Beyond the Beat: Music of Resistance and Change is at the Royal BC Museum until January of next year (photo by Royal BC Museum).<\/figcaption><\/figure>\nThe artifacts come from across Canada and the US, including the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland, the Museum of Pop Culture in Seattle, and the National Music Centre in Calgary. Some were not previously displayed to the public.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou\u2019ll see a lot of items that are actually direct loans from different bands and different artists,\u201d explains Giesbrecht. \u201cSo, that was really cool, getting to interact with some of these personalities, sharing those personal memories. We\u2019re really grateful that they were willing to lend us their instruments and their clothing.\u201d<\/p>\n
The exhibit includes music and movements from both past and present, giving visitors a comprehensive look at how resistance through art has evolved. From the civil rights anthems of the 1960s to contemporary tracks addressing police violence, gender equality, and climate change, protest music remains a powerful form of expression.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n\u201cI think a lot of songs used to be, perhaps, more overt political messaging,\u201d says Giesbrecht. \u201cWhether that was opposition to the Vietnam War, for example, or music in support of the civil-rights movement. And, I think, what we see today, is artists are still protesting and they\u2019re protesting things like racial injustice. But the way in which they\u2019re doing so is a little bit different. A lot of artists are challenging social boundaries in terms of who they are and what they wear. And it\u2019s more of an in-your-face form of protest. So, I think, the way that people are addressing these issues has definitely changed over time. But the majority of these issues have remained remarkably similar.\u201d<\/p>\n
Indeed, societal discontent has taken on many different forms throughout the decades. As audiences change, so do the methods of resistance and the messages artists emphasize.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think, if you look at older forms of protest music from the \u201950s and \u201970s, focused on broader external social issues or events, such as the war in Vietnam or broader working-class discontent, and I think in more recent times a lot of issues stem more around identity,\u201d says Giesbrecht. So, whether that\u2019s LGBTQ+ rights or other issues, related to colonialism. I think [we\u2019re seeing] a little bit more identity-based protests… in recent years.\u201d<\/p>\n
Beyond the Beat: Music of Resistance and Change
\n<\/i>Until Monday, January 5, 2026
\nRoyal BC Museum
\nroyalbcmuseum.bc.ca<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Royal BC Museum\u2019s Beyond the Beat: Music of Resistance and Change exhibit centres on protest music throughout the decades, boasting a wide range of paraphernalia\u2014from Neil Young\u2019s harmonica to the jacket of Public Enemy\u2019s Chuck D. The goal of the exhibit is to illustrate how music functions as a catalyst for social change and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":27033,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4,334],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-27032","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-arts","category-july-2-2025"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27032","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=27032"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27032\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":27034,"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27032\/revisions\/27034"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/27033"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=27032"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=27032"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=27032"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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