Popular music is
music
Music is generally defined as the art of arranging sound to create some combination of form, harmony, melody, rhythm or otherwise expressive content. Exact definitions of music vary considerably around the world, though it is an aspect ...
with wide appeal
that is typically distributed to large audiences through the
music industry
The music industry consists of the individuals and organizations that earn money by writing songs and musical compositions, creating and selling recorded music and sheet music, presenting concerts, as well as the organizations that aid, train, ...
. These forms and styles can be enjoyed and performed by people with little or no
musical training
Music education is a field of practice in which educators are trained for careers as elementary or secondary music teachers, school or music conservatory ensemble directors. Music education is also a research area in which scholars do original ...
.
[Popular Music. (2015). ''Funk & Wagnalls New World Encyclopedia''] It stands in contrast to both
art music
Art music (alternatively called classical music, cultivated music, serious music, and canonic music) is music considered to be of high phonoaesthetic value. It typically implies advanced structural and theoretical considerationsJacques Siron, ...
and
traditional or "folk" music. Art music was historically disseminated through the performances of
written music
Music notation or musical notation is any system used to visually represent wikt:aurally, aurally perceived music played with instrument (music), instruments or singing, sung by the human voice through the use of written, printed, or otherwise ...
, although since the beginning of the
recording industry
A record, recording or records may refer to:
An item or collection of data Computing
* Record (computer science), a data structure
** Record, or row (database), a set of fields in a database related to one entity
** Boot sector or boot record, r ...
, it is also disseminated through
recordings
A record, recording or records may refer to:
An item or collection of data Computing
* Record (computer science), a data structure
** Record, or row (database), a set of fields in a database related to one entity
** Boot sector or boot record, r ...
. Traditional music forms such as early
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 Afr ...
songs or
hymn
A hymn is a type of song, and partially synonymous with devotional song, specifically written for the purpose of adoration or prayer, and typically addressed to a deity or deities, or to a prominent figure or personification. The word ''hymn'' ...
s were passed along orally, or to smaller, local audiences.
The original application of the term is to music of the 1880s
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 ...
period in the
United States
The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...
.
Although popular music sometimes is known as "pop music", the two terms are not interchangeable. Popular music is a generic term for a wide variety of genres of music that appeal to the tastes of a large segment of the population, whereas
pop music
Pop music is a genre of popular music that originated in its modern form during the mid-1950s in the United States and the United Kingdom. The terms ''popular music'' and ''pop music'' are often used interchangeably, although the former describe ...
usually refers to a specific musical genre ''within'' popular music. Popular music songs and pieces typically have easily singable
melodies
A melody (from Greek language, Greek μελῳδία, ''melōidía'', "singing, chanting"), also tune, voice or line, is a Linearity#Music, linear succession of musical tones that the listener perceives as a single entity. In its most liter ...
. The song structure of popular music commonly involves repetition of sections, with the
verse
Verse may refer to:
Poetry
* Verse, an occasional synonym for poetry
* Verse, a metrical structure, a stanza
* Blank verse, a type of poetry having regular meter but no rhyme
* Free verse, a type of poetry written without the use of strict me ...
and chorus or
refrain
A refrain (from Vulgar Latin ''refringere'', "to repeat", and later from Old French ''refraindre'') is the line or lines that are repeated in music or in poetry — the "chorus" of a song. Poetic fixed forms that feature refrains include the vi ...
repeating throughout the song and the
bridge
A bridge is a structure built to span a physical obstacle (such as a body of water, valley, road, or rail) without blocking the way underneath. It is constructed for the purpose of providing passage over the obstacle, which is usually somethi ...
providing a contrasting and transitional section within a piece.
From the 1960s through the mid 2000s,
album
An album is a collection of audio recordings issued on compact disc (CD), Phonograph record, vinyl, audio tape, or another medium such as Digital distribution#Music, digital distribution. Albums of recorded sound were developed in the early ...
s collecting songs were the dominant form for recording and consuming English-language popular music, in a period known as the
album era
The album era was a period in English-language popular music from the mid-1960s to the mid-2000s in which the album was the dominant form of recorded music expression and consumption. It was primarily driven by three successive music recording ...
.
In the 2000s, with songs and pieces available as digital sound files, it has become easier for music to spread from one country or region to another. Some popular music forms have become global, while others have a wide appeal within the culture of their origin.
Through the mixture of musical genres, new popular music forms are created to reflect the ideals of a global culture.
The examples of
Africa
Africa is the world's second-largest and second-most populous continent, after Asia in both cases. At about 30.3 million km2 (11.7 million square miles) including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of Earth's total surface area ...
,
Indonesia
Indonesia, officially the Republic of Indonesia, is a country in Southeast Asia and Oceania between the Indian and Pacific oceans. It consists of over 17,000 islands, including Sumatra, Java, Sulawesi, and parts of Borneo and New Guine ...
, and the
Middle East
The Middle East ( ar, الشرق الأوسط, ISO 233: ) is a geopolitical region commonly encompassing Arabian Peninsula, Arabia (including the Arabian Peninsula and Bahrain), Anatolia, Asia Minor (Asian part of Turkey except Hatay Pro ...
show how Western pop music styles can blend with local musical traditions to create new hybrid styles.
Definition
Folk Music is a genre of music that can be classified as more rural or traditional music. Folk music is similar to oral stories as it can be passed down through generations of families and cultures.
