Blues midterm 1

Ring Shout

A form of folk spiritual characterized by leader- chorus antiphonal singing, hand clapping, and other percussion, which incorporates highly stylized religious dance as participants move in a counterclockwise circle.

Soul Music

Gospel-influenced African American popular music style that began to emerge in the later 1950's and became popular during the 60's.

What factors precipitated the musical transformations among African Americans that led to the evolution of the music that came to be known as gospel music?

- The Great Migration

Lined hymn

Style of hymn singing in which each line of text is sung or chanted first by the song leader and then echoed by the chorus.

As the blues evolved historically, how did it shape other musical traditions? Provide examples from within the United States and beyond.

- Blues anchors new jazz styles. - Country absorbed the blues form. - Major ingredient in western swing and honky tonk and influenced country rock styles. - Many rock styles use blues repertoire and style. - Influenced gospel music with the guitar. - Rap artists sample blues riffs.

Where and when did the blues develop? What African and European musical elements are evident in the blues?

- Blues started in the Deep South between Georgia and Easter Texas around the early 1900's. - The melodic structure can be derived from the field holler, a work song with forceful delivery. - The individualized and improvisatory forms of religious vocal expression, such as moaning, chanting prayer and preaching. - The harmonic and structural form of blues came from folk ballad.

What contributions warrant Thomas Dorsey's designation as "Father of Gospel Music" and what was his most noted composition? What prompted the opposition he faced when he began to promote his compositions?

- Dorsey forged elements of each of the three styles of transitional gospel music into one style. - His most noted composition was "Take My Hand, Precious Lord" he borrowed the tune from other genres of music. - He received opposition that he is starting too big with too much support so it wont last long. Also, some believed music didn't belong in churches.

Identify the recording that represents the advent of the contemporary gospel era. How is contemporary gospel music distinguished from traditional gospel? In what ways do recurrent critiques of contemporary gospel music reinscribe historical commentaries on spirituals and traditional gospel music?

- Edwin Hawkins Singers "Oh Happy Day" represents the start of the contemporary gospel era. - This music moved beyond the Black church and overcame racial, cultural, and musical boundaries. - The African American Christian community critiqued contemporary gospel saying it closely resembled the sonic vision of secular music of the day. Sort of like how Dorsey "borrowed" his tune from other genres of music.

Identify the various rhythm and blues styles/ sounds. For each style/ sound, identify the geographical region, key record labels (when applicable), the distinguishing musical features, and key musicians who pioneered and/ or popularized the style/ sound.

- First Stream 1940-1955 - Los Angeles had trios of piano bass and guitar that played at lounges. - Imperial Records - Musicians include Nat King Young and the Three Blazers. - musical features: Trios and jump combos. Texas blues guitar, triplet piano figures, and horn arrangements, replaced alto sax with tenor. - Chicago urban blues - Chess Records or Vee-Jay records - Used amplified guitars and harmonicas. - Musicians include: Sonny Boy Williamson, Muddy Waters, and Jimmy Reed. - Cincinnati - King Records - Released artists who anchored the gospel tradition. - Artists include the Dominoes and James Brown. - New York - Atlantic Records - "Atlantic Sound" included simplified boogie-woogie bass lines, and big horn style arrangements. - Artists include Ruth Brown, the Clovers, and Joe Turner. - New York, New Jersey, Washington, DC, and Chicago - Vocal harmonies - Musical features associated with the vocal harmony groups are (1) alternating lead vocals, (2) harmonizing choruses, (3) imitating instrumental timbres, and (4) contrasting timbres and vocal range. - The Ravens were a big artist that influenced vocal harmonics. They incorporated blues elements. - The Clovers were an influential Rhythmic harmonic group that incorporated the blues combo and call and response. - The Second stream Mid 1950's to Mid 1960's - New Orleans - Piano players dominated. Included the rolling fifth and octave figures as well as triplets. - Fats Domino's records. - Artists include Little Richard with his choo-choo train beat. - Chicago - Artists include Bo Diddley and Chuck Berry. - Doo-wop sound, used voices instead of instruments.

Define the form and structure of the blues. Consider both musical and textual characteristics.

- Form: Text is frank, and exclusively concerned with the self. They are sung in first person, and are directed toward another person or about someone else. Lyrics are serious, realistic, non sentimental. Most prominent subject is love and sex. - Structural elements are ragtime, 12 bar AAB structure, blue notes, bends, bottlenecks, twelve-bar, pianist, and one or two added jazz instrument. Instrument is a second voice responding to vocals.

