The Real Blues: To Add Electronic Sound and Rock Elements or Not
The content I want to discuses is, I believed that real Blues is acoustic folk art, if using electronic music/sound to compose a band, and if this band adds rock elements, then this will not be a real blues.
Main idea should surround on the blues in 1960s, when blues rebound in that time, the Alan Lomax the representative of the folklorists and the representative of blues bands by Rolling Stones. These two generation representatives has a different definition of the blues, and use these two definition to elaborate the main idea.
The detail can refer to my paper draft, the written content was reasonable and correctly written, because it is DIRECTLY copied on the website, so if I use that, I'll have some problems on plagiarism and fail this assignment.
Those material was found before, can be a references for the writer. The under parts are all the related books or video materials. The pictures I sent were the feedback from teacher, it is hand written. The last page has a suggested a book to read, I'll send you all I could found of the book and upload it to you.
1，Charter, Samuel. Country Blues, London : M. Joseph, 1960. The Country Blues - Samuel B. Charters - Google books
2，Keil, Charles. Urban Blues, Chicago : University of Chicago Press, c1991.Urban Blues - Charles Keil - Google books
3，Black Thought and Culture
4，Alan Lomax, The Land Where the Blues Began http://www(dot)folkstreams(dot)net/film,109 (connected to external website)
5, Wald, Elijah, Escaping the delta : Robert Johnson and the invention of the blues.(if you cant find this book, tell me and I'll find it in library and take pictures then send it to you, only the first chapter would be enough)
6， Ulrich, Adelt. Blues music in the sixties : a story in Black and White. New Brunswick, N.J. : Rutgers University Press, c2010. Project MUSE - Blues Music in the Sixties
7, Can look at the BBC's blues America, Blues America, on blibili video website.
This is the format requirement: Final Paper (25 percent of final grade): You will submit a fully finished paper of 2,200 to 3,750 words (not including footnotes) and a properly formatted bibliography. It must show evidence of continued work since the presentation. It will be graded on the inclusion of a well-crafted thesis, the relevance of content included in relation to the thesis, the quality and effectiveness of the writing, and the formatting of the footnotes and bibliography.
The Real Blues: To Add Electronic Sound and Rock Elements or Not
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The Real Blues: To Add Electronic Sound and Rock Elements or Not
Introduction
Music per se is an indication of one’s way of life. It can be created by human ancestors and the present generation, but the same remains as a way of life that can never be forgotten since music creates a commonality of the human spirit that cannot be set aside and taken for granted. Blues became visible at the beginning of the last century, but as times passes, new elements had been added and eventually change is inevitable. From then on, scores of folks have forgotten the real blues after hundreds of years. Many musicians then believed that keeping the tradition alive while maintaining the old-times blues alive and continue vivaciously is something that we should do as the successor of the older generation. Therefore, whether or not adding electronic and/or rock element in old-times blues do not create real blues; the author claims in the affirmative.
The Blues in Early 1990s, its History and Changes
The old times blues or the so-called traditional blues or country blues is known as the pure ethereal and original music of rural African-Americans which originally came from the Southern USA. At present, this was played globally (Matheis, 2014).It all began when a man named WC Handy, he played a guitar using a knife, the same marks his first time hearing the blues. The earliest blues music is intended to entice adults to appear at the dance hall and enjoy socialization. This likewise creates employment and income to many musicians of the olden times. At the beginning of the century, the blues is already played by the poorest individuals’ using whatever thing that can create sounds: it can be a tambourine, empty bottles, washing tub, spoons, and anything.
