INTRODUCTION to AMERICAN POPULAR MUSIC

1
INTRODUCTION to AMERICAN POPULAR MUSIC
Benjamin Carson / Spring 2006
http//arts.ucsc.edu/faculty/Carson
syllabus /course_materials/Mus11
calendar reading assignments
/course_materials/Mus11/CALENDAR.htm
2
History of American Popular Music (in 30 minutes
or less)
3
First what do we mean by American Popular Music?
4
First what do we mean by American Popular Music?

• American of or from the U.S.? Related to N. and
  S. America?

5
First what do we mean by American Popular Music?

• American of or from the U.S.? Related to N. and
  S. America?
• Popular beloved? lowest common denominator?

6
First what do we mean by American Popular Music?

• American Music music made by and for people
  living in the U.S., or by people who feel
  strongly connected to "the American experience"

7
First what do we mean by American Popular Music?

• American Music music made by and for people
  living in the U.S., or by people who feel
  strongly connected to "the American experience"
• Popular Music music which is meant for wide
  distribution, usually via mass media. Any music
  which succeeds in attracting a large and varied
  audience.

8
U.S. Cultural Historyunique aspects
9
U.S. Cultural Historyunique aspects

• American Music is music thats connected to the
  distinctive cultures of the United States in its
  history.

10
U.S. Cultural Historyunique aspects

• American Music is music thats connected to the
  distinctive cultures of the United States in its
  history.
• Since American cultures developed at a time of
  rapid technological change, the endurance and
  social impact of American music has been
  amplified.

11
Technology and Media
12
Technology and Media

• The invention of the phonograph and the radio
  familiarized many Americans with music from
  remote places, and gave countless musicians new
  and more diverse audiences.

13
Technology and Media

• The invention of the phonograph and the radio
  familiarized many Americans with music from
  remote places, and gave countless musicians new
  and more diverse audiences.
• The marketing of music through broadcasting and
  record sales not only diversifies musical
  culture, but changes its aspirations.

14
Technology and Media

• The invention of the phonograph and the radio
  familiarized many Americans with music from
  remote places, and gave countless musicians new
  and more diverse audiences.
• The marketing of music through broadcasting and
  record sales not only diversifies musical
  culture, but changes its aspirations.
• Musicians who once made music for the
  understanding of a small community, or for
  everyday ritual purposes, now often made music
  intent on engaging in a larger dialogue.

15
Technology and Media

• The invention of the phonograph and the radio
  familiarized many Americans with music from
  remote places, and gave countless musicians new
  and more diverse audiences.
• The marketing of music through broadcasting and
  record sales not only diversifies musical
  culture, but changes its aspirations.
• Musicians who once made music for the
  understanding of a small community, or for
  everyday ritual purposes, now often made music
  intent on engaging in a larger dialogue.
• Listeners were encouraged to seek to understand
  the music of landscapes and communities remote
  from their own.

16
U.S. Cultural Historyunique aspects

• American Music is music thats connected to the
  distinctive cultures of the United States in its
  history.
• Since American cultures developed at a time of
  rapid technological change, the endurance and
  social impact of American music has been
  amplified.

17
(No Transcript)
18
(No Transcript)
19
(No Transcript)
20
U.S. Cultural Historyunique aspects

• American Music is music thats connected to the
  distinctive cultures of the United States in its
  history.
• Since American cultures developed at a time of
  rapid technological change, the endurance and
  social impact of American music has been
  amplified.
• The history of the U.S. provides unique
  opportunities for complex (and sometimes
  troubled) diasporic mixtures of cultural
  influences.

21
Diaspora
diaspora -- the forced or coerced dispersion of a
people from a single ethnicity or heritage, into
new cultural and ethnic surroundings.
22
Diaspora
diaspora -- the forced or coerced dispersion of a
people from a single ethnicity or heritage, into
new cultural and ethnic surroundings.

• The United States began as a colonial
  destination for Europeans who suffered
  persecution or oppression.

23
Diaspora
diaspora -- the forced or coerced dispersion of a
people from a single ethnicity or heritage, into
new cultural and ethnic surroundings.

• The United States began as a colonial
  destination for Europeans--especially of English
  and Irish origin--who suffered persecution or
  oppression.
• The founding of the nation coincided with the
  systematic capture of millions of people, mostly
  from West Africa, for agricultural slave labor.

24
Diaspora
diaspora -- the forced or coerced dispersion of a
people from a single ethnicity or heritage, into
new cultural and ethnic surroundings.

• The United States began as a colonial
  destination for Europeans who suffered
  persecution or oppression.
• The founding of the nation coincided with the
  systematic capture of millions of people from
  West Africa, for agricultural slave labor.
• Americas rise to economic power has depended, in
  part, upon the mass immigration of working-class
  populations from almost every other part of the
  world.

25
Diaspora
diaspora -- the forced or coerced dispersion of a
people from a single ethnicity or heritage, into
new cultural and ethnic surroundings.

• Diaspora inevitably affects culture twice once
  in the cultural transformation of the
  dispossessed, and once in the transformation of
  their new home.

26
Diaspora
diaspora -- the forced or coerced dispersion of a
people from a single ethnicity or heritage, into
new cultural and ethnic surroundings.

• Diaspora inevitably affects culture twice once
  in the cultural transformation of the
  dispossessed, and once in the transformation of
  their new home.
• In the mid-1800s, changes in industry and labor
  also caused large migrations of people
  (especially recent immigrants and
  African-Americans) within the U.S.

27
Diaspora affects music profoundly.
diaspora -- the forced or coerced dispersion of a
people from a single ethnicity or heritage, into
new cultural and ethnic surroundings.

• Diaspora complicates society and human
  identity, forging
• new ways of thinking of your place in the world.

28
Diaspora affects music profoundly.
diaspora -- the forced or coerced dispersion of a
people from a single ethnicity or heritage, into
new cultural and ethnic surroundings.

• Diaspora complicates society and human
  identity, forging
• new ways of viewing ones place in the world.
• Among the most basic purposes of music is the
  expression
• of social belonging, and cultural identity.
  Inevitably, a
• diasporic experience causes shifts and mixtures
  of
• musical culture.

