A City in Motion

This introductory section thumbnails Detroit’s early history and sudden rise to prominence after 1915, as the auto industry created new forms of production and nearly two million people arrived from abroad and the American South. Accounts are scarce of early music history. The chapter outlines chapter coverage for the period roughly of the 1940s-60s, including European heritage musics and the music of white and black southerners, with some emphasis on the author’s own experience and circles, as well as other writers’ and artists’ retrospective glances at their hometown. Detroit’s identification through transportation leads to the guiding metaphors of the chapters, as musical and literal traffic overlap throughout the book.