Over time, how did changes in instrumentation and performance impact the evolution of the blues?

- Instrumental changes helped increase the sound of blues, so they could be heard in noisy environments. The electric guitar helped with its louder volume and new timbres. Instruments added a second voice to respond to the vocal lines.

How was the blues first popularized? Identify the earliest documented performers of the blues and the contexts in which they performed.

- It was popularized by popular entertainment and the mass media. - Earliest documented performers were vaudeville entertainers performing as entertainers at shows.

Compare and contrast the development of the Motown Sound and the Memphis Sound, highlighting the social context and distinguishing musical features, as well as the pioneers/ popularizers of each regional/ company sound.

- Motown sound: phase one was vocal harmony and uptown rhythm and blues traditions. Phase two included gospel and jazz and pop elements. The Supremes were most popular among white audiences. - The Funk bros were the companies resident musicians who created the phase two style keeping the bass line and beat. Specifically, the walking bass and bebop bass lines and back beats two and four on the percussion. Gordy was the head guy. - Stax records: memphis sounds. Formed by bankteller Jim Stewart. Mixed racial groups. Phase 1 blended blues, R&B and rockabilly styles which created the southern sound. Best described as an urban sound with rural undercurrents. Brooker T and the MGs and the Mar-Keys. Phase II memphis sound sounded like soul music. Otis Redding's RESPECT. Bell was the main producer here.

Describe the role of music in African and African American communities. Give Examples.

- Music accompanies all type of events such as: royal functions, religious and life cycle rituals, community festivals, as well as occupational, recreational, and leisure activities. - Music announced the presence of royalty. - Singing while working to speed up time. - Healing and religious rituals. - played at funerals by beating drums/

Race records

- Music industry term used from the 20s to 40s to designate recordings produced by and marketed to African Americans. R&B replaced raced records to identify all black music in 1949.

When was the term "rhythm and blues" first introduced by Billboard, what was its purpose, and why was it replaced in 1969?

- R&B was first used as a marketing label to identify all types of secular music recorded by and for African Americans. Was introduced in 1949 to replace race records. It was replaced by soul in 1969 because the Great Migration ended.

What are the implications of referencing gospel music as "gospel blues"? To what extent does this designation represent African American perspectives of gospel music?

- Rural Gospel and blues were very similar. They were sung by blues singers, and were sonically identical. The text was the only thing that differed. - Blues are about despair while Gospel songs are about hope. - Gospel brings hope when sung, and Blues delivers burden.

What key differences distinguish the creation of the spiritual from that of gospel music? In what ways are these two genres related, and how do they differ?

- Spiritual was created by African Americans in the deep south during slavery. Gospel was created by the African American community as they moved northward during the Great Migration. - They differ by the instrumental accompaniment, the melismas, syncopation, and improve. - Both songs were based on Call and Response, they required a demonstrative style of delivery with hand clapping and dancing in the spirit, and they were both sung in heterophony.

Identify the two most common musical structures found in African and African American music. In what ways do they reflect the communal and interactive approach to making music?

- The Call and Response technique and Repetitive chorus. They use call and response to get the community involved in the song. It also encouraged improvisation from the soloist. - The repetitive rhythm increased the intensity of the songs.

What were the key variables that contributed to the movement of African American popular music from the racial margins into the mainstream in the 1950s? What key artists figured into this process? What was the response from the mainstream?

- The Radio exposed people to Rhythm and blues. - Radio artists included Gene Nobles, WLAC, Al Benson, and John Richbourg - Mainstream refused to play R&B and instead produced covers of popular R&B artists. - White teenagers demanded R&B be played so mainstream changed R&B to Rock and incorporated all types of music.

Describe the way music is created, performed and experienced in African and African American communities.

- They join in by singing, dancing, clapping hands, stomping feet, shaking rattles, thereby eliminating distinctions between performers and audience. - Slaves would mix standard English with other words of their own improvising- Jargon to others but full of meaning to themselves. - They could not use loud instruments because it frightened slave owners so they just clapped and stomped.

Describe the way in which the desired timbre in African and African American music differs from that of European derived traditions.

- Westerns did not like the sound of African American music. They depicted the sounds as "weird, strange, peculiar, and noise" - instruments imitate the voice in African American music. Such as the use of a slide or bottleneck to alter the timbre and the talking drums which are used by altering the pitch of the hourglass drums. - They would alter the playing techniques associated with Western instruments to get their peculiar sounds.

