MUSC 2019 Study Guide - Midterm Guide: White Slave Traffic, Ronnie Spector, Chord Progression
History of Rock and Roll Midterm
Introduction
- Pitch: property of sound that allows us to judge sounds as higher and lower in the sense
associated with musical melodies
o Frequency that is stable enough to distinguish from noise
- Register: the range of a note, for example, a higher register indicates a higher pitch
- Melody: playing notes in an organized way, usually distinguishable and often singable.
This is the horizontal aspect of music.
- Harmony: simultaneously occurring chords, frequencies or pitches on top of each other.
This is the vertical aspect of music.
- Chord progression (harmonic progression): succession of musical chords (two or more
notes) which are typically sounded simultaneously
- I, IV, V → primary harmonies
o 1, 4, 5 is the common chord progression
o The uppercase means that it’s a major chord, not minor
- Major vs Minor
o Main difference is how they sound
o Major – brighter, happier sound
o Minor – sad, melancholy
o Used to evoke emotions
- Tempo: the pacing of the music, usually in beats
- Meter: the recurring pattern of stresses or accents the music that provides the beat of the
music
o Duple meter: musical meter divided by 2 beats per bar
o Triple meter: music meter divided by 3 beats per bar
- Rhythm: a sequence repeated, arrangement of sounds as they move through time
- Syncopation rhythm: meaning a variety of rhythms that are unexpected, usually done by
stressing normally unaccented beats
- Straight rhythm: beat is on the first note of the bar and then the timing is regular – most
classical music has a straight/square rhythm, the rhythm is on the pulse of the music,
*think about sweet dreams by Euthrymics
- Timbre: the quality of the musical sound (sometimes known as the tone quality), the
perceived quality of the musical note, sound or tone
- Musical Form: the overall structure or plan of a piece of music, layout of the
composition that is usually divided into sections
- Verse-Chorus form: a common form to popular music (especially blues and rock n roll),
the chorus is highlighted (contrasted from the verse)
- A A B A form: (also called thirty-two bar form) common structure of Tin Pan Alley
songs, consists of four sections an 8 bar A section, a repeat, an 8 bar B section (usually
contrasting to the first A section) and then the final 8 bar A section. *note all 8 bar, just
one section contrasts in the middle, than all 4 repeat*
- Hook: a short passage/riff/phrase that is used to make a song appealing, it usually occurs
in the chorus
- Dynamics: relative loudness, forte or soft
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Notes: make sure to look at difference between Harmony and Melody, Forms of music (verse-
chorus and AABA), Pitch and Register, Meters, Rhythms
The Rock and Roll Explosion
- 12 Bar Blues Form:
o Form: 12 bars that use the I, IV, V (harmonies above) chord progression, the
form is 1, 1, 1, 1, 4, 4, 1, 1, 5, 4, 1
o Lyrics: that are used are the AAB phrase
o Origins: this has been used for over a century in blues music, African Americans
learned these harmonies (1, 4, 5) from western Europe in the church
- The Rise of Rock:
o Baby boom occurred in the 40s, along came prosperity
o “The Teenager” appeared, this group became a large market for consumerism
o Technological Advances made radios affordable to most households, which meant
exposure to music on a national or international level
- Rhythm and Blues
o The great migration from the south to the north
o South was racist, moved to Memphis, Chicago, New York
o Blues from rural settings was brought into these larger northern cities
o Needed to fill these bigger venues, therefore louder and more appropriate for
these places
o Usually the lyrics were misogynistic, to compensate for the emasculating
conditions they were facing in racist America
- Backbeat: The emphasis is played on the 2nd and 4th beats
- Independent labels: these smaller labels were less afraid to promote and produce music
from African Americans
- Covers: white artists stole black musician’s music and re-recorded them into hits
o These covers ‘made it’
o The lyrics were changed in order to follow Christian and conservative views
- Brown vs Board of Education 1954
o Supreme course case that found that racial segregation of children in public
schools was unconstitutional
o Precedent: separate but equal education and other services were not equal at all
o Little Rock 9, the high school that was desegregated in 1957 where 9 black
students were introduced into the school
- Link to music → Rock and Roll was controversial because it was desegregating culture,
possible influencer?
- Pat Boone: successful popular music singer, covered black artist’s songs
- Dew Drop Inn: most important and influential club in the development of rhythm and
blues music in New Orleans, where Little Richard performed (an integrated venue)
- Enotris Johnson: took in black children as a foster care house, Little Richard was one of
them. He was given rights on some of Little Richard’s songs → provided money for him
(pay him back)
- Riff: short repeated phrase in popular music and jazz; typically used as a introduction or
refrain in a song
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o Can be seen in Muddy Water’s Mannish boy – based around a riff with swagger,
male sexuality
- Mann Act: federal statute that prohibits interstate or foreign transportation of an
individual with the intention of engaging such individual in sexual activity or prostitution
(White Slave Traffic Act) in 1910
- Teen Idols: were used against Rock n Roll, it was used to suppress it. Used the law to do
this.
- Alan Freed: DJ who helped to make Rock and Roll popular, played R&B integrated
playlists on the radio
o Rock and roll was controversial because it desegregated culture, therefore …
- Payola: record labels would pay DJs to play certain music, Alan Freed was targeted
because of his work trying to desegregate racial boundaries
- Brill Building: an office building in NYC, near Tin Pan Alley neighbourhood, famous
for housing music industry offices where popular music tunes were written, the centre of
American music industry that dominated pop charts in the 60s
- Girl Groups: collective singers of girls, usually the beat sounds like a heartbeat, dreamy
quality to the voice of the singers
- Carole King and Gerry Goffin: Gerry was a lyricist that worked with Carole King who
co-wrote many hits
- Phil Spector: first producer, worked with the Ronettes (married the lead singer Ronnie
Spector)
- Wall of sound: Phil Spector wanted to create a wall of sound, an overlay of sound,
armies of musicians and harmonics which accounts for the loud sound behind the music
- The Wrecking Crew: this is the ‘wall of sound’ created by Phil Spector, the orchestra
plays behind a lot of famous bands and records
Surf Music
- Reverb: a huge sound used by electronic effect, it’s supposed to sound like being in the
tube surfing
- Dick Dale (Miserlou) the father of the surf guitar, he’s famous for holding his guitar
upside down and plucking one string at a time, European style to his music
- Miserlou → melody based on the middle eastern song (Greek folk melody)
- Surfaris (Wipe out) follows 12 bars blues
- The Beach Boys
o Pet Sounds is a landmark in pop music, concept album: for the first time a whole
album became a hit
- Brian Wilson the lead singer of the band the Beach Boys, had anxiety and didn’t like
performing, was in the band with his brothers/cousin/friend
- The band used the Wrecking Crew to get the ‘girl group sound’ in their hit don’t worry
baby (Brian had in mind the song ‘be my baby’)
- Theremin: the electric sounds produced in the song Good Vibrations
Urban Folk Revival
- Woody Guthrie: grew up with the depression, wanted to tell stories of these people
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