Overlapping Music Genres ― 2012/06/21 18:33
With many of today's music genre's overlapping borders, it is very often hard to describe one genre from another. Some country sounds like rock and some rock sounds like pop. Ever wonder which genre sells the most? Well I think the big 3 are, in this order, Country, Rock and Hip Hop. This month I'd like to talk a little bit about music genres and what sets one genre apart from another
Country Music
In my ears country music has evolved from simple slow melodies with steel guitars and strumming acoustic guitars (Tammy Wynette, Jim Reeves) to high energy pop or even rock sounding music (Toby Keith, Shania Twain, David Lee Murphy). Country Music is the best selling music in America. This is because, in my opinion, the lyrics are, in 90% of this genre's music, very easy to understand. Check out the lyrics to David Lee Murphy's "Can't Turn It Off" http://www.cowboylyrics.com/lyrics/murphy-david-lee/cant-turn-it-off-14512.html or Toby Keith's "How Do You Like Me Now". http://www.cowboylyrics.com/lyrics/keith-toby/how-do-you-like-me-now-14713.html There are very few metaphors in country music that you might find in any other genres. And so you get most of the southern states population, truckers and generally lower class people as country music lovers. But you'll find that these people are drawing away from today's country music, what they say is not really country music. Well at least the lyrics are still there. Just in case you're interested country is to the U.S. what "enka" is to Japan.
Rock Music
Rock is to me the second most popular or best selling music genre. Young people feel some kind of power from it. I had one student tell me, "When I listen to hard rock I feel like I can do anything." It began with the British invasion of the 60's. Although these bands were classified as rock most of them didn't have the fat loud guitar with unison bass lines that sets the pulse which classifies today's rock sound. There was one exception however and that was Deep Purple who came to U.S. in the late 60's. They were the epitome of the hard rock sound, masters of it. Rock's lyrics fall into 2 categories. One is a very shallow subject geared to the schoolgirl about young love, (Foreigner, Journey, REO Speedwagon). Other bands had metaphoric or political tones (Doors, Beatles, Jimi Hendrix, The Police). Well actually the Police made both types of songs. That was Sting's genius. He made hit songs about schoolgirl love. But then he turned around and made other serious songs. He made songs for everyone. Rock has a few sub cultures namely punk rock which comprises spiky hair, weird clothes, skinny bodies, maybe some body piercing (Prince, Sex pistols), heavy metal had rockers wearing lots of leather: pants, vests and wrist bands, doing a lot of head butting, and having long hair (Judas Priest, Iron Maiden and lots of new bands). There is another one which I don't know very much about called death metal. Rock music is still going strong but to me, the melodies are becoming weaker.
Hip Hop and Rap Music
These 2 genres are roughly one in the same. Most of this music originated in the inner cities of the U.S. in the 1980's among mostly black people (50 cent, Puff Daddy among others) apart from Eminem the sensational white rapper. This genre incorporates a heavy beat and skillful rhyming. It's the popular choice for under 25 year-olds today so let's call it the 3rd best selling genre. The lyrics are filled with swears and profanities and are often built on a certain theme. The hip hop culture is going strong today with the fashion like low rise oversized jeans worn very low and with the crotch around your knees. I don't think the pockets are of any use because they are too low to put your hands into to get something. I don't know how they don't fall down either. I guess they're glued on. There is also "hip hop" the dance which we see on lots of music videos and hip hop dance lessons are internationally popular. So we could say hip hop is a culture of these times.