What were the similarities and differences between the folk spiritual of the rural South and Black urban religious music of the newly formed Pentecostal denomination in the first quarter of the twentieth century?

-They differ by the instrumental accompaniment. - Both songs were based on Call and Response, they required a demonstrative style of delivery with hand clapping and dancing in the spirit, and they were both sung in heterophony.

Identify the three styles of transitional gospel music, noting their distinguishing characteristics and seminal performers. What role did these styles have in the development of gospel music in its present form?

1. Pentacostal Style: Added instruments, loud style of worship, lots of movement, speaking in tongues, call and response. 2. Tindley Style: Soft, less upbeat than Pentacostal, some organ, more like spiritual, harmonies are jazz sounding like quartets. 3. Rural: Solo blues singers with guitar or harmonica accompaniment, more upbeat than spiritual, secular, blues style. These styles helped incorporate a new genre of music that separated itself from old spiritual.

Rock and Roll

1950's derivative of rhythm and blues, characterized by Black gospel and pop influences; created for consumption by black and white teenagers. Category was very broad, included lots of R&B. Was used to make black music acceptable for whites consumption.

Doowop

A cappella vocal harmony group that emphasized the rhythmic delivery of phrases consisting of vocables (syllables without lexical meaning) such as "doo-wop." Sang without instrumental accompaniment usually romantic songs. Used bass voice as an instrument to imitate the walking bass. Back-up singers sang doo-wop phrases in response to the lead singer. Second Stream R&B from 1950-60.

Blue note

A note, sounded or suggested that falls between two adjacent notes in the standard Western division of the octave, most often the third or seventh degree in a scale. They are neutral pitches and can be notated by an upward- or downward- pointing arrow printed above a note.

Slide or bottleneck

A playing technique in which a guitarist slides a metal bar or glass neck from a bottle across the strings to alter the timbre. African artists used this technique to get their instruments to talk.

Cover Record

A recording made by a white artist that attempted to replicate or approximate the sound, arrangement, and content of an earlier black hit, aimed at selling to the white teen market. "Tutti Frutti" by Little Richard.

Storefront church

A retail business structure that has been converted into a worship site. Southern migrants worshipped here, started gospel music. Less formal worship.

Melisma

A single syllable sung over several pitches.

Twelve-bar blues

A stanza of three lines (AAB) of four measures each, the lines beginning respectively in the I, IV, V chord and resolving in the I chord. The B line usually comments on the A line. This was mainly used in blues.

Jug Blues

A type of urban blues that used cheap instruments such as the banjo, guitar, kazoo, harmonica and jugs to create contrasting timbres. Instruments were often made from scratch. More harmonies, and more people singing. More instruments but cheaper. Not AAB, would hear in a storefront church. 1920's-1930's

Pentacostal Style (Transitional)

Added instruments, loud style of worship, lots of movement, speaking in tongues, call and response. 1930's.

Transitional gospel music

African American religious music that represents the bridge between spiritual and traditional gospel music. Included Pentacostal, Tindley and rural style.

Leslie Speaker

An amplifier that produces special sound effects by rotating sound waves in the speaker. Associated with the Hammond organ and also used to alter the timbre to get a voice like effect.

Bend

An instrumental technique used to slightly raise or lower pitch. It is a way to achieve blue notes on an instrument.

Jump blues

An up-tempo blues style of the 1940s and 1950s characterized by boogie-woogie bass lines, shuffle rhythms, and prominent brass and reed sounds. ABCD structure, no 12-bar. Doesn't sound like blues.

Rhythm and Blues

Black dance music that evolved during WW2 era and the two decades followed as a fusion of blues, big band swing, gospel and pop elements. A result from the military draft. Bands had to form with smaller number of members. 1949-1969

Shouting churches

Churches where the worship was highly energized and seated over 2000 members.

Bebop

Combo jazz improvised style that evolved from big band swing in the 1940's characterized by exceedingly fast tempos, improvisational lines based on harmonic structure.

Post War blues "Electric Guitar" blues

Electric guitar and drums and jazz combo. Improve guitar, not call and response. Instruments play verse without vocals. 1940's and 1950's.

Shout songs

Emotionally charged gospel songs performed with heightened vocal delivery

Soul music

Gospel influenced African American popular music style that began to emerge in the late 1950s and became popular during the 60's. Gospel music without the religious text.

