The World of Music7th Edition

Part 2

Listening to American Music:

Folk, Religious, Pop, and Jazz

CHAPTER 6

American Popular Music

American Popular Music

• Tin Pan Alley

• Country

• African American influenced– Blues– Gospel– Motown– Rap

• Pop/Pock

Common Traits of Popular Music

• Music that is known by a majority of interested people at any given time

• Simple and Tuneful• Singable Lyrics• Repetitive• Three (or less) chords (typically)• Strong Beat and Regular Meter• Clear Phrases

Measuring a Song’s Popularity

• Then– measured by sales of sheet music

• Now– Radio/Jukebox play

• Billboard Magazine• The Hit Parade Radio Show• “Airplay”

– Sales• LP’s/45’s• Cassettes/8-Tracks• CD’s

– Downloads

Colonial American/Pre 20th Century Popular Music

• Opera Melodies

• Scottish and Irish Airs

• Hymns

• German Art Songs

Songs by Stephen Foster

• Old Folks at Home (Swanee River)

• Oh Susanna!

• My Old Kentucky Home

• Old Black Joe

• Jeannie with the Light Brown Hair

• Come Where My Love Lies Desiring

• Beautiful Dreamer

Minstrel Shows

• Minstrel Song• First Distinctive American

Music style– Lively, Syncopated,

“humorous”

• Written by and for Whites, sung by musicians in “Black Face”– Attempted to portray the

“Negro way of life”• Often Stereotypical and

not accurate

• Drawn from:– Popular Music– Folk Music– Songs from Italian Opera

• Eventually written by Black Composers– So it ended up as: Blacks,

portraying Whites, who were portraying Blacks…

• Preceded Vaudeville

Vaudeville Shows

• Similar to modern variety shows – typically a group of unrelated acts– Singers– Dancers– Comedians– Jugglers– Child Performers– Animals– Dramatic Sketches

Tin Pan Alley

• A place in NYC– 28th street

• Typically in Verse-Chorus form

• Where to hear Tin Pan Alley Sons– Vaudeville– Broadway Musicals– Films– Nightclubs– Radio and Recordings– Jazz Concerts

Tin Pan Alley Names

• Composers– Jerome Kern– Cole Porter– George Gershwin– Irving Berlin– Richard Rodgers

• Performers– Al Jolson– Eddie Cantor– Rudy Vallee– Kate Smith– Paul Whiteman– Bing Crosby

Broadway Musicals

• A Musical Play– Acting– Singing (but using

vernacular languages)– Costumes

• National Tours

• Then– Stirke Up the Band– Porgy and Bess– West Side Story– Oklahoma!

• Now– The Producers– Spam-a-lot– Cats– The Lion King– Phantom of the Opera

Film and Film Music

• “born” in 1927– The Jazz Singer

• Entertainment for the masses– Transports the viewer

to a different world

• Singers who Act(ed)– Then

• Bing Crosby• Frank Sinatra• Barbra Streisand

– Now• Harry Connick Jr. • Lindsay Lohan• 50 Cent• Ice-T

Radio and Recordings

• Invention of the Term “Hit”

• Folk Styles Now were preserved• Recorded specialized categories of music• Sold the recordings back to the category of people

the music came from

• Fame for Formerly Obscure Artists

• Aided the spread of Jazz

Country Music

• Hillbilly

• Cowboy Songs

• Western Swing

• Bluegrass

• Nashville Sound

Hillbilly

• Described the poor, illiterate, rural, uneducated southerners

• Viewed as “culturally and musically inferior”• Later it represented wholesome concepts in

America• Performers

– Uncle Dave Macon– The Carter Family– Jimmy Rodgers

Cowboy songs

• Dealt with Loneliness and infidelity

• When performed on solo piano:– Honky Tonk

• Propelled by the movie industry

• Singing Cowboys:– Gene Autry– Tex Ritter– Roy Rogers

Bluegrass

• Mountain Music• Instruments

– Acoustic Guitar– Fiddle– Mandolin– Bass Fiddle– Banjo

• Artists then– Bill Monrow– Lester Flatt– Earl Scruggs

• Artists Now– Alison Krauss– Nickel Creek– Nashville Bluegrass

Band

The Nashville Sound

• Grand Ole Opry

• Influential from 1957-1971

• Made Nashville an important city in the American Music Industry

• Obscured roots of country

• Musicians– Roy Acuff– Chet Atkins

Contemporary Country

• Honky-Tonk

• Bluegrass

• Cowboy Music

• Mainstream or Traditional Country

• Young Country

• Success measured by tours and concerts

Popular Music with African-Americans

• Motown• Gospel• Rhythm and Blues (R+B)

– Race Records• Recorded speciality types of music marketed for African-Americans

• Boogie Woogie• Soul

– An extension of R+B– Name changed in 1969 by Billboard mag– Picked up where Motown left off

• Rock– A combination of “Black” music (R+B) and “White” music (C+W)– Originally segregated, but Brown v. BOE changed that– Rockabilly – Southern C+W plus Rock

British Invasion

• Served mostly Urban Whites• In England, it is influenced by American R+B

– Everly Brothers– Buddy Holly– Chuck Berry– Little Richard

• Groups– The Beatles– The Rolling Stones– The Who– Pick Floyd

• Strongly Influenced Future Rock Bands

New Technologies Create Rock Genres

• Sound Amplification• Studio Manipulations• Synthesizers• MIDI

Sampling• Mixing

• Acid Rock• Art Rock• Blues Rock• Folk Rock• Gospel Rock• Industrial Rock• New Wave• Punk• Southern Rock• Metal

Rap and Hip-Hop

• Embraced Technology• Socially Aware• Led by Black Males

• New use of the Turntable/Record Player as an instrument– Scratching– Turntabalism

• From Urban Arts– Street Poetry– Graffitti

• “Tagging”

– Break Dancing