The Significance And Influence Of Blues As A Musical Genre In The History And Development Of Popular Music

Blues Musical Genre in the History

The Blues can be perceived as a single most influential musical genre in the history and development of popular music. Do you agree? Discuss your reasons.

The most famous and popular music of American's has had a tremendous and profound effect all across the universe of music. This country since long has seen the continuous rise of the popular styles which have for long had an important and a very vital influence on all kinds of the global culture that includes blues, ragtime, swing, jazz, bluegrass, rock, country, doo wop, soul, gospel, punk, funk, disco, heavy metal, salsa, house, grunge, techno, and the hip hop (Bernstein, 2008). Additionally, the music of the American industry has always been quite supporting and diverse in so many numbers of the famous regional styles like the klezmer, zydeco, and the slack-key.

The oldest or the earliest songs which could be well considered as the American most popular music songs, as are opposed to the most famous and popular music refer any of the particular ethnicity or the region, were the sentimental songs by Sir Stephen Foster and also by so many of his peers, plus songs which are meant for its use in the theatrical productions and minstrel shows which featured dancing, singing and the comic performances (Cooper, 2012).

In the beginning of the year 1920s and also accelerating in the year 1940s, the blues at that time began very rapidly diversifying into a much broader spectrum of all of the new styles. They also included the energetic style, up-tempo which is called as the rhythm and blues are commonly known as the (R&B), a collaboration of the Anglo-Celtic and the blues  song known as the country music plus the fusion of spirituals and the hymns with the blues structures known as the gospel music. In the year 1940s, the blues, rhythm and blues and the country fusion which was called as the rock and roll mainly developed, and thus coming all together to dominate the American popular at the start of the year 1960s (Bernstein, 2008).

Since long ago, the blues has very deep roots refer the history of the American music industry and background, most particularly in the history of the African-American. This blues has originated on the Southern plantations long ago in the 19th Century (Bernstein, 2008). Its main investors were the ex-slaves, slaves and also the descendants of the slaves—plus the African-American people of the sharecroppers who has sung songs when they toiled in the vegetable fields and the cotton fields. It has been until time generally and almost fully accepted that the music has been evolved from the vegetable fields, African spirituals, field hollers, work songs, drum music, rural fife, country dance music and the revivalist hymns (Scaruffi.com, 2016).

Blues Music and the Development of Popular Music

The singers of the blues bridged on the different realms of the black music plus also bringing together all of the practices and the styles refer the minstrel shows, of ragtime, vaudeville theatres and also of the native and local rural cultures and environments. The first and the foremost blues songs were to be screened and published in the year 1912 were the ever loved and famous Baby Seals Blues, which was at that time written by the ragtime famous artist named Dallas Blues and the Artie Matthews plus written by the Hart Wand who is also called as the white songwriter (Scaruffi.com, 2016). 

Blues since its inception, in the South, or at the time of the early 20th century, named as "the Blues" was simple and also the expressive forms which had become, at the close of the end of the 1960s, among the most vital, famous and important influences refer the development of the most popular music in America. This Blues have essentially as well as shown in the emotional expression plus is the predominantly a medium vocal - although there are plenty of illustrations of the Blues instrumentals (SAGEE, 2007). Generally, it is always the singer, who tends to express the feelings of the songs which are made by the Blues; and there is the availability of so many of the vocal techniques that are brought into use so as to create the required and the desired effects. There is also availability of a wide range of the Blues instrumentations which accompanies the central vocal demonstration or the performance presentation, i.e. the bending of the strings of the guitar, the ever loved and the classic bottleneck of the blues guitarists, the famous and worldwide loved harmonica which has always been imitating the voice of the humans etc.), and that these clearly characterize the requirements of the Blues performance presentations (SAGEE, 2007).

Main reasons of the reasons that the Blues genre has with such a remarkable speed moved forward, has been the economic migration which has been done by millions of the Black workers to the cities of the area of the North from that from the South. The famous Blues has gone with them, and also adapting to the urban environment.  Thus the Themes which are extracted from the Blues song has with the passage of time become more and more urban based than ever (Panish, 2004). The single, or the solo bluesman has been with the passage of time joined by so many of the other famous musicians plus the Blues combination (combo) was now born. The harmonica, piano, drums, bass and the most importantly of all of them, the ever loved electric guitar has become the main cornerstone and also the sound of the increasing music and rhythmic intensity among the worldwide listeners (Smith, 2014). 

Among the major centres of the urban which has been now creating the much more "sophisticated" sounds of the Blues now also included the Atlanta, St. Louis and Memphis. Thus, the most exceptional and world famous Talents were now found that are to be placed at the number of places all across the world. Sir John Lee Hooker also now found a perfect home at the Detroit, later T-Bone Walker the great established in the Chicago and the West Coast produced the best and the most popular ones (Stott, 2013). Muddy Waters, Sonny Boy Williamson, Howlin' Wolf, Little Walter, Elmore James and the Otis Spann also were all established and based there.

Blues has been the number one and has also with the passage of time influenced just about each and everything all across the universe musically that subsequently enhanced and developed. The emergence of this also, later on, came to be well called as the Rhythm and the Blues. The Blues, a stylistic, haunting kind of the instrumental and vocal music, is mainly based upon the use of the 'blue' intentional aberration or the notes or the 'bending' of the scalar tone based on the repetitive pattern, that is always or usually a 12-bar structure. Further, it provided the blues its harmony and the characteristic melody (Panish, 2004).

