1. AOS 3 Popular Song in Context

2. The Blues  The Blues began as a music of hardship developed by the descendants of the African slaves.  The lyrics (words) were about hardship and misery.  African styles like call and response blended with music influences from Europe to add chords (hymns) and harmony.  Together these were the beginning of the blues.  Together these were the beginning of the blues.  Traditional blues instruments were all acoustic  Harmonica, guitar, banjo, violin, piano, double bass and voice.  By the 1920’s blues was very popular all over America as blues musicians played in bars and clubs.  By the 1940’s and 1950’s as the blacks moved to the northern cities the blues became faster and used electric instruments. This style was known as R’n’B or rhythm and blues.

3. Blues  The Blues uses a major scale with a flattened third and seventh note of the scale. Also the 5th sometimes.  The flattened notes are called BLUES NOTES  Blues melodies use a swing rhythm and off beat syncopated patterns.  The most popular blues structure is the 12 bar blues – a 12 bar chord pattern  I - I - I - I  IV - IV - I - I  V - IV - I - I  The backing chords often play a repeated pattern called a RIFF  In the WALKING BASS, the bass plays the chord notes walking up and then down.  The BOOGIE WOOGIE blues bass line has a dotted rhythm.  For the LYRICS the 12 bar blues breaks into 3 x 4 bar lines.

4. Ska and Rock Steady  These two developed in the island of Jamaica in the 1960’s also as a mix of musics from Europe and Africa.  SKA used the simple tunes from Jamaican folk music with jazzy rhythms and a walking bass line.  It’s played on jazz and electric instruments like trumpets, saxes and electric organs and guitars.  There are rests in the vocals parts, a fast tempo, and brass chords which punctuate the melody.  There is a back beat played by the snare drum on beats 2 and 4 (the off beats)  ‘My Girl Lollipop’ and the Madness and The Specials are all SKA  ROCK STEADY is a slower version of ska with ideas from gospel an soul music.  Same back beat but slower tempo.  Heavier bass line and the horn section was dropped in favour of guitar and piano.  Lots of repeated riffs and few chords.  Songs were about poverty and social problems.  Desmond Dekker’s ‘The Israelites’ is ROCK STEADY

5. REGGAE  Reggae grew out of Ska and Rock Steady and was made famous by Bob Marley and the Wailers.  It has a slow, chilled out tempo and an off beat feel.  Reggae puts the heavy bass drum beats on beats 2 and 4 (the off beats)  Maracas and tambourines play syncopated rhythms  Bass guitar plays complicated SYNCOPATED RIFFS  SIMPLE HARMONY usually 2 or 3 chords  Most songs have short snatches of tune and there can be call and response between the lead singer and the backing singers.  Brass, sax, organ and bvox often fill in the harmonies.  LYRICS are about poverty, politics and religion. Its influenced by the Rastafarian religion.  DJ’s who played the records often talked over the top. This was called DUBBING, an idea later used by RAP  Bob Marley and the Wailers – Exodus. Eric Clapton – I Shot the Sheriff. Sting’s old band the Police Walking on the Moon

6. Musicals  Musicals are pop versions of OPERA.  Talking and dancing and lots of singing.  An orchestra plays the ACCOMPANIMENT and plays INCIDENTAL MUSIC as well. (The bits in between)  They are written In Pop Music style.  They were invented in the USA.  Rogers and Hammerstein wrote lots of musicals as films like Oklahoma, Carousel, The King and I, South Pacific in the 1950’s.  There are 4 types of songs

7.  SOLO CHARACTER SONG where a main character sings about how they are feeling. Memory from Cats is a good example.  DUET where two people sing and you get a different version of the storyline. ‘I know him so well’ from Chess is a good example of this.  ACTION SONG where the words tell what is going on in the lot and lead to the next bit of the story.  CHORUS NUMBER where the whole cast get together and sing and dance. ‘We get together like ramma lamma lamma’ form the end of Grease  Musicals are easy listening entertainment.  Tunes are easy and memorable and usually use diatonic harmony (no chromatic notes)

8.  Song structure is usually simple with verses and choruses and a middle eight passage.  32 bar song form is often used  8 bars of A, 8 bars of A1, 8 bars of contrast B, finally 8 bars of A1  Musicals are heavily influenced by jazz. They use lots of syncopated rhythms and jazzy chords with added notes like 7ths and 9ths.  Before rock ‘n roll in the 1950’s nearly all pop songs came from musicals.  See Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice.  Sound of Music, West Side Story, Evita, and Cabaret are all musicals