Blues
I hear a lot of people talk about blues music. People knows it's blues because of a certain tonality and it's lack of strict melody for a more improvisational style. For anyone who knows a little bit about music theory they know that blues is based on a repeated 12 bar structure with a chord progression using all dominant 7 chords. Some of the big names are of course B.B. King, Eric Clapton and Stevie Ray Vaughn who has since passed away. I 'm not a big fan of blues music but there is one blues artist whose music I call sophisticated blues and that's Robert Cray. He gets away from the traditional blues structure and has stronger melodies but they're blues sounding. He should be checked out. http://www.robertcray.com/
Jazz
Jazz is a genre which is comprised of numerous styles and sounds. We can find blues eminent in numerous jazz songs of the past as in today. In New Orleans where Dixieland Jazz was born people became familiar with jazz. In the 1940's jazz had it's hey day as the mainstream popular music of the day. Glenn Miller and Benny Goodman were the hit makers. Big bands were in the limelight with hits such as "In the Mood" and Sing, Sing, Sing. Through the years jazz became less realized and pushed into the background with the emergence of rock n' roll. However, people like John Coltrane and Miles Davis led the pack to keep jazz going and bring about names like Michael Buble, who keeps the big band style going, Roy Harland, John Scofield and so many other masters. One of jazzes sub cultures is fusion which has a rock beat but has lots of improvisation as does traditional jazz. Larry Carlton is a big name in fusion as is Roy Ayers and Lee Ritenour, and as was John McGlaughlin's Mahavishnu Orchestra and Chick Corea's Return to Forever,
So no matter what the genre is music is music. As for me I get a lot of enjoyment listening to all types of music and I can appreciate the hard work that goes into the making of good music no matter what the genre may be. I'm sure there are thousands or even millions of excellent musicians or singers who we never hear about but they are providing somebody somewhere with enjoyment playing all kinds of music genres and probably overlapping them.
Country Music
In my ears country music has evolved from simple slow melodies with steel guitars and strumming acoustic guitars (Tammy Wynette, Jim Reeves) to high energy pop or even rock sounding music (Toby Keith, Shania Twain, David Lee Murphy). Country Music is the best selling music in America. This is because, in my opinion, the lyrics are, in 90% of this genre's music, very easy to understand. Check out the lyrics to David Lee Murphy's "Can't Turn It Off" http://www.cowboylyrics.com/lyrics/murphy-david-lee/cant-turn-it-off-14512.html or Toby Keith's "How Do You Like Me Now". http://www.cowboylyrics.com/lyrics/keith-toby/how-do-you-like-me-now-14713.html There are very few metaphors in country music that you might find in any other genres. And so you get most of the southern states population, truckers and generally lower class people as country music lovers. But you'll find that these people are drawing away from today's country music, what they say is not really country music. Well at least the lyrics are still there. Just in case you're interested country is to the U.S. what "enka" is to Japan.
Rock Music
Rock is to me the second most popular or best selling music genre. Young people feel some kind of power from it. I had one student tell me, "When I listen to hard rock I feel like I can do anything." It began with the British invasion of the 60's. Although these bands were classified as rock most of them didn't have the fat loud guitar with unison bass lines that sets the pulse which classifies today's rock sound. There was one exception however and that was Deep Purple who came to U.S. in the late 60's. They were the epitome of the hard rock sound, masters of it. Rock's lyrics fall into 2 categories. One is a very shallow subject geared to the schoolgirl about young love, (Foreigner, Journey, REO Speedwagon). Other bands had metaphoric or political tones (Doors, Beatles, Jimi Hendrix, The Police). Well actually the Police made both types of songs. That was Sting's genius. He made hit songs about schoolgirl love. But then he turned around and made other serious songs. He made songs for everyone. Rock has a few sub cultures namely punk rock which comprises spiky hair, weird clothes, skinny bodies, maybe some body piercing (Prince, Sex pistols), heavy metal had rockers wearing lots of leather: pants, vests and wrist bands, doing a lot of head butting, and having long hair (Judas Priest, Iron Maiden and lots of new bands). There is another one which I don't know very much about called death metal. Rock music is still going strong but to me, the melodies are becoming weaker.
Hip Hop and Rap Music
These 2 genres are roughly one in the same. Most of this music originated in the inner cities of the U.S. in the 1980's among mostly black people (50 cent, Puff Daddy among others) apart from Eminem the sensational white rapper. This genre incorporates a heavy beat and skillful rhyming. It's the popular choice for under 25 year-olds today so let's call it the 3rd best selling genre. The lyrics are filled with swears and profanities and are often built on a certain theme. The hip hop culture is going strong today with the fashion like low rise oversized jeans worn very low and with the crotch around your knees. I don't think the pockets are of any use because they are too low to put your hands into to get something. I don't know how they don't fall down either. I guess they're glued on. There is also "hip hop" the dance which we see on lots of music videos and hip hop dance lessons are internationally popular. So we could say hip hop is a culture of these times.
