Brian Fairley is a Postdoctoral Fellow in the Center for Russian, East European, and Eurasian Studies at the University of Pittsburgh, with appointments in the Music and History departments. His work explores the history of sound-recording technology, anthropological theories of race and evolution, and the traditional vocal music of the Republic of Georgia. His monograph in progress, Channeling Voices: A Media History of Georgian Polyphony, excavates a series of experimental sound recordings from 1916 to 1966 to show how the concept of musical polyphony evolved in tandem with techniques of multichannel sound recording and imperial discourses of racial, national, and religious difference. His research has received funding from the Wenner-Gren Foundation, the Social Science Research Council, the American Musicological Society, and New York University’s Jordan Center for the Advanced Study of Russia.

Brian holds a PhD in Ethnomusicology from New York University’s Graduate School of Arts & Science, an M.A. in Ethnomusicology from Wesleyan University, and an A.B. in Classics from Harvard University. From 2006 to 2013, Brian was the music director and dramaturg for Double Edge Theatre, a collaborative ensemble in Western Massachusetts, where he composed, arranged, and performed a wide variety of musical styles. He has also worked as a sound and video designer for theater. A pianist by training, he enjoys playing with Javanese gamelan ensembles, Georgian choirs, and anyone else who will have him.