Scholars have classified music as "popular" based on various factors, including whether a song or piece becomes known to listeners mainly from hearing the music (in contrast with
classical music
Classical music generally refers to the art music of the Western world, considered to be distinct from Western folk music or popular music traditions. It is sometimes distinguished as Western classical music, as the term "classical music" also ...
, in which many musicians learn pieces from
sheet music
Sheet music is a handwritten or printed form of musical notation that uses List of musical symbols, musical symbols to indicate the pitches, rhythms, or chord (music), chords of a song or instrumental Musical composition, musical piece. Like ...
); its appeal to diverse listeners, its treatment as a marketplace
commodity
In economics, a commodity is an economic good, usually a resource, that has full or substantial fungibility: that is, the market treats instances of the good as equivalent or nearly so with no regard to who produced them.
The price of a comm ...
in a
capitalist
Capitalism is an economic system based on the private ownership of the means of production and their operation for profit. Central characteristics of capitalism include capital accumulation, competitive markets, price system, priva ...
context, and other factors.
Sales of 'recordings' or
sheet music
Sheet music is a handwritten or printed form of musical notation that uses List of musical symbols, musical symbols to indicate the pitches, rhythms, or chord (music), chords of a song or instrumental Musical composition, musical piece. Like ...
are one measure. Middleton and Manuel note that this definition has problems because multiple listens or plays of the same song or piece are not counted.
Evaluating appeal based on size of audience (mass appeal) or whether audience is of a certain
social class
A social class is a grouping of people into a set of Dominance hierarchy, hierarchical social categories, the most common being the Upper class, upper, Middle class, middle and Working class, lower classes. Membership in a social class can for ...
is another way to define popular music, but this, too, has problems in that social categories of people cannot be applied accurately to musical styles. Manuel states that one criticism of popular music is that it is produced by large media conglomerates and passively consumed by the public, who merely buy or reject what music is being produced. He claims that the listeners in the scenario would not have been able to make the choice of their favorite music, which negates the previous conception of popular music.
Moreover, "understandings of popular music have changed with time".
Middleton argues that if research were to be done on the field of popular music, there would be a level of stability within societies to characterize historical periods, distribution of music, and the patterns of influence and continuity within the popular styles of music.
Anahid Kassabian separated popular music into four categories:
* "popular as
populist
Populism refers to a range of political stances that emphasize the idea of "the people" and often juxtapose this group against " the elite". It is frequently associated with anti-establishment and anti-political sentiment. The term developed ...
," or having overtones of liberation and expression; see
jazz
Jazz is a music genre that originated in the African-American communities of New Orleans, Louisiana in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, with its roots in blues and ragtime. Since the 1920s Jazz Age, it has been recognized as a major ...
,
Latin music
Latin music (Portuguese language, Portuguese and es, música latina) is a term used by the music industry as a catch-all category for various styles of music from Ibero-America (including Music of Spain, Spain and Portuguese music, Portugal) ...
, and
rhythm and blues
Rhythm and blues, frequently abbreviated as R&B or R'n'B, is a genre of popular music that originated in African-American communities in the 1940s. The term was originally used by record companies to describe recordings marketed predominantly ...
.
* "popular as
folk
Folk or Folks may refer to:
Sociology
*Nation
*People
* Folklore
** Folk art
** Folk dance
** Folk hero
** Folk music
*** Folk metal
*** Folk punk
*** Folk rock
** Folk religion
* Folk taxonomy
Arts, entertainment, and media
* Folk Plus or Fol ...
," or stating that the music is written by the people, for the people; see
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, ...
,
reggae
Reggae () is a music genre that originated in Jamaica in the late 1960s. The term also denotes the modern popular music of Jamaica and its diaspora. A 1968 single by Toots and the Maytals, " Do the Reggay" was the first popular song to use ...
, and
gospel music
Gospel music is a traditional genre of Christian music, and a cornerstone of Christian media. The creation, performance, significance, and even the definition of gospel music varies according to culture and social context. Gospel music is com ...
.
* "popular as
counterculture
A counterculture is a culture whose values and norms of behavior differ substantially from those of mainstream society, sometimes diametrically opposed to mainstream cultural mores.Eric Donald Hirsch. ''The Dictionary of Cultural Literacy''. Hou ...
," or empowering citizens to act against the
oppression
Oppression is malicious or unjust treatment or exercise of power, often under the guise of governmental authority or cultural opprobrium. Oppression may be overt or covert, depending on how it is practiced. Oppression refers to discrimination w ...
they face; see
punk rock,
heavy metal music
Heavy metal (or simply metal) is a genre of rock music that developed in the late 1960s and early 1970s, largely in the United Kingdom and United States. With roots in blues rock, psychedelic rock and acid rock, heavy metal bands developed a ...
, and
hip hop music.
* "popular as mass," or the music becomes the tool for
oppression
Oppression is malicious or unjust treatment or exercise of power, often under the guise of governmental authority or cultural opprobrium. Oppression may be overt or covert, depending on how it is practiced. Oppression refers to discrimination w ...
.
A society's popular music reflects the ideals that are prevalent at the time it is performed or published.
David Riesman
David Riesman (September 22, 1909 – May 10, 2002) was an American sociologist, educator, and best-selling commentator on American society.
Career
Born to a wealthy German Jewish family, he attended Harvard College, where he graduated in 1931 ...
states that the youth audiences of popular music fit into either a majority group or a
subculture
A subculture is a group of people within a culture that differentiates itself from the parent culture to which it belongs, often maintaining some of its founding principles. Subcultures develop their own norms and values regarding cultural, poli ...
