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Popular music in the period 1900-‐1930
In Britain and America
General Books
Ê Fletcher, P. 2001. World Musics in Context (Oxford: OUP)
Ê Frith, S. Straw W. 2001. The Cambridge Companion to Pop and Rock. (Cambridge: CUP)
Ê Middleton, R. 1990. Studying Popular Music. (London: Open UP)
Ê Shuker, R. 2001. Understanding Popular Music. (London: Routledge)
Books for this Lecture Ê Donald Clarke, The Rise and Fall of Popular Music, Penguin, 1995.
Ê Dave Russell, Popular Music in England, 1840-‐1914 A Social History, Manchester University Press (1987)
Ê Paul Oliver, Black Music in Britain OUP, 1990.
Ê Arnold Shaw, Black Popular Music in America, Macmillan, 1884
Ê Tony Palmer, All you need is Love, The Story of Popular Music 1976.
Ê Paul Oliver, Songsters and Saints, CUP 1984
Ê Peter Van der Merwe, Origins of the Popular Style, Oxford 1989
Ê Wilder, Alex, American Popular Song, New York, 1990
Ê Ted Gioia, The History of Jazz,
Ê Ed. Mervyn Cooke and David Horn, The Cambridge Companion to Jazz, CUP, 2002, pp. 9-‐32
Ê Gunter Schuller, Early Jazz, 1968, pp. 63-‐133
Ê Lomax, Alan, Jelly Roll Morton,
Essay Title
Ê Trace the development of popular song and dance forms from the beginning of the twen]eth century to the 1930s. Discuss Music Halls, Tin Pan Alley, Rag]me and Early Jazz, Musicals, Radio and Film. To what extent was success reliant on the mechaniza]on of media forms?
Popular music and the masses
Ê One defini]on is that poplar music is ‘Music of the masses’ (I.e.expanding urban middle classes).
Ê ‘Mass market for published music since the ]n-‐pan alley era in the USA and Europe (1880s -‐ 1930s’)’.
Ê Dissemina]on by sheet music, then also gramophone and later forms of recorded sound.
Ê Exploited for commercial gain. Popular because it sold well.
Ê From the 60s it has become a world-‐wide phenomena dominated by North American forms and styles.
Ê Before the 1960s it was industrialised but not global.
Pop verses Popular Music
Ê ‘It is tempting to confuse pop music with popular music. The New Grove Dictionary Of Music and Musicians, the musicologist's ultimate reference resource, identifies popular music as the music since industrialization in the 1800's that is most in line with the tastes and interests of the urban middle class. This would include an extremely wide range of music from vaudeville and minstrel shows to heavy metal. Pop music, on the other hand, has primarily come into usage to describe music that evolved out of the rock 'n roll revolution of the mid-‐1950's and continues in a definable path to today.’
Mass Culture Theory – the starting point -‐ See previous slides
Ê Concepts of Mass Culture and Mass Society based on divisions into:
Ê 1. High Art – not for commercial gain (supposedly). Beethoven, etc.
Ê 2. Folk Art-‐ from below as an expression of the people
Ê 3. Mass Media/Mass Culture
Ê Mass culture theory holds that through `atomisa]on’ individuals can only relate to each other like atoms in a chemical compound. Individuals are vulnerable to exploita]on by core ins]tu]ons of mass media and pop culture. (example of rise of Nazism in 1930s and Orwell’s 1984)
Popular Music of the pre-‐industrial Age
Ê Origins of popular music
Ê Elizabethan Broadside ballads – idea exported to America. Commercially printed from 16th to 18th century. Tabloids of the age.
Ê Common stock of tunes for ballads and songs
Ê Ballad tunes from Dancing Master onwards
Folk Music
Ê Its history and con]nua]on in both America and Britain.
Ê Constantly re-‐inven]ng itself. A series of revivals.
Ê Always has both a conserva]ve and forward looking aspect.
Ê Both urban and rural. Populist and purist.
Ê Many connected with trades and the sea.
Ê Crossovers with commercial popular music.
Industrial Urban Working Class
Ê Industrial Revolu]on produced an expanding lower middle-‐class and upper working-‐class with sufficient wealth and ]me to support a commercial music prin]ng industry based on widespread ownership of home pianos. Novellos, Booseys, etc. A large amount of popular music printed at this ]me. Rag]me Scot Joplin was made famous through sheet music. Era of sheet music.
1. Sheet Music -‐ Tin Pan Alley – Denmark Street
Tin Pan Alley con]nued
Ê Piano industry at its height in Edwardian era – piano pieces songs and solos (two hands especially) produced by Tin Pan Alley. ‘Daisy Bell’(1892)
Ê Early 19th century dance halls and pleasure gardens of Vienna, Strauss’s music, Military band music, Sousa marches, patrio]c songs, operega and music hall provided much of the material for Tin Pan Alley – at its height 1880s to 1920s. This era now a huge area of research – looking at how the printed output reflects the na]onalis]c and moralis]c concerns of the day.
