music

music

All you need is love and the Beatles

All you need is love and the Beatles

, Other
On February 9, 1964, a quartet of four young men from the northern port city of Liverpool, England, made their American television debut on the Ed Sullivan Show.  By April 4 of that year, that same band would hold ten of the top 12 positions on the Billboard Hot 100 chart, including the entire top 5.  Heavily bootlegged, widely covered and deemed the best selling artist of all time by Billboard, the Beatles remain a musical phenomenon unparalleled in popular music history.  As troubadours and rock stars, they wrote an enduring collection of romantic modern classics.  As trendsetters and influencers, they also placed an emphasis on universal love that had been rarely explored in popular music to that time.  John … Continued
The delights of French yé-yé pop

The delights of French yé-yé pop

, Uncategorized
From 1962 to 1968, some of the most vibrant popular music in the Western world stemmed not from the US or the UK, but France.  Dubbed the yé-yé movement, in part after the syllables “yeah yeah yeah” in the then-current Beatles’ hit “She Loves You,” this music combined French chansonwith British and American rock and occasionally charted in non-French speaking nations.  Roughly analogous to girl-group pop in the US, yé-yé was primarily performed by women, whose employment opportunities were somewhat limited at that time.  Although the student riots of 1968 mostly tamped enthusiasm for yé-yé in France, the music continues to influence both musicians and filmmakers to the present day.  Of all the yé-yé performers, it is likely that the … Continued
Celebrating African-American Music Month

Celebrating African-American Music Month

, , Uncategorized
June is African-American Music Month, intended to celebrate the important contributions of African-American entertainers in the music industry.  Most American popular music is rooted in Black music traditions dating to the founding of the country, a fact not always acknowledged in society, and these traditions range from instrumentation to musical style to vocalization.  This blog highlights a handful of influential African-American musicians whose work is part of American collective social memory. Gladys Bentley Openly lesbian and among the first well-known drag king performers in American history, Gladys Bentley (1907-1960) was born in Port-of-Spain, Trinidad, and grew up in Philadelphia.  She left home at 16 to perform in jazz clubs in New York, under her own name but dressed in formal … Continued
The Archives of Traditional Music

The Archives of Traditional Music

, , Library Resources
On wax cylinders, aluminum and lacquer discs, open reel tape, wire and cassette tape, Chinese folk songs commingle with Native American narrative songs and Sea Islands protest songs.  Here the works of Hoagy Carmichael rub shoulders with traditional songs of the Ainu, a people native to the island of Hokkaido in northern Japan.  With over 120,000 audio recordings spread out over 4000 collections, the Archives of Traditional Music is one of the country’s most important repositories of recorded music history.  This blog will dive into a handful of the collections available there. The Lawrence Gellert Collection Collector Lawrence Gellert (born 1898, disappeared 1979) possessed a sincere, if homegrown, interest in Black folk music.  His family immigrated to the US from … Continued
Music for social movements

Music for social movements

, Research
Music is essential to social movements throughout American history.  From the Revolutionary War to modern civil rights protests, music has invigorated the masses, served as a cultural touchstone for future generations, and galvanized communities to take action.  This is true not only in the United States but throughout the world.  A quick overview of protest music, with a look at the future of the form, is important to understanding the role of music in securing rights and freedoms.  The very first American protest song was written probably in 1755 by a British doctor.  Known today as “Yankee Doodle”, it was originally written as a taunt to American colonists who were viewed as childish, immature and lacking in strength.  When the … Continued