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| Music: the story of the Blues |
What
is - or what are - the Blues? The Blues is a
feeling, most African Americans will tell
you. If
your girl or boyfriend leaves you, for instance, it's quite likely
you'll feel
sad or dejected for days. In other words, you'll feel blue;
you'll have
the blues.
What
few African Americans will tell you is that the origin of the
expression isn't black
and
American, but English, although today it's usually
associated with Black Americans. In
16th century England, people who were depressed were said to
be persecuted by
the "blue devils". Later, in 1807, American author Washington
Irving
already talked about "having a fit of the blues".
But
the
blues today is generally understood as being a type of music which
expresses
the feeling of depression which was once common to Blacks, due to
oppression,
segregation and problems with the other sex. This may be the
reason why Blacks
used to say "White men can't have the blues", at least not the same
kind of blues
 .
The
origins of the blues are difficult to retrace because, quite
naturally, an
oral genre like the blues leaves few written
traces. It seems to have
developed about 100 years ago, though the name "blues" was not
yet
applied at the time. It grew out of black field songs, negro
spirituals
and the white folk ballads imported by British settlers and somewhat
modified
on American soil.
The
first blues recordings appeared around 1920. They were made by
black women singers who
were actually
singing a somewhat adulterated form of the music
which, strangely
enough, was later called "the classic blues". Ma Rainey
and Bessie
Smith were the most authentic and popular performers
of the genre in the 1920's.
The
original country or rural blues did not come to be recorded until
around 1925,
when the record companies realised they could make
quite a profit by asking
black farmers, who were at best semi-professional musicians, to record
a few
songs for them in return for a little whisky and about $5 per song. The
lady
singers, being professional entertainers, of course
requested more.
Thanks
to this fortunate circumstance, we are now reasonably
certain that the
country blues originated from the Mississippi Delta (an area
in the state
of Mississippi which must not be confused with the Delta of
the Mississippi
river in Louisiana). Blacks here once made up over
90% of the
population, and were heavily exploited and oppressed.
Typically in this
original form of blues, a black sharecropper would
sing about his hardships,
while accompanying himself on the guitar. The
rural blues also developed in the cotton-growing region of East Texas,
and
through much of the South Eastern part of the USA.
In
the
1920s and 1930s, many Blacks migrated to the North and
Midwest. They found
work in the factories in Chicago, Detroit, St. Louis, and
other cities; but
ghettoes formed quite soon, when, by sheer weight
of numbers, they began
to overwhelm the whites who left city areas they
had once had to
themselves. Blacks brought their ethnic culture and their music with
them.
Blues singers migrated too, especially since, in a lot of cases, they
were
workers themselves, and like everyone else they were trying to
make a
better living.
A
certain nostalgia for the south developed; but at the same
time, the transplanted
Blacks were becoming more sophisticated, prefering to listen
to music played
by musicians more sophisticated than the rural blues performers. Thus
small
blues combos, with piano, guitar,
harmonica and other instruments,
began to replace the solo performers. From the 40's onwards, they
converted to
electric instruments, and began to play a new form of blues,
louder, more
aggressive, which came to be called "urban blues". In the
50's, Muddy Waters and Howlin'
Wolf
were among the major exponents
of this type of music, and later served as models imitated by many
sixties
groups such as the Rolling Stones
and the Animals.
After
a
period of hibernation in the 50's, the growing
popularity of blues with
young white audiences gave a lot of black blues-singers the opportunity
to play
again on a larger scale, for more money than before.
Still,
it is quite clear that today the blues, as an independent
genre, is no longer
considered as very fashionable. Yet with its easy-to-learn
three-chord
structure, it is a convenient springboard
for musical improvisation. It
has had a wide influence on modern popular music of many varieties, and
on
musicians who wish to return to the roots of modern popular music
before
jumping off in another, perhaps new, direction.
WORDS
a fit: an
attack - a genre: a type
- negro
spirituals: religious songs sung
by Blacks - adulterated: impure
- entertainer: artist
- hardship: difficulty - sheer:
pure -
sharecropper:
agricultural worker
- overwhelm: dominate - make a better
living: have a better
life - combos: groups
- exponents: players
- hibernation:
period of sleep
- chord: two or more notes played
together - springboard:
point of departure.
Article
by Blues historian Robert Springer, originally published in Spectrum
magazine © Linguapress 1990 - 2009
Robert Springer is the author of Nobody
Knows where the Blues come from, published by the
University of Mississippi Press, 2005.
|
TEACHER
ZONE
Language study, based on the
first seven paragraphs of the text:
1. There are words and expressions we
use to
indicate that what we are expressing is approximate, true to a certain
degree, or apparently or generally true. How many words or expressions
of this type can students pick out? How does the meaning of each
sentence change, if they are eliminated?
(Answers: § 1; it's quite likeley § 2;
usually. § 3 generally, may;
§ 4; seems to
have, about, somewhat. § 5; around,
somewhat. §
6; around. § 7; reasonably)
2. Explain the use of the following
expressions. Is it possible to eliminate them and keep the same meaning?
§ 1; In other words. § 2; said to
be §
4; quite naturally. § 5; actually.
§ 6; at
best. § 7; heavily, Typically.
Have students write short coherent sentences, based on information in
the article, to link the following words in the order given:
1.
oppression / segregation / the blues
2. traces / genre / origins
3. "classic blues" / adulterated / Bessie
Smith
4. blues / sharecroppers / Mississippi
delta / hardships
5. cities / Midwest / ghettoes / combos
6. 1960's / popular / white / money
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