About the Blues

      Blues music is a musical genre that uses the blue notes as their basis. Blue notes, in music, are referred to notes that have lower pitch than the major scale, used mainly for expressive and stylistic purposes. They also have repetitive style. The origin of blues music is traced back to the times of slavery in the United States. The term “blue” refers to a depressed state. Blues music reflected the sadness in the lives of the Africans slaves in the United States. During their slavery in the plantations, they developed a specific style of singing that helped them to let out their bottled up emotions and today’s western music has a painful history. It has gnostalgia for their home country. These were in the form of hollers and call and response pattern. Blues music that has influenced reatly influenced all popular genres of music including rock and roll, country music, bluegrass, ragtime, pop songs, and ragtime. Taking into consideration its origin and the historical situation, blues music always exhibited powerful musical structure that gave a release to the pent up emotions. The lyrics always contained a note of sadness. Blues music became more and more popular among the commoners because it reflected the simple day-to-day lives of people including love, sex, loss, poverty, difficulties, disappointments etc which everyone can identify with easily. It was originally sung by people at leisure Though blues music became popular with the advent of the 78-rpm phonograph in 1920s, the entry was made in 1909, with “Memphis Blues” by W.C. Handy. He was instrumental in giving shape to blues style as a genre of music. He called himself as the father of blues music. Some of the famous record companies such as American Record Corporation, Okeh Records, and Paramount records invested in blues music in the 20s. They created special categories called ‘race music’ to market to the Africans and when it came to non-Africans, they used the term ‘hillbilly music’. Blues music became one of the popular forms of music in the United States irrespective of the race. Some of the great blues musicians of the time are Leadbelly (Huddie William Ledbetter), Charlie Patton, Blind Lemon Jefferson, Son House (Eddie James House, Jr.) and Blind Blake. In 20s, blues music was recorded in two categories urban blues and country blues. Urban blues was little polished to suit the urban mass whereas country blues remained crude. Blues music moved wherever the Africans moved. When they migrated to Chicago, they took their new form of music with them. Many Memphis based musicians moved to Chicago and started urban blues movement in late 30s and early 40s. After the Second World War, there was a great Afro American movement towards the northern cities such as Chicago, Detroit, and Kansas. Blues music got an unprecedented welcome there too. The blues music bands started incorporating guitars and drums. This made the blues sound even more powerful. Chicago became the center of blues music in the north. Because of the movement of the Afro Americans, the blues music was introduced to various parts of the United States and blues music influenced heavily all the other forms of popular music. At the same time blues music, too was influenced by those popular music genres that borrowed the blues style. For instance, Bo Diddley and Chuck Berry were greatly influenced by blues music but they retained their originality while they played blues music. They were not limiting themselves to the melancholic blues style. This form of playing blues music eventually gave rise to rock and roll style of music. Other famous musicians who were influenced by blues music include Bill Haley and Elvis Presley; they were impressed by jump blues and boogie woogie styles. Blues music continued to remain popular in 60s and 70s up to the present times. Many types of blues music came into existence these subgenres are mainly to cater to regional needs. Many famous musicians of this century are from the blues tradition Bud dy Guy, Muddy Waters, and John Lee Hooker are just a few to name. Blues music though had a painful history it has a great moral to teach our generation that most beautiful things of life are often born out of pain. For More information go to Musichistoryinfo.com