29
United States in the 19th-century
Samuel B. Waugh's (1855) "The Bay and the Harbor
of New York"
30
Fun Facts 19th-c History
-- Louisiana Purchase (1804) -- Rise of Modern
Capitalism (1770-) steam and coal power
revolutionize transportation and
manufacturing. -- Romantic poets and
philosophers (Emerson, Thoreau, Nietzsche,
etc.) very interested in the importance of
individuality, liberty, exploration of
humanness. -- Mostly illiterate working class
very interested in getting home to eat some
gruel and get five hours' sleep. -- Rise of
the European "middle class" -- U.S. Civil War
1861-1865 New York Immigrants' Anti-Draft Riots
of 1863
31
Patterns of Settlement of theEastern U.S. in the
19th century
32
Patterns of Settlement of theEastern U.S. in the
19th century

• Resources and land, throughout the East, are
  owned by Anglo-Americans.

33
Patterns of Settlement of theEastern U.S. in the
19th century

• Resources and land, throughout the East, are
  owned by Anglo-Americans.
• The majority of hard labor performed by recent
  immigrants and slaves or former slaves.

34
Patterns of Settlement of theEastern U.S. in the
19th century

• Resources and land, throughout the East, are
  owned by Anglo-Americans.
• The majority of hard labor performed by recent
  immigrants and slaves or former slaves.
• Northern cities are largely segregated by class
  and race working class white immigrants (Irish,
  German), and black Americans largely separated
  from one another, both in residence and in the
  workplace.

35
Patterns of Settlement of theEastern U.S. in the
19th century

• Resources and land, throughout the East, are
  owned by Anglo-Americans.
• majority of hard labor performed by recent
  immigrants and slaves or former slaves.
• Northern cities are largely segregated by class
  and race working class white immigrants (Irish,
  German), and black Americans largely separated
  from one another, both in residence and in the
  workplace.
• Mountain villiages and rural communities were
  often integrated and relatively disinterested in
  racial and ethnic difference.

36
Timeline of Migration from Europe to the U.S.
37
First wave of immigrationto the U.S. Irish,
English,Scotch, and German.
38
Distribution of U.S. Immigration Origins
39
Euro- and Anglo- American Music in the 19th
century
40
Euro- and Anglo- American Music in the 19th
century

• White Americans who owned property and were
  educated tended to be familiar with two kinds of
  entertainment music opera and song.

41
Euro- and Anglo- American Music in the 19th
century

• White Americans who owned property and were
  educated tended to be familiar with two kinds of
  entertainment music opera and song.
• Operas are stage works based on plays (sometimes
  called "librettos") the texts involve dramatic
  enactments of a fictional world.

42
Euro- and Anglo- American Music in the 19th
century

• White Americans who owned property and were
  educated tended to be familiar with two kinds of
  entertainment music opera and song.
• Operas are stage works based on plays (sometimes
  called "librettos") the texts involve dramatic
  enactments of a fictional world.
• Songs are musical interpretations of poetry.

43
Euro- and Anglo- American Music in the 19th
century

• White Americans who owned property and were
  educated tended to be familiar with two kinds of
  entertainment music opera and song.
• Operas are stage works based on plays (sometimes
  called "librettos") the texts involve dramatic
  enactments of a fictional world.
• Songs are musical interpretations of poetry.
• Avoid confusing these two categores Operas
  rarely contain songs instead they contain works
  called -- arias, duets, and choruses -- sung by
  actors portraying characters.

44
Song Parlor Song and "Art" Song
45
Song Parlor Song and "Art" Song

• Songs in 19th-century England and the U.S. were
  an major feature of popular entertainment,
  increasing in importance throughout the century.

46
Song Parlor Song and "Art" Song

• Songs in 19th-century England and the U.S. were
  an major feature of popular entertainment,
  increasing in importance throughout the century.
• Early-19th century composers (especially German
  and Austrian) popularized the form and made it
  "respectable" (on a par with symphonies and
  string quartets).

47
Song Parlor Song and "Art" Song

• Songs in 19th-century England and the U.S. were
  an major feature of popular entertainment,
  increasing in importance throughout the century.
• Early 19th-century composers (especially German
  and Austrian) popularized the form and made it
  "respectable" (on a par with symphonies and
  string quartets).
• In the late 19th-century, the rise of the middle
  "consumer" class made songs (in the form of sheet
  music) into the world's first mass media music
  industry. These were often called "Parlor Songs."

48
Review of Week 1 diaspora

• American Popular Music is, for purposes of this
  course, music that is made by and for U.S.
  audiences, and is intended to reach a large and
  varied audience.
• American Popular Music is distinctive because,
  along with American cultural history itself, the
  musical styles of Americans have developed
• during a period of complex and diasporic
  mixtures of cultural identity, and
• during a period of rapid changes in media
  technology.
• Many significant U.S. cultural identities are
  products of the 19th century a time when the
  industrial revolution sets off mass movements of
  people to the U.S. from all over the world.
• This results in diaspora -- a process by which
  cultures find themselves transformed by
  unfamiliar environments, and struggling to
  maintain or reinvent their identities. Music is
  essential to cultural identity, and so diaspora
  affects music profoundly.

49
Review of Week 1 Art Song and Folk Song

• "Songs" are musical interpretations of poetry.
• Song can come from the "oral tradition," being
  musical performances of jokes, historical events,
  or popular stories.
• Songs can also come from "elite" culture, written
  down by educated composers. European composers in
  the 19th century brought wider respect to songs
  as a "high" art form, making song almost as
  important as opera.
• The first example of mass media is sheet music.
  As soon as publishers started selling written
  songs for middle-class audiences, the "song"
  medium became the earliest form of pop music.
  (Sometimes popular songs were called "Parlor
  Songs"

50
Johann Gottfried von Herder (1744-1803)
Alan Lomax (1915-2002)
Ethnomusicologist/Documentarian discovered and
archived dozens of American Folk Music Styles
Philosopher/Musicologist coined and popularized
the term "Volksmusik" (Folk Music)
51
Folk Song and "Authenticity"
authenticity the status of being the "true
source," or "origin" of a trend, style, or a form
of expression

• German poets and writers in the early 19th
  century (Brothers Grimm, Johann Gottfried von
  Herder, and others) took a strong interest in the
  ancient (pre-Christian) roots of their cultures.
• One of the best ways to gain insight into one's
  roots is through the exploration of
  oral-tradition music and literature, especially
  found in rural and illiterate communities.

