The term blues ballad is used to refer to a specific form of popular music which fused Anglo-American and Afro-American styles from the late 19th century onwards. Early versions combined elements of the European influenced "native American
ballad
A ballad is a form of verse, often a narrative set to music. Ballads derive from the medieval French ''chanson balladée'' or ''ballade'', which were originally "dance songs". Ballads were particularly characteristic of the popular poetry and ...
" with the forms of
African American
African Americans (also referred to as Black Americans and Afro-Americans) are an ethnic group consisting of Americans with partial or total ancestry from sub-Saharan Africa. The term "African American" generally denotes descendants of ens ...
music.
[ From the 20th century on it was also used to refer to a slow tempo, often sentimental song in a blues style.
]
Structure and variations
The blues ballad often uses the Thirty-two-bar form
The 32-bar form, also known as the AABA song form, American popular song form and the ballad form, is a song structure commonly found in Tin Pan Alley songs and other American popular music, especially in the first half of the 20th century.
A ...
of verse-verse-bridge-verse, in contrast to the 12-bar or 8-bar blues
In music, an eight-bar blues is a common blues chord progression. Music writers have described it as "the second most common blues form" being "common to folk, rock, and jazz forms of the blues". It is often notated in or time with eight bars ...
forms.[Boyd, Jack (1991). ''Encore!: A Guide to Enjoying Music'', p.31. . " 2-bar formis sometimes called ballad form because so many of our popular ballads, middle-of-the-road popular songs, and Country Western songs use this form."]
Popular blues ballads
The first blues ballads tended to deal with active protagonists, often anti-heroes, resisting adversity and authority, often in the context of industrialisation. They usually lacked the strong narrative common in European ballads, and emphasised instead individual character.[N. Cohen, ''Folk Music: a Regional Exploration'' (Greenwood, 2005), pp. 14-29.] They were often accompanied by banjo and guitar and often followed a standard 12-bar the blues
Blues is a music genre and musical form which originated in the Deep South of the United States around the 1860s. Blues incorporated spirituals, work songs, field hollers, shouts, chants, and rhymed simple narrative ballads from the African- ...
format, with a repeated refrain in the last line of every verse.[T. A. Green, ''Folklore: An Encyclopedia of Beliefs, Customs, Tales, Music, and Art'' (ABC-CLIO, 1997), p. 81.] Blues ballads are usually anonymously authored and were performed by both black and white musicians in the early 20th century. Ballads about anti-heroes include "Wild Bill Jones", " Stagger Lee" and " John Hardy". The most famous blues ballads that deal with heroes in the context of industrialisation include those about John Henry and Casey Jones
John Luther "Casey" Jones (March 14, 1863 – April 30, 1900) was an American railroader who was killed when his passenger train collided with a stalled freight train at Vaughan, Mississippi.
Jones was a locomotive engineer for the Illinois Ce ...
.[
]
Blues ballads in other genres
From the late 19th century the term ballad began to be used for sentimental songs with their origins in the early ‘Tin Pan Alley
Tin Pan Alley was a collection of music publishers and songwriters in New York City that dominated the popular music of the United States in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. It originally referred to a specific place: West 28th Street ...
’ music industry.[D. M. Randel, ''The Harvard Dictionary of Music'' (Harvard University Press, 4th edn., 2003), p. 73,] As new genres of music, including the blues, began to emerge in the early 20th century the popularity of the genre faded, but the association with sentimentality meant led to this being used as the term for a slow love song from the 1950s onwards.[
Today the term is used to describe a song that uses a blues format with a slow tempo, often dealing with themes of love and affection.][ Examples include songs like B. B. King's "]Blues on the Bayou
''Blues on the Bayou'' is the thirty sixth studio album by B.B. King, released in 1998.
In the CD liner notes, B.B. King writes: "Of the many records Lucille and I have had the pleasure of recording over the years, this one is especially close t ...
", Fats Domino
Antoine Dominique Domino Jr. (February 26, 1928 – October 24, 2017), known as Fats Domino, was an American pianist, singer and songwriter. One of the pioneers of rock and roll music, Domino sold more than 65 million records. Born in New O ...