Rural (Transitional)

Guitar, more upbeat than spiritual, secular, blues style. 1930's.

Crossover aesthetic

Highly lyrical vocals with limited ornamentation, supported by lush orchestral arrangement and simple rhythmic foundation.

Jim Crow Laws

Laws limiting African American freedoms and rights in US.

barrelhouse blues (Folk blues)

Pianists played ragtime and blues. Term "barrelhouse" references the storage of alcohol in barrels. Guitars often used because much cheaper. Involved an instrument and a person who is singing as one. Early 1930's.

Boogie-woogie (Piano blues)

Piano style popular in the 1930's and 1940's featured repeated bass riffs against a syncopated improvised melody. Influenced Rock and Jazz. Dance music, faster tempo.

Traditional

Piano, loud, melisma- stretching of syllables, Rebato- slowing down the time, high level of muscianship doesn't hide behind the instrument, down tempo. 1950's.

Second Great Migration

Period between 1940 to 1970 when 5 million black southerners moved o the North and West.

Contemporary

Post-1990 gospel that embraces elements of R& B, rock, funk, jazz, and other popular styles, usually performed by a small ensemble.

Timbre

Primary element in African American music that traditionally has been subjected to severe criticism from cultural outsiders. It is the quality of sound that distinguishes different voices or instruments from one another.

Motown

Record label created by Berry Gordy. Emphasized the KISS motto: keep it short and simple. Crossed racial boundaries and became the sound of young America. Third stream of R&B from 1960-1969.

Spirituals

Religious music from African American slavery, melancholy in character, had call of response patterns, sometimes heterophonic or polyphonic rhythmic accompaniment. Original contexts included work as well as religious meetings. 1890+

Gospel Music

Religious music of African Americans that emerged in urban centers during the early decades of the twentieth century. Black American Protestan sacred singing and an associated 10th-cenutry sacred genre. In this style, vocalists radically embellish simple melodies, and in full and falsetto voice, they shout, hum, growl, moan, whisper, scream and cry.

Polyrhythm

Several contrasting rhythms played or sung simultaneously.

Call and Response

Style used in the early and contemporary accounts of African musical performance. It is a song structure practice in which a singer or instrumentalist makes a musical statement that is answered by another soloist, instrumentalist, or group. The statement and answers sometime overlap. Also called antiphony.

Tindley Style (Transitional)

Soft, less upbeat than Pentacostal, some organ, call and response, more like spiritual, harmonies are jazz sounding like quartets. 1920's.

Folk Spiritual

The earliest form of indigenous a cappella religious music created by African Americans during slavery. Lots of improve, transmitted orally.

Structural Characteristics

The form as well as rhythmic, melodic, and harmonic organization of music.

blues scale

The incorporation of the flat third, fifth, and flat seventh degree in the scale.

Artists and Repertoire

The individual who scouts talent and oversees the development of recording artists. Includes, songwriters, arrangers and producers.

Polyrhythms

The layering of contrasting rhythms is found everywhere in the sub-Saharan African instrumental ensembles made up of various percussive and melodic instruments.

Great Migration

The mass movement of southern African Americans to urban cities during the period surrounding World Wars I and II. These African American's influenced religion in the North.

Style of delivery

The physical mode of presentation - how performer s engage the body in movement and adornment during performance.

Syncopation

The shifting of accent from standard Western stressed beats to non anticipated stress points in the measure. Instead of stressing the 1,2,3,4 beat, this style stresses the beat in between or after the regular beat.

Musical Processes

The way music is created, performed, and experienced.

Identify the historical events and describe the social conditions that contributed to the development of rhythm and blues as a musical style beginning in the mid- to late 1940s.

Two major historical events that contributed to the development of R&B were: World War II and the Great migration. World War II drafted many people so bands had to become significantly smaller. Jazz swing bands broke up and many created R&B bands because it required less people. The Jim Crow laws forced Blacks to migrate North to escape racial oppression. These conditions created a great opportunity for entertainment.

Crossover

When a recording that was initially released in a secondary market achieves hit status in the mainstream market. Mainly used for recording R&B artists singing Country songs.

territory jazz bands

jazz bands based in smaller cities primarily in the midwest and southwest.

Riff

short, reoccurring melodic-rhythmic phrase. This occurs in the blues and is linked to the African tradition. Influenced American popular music. Can be used to extend the instrumental response to a vocal part as well as background music to support the vocals.