. The majority group listens to the commercially produced styles while the subcultures find a minority style to transmit their own values.
This allows youth to choose what music they identify with, which gives them power as consumers to control the market of popular music.
Music critic
Robert Christgau
Robert Thomas Christgau ( ; born April 18, 1942) is an American music journalist and essayist. Among the most well-known and influential music critics, he began his career in the late 1960s as one of the earliest professional rock critics and ...
coined the term "semipopular music" in 1970, to describe records that seemed accessible for popular consumption but proved unsuccessful commercially. "I recognized that something else was going on—the distribution system appeared to be faltering,
FM and all", he later wrote in ''
Christgau's Record Guide: Rock Albums of the Seventies'' (1981), citing that records like ''
The Velvet Underground
The Velvet Underground was an American rock band formed in New York City in 1964. The original line-up consisted of singer/guitarist Lou Reed, multi-instrumentalist John Cale, guitarist Sterling Morrison, and drummer Angus MacLise. MacLise w ...
'' and ''
The Gilded Palace of Sin
''The Gilded Palace of Sin'' is the first album by the country rock group the Flying Burrito Brothers, released on February 6, 1969. It continued Gram Parsons' and Chris Hillman's work in modern country music, fusing traditional sources like folk ...
'' (by
Flying Burrito Brothers
The Flying Burrito Brothers are an American country rock band, best known for their influential 1969 debut album, ''The Gilded Palace of Sin''. Although the group is perhaps best known for its connection to band founders Gram Parsons and Chris ...
) possessed populist qualities yet failed to impact the
record chart
A record chart, in the music industry, also called a music chart, is a ranking of Sound recording and reproduction, recorded music according to certain criteria during a given period. Many different criteria are used in worldwide charts, often ...
s. "Just as
semiclassical music is a systematic dilution of
highbrow
Used colloquially as a noun or adjective, "highbrow" is synonymous with intellectual; as an adjective, it also means elite, and generally carries a connotation of high culture. The term, first recorded in 1875, draws its metonymy from the pseudo ...
preferences, semipopular music is a cross-bred concentration of fashionable modes." In his mind, a liking "for the nasty, brutish, and short intensifies a common semipopular tendency in which lyrical and conceptual sophistication are applauded while musical sophistication—
jazz
Jazz is a music genre that originated in the African-American communities of New Orleans, Louisiana in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, with its roots in blues and ragtime. Since the 1920s Jazz Age, it has been recognized as a major ...
chops or classical design or
avant-garde
The avant-garde (; In 'advance guard' or ' vanguard', literally 'fore-guard') is a person or work that is experimental, radical, or unorthodox with respect to art, culture, or society.John Picchione, The New Avant-garde in Italy: Theoretical ...
innovation—is left to the specialists."
Form of Western popular music
Form in popular music is most often
sectional, the most common sections being
verse
Verse may refer to:
Poetry
* Verse, an occasional synonym for poetry
* Verse, a metrical structure, a stanza
* Blank verse, a type of poetry having regular meter but no rhyme
* Free verse, a type of poetry written without the use of strict me ...
, chorus or
refrain
A refrain (from Vulgar Latin ''refringere'', "to repeat", and later from Old French ''refraindre'') is the line or lines that are repeated in music or in poetry — the "chorus" of a song. Poetic fixed forms that feature refrains include the vi ...
, and
bridge
A bridge is a structure built to span a physical obstacle (such as a body of water, valley, road, or rail) without blocking the way underneath. It is constructed for the purpose of providing passage over the obstacle, which is usually somethi ...
. Other common
forms
Form is the shape, visual appearance, or configuration of an object. In a wider sense, the form is the way something happens.
Form also refers to:
*Form (document), a document (printed or electronic) with spaces in which to write or enter data
* ...
include
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 ...
,
chorus form
Strophic form – also called verse-repeating form, chorus form, AAA song form, or one-part song form – is a song structure in which all verses or stanzas of the text are sung to the same music. Contrasting song forms include through-composed, w ...
*(Middleton pg 30), and
twelve-bar blues
The 12-bar blues (or blues changes) is one of the most prominent chord progressions in popular music. The blues progression has a distinctive form in lyrics, phrase, chord structure, and duration. In its basic form, it is predominantly based on ...
. Popular music songs are rarely composed using different music for each stanza of the lyrics (songs composed in this fashion are said to be "
through-composed
In music theory of musical form, through-composed music is a continuous, non- sectional, and non- repetitive piece of music. The term is typically used to describe songs, but can also apply to instrumental music.
While most musical forms such as t ...
").
The verse and chorus are considered the primary elements. Each verse usually has the same melody (possibly with some slight modifications), but the lyrics change for most verses. The chorus (or "refrain") usually has a melodic phrase and a key lyrical line which is repeated. Pop songs may have an
introduction
Introduction, The Introduction, Intro, or The Intro may refer to:
General use
* Introduction (music), an opening section of a piece of music
* Introduction (writing), a beginning section to a book, article or essay which states its purpose and g ...
and
coda
Coda or CODA may refer to:
Arts, entertainment, and media Films
* Movie coda, a post-credits scene
* ''Coda'' (1987 film), an Australian horror film about a serial killer, made for television
*''Coda'', a 2017 American experimental film from Na ...
("tag"), but these elements are not essential to the identity of most songs. Pop songs that use verses and choruses often have a bridge, a section which connects the verse and chorus at one or more points in the song.