52
Folk Song and "Authenticity"
authenticity the status of being the "true
source," or "origin" of a trend, style, or a form
of expression

• J.G. Herder was the first to record hundreds of
  songs (in poem form, and sometimes with musical
  notes) that had been evolving in rural and
  European folk culture through several centuries
  he championed an "authentic" or "original" white
  European culture.
• But in many cases those songs were not authentic
  -- they were in a constant process of evolution
  that we may never understand completely.

53
deadline 1
Due April 10 American Popular Music Chapter 2,
Chapter 3 pp 39-44
54
What motivates scholars like Alan Lomax (20th
century) and J.G. von Herder (late 18th c.) to
collect and record folk music?
55
African-American Diasporalate 1800s

• Little is known about African-American folk music
  of the 19th century, because it was not often
  highly valued by those who documented
  19th-century American musical culture.
• Freed slaves in the south, after the civil war,
  were able to bring a hidden culture and music
  "out of hiding."
• African-American Christians began to incorporate
  some new rhythmic sensibilities, and new
  communication styles, into their religious
  services.
• African-American songs and dances were no longer
  a taboo among white audiences, who began to
  regard them with curiosity.
• However, racism was still an important feature of
  everyday life for African American society.
• Many black Americans have described rural black
  culture consequently as a culture of wariness,
  and irony.

56
Chernoff, John Miller African Rhythm and
African Sensibility Aesthetics and Social Action
in African Musical Idioms. 280 p., 30 plates,
frontispiece. 1979
57
Hurston quote

• Novelist and anthropologist Zora Neale Hurston's
  essay "Characteristics of Negro Expression,"
  describes the "absence of the concept of privacy"
  as a phenomenon that influences African American
  voices, a result of chosen and enforced communal
  living and struggle.
• "I do not always feel colored. Even now I often
  achieve the unconscious Zora of Eatonville before
  the Hegira. I feel most colored when I am thrown
  against a sharp white background. For instance at
  Barnard...I feel my race. Among the thousand
  white persons, I am a dark rock surged upon,
  overswept by a creamy sea. I am surged upon and
  overswept, but through it all, I remain myself.
  When covered by the waters, I am and the ebb but
  reveals me again. At certain times I have no
  race, I am me. When I set my hat at a certain
  angle and saunter down Seventh Avenue, Harlem
  City, feeling as snooty as the lions in front of
  the Forty-Second Street Library, for instance. .
  . . The cosmic Zora emerges. I belong to no race
  or time, I am the eternal feminine with its
  string of beads."
• Zora Neale Hurston, "How It Feels to Be
  Colored Me" (1928)

58
African-American Diasporalate 1800s

• Many scholars have suggested that these features
  of American black music are related to deeply
  ingrained elements of West African heritage.
• But African American ways of living had already
  been developing for over 200 years on this
  continent, under the deeply transformative
  circumstances of slavery and near-total
  prohibition of African language and ideas.
• When we emphasize the "African-ness" of early
  African-American music and art forms, we run the
  risk of hearing their voices as though they were
  a unified and authentic link to some mysterious
  past. That tends to degrade the value of the
  diasporic culture, a modern culture with
  contemporary struggles, and with a people whose
  experiences are varied and individualized.

59
Minstrelsy

• One of the most well-known early forms of
  American Music (white or black) was minstrelsy
  parody of black music, dance, and language mostly
  propogated by white entertainers.

60
Minstrelsy

• One of the most well-known early forms of
  American Music (white or black) was minstrelsy
  parody of black music, dance, and language mostly
  propogated by white entertainers.
• Minstrelsy is actually a large category of
  entertainment, including
• extensive racist humor and "blackface" music, but
  also
• ragtime players and singers, cakewalk dancers,
  and others who were influenced less crudely by
  African American styles.

61
Minstrelsy

• One of the most well-known early forms of
  American Music (white or black) was minstrelsy
  parody of black music, dance, and language mostly
  propogated by white entertainers.
• Minstrelsy is actually a large category of
  entertainment, including
• extended racist jokes and "blackface" music, but
  also
• ragtime players and singers, cakewalk dancers,
  and others who were influenced less crudely by
  African American styles.

62
Minstrelsy

• One of the most well-known early forms of
  American Music (white or black) was minstrelsy
  parody of black music, dance, and language mostly
  propogated by white entertainers.
• Some minstrelsy was blatant and hateful racism
  white (and sometimes black) entertainers
  ridiculing black mannerisms, in order to distance
  themselves from a culture they feared, a culture
  they wanted to identify themselves against.

63
Minstrelsy

• One of the most well-known early forms of
  American Music (white or black) was minstrelsy
  parody of black music, dance, and language mostly
  propogated by white entertainers.
• Some minstrelsy was blatant and hateful racism
  white (and sometimes black) entertainers
  ridiculing black mannerisms, in order to distance
  themselves from a culture they feared, or loathed
  to be connected with.
• But some scholars have suggested that minstrel
  shows were invented by rural white musicians as a
  form of imitation and identification that had a
  political purpose

64
Minstrelsy

• One of the most well-known early forms of
  American Music (white or black) was minstrelsy
  parody of black music, dance, and language mostly
  propogated by white entertainers.
• Some minstrelsy was blatant and hateful racism
  white (and sometimes black) entertainers
  ridiculing black mannerisms, in order to distance
  themselves from a culture they feared, or loathed
  to be connected with.
• But some scholars have suggested that minstrel
  shows were invented by rural white musicians as a
  form of imitation and identification that had a
  political purpose Identifying with black culture
  gave poor whites an opportunity to emphasize
  their differences from despised figures of
  authority.