The (R&B) Rhythm and Blues have most commonly learned and understood as the main term which has been used to well clearly describe the simple and the sophisticated music of the urban times which grew out and was born from the urbanization of the group Blues that began in the early years of the 1930s (Panish, 2004). The most renowned and the single exponent of such a kind of the development is named as the Louis Jordan, he originally came from a comparatively much smaller band, started to make the Blues-based songs and records with serious humorous lyrics plus a rhythm which is considered as the owing as much for the boogie Woogie as is for the much traditional classic type of the form of blues. Amos Milburn, Louis Jordan, Charles Brown, Floyd Dixon plus even the famous and most loved great, "Big" Joe Turner, at that time were all the leading practitioners of which came to be called as the jump blues (Panish, 2004).

In this mix of the R&B, there existed so many of the room for all kinds of different band formations - and also so many of the relatively bigger bands as well were being led by the singers who has got much vast previous experience with famous and much renowned and bigger great bandleaders like the Lucky Millender and Count Basie. Jimmy Witherspoon and Joe Turner had earlier spells with the Basie. The relatively smaller kinds of the groups often were dependent and also relied more and more on the individual soloists and earned the spotlight, so many solos were at that time being taken by the tenor sax and the alto players. This is also important to note down that the singers who used the electric guitar, which has played such a huge part, refer for the popularization and the urbanization of the Blues, were often designated and relegated to important roles to accompany (Lipsitz, 2015). When we listen to the famous records of the Charles Brown, for example, and we hear the virtual all of the solos which are played by the all famous Brown on the instrument piano. Many great "jump blues" also came from the T-Bone Walker, with his highly influential guitar and unique work, being all together being very clearly and also undoubtedly in the all-time lead (Litwack, 2004). 

The often use of the blue notes plus the prominence and the usual use of the call and the response patterns refer the lyrics and the music is the most indicative of all time blues' pedigree of the West African. These blues were influenced by the Western and the American well known and popular music, soon they became vital part of genres of the jazz, ragtime, rhythm, bluegrass and the blues, hip-hop, rock and roll, pop songs and the country music in the United Kingdom, some of the bands which emulated in the United states blues legends, and also the United Kingdom blues which is rock based bands and had very important and influential role all around the year 1960s and further (Hamilton, 2002). The John Lee Hooker combined his style of the blues with the elements of the rock and then playing with the younger musicians which belonged to the white genres, creating an impressive musical style which came to light in the 1971 album named as the Endless Boogie. In a different style which is a particular contrast to Chicago style, which is made as the King's band, brought into use some strong brass type of the support from the trumpet, saxophone, and the trombone, in spite of taking into use the harp or the slide guitar (Fleissner, 2013). The Tennessee-born star named Bobby "Blue" Bland, such as the B. King also straddled the famous R&B and the blues genres.

The music of the Jug band was all the way popular all over the South since and until the year 1930s (Lee, 2004). The early jug bands which have been variously featured by the guitars, jugs, banjos, mandolins, stringed basses, kazoos, fiddles, harmonicas, washboards and so many of the other each day used appliances got with the passage of time and preference got converted to the into the crude instruments (Lee, 2004).

Conclusion: 

There has been no doubt regarding the fact that the blues has for sure served and been the backbone or the main contender for the spread of all kinds of the styles and also probably for so many of the styles which are yet to come in near future. The blues music has always been the most reflective of the struggle which has been done by the black American so as to reach and achieve the success and fame in the life. Such kinds of the musical forms have all emerged as the main responses to economic, social and also often the state-sanctioned repression and rejection. The situation and the circumstances refer the black American in the history of the America post the Emancipation has very significantly and greatly shaped all kinds of the development of these, America's 1st indigenous products of the music. The famous and very Well-known blues pioneers in the year 1920s like the Blind Lemon Jefferson, Son House, Charlie Patton, Lead belly,  and the Robert Johnson most probably at the times performed the solo with just the use of a mere a guitar. Very rarely they used to get teamed up with additional fellow beings like the bluesmen so as to perform at the camps, rambling shacks, and the rural juke joints. The rich and famous Blues bands might have evolved early from the gospel choirs, jazz bands, and the jug bands.

References

Bernstein, C. (2008). Objectivist Blues: Scoring Speech in Second-Wave Modernist Poetry and Lyrics.American Literary History, 20(1-2), pp.346-368.

Cooper, B. (2012). Blues and Chaos: The Music Writing of Robert Palmer. Popular Music and Society, 35(1), pp.131-132.

Fleissner, J. (2013). Historicism Blues. American Literary History, 25(4), pp.699-717.

Hamilton, M. (2002). The Voice of the Blues. History Workshop Journal, 54(1), pp.123-143.

Lee, S. (2004). The Jazz Harmonies of Connection and Disconnection in "Sonny's Blues". Genre, 37(2), pp.285-299.

Lipsitz, G. (2015). Backwater Blues: The Mississippi Flood of 1927 in the African American Imagination. Journal of American History, 102(1), pp.281-281.

Litwack, L. (2004). Jim Crow Blues. OAH Magazine of History, 18(2), pp.7-58.

Panish, J. (2004). Twelve Bar Blues. Genre, 37(2), pp.350-352.

SAGEE, A. (2007). Bessie Smith: ‘Down Hearted Blues’ and ‘Gulf Coast Blues’ revisited. Popular Music, 26(01), p.117.

Scaruffi.com. (2016). A History of Blues Music. [online] Available at: https://www.scaruffi.com/history/blues.html [Accessed 10 Jul. 2016].

Smith, S. (2014). Union Blues: Melville's Poetic In(ter)ventions. Genre, 47(1), pp.21-53.

Stott, R. (2013). Homesick Blues. Reviews in American History, 41(1), pp.19-24.