The verse and chorus are usually repeated throughout a song, while the bridge, intro, and coda (also called an "outro") tend to be used only once. Some pop songs may have a solo section, particularly in
rock
Rock most often refers to:
* Rock (geology), a naturally occurring solid aggregate of minerals or mineraloids
* Rock music, a genre of popular music
Rock or Rocks may also refer to:
Places United Kingdom
* Rock, Caerphilly, a location in Wales ...
or
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 Afr ...
-influenced pop. During the solo section, one or more instruments play a melodic line which may be the melody used by the singer, or, in blues- or jazz-influenced pop, the solo may be improvised based on the
chord progression
In a musical composition, a chord progression or harmonic progression (informally chord changes, used as a plural) is a succession of chords. Chord progressions are the foundation of harmony in Western musical tradition from the common practice ...
. A solo usually features a single instrumental performer (e.g., a
guitarist
A guitarist (or a guitar player) is a person who plays the guitar. Guitarists may play a variety of guitar family instruments such as classical guitars, acoustic guitars, electric guitars, and bass guitars. Some guitarists accompany themselv ...
or a
harmonica
The harmonica, also known as a French harp or mouth organ, is a free reed wind instrument used worldwide in many musical genres, notably in blues, American folk music, classical music, jazz, country, and rock. The many types of harmonica inclu ...
player) or less commonly, more than one instrumentalist (e.g., a
trumpeter
The trumpet is a brass instrument commonly used in classical and jazz ensembles. The trumpet group ranges from the piccolo trumpet—with the highest register in the brass family—to the bass trumpet, pitched one octave below the standard B ...
and a
sax player).
Thirty-two-bar form uses four sections, most often eight measures long each (4×8=32), two verses or A sections, a contrasting B section (the bridge or "middle-eight") and a return of the verse in one last A section (AABA). Verse-chorus form or ABA form may be combined with AABA form, in compound AABA forms. Variations such as a1 and a2 can also be used. The repetition of one chord progression may mark off the only section in a simple verse form such as the twelve bar blues.
Development in North America and Europe
Industry
![Jenny Lind in La Sonnambula](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/4b/Jenny_Lind_in_La_Sonnambula.jpg)
"The most significant feature of the emergent popular music industry of the late 18th and early 19th centuries was the extent of its focus on the commodity form of
sheet music
Sheet music is a handwritten or printed form of musical notation that uses List of musical symbols, musical symbols to indicate the pitches, rhythms, or chord (music), chords of a song or instrumental Musical composition, musical piece. Like ...
".
[Middleton, Richard and Peter Manuel. "Popular music" in ''Grove Music Online''.] The availability of inexpensive, widely available sheet music versions of popular songs and instrumental music pieces made it possible for music to be disseminated to a wide audience of amateur, middle-class music-makers, who could play and sing popular music at home. Amateur music-making in the 19th century often centred around the
piano
The piano is a stringed keyboard instrument in which the strings are struck by wooden hammers that are coated with a softer material (modern hammers are covered with dense wool felt; some early pianos used leather). It is played using a keyboa ...
, as this instrument could play
melodies
A melody (from Greek language, Greek μελῳδία, ''melōidía'', "singing, chanting"), also tune, voice or line, is a Linearity#Music, linear succession of musical tones that the listener perceives as a single entity. In its most liter ...
, chords and basslines, thus enabling a pianist to reproduce popular songs and pieces. In addition to the influence of sheet music, another factor was the increasing availability during the late 18th and early 19th century of public popular music performances in "pleasure gardens and
dance halls
Dance hall in its general meaning is a hall for dancing. From the earliest years of the twentieth century until the early 1960s, the dance hall was the popular forerunner of the discothèque or nightclub. The majority of towns and cities in ...
, popular theatres and concert rooms".
The early popular music performers worked hand-in-hand with the sheet music industry to promote popular sheet music. One of the early popular music performers to attain widespread popularity was a
Swedish
Swedish or ' may refer to:
Anything from or related to Sweden, a country in Northern Europe. Or, specifically:
* Swedish language, a North Germanic language spoken primarily in Sweden and Finland
** Swedish alphabet, the official alphabet used by ...
opera singer
Jenny Lind
Johanna Maria "Jenny" Lind (6 October 18202 November 1887) was a Swedish opera singer, often called the "Swedish Nightingale". One of the most highly regarded singers of the 19th century, she performed in soprano roles in opera in Sweden and a ...
, who toured the US in the mid-19th century. In addition to living room amateur music-making during the 19th century, more people began getting involved in music during this era by participating in amateur choirs, joining
brass bands or playing in amateur orchestras.
The center of the music publishing industry in the US during the late 19th century was in New York's '
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 ...
' district. The Tin Pan Alley music publishers developed a new method for promoting sheet music: incessant promotion of new songs. One of the technological innovations that helped to spread popular music around the turn of the century was
player pianos
A player piano (also known as a pianola) is a self-playing piano containing a pneumatic or electro-mechanical mechanism, that operates the piano action via programmed music recorded on perforated paper or metallic rolls, with more modern im ...
. A player piano could be used to record a skilled pianist's rendition of a piano piece. This recorded performance could be "played back" on another player piano. This allowed a larger number of music lovers to hear the new popular piano tunes.
By the early 1900s, the big trends in popular music were the increasing popularity of vaudeville theaters and dance halls and a new invention—the
gramophone player
A phonograph, in its later forms also called a gramophone (as a trademark since 1887, as a generic name in the UK since 1910) or since the 1940s called a record player, or more recently a turntable, is a device for the mechanical and analogu ...