65
Minstrelsy

• One of the most well-known early forms of
  American Music (white or black) was minstrelsy
  parody of black music, dance, and language mostly
  propogated by white entertainers.
• Some minstrelsy was blatant and hateful racism
  white (and sometimes black) entertainers
  ridiculing black mannerisms, in order to distance
  themselves from a culture they feared, or loathed
  to be connected with.
• But some scholars have suggested that minstrel
  shows were invented by rural white musicians as a
  form of imitation and identification that had a
  political purpose Identifying with black culture
  gave poor whites an opportunity to emphasize
  their differences from despised figures of
  authority.
• (And they may also have loved the music!)

66
MinstrelsyTwo 19th-c white artists who
appropriated African-American styles
Thomas Dartmouth Rice (1808-1960) Stephen Foster
(1828-1864)
67
MinstrelsyTwo white artists who appropriated
African-American styles

• Thomas Dartmouth Rice (1808-1860) was a white
  entertainer who was, ironically, the first to
  popularize a notion of black American culture,
  with his character Jim Crow.

68
Thomas Dartmouth Rice (1808-1860)
69
MinstrelsyTwo white artists who appropriated
African-American styles

• Thomas Dartmouth Rice (1808-1860) was a white
  entertainer who was, ironically, the first to
  popularize a notion of black American culture,
  with his character Jim Crow.

70
MinstrelsyTwo white artists who appropriated
African-American styles

• Thomas Dartmouth Rice (1808-1860) was a white
  entertainer who was, ironically, the first to
  popularize a notion of black American culture,
  with his character Jim Crow.
• Jim Crow was a fictional character created in
  Rice's minstrel shows, who made fun of the upper
  classes, and exhibited sophisticated layers of
  irony. Starr/Waterman p 19

71
MinstrelsyTwo white artists who appropriated
African-American styles

• Thomas Dartmouth Rice (1808-1860) was a white
  entertainer who was, ironically, the first to
  popularize a notion of black American culture,
  with his character Jim Crow.
• Jim Crow was a fictional character created in
  Rice's minstrel shows, who made fun of the upper
  classes, and exhibited sophisticated layers of
  irony. Starr/Waterman p 19
• Rice's character was widely imitated after the
  civil war, and in some cases it came to represent
  the need to separate the lives of whites and
  blacks. Starr / Waterman p 20-21

72
MinstrelsyTwo white artists who appropriated
African-American styles

• Thomas Dartmouth Rice (1808-1860) was a white
  entertainer who was, ironically, the first to
  popularize a notion of black American culture,
  with his character Jim Crow.
• Jim Crow was a fictional character created in
  Rice's minstrel shows, who made fun of the upper
  classes, and exhibited sophisticated layers of
  irony. Starr/Waterman p 19
• Rice's character was widely imitated after the
  civil war, and in some cases it came to represent
  the need to separate the lives of whites and
  blacks. Starr / Waterman p 20-21
• The term "Jim Crow" has (even more ironically)
  come to represent segregation and rigidly
  stereotypical thinking about differences between
  blacks and whites in America.

73
STEPHEN FOSTER (1826-1864)
74
MinstrelsyTwo white artists who appropriated
African-American styles

• Stephen Foster(1826-1864) was the first composer
  of real American popular music. His music
  represents the influence of the art song
  tradition, the Irish folk tradition, and the
  tradition of minstrelsy.

75
MinstrelsyTwo white artists who appropriated
African-American styles

• Stephen Foster(1826-1864) was the first real
  composer of popular music. His music represents
  the influence of the art song tradition
  ("Beautiful Dreamer") on the Irish folk music
  tradition and the minstrel tradition
• "Jeanie with the light brown hair" strongly
  reflects Irish folk sentiments about beauty and
  feminine elegance.
• "Oh Susannah!" reflects elements of minstrelsy
  and rural folk music.

76
MinstrelsyTwo white artists who appropriated
African-American styles

• Stephen Foster(1826-1864) was the first real
  composer of popular music. His music represents
  the influence of the art song tradition
  ("Beautiful Dreamer") on the Irish folk music
  tradition and the minstrel tradition
• "Jeanie with the light brown hair" strongly
  reflects Irish folk sentiments about beauty and
  feminine elegance.
• "Oh Susannah!" reflects elements of minstrelsy
  and rural folk music.

77
MinstrelsyTwo white artists who appropriated
African-American styles

• Stephen Foster(1826-1864) was the first real
  composer of popular music. His music represents
  the influence of the art song tradition
  ("Beautiful Dreamer") on the Irish folk music
  tradition and the minstrel tradition
• "Jeanie with the light brown hair" strongly
  reflects Irish folk sentiments about beauty and
  feminine elegance.
• "Oh Susannah!" reflects elements of minstrelsy
  and rural folk music.
• All Foster's songs are "Parlor songs" intended
  for middle-class consumption in mass-distributed
  sheet music form, for performance on pianos.

78
Stephen Foster Irish influence, art music
influence, and minstrelsy influence

• Jeanie with the light brown hair
• Jeanie's beauty is compared to pastoral and
  natural scenery, common in Irish poems. It
  idealizes the rural origins of the Irish
  diaspora.
• Art music influence is reflected in
• its soaring, memorable melody
• its clear, steady, and symmetrical rhythmic
  structure.

79
Stephen Foster Irish influence, art music
influence, and minstrelsy influence

• Jeanie with the light brown hair
• Jeanie's beauty is compared to pastoral and
  natural scenery, common in Irish poems. It
  idealizes the rural origins of the Irish
  diaspora.
• Art music influence is reflected in
• its soaring, memorable melody
• clear, steady, and symmetrical rhythmic
  structure.

80
Stephen Foster Irish influence, art music
influence, and minstrelsy influence

• Jeanie with the light brown hair
• Jeanie's beauty is compared to pastoral and
  natural scenery, common in Irish poems. It
  idealizes the rural origins of the Irish
  diaspora.
• Art music influence is reflected in
• its soaring, memorable melody
• clear, steady, and symmetrical rhythmic
  structure.
• Irish-Americans loved hearing tribute to their
  culture in this modern, artful style.