Time lapsed; blues music was eventually used played at work at in the church. It eventually came from Africa, where an ancestral singer sang a line of acknowledgement and confirmation and others repetitively sang the same. In the blues, the second voice is deliberated as the instrumental voice, and then reckoned as call and response. When playing blues, one will sing or say a word or lyric and thereafter play music. This evolved into the 12-bar blues where sadness was turned into stoicism and misfortune into humor. The blues is more than sadness; it is more profound than anyone could ever think. It can turn sadness into entertaining jokes and much more. Blues musicians differ from others since they tend to repeat the lines before laying punch lines at the end. One good example is the song: St. Louis Blues of Bessie Smith in 1925. It is a happy music, but the subject matter and lyrics cover sad feelings: “I hate to see the evening sun go down, I hate to see the evening sun go down, It makes me think of all my left go around.” It is tuned in a happy sound but when one lingers, he or she can easily point out that its lyrics form a sad story.
In 1929, the beginning of great depression came about. Many lost their jobs and the music industry was greatly affected. During this time, the folklorist, deemed as the new record scout drove south who are the only white people that have a keen interest in blues since they want to record and make hits. But folklorists aim to preserve the essence and structure of music. John Lomax together with his son Alan travelled south to visit large penitentiaries and make recordings. For them, this is a good avenue to entice black people sing using their idioms, but they both believed that socialization is with the latter is the key to learning their ways of music.
In the 1940s owing to the era of great migration, several African-American migrated from south to north but throughout Lomax already discovered many black bluesmen that possess great singing talents. One of them is Muddy Waters, who truly changed the style of blues. In Chicago, Muddy Waters began to plug his guitar into electricity and thereafter create a band.
In 1948, Waters released “I Can’t be Satisfied” which craft rural blues sold out overnight, making a feel of country going to the city. Waters started in Mississippi but Chicago offers her faster fame, modernity—and electricity. He then ponders as regards his responsibility of setting Chicago Blues and entices the state for real blues which create a collision of thoughts and precedence.
Before 1954, beyond doubt, blues is indeed popular in blacks. However, in 1954, the US Supreme Court opined that it is unconstitutional to separate schools. This is owing to the height of civil rights movements. The separation did not cover and leave behind the culture of the Blacks, making the young blacks forget the blues from their culture. They need to cope and learn from the White’s culture and education. In worst cases, some of them already associated blues as an instrument of slavery rather than their way of life and their very own. By the end of 1950s, the blues music began to topple even the famous blues artists stumbled. The time of immense abandonment came; blues had been forgotten by many. This marks the return of many famous black bluesmen to the south.
In the early 1960`s, Blues had been revived. Many white educated Blues enthusiasts began to look back past the electric blues and embark on to instigate Blues again. They believed that there is something deeper in Blues. In the person of Alan Lomax, the real Blues was again brought to light. It was in 1959, when Sam Carters, initiator of the new generation of Blues hunters went to Memphis and documented his journey, discerning that it is high time to bring back the long-forgotten bluesmen. This paves its way to a generation that was curious and interested to old blues artists and eventually made a retort of Blues in the north. But it created a change of meaning: Blues that once one a black pop phenomenon is showcased as music of pain and alienation from the old Delta. During this time, many Blues artists are already playing for some fraction of white audience. This breakthrough of Blues music electrified folk festival and coffee house crowds.
In 1964, the Rolling Stones (the name was taken from Muddy waters’ song), a fanatic of Blues, travelled from London to America, they travel and opened an opportunity to situate blues in the mainstream. Many Americans then considered the Rolling Stones as a great influence in music like Howling Wolf. They are the first pop stars that become adamant that Blues should be played in that manner; making a lot of young Americans follow their path and play the music they called Blues. All of a sudden everyone who wanted fame named their group Blues band.
Many may view the rise of Blues a good thing, but for the folklorists who still view Blues as an acoustic folk art; these electric Blues are mere impostors. For them the Rolling Stones’ Blues if is immensely unlike from their acoustic blues. Like the Rolling Stones’ cover version of the song from Muddy waters- I Can’t be Satisfied while standing on the stage, swinging and jumping, waving their hands with a microphone, the same is far-fetched from the olden times Blues that is shaped from the African American culture of the south. For them, the real blues was removed from the picture of their culture and those singers keep on surviving while playing not real blues at the expense of real blues. Changing real blues and sounding like a rock and roll performers in ...