. The record industry grew very rapidly; "By 1920 there were almost 80 record companies in Britain, and almost 200 in the USA".
The availability of records enabled a larger percentage of the population to hear the top singers and bands.
Radio broadcasting of music, which began in the early 1920s, helped to spread popular songs to a huge audience, enabling a much larger proportion of the population to hear songs performed by professional singers and music ensembles, including individuals from lower income groups who previously would not have been able to afford concert tickets. Radio broadcasting increased the ability of songwriters, singers and bandleaders to become nationally known. Another factor which helped to disseminate popular music was the introduction of "talking pictures"—
sound films
A sound film is a motion picture with synchronized sound, or sound technologically coupled to image, as opposed to a silent film. The first known public exhibition of projected sound films took place in Paris in 1900, but decades passed before ...
—in the late 1920s, which also included music and songs. In the late 1920s and throughout the 1930s, there was a move towards consolidation in the recording industry, which led several major companies to dominate the record industry.
In the 1950s and 1960s, the new invention of television began to play an increasingly important role in disseminating new popular music. Variety shows regularly showcased popular singers and bands. In the 1960s, the development of new technologies in recording, such as multitrack recorders gave
sound engineer
An audio engineer (also known as a sound engineer or recording engineer) helps to produce a recording or a live performance, balancing and adjusting sound sources using equalization, dynamics processing and audio effects, mixing, reproduction, ...
s and
record producer
A record producer is a recording project's creative and technical leader, commanding studio time and coaching artists, and in popular genres typically creates the song's very sound and structure.Virgil Moorefield"Introduction" ''The Producer as ...
s an increasingly important role in popular music. By using multitrack recording techniques, sound engineers could create new sounds and
sound effect
A sound effect (or audio effect) is an artificially created or enhanced sound, or sound process used to emphasize artistic or other content of films, television shows, live performance, animation, video games, music, or other media. Traditi ...
s that were not possible using traditional "live" recording techniques,
such as singers performing their own backup vocals or having
lead guitar
Lead guitar (also known as solo guitar) is a musical part for a guitar in which the guitarist plays melody lines, instrumental fill passages, guitar solos, and occasionally, some riffs and chords within a song structure. The lead is the featur ...
ists play
rhythm guitar
In music performances, rhythm guitar is a technique and role that performs a combination of two functions: to provide all or part of the rhythmic pulse in conjunction with other instruments from the rhythm section (e.g., drum kit, bass guitar ...
s behind their
guitar solo
A guitar solo is a melodic passage, instrumental section, or entire piece of music, pre-written (or improvised) to be played on a classical guitar, electric guitar or an acoustic guitar. In 20th and 21st century traditional music and popular m ...
. During the 1960s era of
psychedelic music
Psychedelic music (sometimes called psychedelia) is a wide range of popular music styles and genres influenced by 1960s psychedelia, a subculture of people who used psychedelic drugs such as LSD, psilocybin mushrooms, mescaline, and cannabis to ...
, the recording studio was used to create even more unusual sounds, in order to mimic the effect of taking
hallucinogenic drug
Hallucinogens are a large, diverse class of psychoactive drugs that can produce altered states of consciousness characterized by major alterations in thought, mood, and perception as well as other changes. Most hallucinogens can be categorized ...
s, some songs used tapes of instruments played backwards or panned the music from one side to the other of the stereo image. The next decade saw moves away from these sensibilities, as
Robert Christgau
Robert Thomas Christgau ( ; born April 18, 1942) is an American music journalist and essayist. Among the most well-known and influential music critics, he began his career in the late 1960s as one of the earliest professional rock critics and ...
noted in ''
Christgau's Record Guide: Rock Albums of the Seventies'' (1981):
In the 1970s, the trend towards consolidation in the recording industry continued to the point that the "... dominance was in the hands of five huge transnational organizations, three American-owned (
WEA
The Wea were a Miami-Illinois-speaking Native American tribe originally located in western Indiana. Historically, they were described as either being closely related to the Miami Tribe or a sub-tribe of Miami.
Today, the descendants of the ...
,
RCA
The RCA Corporation was a major American electronics company, which was founded as the Radio Corporation of America in 1919. It was initially a patent trust owned by General Electric (GE), Westinghouse, AT&T Corporation and United Fruit Comp ...
,
CBS
CBS Broadcasting Inc., commonly shortened to CBS, the abbreviation of its former legal name Columbia Broadcasting System, is an American commercial broadcast television and radio network serving as the flagship property of the CBS Entertainm ...
) and two European-owned
companies
A company, abbreviated as co., is a legal entity representing an association of people, whether natural, legal or a mixture of both, with a specific objective. Company members share a common purpose and unite to achieve specific, declared go ...
(
EMI
EMI Group Limited (originally an initialism for Electric and Musical Industries, also referred to as EMI Records Ltd. or simply EMI) was a British transnational conglomerate founded in March 1931 in London. At the time of its break-up in 201 ...
,
Polygram
PolyGram N.V. was a multinational entertainment company and major music record label formerly based in the Netherlands. It was founded in 1962 as the Grammophon-Philips Group by Dutch corporation Philips and German corporation Siemens, to be a ...
)". In the 1990s, the consolidation trend took a new turn: inter-media consolidation. This trend saw music recording companies being consolidated with film, television, magazines, and other media companies, an approach which facilitated
cross-marketing promotion between subsidiaries. For example, a record company's singing star could be cross-promoted by the conglomerate's television
talk show
A talk show (or chat show in British English) is a television programming or radio programming genre structured around the act of spontaneous conversation.Bernard M. Timberg, Robert J. Erler'' (2010Television Talk: A History of the TV Talk Show ...
s and magazine arms.