81
Stephen Foster Irish influence, art music
influence, and minstrelsy influence

• Jeanie with the light brown hair
• Jeanie's beauty is compared to pastoral and
  natural scenery, common in Irish poems. It
  idealizes the rural origins of the Irish
  diaspora.
• Art music influence is reflected in its soaring,
  memorable melody, and its clear, steady, and
  symmetrical rhythmic structure. Irish-Americans
  loved hearing tribute to their culture in this
  modern, artful style.
• Oh Susannah!
• reflects African-American tradition in its
  reference to the banjo (an instrument at least
  partly connected to African origins, and commonly
  played by former slaves)
• its plaintiff, declamatory melody, and its
  (sometimes absurd) comic lyrics reflect any
  number of folk music traditions.

82
Stephen Foster Irish influence, art music
influence, and minstrelsy influence

• Jeanie with the light brown hair
• Jeanie's beauty is compared to pastoral and
  natural scenery, common in Irish poems. It
  idealizes the rural origins of the Irish
  diaspora.
• Art music influence is reflected in its soaring,
  memorable melody, and its clear, steady, and
  symmetrical rhythmic structure. Irish-Americans
  loved hearing tribute to their culture in this
  modern, artful style.
• Oh Susannah!
• reflects African-American tradition in its
  reference to the banjo (an instrument at least
  partly connected to African origins, and commonly
  played by former slaves)
• its plaintiff, declamatory melody, and its
  (sometimes absurd) comic lyrics reflect any
  number of folk music traditions.

83
Stephen Foster Irish influence, art music
influence, and minstrelsy influence

• Jeanie with the light brown hair
• Jeanie's beauty is compared to pastoral and
  natural scenery, common in Irish poems. It
  idealizes the rural origins of the Irish
  diaspora.
• Art music influence is reflected in its soaring,
  memorable melody, and its clear, steady, and
  symmetrical rhythmic structure. Irish-Americans
  loved hearing tribute to their culture in this
  modern, artful style.
• Oh Susannah!
• reflects African-American tradition in its
  reference to the banjo (an instrument at least
  partly connected to African origins, and commonly
  played by former slaves)
• its plaintiff, declamatory melody, and its
  (sometimes absurd) comic lyrics reflect any
  number of folk music traditions.

84
Stephen Foster Irish influence, art music
influence, and minstrelsy influence

• Jeanie with the light brown hair
• Jeanie's beauty is compared to pastoral and
  natural scenery, common in Irish poems. It
  idealizes the rural origins of the Irish
  diaspora.
• Art music influence is reflected in its soaring,
  memorable melody, and its clear, steady, and
  symmetrical rhythmic structure. Irish-Americans
  loved hearing tribute to their culture in this
  modern, artful style.
• Oh Susannah!
• reflects African-American tradition in its
  reference to the banjo (an instrument at least
  partly connected to African origins, and commonly
  played by former slaves)
• its plaintiff, declamatory melody, and its
  (sometimes absurd) comic lyrics reflect any
  number of folk music traditions.

85
quiz what's the difference between a BEAT and
a METER?
86
Starr/Waterman Chapter 2 main points for
comprehension

• Thomas Dartmouth Rice Minstrel Shows
• compare early minstrelsy to post-civil war
  minstrelsy
• Stephen Foster
• The Birth of Popular Song and Tin Pan Alley (also
  to be discussed Wednesday 4/19)
• Ragtime, syncopation, and black identity
• Rise of the Phonograph
• the first popular music records Enrico Caruso
• schizophonia

87
Starr/Waterman Chapter 3 (pp 39-44) main points
for comprehension

• Decline of the phonograph and the rise of radio
  (1920s and 1930s).
• Electric recording and crooning.
• Introduction of sound film ("talkies") and the
  dominance of Hollywood in the 1930s music
  industry -- to be discussed in lectures April
  21/24.

88
Starr/Waterman Chapter 4 main points for
comprehension

• Tin Pan Alley's Golden Age
• composers Irving Berlin, Richard Rodgers, Cole
  Porter, George Gershwin, Harold Arlen, Jerome
  Kern
• Jewish immigrant culture in New York City
• Cultivation of the first internationally popular
  songwriting style to be associated with America
  (AABA form)
• Listen to "My Blue Heaven" (analysis pp. 68-71),
  and "April Showers" (analysis pp. 72-73)
• first performers Al Jolson and Bing Crosby

89
slight changes in the syllabus
90
EARLY "JAZZ"African American Music in the early
1900s
91
EARLY "JAZZ"African American Music in the early
1900s

• The famously syncopated and layered rhythms that
  were the hallmark of early jazz have many
  cultural origins
• Latin American and Caribbean dance styles,
• African-American ring-shouts and gospel singing
• Anglo-American fiddle playing
• Some patriotic French and English marching band
  music.

92
EARLY "JAZZ"African American Music in the early
1900s

• The famously syncopated and layered rhythms that
  were the hallmark of early jazz have many
  cultural origins
• Latin American and Caribbean dance styles,
• African-American ring-shouts and gospel singing
• Anglo-American fiddle playing
• Some examples of patriotic or martial French and
  English brass band music.
• (The Spanish American War ended in 1898, and when
  American bases were decommissioned, our military
  left behind, in New Orleans, hundreds of brass
  instruments, later bought and repaired by local
  dock and boat workers, who used them at dance
  celebrations and to accompany local folk songs.)

93
EARLY "JAZZ"African American Music in the early
1900s

• The famously syncopated and layered rhythms that
  were the hallmark of early jazz have many
  cultural origins Latin American and Caribbean
  dance styles, African-American ring-shouts and
  gospel singing, Anglo-American fiddle playing,
  and some patriotic or martial marching band
  music.
• These numerous cultures come together
  powerfullywithin reach of the Mississippi River
  and its tributaries, where international
  influences affected the daily lives of
  working-class black musicians.
• New Orleans Kansas City Memphis
• St. Louis Louisville
  Indianapolis

94
EARLY "JAZZ"African American Music in the early
1900s

• The term "jazz," by itself, is troublesome
• it refers to virtually any style of music
  innovated by early 20th-century African American
  entertainers.
• Most of those styles utilize European harmony
  with a variety of international influences on
  rhythm and melody.
• Regardless of the mixture, African Americans
  tended to be the ones performing it on tour, and
  writing it down for publication.

