My name is Ryleigh Corcoran, and I created this project for my History of Rock & Roll class, where we had to create a Digital History Project based on an event, person, band, etc. that is related to Rock & Roll. This website was published December 3, 2024.
I settled on the topic due to the fact that as a Deaf person myself, I've always enjoyed rock, metal, and any loud music with a beat. When it came time for the project, I wanted to explore something about how the Deaf community interacts with music and found Beethoven's Nightmare. However, due to the band not being as popular as other musicians, they didn't have a lot of research done on them, Because of that, I used a variety of scholarly sources and online articles/promotional materials. Using these sources, I was able to figure out how they challenged traditional perceptions of both music and Deaf artists in the music industry. They never shied away from their lack of hearing and making references to it, and while they briefly had a hearing CODA singer, the original band members have stayed the same. I also analyzed the song Turn It Up Louder, their only song published with a music video, to further explore their interactions in bridging the Deaf and hearing community and their song Angel of Darkness, one that doesn't have a music video but encapsulates a Deaf song with there only being one line of lyrics.