The "introduction of digital equipment (mixing desks, synthesizers, samplers, sequencers)" in the 1980s resulted in what ''
Grove Dictionary of Music'' dubbed the creation of "new sound worlds", as well as facilitating DIY music production by amateur musicians and "tiny independent
record labels
A record label, or record company, is a brand or trademark of music recordings and music videos, or the company that owns it. Sometimes, a record label is also a publishing company that manages such brands and trademarks, coordinates the produc ...
".
In the 1990s, the availability of sound recording software and
effects unit
An effects unit or effects pedal is an electronic device that alters the sound of a musical instrument or other audio source through audio signal processing.
Common effects include distortion/overdrive, often used with electric guitar in el ...
s software meant that an amateur indie band could record an album—which required a fully equipped recording studio in previous decades—using little more than a
laptop
A laptop, laptop computer, or notebook computer is a small, portable personal computer (PC) with a screen and alphanumeric keyboard. Laptops typically have a clam shell form factor with the screen mounted on the inside of the upper li ...
and a good quality
microphone
A microphone, colloquially called a mic or mike (), is a transducer that converts sound into an electrical signal. Microphones are used in many applications such as telephones, hearing aids, public address systems for concert halls and public ...
. That said, the audio quality of modern recording studios still outstrips what an amateur can produce.
Criticism
Popular Genres of Music
There are many genres of music worldwide, over 300. Leading for the most popular genres worldwide, pop music takes the first spot. In countries like the USA, include hip-hop, blues, RNB, and rap take the leading spots.
The most popular genres of music rank differently throughout the world. However, there are also very niche genres of music. For example, in Canada the most popular niche genre of music are video game soundtracks. In Sweden, black metal is a niche genre of music. In South India, Carnatic is a niche genre of music people enjoy listening to.
Music genre popularity changes greatly overtime. This can be influenced by a number of factors such as current trends or even historical events. In America during the 80s, rock music was at its peak and then slowly lost its top spot as pop music began to climb the charts. Since the early 2000’s, pop music has charted number one in American music charts, but ever since 2017, RnB and Hip Hop has since taken that spot.
Changes
In addition to many changes in specific sounds and technologies used, there has been a shift in the content and key elements of popular music since the
1960s
File:1960s montage.png, Clockwise from top left: U.S. soldiers during the Vietnam War; the Beatles led the British Invasion of the U.S. music market; a half-a-million people participate in the 1969 Woodstock Festival; Neil Armstrong and Buzz ...
. One major change is that popular music has gotten slower; the average
BPM of popular songs from the 1960s was 116, while the average of the
2000s
File:2000s decade montage3.png, From top left, clockwise: The World Trade Center on fire and the Statue of Liberty during the 9/11 attacks in 2001; the euro enters into European currency in 2002; a statue of Saddam Hussein being toppled durin ...
was 100BPM. Additionally, songs getting radio play in the 1960s were, on average, only about three minutes long.
In contrast, most of the songs in the ''
Billboard
A billboard (also called a hoarding in the UK and many other parts of the world) is a large outdoor advertising structure (a billing board), typically found in high-traffic areas such as alongside busy roads. Billboards present large advertise ...
'' Top 5 in 2018 were between 3:21 and 3:40 minutes long. There has also been a drop in the use of major
keys and a rise in the use of minor keys since the 1960s; 85% of songs were in a major key in that decade, while only around 40% of songs are in a major key now.
The subject matter and lyrics of popular music have also undergone major change, becoming sadder as well as more antisocial and self-centered since the 1960s.
There has also been an increasing trend of songs' emotional content, key, and tempo not following common associations; for example, fast songs with sad subject matters or in a minor key, or slow songs with happier content or in a major key.
There are multiple possible explanations for many of these changes. One reason for the brevity of songs in the past was the physical capability of
records
A record, recording or records may refer to:
An item or collection of data Computing
* Record (computer science), a data structure
** Record, or row (database), a set of fields in a database related to one entity
** Boot sector or boot record, ...
. Vinyl record singles, which were heavily favored for radio play, only had room for about three minutes of music, physically limiting the possible length of popular songs.
With the invention of
CDs
The compact disc (CD) is a digital optical disc data storage format that was co-developed by Philips and Sony to store and play digital audio recordings. In August 1982, the first compact disc was manufactured. It was then released in Octo ...
in 1982, and more recently with
streaming
Streaming media is multimedia that is delivered and consumed in a continuous manner from a source, with little or no intermediate storage in network elements. ''Streaming'' refers to the delivery method of content, rather than the content it ...
, music can be as long or short as both writers and listeners wish. However, songs have shortened again, partially due to the ubiquity of streaming. The average song length in 2018 was 3 minutes and 30 seconds, 20 seconds shorter than the average in 2014. The most probable cause of this is that artists are now paid per individual stream, and longer songs could mean fewer streams. As for the difference in songs' subject matter and emotional content, popular music since the late 1960s has increasingly been used to promote social change and political agendas. Artists since that time have often focused their music on current events and subjects relevant to the current generations. Another theory is that globalization makes audiences' tastes more diverse, so different ideas in music have a chance to gain popularity.