95
EARLY "JAZZ"African American Music in the early
1900s

• The term "jazz," by itself, is troublesome
• it refers to virtually any style of music
  innovated by early 20th-century African American
  entertainers.
• RAGS CAKEWALKS BLUES "BOOGIE"
• TWO-STEP DIXIELAND SWING
• (and these styles are all quite different from
  one another!)
• Most of those styles utilize European harmony
  with a variety of international influences on
  rhythm and melody.
• Regardless of the mixture, African Americans
  tended to be the ones performing it on tour, and
  writing it down for publication.

96
EARLY "JAZZ"African American Music in the early
1900s

• The term "jazz," by itself, is troublesome
• it refers to virtually any style of music
  innovated by early 20th-century African American
  entertainers.
• In spite of their differences, most of those
  styles utilize European harmony with a variety of
  international influences on rhythm and melody.
• Regardless of the mixture, African Americans
  tended to be the ones performing it on tour, and
  writing it down for publication.

97
EARLY "JAZZ"African American Music in the early
1900s

• The term "jazz," by itself, is troublesome
• it refers to virtually any style of music
  innovated byearly 20th-century African American
  entertainers.
• Most of those styles utilize European harmony
  with a variety of international influences on
  rhythm and melody.
• Regardless of the mixture, African Americans
  tended to be the ones performing it on tour, and
  writing it down for publication.

98
EARLY "JAZZ"African American Music in the early
1900s

• The term "jazz," by itself, is troublesome
• it refers to virtually any style of music
  innovated by early 20th-century African American
  entertainers.
• Most of those styles utilize European harmony
  with a variety of international influences on
  rhythm and melody.
• Regardless of the mixture, African Americans
  tended to be the ones performing these styles,
  and writing it down for publication.

99
What is the musical feature most common in the
wide variety of early "jazz" styles?
100
W.C. Handy
W.C. Handy
(1873-1958)
101
W.C. Handy
(1873-1958)

• born in rural Alabama

• Middle class background
• Self-taught trumpeter and
• composer, highly educated
• played in Mississippi river
• brass bands and "minstrel
• shows."

W.C. Handy
102
W.C. Handy
(1873-1958)

• born in rural Alabama

• Middle class background

• Self-taught trumpeter and
• composer, highly educated played in Mississippi
  river brass bands and "minstrel shows."
• Finished college with honors, took a faculty
  position at an Alabama black college.

W.C. Handy
103
W.C. Handy
(1873-1958)

• In the 1910s, was inspired by rural musicians
  to compose what he called a "new American music."
• Became a composer and published hundreds of
  "blues" tunes for solo voice or for brass bands
  that he led in Memphis, Tennesee
• His funeral procession in 1958 (New York) was
  attended by 150,000.

104
W.C. Handy
(1873-1958)
important works
Memphis Blues (1912)
inspired the "Fox Trot" dance craze
Beale St. Blues (1916)
St. Louis Blues (1919)
105
W.C. Handy
(1873-1958)
important works
Memphis Blues (1912)
inspired the "Fox Trot" dance craze
Beale St. Blues (1916)
became the quintessential example of New Orleans
Jazz
St. Louis Blues (1919)
106
W.C. Handy
(1873-1958)
important works
Memphis Blues (1912)
inspired the "Fox Trot" dance craze
Beale St. Blues (1916)
became the quintessential example of New Orleans
Jazz
St. Louis Blues (1919)
benefitted uniquely from phonograph distribution
107
St. Louis Blues and the record industry
1917 - Because of Euro-centric recording
practices in the early history of the phonograph,
the first "Jazz" record "Livery Stable Blues" was
recorded by the all-white Original Dixieland Jass
Band from New Orleans. 1919 - Gennett Record
Company tried to make records using a similar
technology to the recording giant "Victor"
records they were sued. Smaller labels such as
Okeh, Vocalian, Compo joined Gennett in defending
its claim that lateral-cut was in the public
domain. Gennett won the case in 1920. Gennett
quickly became one of the largest record
producers in the nation, and distributed African
American "blues" and "jazz" internationally. 1920
- "St. Louis Blues" happened to be in vogue
among Vaudeville performers, after a popular
singer Ethel Waters began to sing it in New York.
Because of its local importance at the moment of
Gennet records' court victory, it quickly became
one of the most widely recorded (and distributed)
songs in history.
108
St. Louis Blues and the record industry
because of its popularity, St. Louis Blues

• inspired the "Shimmy" dance craze
• was requested by King Edward VIII
• from his bagpipers.
• was performed at a royal Greek wedding
• became the Ethiopian Military's battle
• hymn as they resisted Italian invaders in the
• 1930s.

109
W.C. Handy
(1873-1958)
important works
Memphis Blues (1912)
inspired the "Fox Trot" dance craze
Beale St. Blues (1916)
St. Louis Blues (1919)
benefitted uniquely from phonograph distribution
110
BASIC MUSICAL TERMS for musical time
rhythm the pattern of distribution for any
sounds in time.
tempo the speed at which rhythms progress.
duration the length of a musical note, or a span
of time
beat a unit of time of consistent duration,
occuring at about the speed that you would tap
your foot.
meter a repeating pattern of beats, usually
equal in number with each repetition.
NEAR-SYNONYMS bar, measure
111
BASIC MUSICAL TERMSfor melody
pitch a measure of how high or low a note is.
step the basic unit of melodic motion. Steps
can vary in size, but they feel like an
incremental and graduate change in pitch height.
skip a motion of two steps. Notes that are two
steps apart, but sounding at the same time,
sometimes sound good together as harmony.
leap a motion of more than two steps. Leaps in
a song melody often correspond with dramatic
feelings in the lyrics.
octave the distance between pitches at the top
and bottom of any one scale. Octaves are
"equivalent" -- if you sing a melody with
someone whose voice is higher and lower than
yours, you're likely to sing the same exact notes
but in different octaves.
112
The Blues

• "The Blues" was originally a name, coined by
  early African American entertainers (W. C. Handy
  and Gertrude "Ma" Rainey), for a variety of rural
  African American folk styles.