's "Every night about this time", Percy Mayfield
Percy Mayfield (August 12, 1920August 11, 1984) was an American Rhythm and blues singer with a smooth vocal style. He also was a songwriter, known for the songs " Please Send Me Someone to Love" and "Hit the Road Jack", the latter being a song ...
's love song " Please Send Me Someone to Love", and Buddy Johnson
Woodrow Wilson "Buddy" Johnson (January 10, 1915 – February 9, 1977) was an American jump blues pianist and bandleader active from the 1930s through the 1960s. His songs were often performed by his sister Ella Johnson, most notably "Since I F ...
's "Since I Fell for You
"Since I Fell for You" is a blues ballad composed by Buddy Johnson in 1945 that was first popularized by his sister, Ella Johnson, with Buddy Johnson and His Orchestra.
A version by Annie Laurie with Paul Gayten and His Trio in 1947 led to its ...
". The blues ballad format is also popular in rock, jazz, country music
Country (also called country and western) is a genre of popular music that originated in the Southern and Southwestern United States in the early 1920s. It primarily derives from blues, church music such as Southern gospel and spirituals, ...
, such as Janis Joplin
Janis Lyn Joplin (January 19, 1943 – October 4, 1970) was an American singer and musician. One of the most successful and widely known Rock music, rock stars of her era, she was noted for her powerful mezzo-soprano vocals and "electric" stage ...
"Cry Baby", Jimi Hendrix "Red House", Grand Funk Railroad "Heartbreaker", Jazzy blues singer Charles Brown " Merry Christmas, Baby", "Please Come Home for Christmas", Phoebe Snow
Phoebe Snow (born Phoebe Ann Laub; July 17, 1950 – April 26, 2011) was an American roots music singer-songwriter and guitarist, known for her hit 1974 and 1975 songs "San Francisco Bay Blues", "Poetry Man", "Harpo's Blues", and her credited g ...
"Poetry Man
"Poetry Man" is a song by the American singer-songwriter Phoebe Snow. It was written by Snow, produced by Dino Airali, and first appeared on her 1974 self-titled debut album.
Composition/ recording/ release
"Poetry Man" was the second song writ ...
", "San Francisco Bay Blues
"San Francisco Bay Blues" is an American folk song and is generally considered to be the most famous composition by Jesse Fuller. Fuller first recorded the song in 1954, which was released by the World Song label in 1955. A "one-man band" renditio ...
", country singer Crystal Gayle
Crystal Gayle (born Brenda Gail Webb; January 9, 1951) is an American country music singer widely known for her 1977 hit "Don't It Make My Brown Eyes Blue". Initially, Gayle's management and record label were the same as that of her oldest sist ...
" Don't It Make My Brown Eyes Blue
"Don't It Make My Brown Eyes Blue" is a song written by Richard Leigh, and recorded by American country music singer Crystal Gayle. It was released in June 1977 as the first single from Gayle's album '' We Must Believe in Magic''.
Background
" ...
", and Freddy Fender
Freddy Fender (born Baldemar Garza Huerta; June 4, 1937 – October 14, 2006) was an American Tejano, country and rock and roll musician, known for his work as a solo artist and in the groups Los Super Seven and the Texas Tornados. He was bes ...
"Wasted Days and Wasted Nights".
Notes and references
External links
Blues Ballad's real beauty comes through with Staton
a review by ''Chicago Tribune
The ''Chicago Tribune'' is a daily newspaper based in Chicago, Illinois, United States, owned by Tribune Publishing. Founded in 1847, and formerly self-styled as the "World's Greatest Newspaper" (a slogan for which WGN radio and television ar ...
'' writer Larry Kart of performances by Dakota Staton
Dakota Staton (June 3, 1930 – April 10, 2007) was an American jazz vocalist who found international acclaim with the 1957 No. 4 hit "The Late, Late Show". She was also known by the Muslim name Aliyah Rabia for a period due to her conversion to ...
.
{{Blues
Blues music genres