, author of Right to Rock: The Black Rock Coalition and the Cultural Politics of Race and Black Diamond Queens

“We can never hear enough of the fresh, conscientious perspective of Ian Brennan. His words gives voice to people who have been silenced.”
—Booker T. Jones, frontman of Booker T. and the M.G.’s and winner of the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award

“By all means keep this book by your bedside.”
—Songlines

“Brennan is unflinching in his criticism of the commercial music industry.”
—The Australian, weekend special-edition

“Think Alan Lomax meets Steve Albini with a megaphone.”
—Record Collector

“It’s not often that you read a book that changes the way you listen to music. . . . If you only read one book about music this year, I strongly recommend that you make it this one.”
—Hi-Fi Choice

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Praise

“An interesting and important project.”
—Noam Chomsky

“Shocking! I didn’t think it was possible to write a shocking book about music anymore. This is the most radical music book I’ve read in years.”
—John Waters

“There is hope. Thanks to Ian Brennan for shining a light.”
—Bill Frisell

“Every page of Silenced by Sound is like listening to a fresh, bracing, previously unknown kind of music for the very first time.”
—David Harrington, Kronos Quartet

“Brennan presents a hefty, bracing tome . . .”
—Booklist

“. . . full of wisdom from someone who cares deeply about the power of real music.”
—MOJO

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Book Events

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Reviews

• 5 stars— A No bullshit approach to music appreciation
• Muse Sick Reviewed in The Wire
• Ian Brennan’s Silenced by Sound— A Songlines Review
• Silenced by Sound in il manifesto (Italian)
• Ian Brennan Knocks Pop Stars Off Their Pedestal With his New Book

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Interviews

• Ian Brennan event recorded at the Henry Miller Library in Big Sur, CA 10/2019
• Ian Brennan of Silenced By Sound on the BBC
• Ian Brennan Interview: Ustad Saami, the Master of the Forty-Nine Notes
• Grex Performs Live on The Hear and Now, Plus an Interview with Ian Brennan
• Ian Brennan on PRI’s The World

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Mentions

• Opinion: Grammy’s ‘global music’ categories ignore musicians from much of the globe
• Muse Sick in Pitchfork
• Ian Brennan: Grammy-winning Producer, Zomba Prison Project, Witch Camp (Ghana), and Tinariwen
• Ian Brennan’s New Album Is A Unique Look At The Comoros Islands
• Witch Camp (Ghana): I’ve Forgotten Now Who I Used To Be review – magical sound of the marginalised
• Music from the Heart— Ian Brennan in The Australian
• Radio Pulled Violent Songs Off Air After 9/11 — But It Won’t Reckon With Race
• Cambodian Musicians Heal Through Music: Ian Brennan on VOA
• Producer taps voices of Oakland’s homeless community for new album
• Ian Brennan’s Silenced by Sound Is a Rallying Cry for International Musicians
• Ian Brennan & the Good Ones in the New Yorker
• Ian Brennan’s Powell’s Event as a Top Weekly Pick

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Blog

• New Grammy category for African music ignores almost all of Africa
• Hear stunning music recorded inside Mississippi’s infamous Parchman prison
• ‘It’s a charged place’: Parchman Farm, the Mississippi prison with a remarkable musical history
• Obituary: Yanna Momina (1947-2023)
• And the Oscar for best international film rarely goes to …
• Visa dissonance: Why world music performers can’t always make it to the stage on time
• Remembering ‘Small,’ the funeral singer who made joyful music in the face of deat
• An African immigrant’s pizza wins global raves — and overcomes Italian prejudices
• 5 stars— A No bullshit approach to music appreciation
• Kathryn Tickell with Ian Brennan on BBC’s Music Planet
• Ian Brennan and Corin Tucker Make Sense of Themselves Through Music
• Rolling Stones drop Brown Sugar from US tour set list
• Muse Sick Reviewed in The Wire
• WORD Presents: Ian Brennan + Michelle Cruz Gonzales
• Politics & Prose Live! Ian Brennan | MUSE SICK with Judith Heumann
• Tom Wilson: An Unsung Hero of the Studio
• Ian Brennan’s New Album Is A Unique Look At The Comoros Islands
• Witch Camp (Ghana): I’ve Forgotten Now Who I Used To Be review – magical sound of the marginalised
• Gurrumul, Omar Souleyman, 9Bach and DakhaBrakha: the best global artists the Grammys forgot
• The Grammys have a major problem with global diversity. Lip service isn’t going to solve it
• Songwriter U: The Highs of Lo-Fi
• The Good Ones: Rwanda, You Should Be Loved
• The Earth Is a Drum
• The Good Ones: Tiny Desk (Home) Concert
• ‘Music Was Our Language’: Grammy Award-Winning Producer Turns the Mic on His Sister
• My sister is nonverbal but she knows the words to every song. Now we’ve made an album together
• “Who You Calling Slow?” an album by the Sheltered Workshop Singers on BBC World
• Malawi Mouse Boys: Tiny Desk (Home) Concert on NPR
• Radio Pulled Violent Songs Off Air After 9/11 — But It Won’t Reckon With Race
• The Invisible Damage To Global Music COVID-19 Has Wrought — By Ian Brennan
• Turn Away from the Sound. Listen to the silence.— By Ian Brennan
• Rwanda: How music heals divides, 25 years on
• Ian Brennan event recorded at the Henry Miller Library in Big Sur, CA 10/2019
• Producer taps voices of Oakland’s homeless community for new album
• Homeless Oakland Heart: “Not a Homeless Person, Just a Person Without a Home.”
• Ian Brennan’s Silenced by Sound Is a Rallying Cry for International Musicians
• Ian Brennan & the Good Ones in the New Yorker
• Ian Brennan on PRI’s The World
• Ian Brennan’s Powell’s Event as a Top Weekly Pick
• We Aren’t the World
• Ian Brennan on Pollstar: Opening Our Borders, Embracing Diversity & Championing Cross-Cultural Artistic Exchange
• Alvin Lucier: Do Something Original