113
The Blues

• "The Blues" was originally a name, coined by
  early African American entertainers (W. C. Handy
  and Gertrude "Ma" Rainey), for a variety of rural
  African American folk styles.
• W.C. Handy "A lean loose-jointed Negro() had
  commencced plunking a guitar beside me while I
  slept. His clothes were rags his feet peeped out
  of his shoes. His face had on it the sadness of
  the ages. As he played, he pressed a knife on the
  strings of the guitar in a manner popularized by
  Hawaiian guitarists who used steel bars. The
  effect was unforgettable.

114
The Blues

• "The Blues" was originally a name, coined early
  African American entertainers (W. C. Handy and
  Gertrude "Ma" Rainey), for a variety of rural
  African American folk styles.
• W.C. Handy "His song, too, struck me
  instantly...Goin' where the Southern cross' the
  Dog...the singer repeated the line three times,
  accompanying himself on the guitar with the
  weirdest music I had ever heard."
• William Christopher Handy, Father of the Blues
  (New York Macmillan, 1941), p. 74 -- quoted in
  Elija Wald's Escaping the Delta Robert Johnson
  and the Invention of the Blues. New York Harper
  Collins, 2004, p. 8

115
The Blues

• "The Blues" was originally a name, coined early
  African American entertainers (W. C. Handy and
  Gertrude "Ma" Rainey), for a variety of rural
  African American folk styles.
• folklorist John Work "A girl from the
  town...came to the ten one morning and began to
  sing about the 'man' who had left her. The song
  was so strange and poignant that it attracted
  much attention. "Ma" Rainey became so interested
  that she...used the song as an encore.

116
The Blues

• "The Blues" was originally a name, coined early
  African American entertainers (W. C. Handy and
  Gertrude "Ma" Rainey), for a variety of rural
  African American folk styles.
• folklorist John Work "The song elicited such a
  response...that it won a special place in her
  act. Many times she was asked what kind of song
  it was, and one day she replied, in a moment of
  inspiration, 'It's the Blues -- ' ... " Ibid.
  p 11
• she added that she heard several other singers
  perform in that way in the course of her travels,
  but the music had never been called the blues.

117
The Blues

• "The Blues" was originally a name, coined early
  African American entertainers (W. C. Handy and
  Gertrude "Ma" Rainey), for a variety of rural
  African American folk styles.
• In its earliest commercial form, its most
  characteristic features were
• syncopated singing and
• a "blues note" -- a note that falls into the
  ambiguous space between a major third (4 half
  steps) and minor third (3 half steps).

118
The Blues

• "The Blues" was originally a name, coined early
  African American entertainers (W. C. Handy and
  Gertrude "Ma" Rainey), for a variety of rural
  African American folk styles.
• In its earliest commercial form, its most
  characteristic features were
• syncopated singing and
• a "blues note" -- a note that falls into the
  ambiguous space between a major third (4 half
  steps) and minor third (3 half steps).
• The standard blues form is AAB -- both in poetry
  and in melody a line, repeated, followed by a
  contrasting idea. The contrasting idea is often a
  "punch line."

119
deadline 2
Due April 17 Chapter 4, Chapter 5 pp
86-100 Due April 21 Chapter 5 pp
100-114 Chapter 6 pp 121-142 Info about the
origin of the song "St. James Infirmary" http//
robwalker.net/html_docs/letterthirteen.html
120
Starr/Waterman Chapter 4 main points for
comprehension

• Tin Pan Alley's Golden Age
• composers Irving Berlin, Richard Rodgers, Cole
  Porter, George Gershwin, Harold Arlen, Jerome
  Kern
• Jewish immigrant culture in New York City
• Cultivation of the first internationally popular
  songwriting style to be associated with America
  (AABA form)
• Listen to "My Blue Heaven" (analysis pp. 68-71),
  and "April Showers" (analysis pp. 72-73)
• first performers Al Jolson and Bing Crosby

121
Tin Pan Alley

• Beginning in the 1880s, the 28th St. region of
  New York City became a center for a diaspora of
  Jewish refugees from Eastern Europe, who were
  victims of one of the first modern waves of
  anti-semitism.

122
Tin Pan Alley

• Beginning in the 1880s, the 28th St. region of
  New York City became a center for a diaspora of
  Jewish refugees from Eastern Europe, who were
  victims of one of the first modern waves of
  anti-semitism.
• Jewish men in the 19th-c were often prevented
  from entering into building and agricultural
  trades, partly because of their tendency to work
  longer hours for lower wages, and partly because
  of hatred and anti-Jewish superstitions motivated
  by Christian mythology.

123
Tin Pan Alley

• Beginning in the 1880s, the 28th St. region of
  New York City became a center for a diaspora of
  Jewish refugees from Eastern Europe, who were
  victims of one of the first modern waves of
  anti-semitism.
• Jewish men in the 19th-c were often prevented
  from entering into building and agricultural
  trades, partly because of their tendency to work
  longer hours for lower wages, and partly because
  of hatred and anti-Jewish superstitions motivated
  by Christian mythology.
• Consequently, Jewish families entered into other
  businesses publishing, clerical, entertainment,
  and financial trades which were often considered
  less prestigious by whites.

124
Tin Pan Alley

• Beginning in the 1880s, the 28th St. region of
  New York City became a center for a diaspora of
  Jewish refugees from Eastern Europe, who were
  victims of one of the first modern waves of
  anti-semitism.
• Jewish men in the 19th-c were often prevented
  from entering into building and agricultural
  trades, partly because of their tendency to work
  longer hours for lower wages, and partly because
  of hatred and anti-Jewish superstitions motivated
  by Christian mythology.
• Consequently, Jewish families entered into other
  businesses publishing, clerical, entertainment,
  and financial trades which were often considered
  less prestigious by whites.
• As a result, the first Jewish immigrant
  communities arrived with a long legacy of
  expertise and tradition related to two areas
  related to popular music entertainment and
  publishing.

125
Introduction to SONG FORMS

• Form in music is denoted by capital letters to
  indicate any basic melodic "ideas." (These are
  about the length of a spoken sentence.) A change
  from one letter to another (A to B) indicates
  contrast.
• A prime symbol (') indicates significant
  variation, without the purpose of contrast.
• Probably the most common form for song choruses
  in American popular music is A A B A (including A
  A B A').
• The standard form for blues is A A B.
• "Where'd you get those eyes" and "Always" are
  examples of another possible form A B A C.