Blues
I hear a lot of people talk about blues music. People knows it's blues because of a certain tonality and it's lack of strict melody for a more improvisational style. For anyone who knows a little bit about music theory they know that blues is based on a repeated 12 bar structure with a chord progression using all dominant 7 chords. Some of the big names are of course B.B. King, Eric Clapton and Stevie Ray Vaughn who has since passed away. I 'm not a big fan of blues music but there is one blues artist whose music I call sophisticated blues and that's Robert Cray. He gets away from the traditional blues structure and has stronger melodies but they're blues sounding. He should be checked out. http://www.robertcray.com/
Jazz
Jazz is a genre which is comprised of numerous styles and sounds. We can find blues eminent in numerous jazz songs of the past as in today. In New Orleans where Dixieland Jazz was born people became familiar with jazz. In the 1940's jazz had it's hey day as the mainstream popular music of the day. Glenn Miller and Benny Goodman were the hit makers. Big bands were in the limelight with hits such as "In the Mood" and Sing, Sing, Sing. Through the years jazz became less realized and pushed into the background with the emergence of rock n' roll. However, people like John Coltrane and Miles Davis led the pack to keep jazz going and bring about names like Michael Buble, who keeps the big band style going, Roy Harland, John Scofield and so many other masters. One of jazzes sub cultures is fusion which has a rock beat but has lots of improvisation as does traditional jazz. Larry Carlton is a big name in fusion as is Roy Ayers and Lee Ritenour, and as was John McGlaughlin's Mahavishnu Orchestra and Chick Corea's Return to Forever,
So no matter what the genre is music is music. As for me I get a lot of enjoyment listening to all types of music and I can appreciate the hard work that goes into the making of good music no matter what the genre may be. I'm sure there are thousands or even millions of excellent musicians or singers who we never hear about but they are providing somebody somewhere with enjoyment playing all kinds of music genres and probably overlapping them.
Prince ― 2012/06/23 21:05
Well hello again. I’m surprising myself by writing for 2 consecutive nights. Well I just want to tell you about the documentary I watched last night on Music Air. For those of you who have cable TV ( I have Tokyu cable in Tokyo) it’s on channel 260. The program was about “Prince”. Of course I’ve known this artist ever since he came on the seen over 25 years ago. I never took much notice of him. But, after watching last night’s documentary I found that the man is a musical genius. On some of his albums he plays all the instruments, writes all the music, sings it and engineers it.
He has a knack for finding what artists are capable of and producing them. On one occasion he asked Sheila Escovedo (percussionist) to join one of his tours. She got to the rehearsal and there were no drums or percussion instruments. He said to her “You’re gonna sing.” Of course she never considered herself a singer, but Prince transformed her into a hot looking sexy singer and she was good at it. And after this she named herself Sheila E. He produced lots of other unknown artists as well.
Other musicians would say they would rehearse for a show and then on the performance night Prince would play totally different songs so the musicians had to follow him. They never knew what to expect. He would sometimes yell out chords to them on stage.
They played a lot of clips of his songs on the documentary and I found he had lots of good songs that I didn’t know. And so now that I know more about him and his music, and Prince the producer, I can appreciate him more. Check him out if you get a chance.
He has a knack for finding what artists are capable of and producing them. On one occasion he asked Sheila Escovedo (percussionist) to join one of his tours. She got to the rehearsal and there were no drums or percussion instruments. He said to her “You’re gonna sing.” Of course she never considered herself a singer, but Prince transformed her into a hot looking sexy singer and she was good at it. And after this she named herself Sheila E. He produced lots of other unknown artists as well.
Other musicians would say they would rehearse for a show and then on the performance night Prince would play totally different songs so the musicians had to follow him. They never knew what to expect. He would sometimes yell out chords to them on stage.
They played a lot of clips of his songs on the documentary and I found he had lots of good songs that I didn’t know. And so now that I know more about him and his music, and Prince the producer, I can appreciate him more. Check him out if you get a chance.
the Blue Flame ― 2012/06/27 01:31
Last Sunday nite I went to Minami Azabu to check out a club called “Blue Flame” as a possible place to do another “Elvis” gig. I wasn’t expecting it but it was jam session nite. Well I was rather surprised because when I walked in and listened it was different from the usual jam sessions that you go to. The guys that were playing were excellent. Two of them were pro musicians. The drummer was a Chinese American. He was really tasty and had good technique as well. An excellent bass player as well. Then another funk bassist came in who was excellent. He played with this (maybe American) woman who looked like a typical housewife. I wasn’t expecting it but she wailed! What a great voice and so much soul. I played a set of music, some jazz standards and some Brazilian songs with a pretty decent Japanese singer. It was a good night. I’ll be heading there on the next jam session night in July
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