Global perspective
In contrast to Western popular music, a genre of music that is popular outside of a Western nation, is categorized into
World music. This label turns otherwise popular styles of music into an exotic and unknown category''.'' The Western concept of 'World Music' homogenizes many different genres of popular music under one accessible term for Western audiences.
New media technology has led urban music styles to filter into distant rural areas across the globe. The rural areas, in turn, are able to give feedback to the urban centers about the new styles of music.
Urbanization, modernization, exposure to foreign music and mass media have contributed to hybrid urban pop styles. The hybrid styles have also found a space within Western popular music through the expressions of their national culture.
Recipient cultures borrow elements from host cultures and alter the meaning and context found in the host culture. Many Western styles, in turn, have become international styles through multinational recording studios.
Africa
![Didier Awadi](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/82/Didier_Awadi.jpg)
Popular African music styles have stemmed from traditional entertainment genres, rather than evolving from music used with certain traditional ceremonies like weddings, births, or funerals.
African popular music as a whole has been influenced by European countries, African-American and Afro-Latin music, and region-specific styles that became popular across a wider range of people. Although due to the significance and strong position of culture in traditional African music, African popular music tends to stay within the roots of traditional African Popular Music.
The genre of music,
Maskanda
Maskandi is a form of Zulu folk music, originally associated with migrant workers, that is evolving with South African society. Often characterised by a picking guitar style which draws on a variety of historical influences it also has an impor ...
, is popular in its culture of origin, South Africa. Although maskanda is a traditional music genre by definition, the people who listen to it influence the ideals that are brought forth in the music.
A popular maskandi artist,
Phuzekhemisi, had to lessen the political influence within his music to be ready for the public sphere. His music producer, West Nkosi, was looking for the commercial success in Phuzekhemisi's music rather than starting a political controversy.
Political songs have been an important category of African popular music in many societies. During the continent's struggle against colonial rule, nationalistic songs boosted citizens' morale. These songs were based on Western marches and hymns reflecting the European education system that the early nationalistic leaders grew up in. Not all African political songs were based on Western styles. For example, in South Africa, the political songs during the
Anti-Apartheid Movement
The Anti-Apartheid Movement (AAM), was a British organisation that was at the centre of the international movement opposing the South African apartheid system and supporting South Africa's non-White population who were persecuted by the policie ...
were based on traditional tribal styles along with hybrid forms of imported genres.
Activists used protest and freedom songs to persuade individuals to take action, become educated with the struggle, and empower others to be politically conscious. These songs reflected the nuances between the different classes involved in the liberation struggle.
One of the genres people of Africa use for political expression is
Hip hop.
Although hip hop in Africa is based on the North American template, it has been remade to produce new meanings for African young people. This allows the genre to be both locally and globally influential.
African youth are shaped by the fast-growing genre's ability to communicate, educate, empower, and entertain.
Artists who would have started in traditional music genres, like maskanda, became hip hop artists to provide a stronger career path for themselves. These rappers compare themselves to the traditional artists like the
griot
A griot (; ; Manding: jali or jeli (in N'Ko: , ''djeli'' or ''djéli'' in French spelling); Serer: kevel or kewel / okawul; Wolof: gewel) is a West African historian, storyteller, praise singer, poet, and/or musician.
The griot is a repos ...
and oral storyteller, who both had a role in reflecting on the internal dynamics of the larger society.
African hip hop creates youth culture, community intelligence, and global solidarity.
America
United States
In the United States, hip-hop culture shines and one of the most popular forms of music is rap. DJ Kool Herc, is famously known for creating hip-hop itself in the 1970s. With the technique he created when mixing two identical records back and forth, he was able to make unique-sounding sounds that later gave birth to rap itself. In modern times, rap is used to bring awareness to a problem such as: racism, sexism, and much more. It developed communities in a culture regarding music.
Asia
Indonesia
![Peterpan (Indo)](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/81/Peterpan_%28Indo%29.jpg)
Popular music in Indonesia can be categorized as hybrid forms of Western rock to genres that are originated in Indonesia and indigenous in style.
The genre of music, Dangdut, is a genre of popular music specifically found in
Indonesia
Indonesia, officially the Republic of Indonesia, is a country in Southeast Asia and Oceania between the Indian and Pacific oceans. It consists of over 17,000 islands, including Sumatra, Java, Sulawesi, and parts of Borneo and New Guine ...
. Dangdut formed two other styles of popular music, Indo pop, Indo-pop and Underground music, Underground,
together to create a new hybrid or fusion genre. The genre takes the noisy instrumentation from Underground, but still makes it easy to listen to like Indo-pop. Dangdut attempts to form many popular music genres like rock, pop, and traditional music to create this new sound that lines up with the consumers' tastes. This genre has formed into a larger social movement that includes clothing, youth culture, the resurgence of Islam, and the capitalist entertainment industry.
Another music scene that is popular in Indonesia is Punk rock. This genre was shaped in Indonesia by the local interpretations of the media from the larger global punk movement.
Jeremy Wallach argues that while Green Day was seen as the "death of punk," in Indonesia they were the catalyst for a larger punk movement.
Punk in Indonesia calls on the English-speaking world to embrace the global sects of the punk culture and become open-minded to the transnational genre.
China
In a 2015 study involving young students in Shanghai, youths stated they enjoyed listening to both Chinese, other Asian nationalities, and Anglo-American popular music. There are three ways that young people of China were able to access global music.
The first reason was a policy change since the late 1970s where the country was opened up to the rest of the world instead of being self-contained. This created more opportunities for Chinese people to interact with people outside of their country of origin to create a more globalized culture. The second reason is that the Chinese television and music industry since the 1980s has broadcast television shows from their neighboring Asian societies and the West. The third reason is the impact of the internet and smartphones on the accessibility of streaming music.