126
From the perspective of a Western- European
musical heritage, what's unusual about a blues
note?
127
BASIC MUSICAL TERMSfor harmony

• harmony is defined, in opposition to melody, as
  the organization of simultaneous or overlapping
  pitches. (Melody individual pitches in rhythmic
  succession)
• A chord is a combinations of notes sounding
  together, usually stacked up by skipping every
  other note of a major or minor scale.
• A key is a collection of chords that are all part
  of the same scale they sound like members of the
  same family.
• chromaticism is the use of harmonies and keys in
  colorful ways, often involving movement between
  distant keys in a single melodic idea.

128
Reading assignment
plus "Ellington Refutes Cry That Swing Started
Sex Crimes" 1 1/2 pages (Downbeat Magazine,
1937) on ERes http//cruzcat.ucsc.edu (or
follow the link from our course page to --gt
Electronic Reserves http//eres.ucsc.edu --gt
Search by instructor Carson --gt Mus 11c
PASSWORD uspop
129
Mid-term review (two documents linked to the
course page)
1. Listening Review
- list of songs to listen to for form
identification - new playlist
"4_Additional_Listening" at the listening page
- find one song in each of the first two
playlists (artsong/folksong, and tin pan alley)
that are in triple meter.

• Selected powerpoint slides with sample
  questions. (will be online starting 5 pm today)

130
Quiz What is the standardmelodic form in the
blues?
131
Early History of Mass Media (overview)

• The earliest method of disseminating music, and
  among the most significant, is writing. (Same
  goes for recording speech and other information.)
• Another major form of mass media is, of course,
  performaning for large audiences, which was
  common for traveling performers and performance
  groups of the 19th century, whose music often
  reached communities across the U.S. and Europe.
• In the late 19th century, inventors like Thomas
  Edison and Alexander Graham Bell developed ways
  of recording and transmitting actual sound.

132
Sound Recording 1877-1925

• 1877 Edison's first sound recording ("Mary had
  a little lamb") was made on a tinfoil cylinder.
  At around the same time similar recordings were
  being made by French inventor Charles Cros.
• 1877-1889 Frank Lambert, Charles Tainter,
  Augustus Stroh, and Chichester Bell improved
  Edison's basic concept by making recordings on
  hard rubber, brass, wax, and lead, for more
  durability and portability.
• In 1888 Emile Berliner invented the phonograph in
  its modern form a flat, round, record that could
  be mass produced and easily distributed.

133
(No Transcript)
134
Sound Recording 1877-1925
the first commercial records

• 1890 The first jukebox, the "nickel-in-the-slot
  phonograph" was tested in San Francisco, similar
  machines were installed at major fairs and public
  parks, playing marching band tunes by John
  Phillip Sousa and parlor songs by Stephen Foster.
• 1903 The phonograph was popularized by the
  "Victrola" company, as a home furnishing for the
  middle class, and the earliest records were made
  by Opera singers like Enrico Caruso and Fedor
  Chaliapan.
• 1904 A British company records the first opera
  (Verdi's Ermani), on 40 disks each held about 4
  minutes of music.
• 1908 Alan Lomax's father, John Lomax, traveled
  to rural Texas and recorded cowboy songs,
  including "Home on the Range," which quickly
  became a national favorite.

135
Sound Recording 1877-1925
the first commercial records

• 1921 The triumph of independent record
  companies finally allows widespread commercial
  distribution of jazz records W.C. Handy's "St.
  Louis Blues" then far outsells any previous
  recording, and establishes jazz as an
  internationally known style.
• 1925 New technologies in microphones (named
  "Der Bingle" technology, after Bing Crosby), and
  recording (electric recording vs. acoustic),
  enable singers to create new sounds
• greater intimacy, including a natural or everyday
  quality of voice
• more range of intensity
• easier to control pitch and rhythm, since loud,
  operatic technique is no longer unnecessary
• 1929 Stock market crashes, record sales and
  manufacturing take a dive radio rises from the
  ashes.

136
Electric Turntable illustration from Science
magazine, 1926
137
SWING and the "BIG BAND ERA" early developments
in the 1920s

• The meaning of "Jazz" was transformed in the
  1920s
• In the early 1900s, "Jazz" was a catch-all word
  for new African American styles evolving in New
  Orleans, St. Louis, Kansas City, and Memphis
  when played in New York or Chicago, it was
  considered exotic and unusual.
• After 1921, thanks to phonograph records, radio
  shows could be "canned" and distributed for
  broadcast, or for sale, anywhere in the world. By
  the mid-1920s, jazz became the chosen
  entertainment of the urban wealthy, and it was
  the most popular kind of dance in upper-class
  hotels and clubs.
• In the late 1920s, African American Jazz was
  beloved in France and respected as a high art
  form.
• Jazz ould be heard in clubs in almost every
  outpost of imperialism not only in Paris and
  London but throughout Europe, as well as
  Shanghai, Hong Kong, and in cities throughout the
  middle east and in India.
• Many African American musicians escaped U.S.
  poverty and racism to lucrative careers and
  middle-class lifestyles in Europe.

138
SWING and the "BIG BAND ERA" late 1920s origins

• African-American bands of Bennie Moten (with
  Count Basie on piano) and Fletcher Henderson
  developed the "Kansas City Swing" style.
• Equally important are Duke Ellington and Cab
  Calloway who developed the "Big Band" style at
  New York's Cotton Club, a venue designed for
  all-black entertainers and all-white audiences.
• Duke Ellington's band included Coleman Hawkins,
  whose improvisation style gave the public its
  first appreciation of jazz improvisation as high
  art -- not just a willingness to modify existing
  melodies, but a style based on utterly
  spontaneous and original melodic composition.
• Wider appreciation for jazz meant that ensembles
  were also appreciated for their compositions and
  arrangements. Duke Ellington's band traveled to
  Europe in 1934 and found that his style was
  already well-known among white audiences ther