The Birth of the Blues

The blues was born on the Mississippi River Delta in the early 1890s. After the Civil War, the slaves were free, but life was still not easy. They had to find new work. In the South, new camps were formed. Black people from the camps worked on farms and built up the Mississippi River banks. During the week the people worked hard. They often lived alone, without their families, far from home.

On weekends, the workers got together at picnics or drinking places. Travelling black musicians with guitars entertained them. The musicians sang songs about the difficult life of the workers. Those songs were called the blues.

If you have the blues it means you feel very sad. You can have the blues because you have no money, no job, no lover, no home, or no friend. You can have the St. Louis blues, the Memphis blues, or the Monday morning blues. But blues songs were not always sad. Some of them were happy and many of them were funny.

The blues was a new kind of music. In blues songs some notes were flattened. These notes were called “blue notes”. They made the music sound sad and different.

Early blues singers often had very interesting names, like Blind Lemon Jefferson, Howlin’ Wolf, Muddy Waters and Leadbelly.

Sometimes the blues singers had song contests. Each singer sang new words or a new style of the blues song. They made up the music as they played. In this way they created new music. This is called improvization. Later, improvization became a very important part of jazz music.

The blues began in the country in the South. As blacks moved into big cities to work, the blues went with them. There they sang about life in the cities. W. C. Handy, a black band leader from Memphis, made the blues popular all over America. In 1914 he wrote the most famous blues song of all, “The St. Louis Blues”.

New York, New York

Most sheet music was written in the area of New York called Tin Pan Alley. Here the music companies had many pianos in many small rooms. Song writers wrote songs all day on the pianos. When the windows were open and the pianos were playing they made a lot of noise. They sounded like tin pans. Some people say that is why this area was called Tin Pan Alley.

The song writers of Tin Pan Alley wrote music for marches, ragtime songs and romantic love songs.

The period from the 1920s trough the 1940s is known as the golden age of American popular music. Great song writers, like George Gershwin, Rodgers and Hart and Cole Porter, wrote beautiful romantic love songs. Many of those song writers, singers and men in the music industry were Jewish. They were new Americans looking for a place to become successful. The new music and show business gave them a chance.

In New York most musical shows were on Broadway. These musical shows became very big and expensive. Hundreds of singers and dancers went on the stage at one time. The clothes that the singers and dancers wore were very colourful. One of the most famous musical shows was the Ziegfield Follies.

Song writers also wrote music for a new kind of Broadway musical. Instead of separate acts those new musicals were long plays that told a story. Songs and dances were added to the plays. One of the most famous Broadway musical stars was Ethel Merman. With her loud, strong voice and her comic style, she was the star of such shows as Annie Get Your Gun.

New York is still the most important city in America for musical shows of all kinds. It is also the centre for the theatre, classical music, opera, and ballet.

Date: 2016-04-22; view: 778