In 2015, students in China accounted for 30.2% of China's internet population and the third and fifth most popular uses of the internet were respectively, internet music and internet video use. The youths described being able to connect to the emotions and language of the Chinese music, but also enjoyed the melodies found within Anglo-American music. The students also believed that listening to the English music would improve their English language skills.
Middle East
![KioskSF](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b5/KioskSF.JPG)
Modernization of music in the Arab world involved borrowing inspiration from Turkish music and Western musical styles.
The late Egyptian singer, Umm Kulthum, stated,
"We must respect ourselves and our art. The Indians have set a good example for us - they show great respect for themselves and their arts. Wherever they are, they wear their native dress and their music is known throughout the world. This is the right way."
She discussed this to explain why Egypt and the Arab world needed to take pride in the popular music styles originating in their culture so the styles were not lost in the modernization.
Local musicians learned Western instrumental styles to create their own popular styles including their native languages and indigenous musical features.
Communities in throughout the Arab world place high value on their indigenous musical identities while assimilating to new musical styles from neighboring countries or mass media.
Through the 1980s and 1990s, popular music has been seen as a problem for the Iranian government because of the non-religious meanings within the music and the bodily movements of dancing or headbanging.
During this time period, Heavy metal music, metal became a popular underground subculture through the
Middle East
The Middle East ( ar, الشرق الأوسط, ISO 233: ) is a geopolitical region commonly encompassing Arabian Peninsula, Arabia (including the Arabian Peninsula and Bahrain), Anatolia, Asia Minor (Asian part of Turkey except Hatay Pro ...
. Just like their Western counterparts, Middle Eastern metal followers expressed their feelings of alienation. But their thoughts came from war and social restrictions on youth.
In interviews of Iranian teenagers between 1990 and 2004, the youth overall preferred Western popular music, even though it was banned by the government.
Iranian underground rock bands are composed of members who are young, urban-minded, educated, relatively well-off, and global beings. Iranian rock is described by the traits that these band members possess.
The youth who take part in underground music in the Middle East are aware of the social constraints of their countries, but they are not optimistic about social change.
Iranian rock bands have taken up an internationalist position to express their rebellion from the discourses in their national governments.
See also
* Music radio
* Popular culture
* List of popular music performers
* List of popular music genres
* Popular music pedagogy
* List of honorific titles in popular music
* Music popularity index
* ''Volume!''
References
44. HeadphonesAddict. “20+ Music Genre Statistics: Most Popular Music Genres (2022).” ''HeadphonesAddict'', 8 July 2022,
https://headphonesaddict.com/music-genre-statistics/.
Further reading
* T.W. Adorno with G. Simpson: 'On Popular Music', ''Studies in Philosophy and Social Science'', ix (1941), 17–48
* D. Brackett: ''Interpreting Popular Music'' (Cambridge, 1995)
* Brøvig-Hanssen, Ragnhild & Danielsen, Anne (2016). ''Digital Signatures: The Impact of Digitization on Popular Music Sound''. MIT Press.
*Larry Freeman: ''The Melody Lingers on: 50 Years of Popular Song'' (Watkins Glen, N.Y.: Century House, 1951). 212 p. ''N.B''.: Includes a chronology, "50 Years of Song Hits", on p. 193-215.
*P. Gammond: ''The Oxford Companion to Popular Music'' (Oxford, 1991)
* Haddix, Chuck. ''Rags to Be-bop: the Sounds of Kansas City Music, 1890-1945''. [Text by] Chuck Haddix (Kansas City, Mo.: University of Missouri at Kansas City, University Libraries, Marr Sound Archives, 1991). Without ISBN
*P. Hardy and D. Laing: ''The Faber Companion to 20th-Century Popular Music'' (London, 1990/R)
* R. Iwaschkin: ''Popular Music: a Reference Guide'' (New York, 1986)
* J. Kotarba, B. Merrill, J. P. Williams, & P. Vannini ''Understanding Society through Popular Music.'' NY:Routledge, 2013 (second ed.)
* Larkin, Colin. ''The Encyclopedia of Popular Music''. Oxford University Press, 2006 (10 volumes)
* R. Middleton: ''Studying Popular Music'' (Milton Keynes, 1990)
* Moore, Allan F., ed. ''Analyzing popular music''. Cambridge University Press, 2003.
* M. Sorce Keller: "Continuing Opera with Other Means: Opera, Neapolitan song, and popular music among Italian immigrants overseas", ''Forum Italicum'', Vol. XLIX(2015), No 3, 1- 20.
External links
Genres of popular music - Interactive relationships diagramFamous Music Videos- Music Video Databases - YouTube, Google Video, MySpace TV, MetaCafe, DailyMotion, Veoh, Current.com, ClipFish.de, MyVideo.de, Break.com and EyeSpot
The 1950s-2000's Week-By-Week- Looks at pop music/albums/radio and music news through these decades.
Pop Culture MadnessFeatures the most requested pop songs 1920s through today
The Daily Vault music reviewsYale Music Library Guide to Pop Music Researchthe French academic journal dedicated to the study of popular music
Éditions Mélanie Seteun !a French publisher dedicated to popular music studies - publishes Volume!, the French journal of PMS.
1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die
{{DEFAULTSORT:Popular Music
Popular music,
Music genres
Mass media
Popular culture, Music