Second World Music
How music and dance connected Latin America & East Germany
Latin American music on East German radio
(and in festivals, social dances, research projects, and more)
Socialist internationalism, viewed through music
& dance.
What roles did East Germans and Cubans play in establishing international concepts of world music, music festivals, and popular music studies?
How did socialist citizens understand themselves and imagine other socialists through music and dance?
Is internationalism the same as cosmopolitanism? What roles do music and dance play in each?
Funded by German Research Council
Housed at
State Institute for Music Research
Hosted by the Ethnological Museum
The Berlin Phonogram Archive
The Berlin Phonogram Archive may be the world’s oldest sound archive. Today it is part of the Music and Media Department of the Ethnological Museum and the Museum of Asian Art. It also holds the 3000 reel-to-reel tapes from East German radio that are a primary source for this project.
Popular Music Research Center
The Popular Music Research Center at Humboldt University’s Institute for Musicology and Media Studies was founded by student initiative in 1983, making it among the first such centers in the world. Today it hosts the Second World Music project and welcomes international visitors.
Listen, learn, explore
Listen to Latin American sounds once heard
on East German radio.
SWM News
Some impressions from June 28 at the Lange Nacht der Wissenschaft Berlin 2025. Read more here!
Video news update on SWM tapes.
Text c. 2022, Sydney Hutchinson. Photos c. 2022, Clara Bohner.
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