Musical memory,heritage and local identity: remembering the popular music past in a European Capital of Culture

This paper explores the relationship between rock music, collective memory and local identity, by focusing on events connected to Liverpool's status as European Capital of Culture 2008. The first part of the paper describes these events and how memories of local rock music were attached to heritage and local identity and mobilised to validate Liverpool as a capital of culture, whilst in turn the city's Capital of Culture status served to validate particular ways of remembering the local musical past. The second part of the paper considers the broader significance of these events by relating them to three pan-European trends in cultural policy: the development of the cultural and heritage industries; the protection and promotion of local culture and identity; and the fostering of cultural diversity and integration. It highlights the general significance of the popular music past for cultural policy in Europe, but also the politics of popular music memory and how it involves a complex and dynamic process of negotiation that relates to cultural policy in particular ways. The paper concludes by arguing that popular music offers a specific and productive focus for research on cultural policy, heritage and local identity in Europe.