Ê Age of the player piano. Over by the 1930s. Its advantages were that you had someone’s performance but you could also control it.
2. Records and Recorded Sound
Ê 1890s saw the start of recorded sound with Thomas Edison’s inven]on of the phonograph 1877. Eddison tape.
Ê Many 19th century personali]es were recorded – Queen Victoria, Edison, Brahms, Arthur Sullivan
Ê Quickly the effects on the prac]ce of music became apparent. Emile Caruso (1873-‐1921)the first recorded ar]st to achieve a huge audience through recordings rather than live performance.
Ê Elgar the first composer to be ac]vely involved with the recordings of his own works. All done without electric microphones.
Ê By 1900 recordings were commonplace and all sorts of music was available – popular, opera, military, world music, etc.
Ê Early companies successful – and some even around today.
Ê Caruso singing ‘Cielo e Mar’ from la Giaconda by A. Pionchielli
3. Radio
Ê Radio became the medium of the na]on and was used for poli]cal effect everywhere.
Ê The BBC monopoly was copied all over the world – Aun]e and Lord Reith. America had a different approach and popular music flourished on radio here.
Ê During the 40s record sales con]nued to fall as Radio seemed to be the future.
BBC 1922
Ê The British Broadcasting Company, as the BBC was originally called, was formed on 18 October 1922 by a group of leading wireless manufacturers including Marconi. Daily broadcasting by the BBC began in Marconi’s London studio, 2LO, in the Strand, on November 14, 1922.
Ê This was followed the next day by broadcasts from Birmingham and Manchester. Reith, a 33-‐year-‐old Scottish engineer, was appointed General Manager of the BBC at the end of 1922.
Ê Within a year the fledgling BBC had broadcast plays, concerts of popular and classical music, talks and variety programmes. There was some news but in the early days only after 7pm to avoid upsetting the sales of newspapers.
Radio Era Ê In 1920s the huge popularity of dance music (Charleston,
Blackbogom, etc) and early Jazz produced a new a greater demand for records and gramophones. – For dancing in the home.
Ê Inven]on of electric microphone a breakthrough for radio and recordings. In use from 1925.
Ê In the late 1920s and especially aker the Wall Street crash radio began to take over as the main medium for popular music. Basic crystal sets were cheap.
Ê The quality was oken beger than shellac records which scratched easily. The live event was brought into the home.
Ê Radio brought music into working class homes.
Popular music in Britain in the first decades of the 20th century
Ê Gave way to America – looked to for new styles and technical innova]on.
Ê Less commercially driven – lots of state interven]on.
Ê Less networked – America had Hollywood, Broadway, Radio and Records working together much more. E.g. Bing Crosby used all the media.
Ê Many stars went to America – because of Holywood – e.g Chaplin
Chaplin 1917 Movie (moved to America by 1913 – World famous by 1918)
Britain -‐ BBC from the 1930s
Ê Divided up into the Home, Light and Third – aker WW2.
Ê Third played mostly serious music and more intellectual talk programmes.
Ê Light was light entertainment -‐ much of it music. Brass bands, organists, light orchestras etc.
Ê Home was soaps, news and talk shows.
Areas of Mass Musical Activity in Britain pre WW2
Ê Brass bands -‐ for parades and street marching events.
Ê Social Dancing -‐ boom in cheap dance halls.
Ê Music Halls -‐ urban entertainment before the age of television. Variety and Music Hall.
Ê Singing clubs, hand bells, etc.
Ê Importance of temperance movements in promo]ng music par]cipa]on.
Ê Choir and chorale singing.
Brass Bands Ê Took root in the 19th century -‐ as an encouragement
to workers to beger themselves and not drink their wages.
Ê Firms sponsored bands -‐ who gradually took to playing all brass instruments (strings and reed where slowly abandoned).
Ê Strongly associated with temperance social clubs -‐ people taking the pledge.
Ê Spread from the north and midlands to the whole country -‐ urban and rural areas.
Ê Development of contes]ng as a social ac]vity -‐ like being part of a football club with fixtures.
Social Dancing Ê Jazz as much a dance phenomena as a musical one.
Ê Great succession of new dance emerged in the 1920s -‐ blackbogom, charleston, stomp, etc. Jigerbugging in the 30s and 40s. Also la]n dances and novelty dances. Oken instructed on the floor and danced to by masses in lines.
Ê Dance halls opening all over England from the 1890s to 1930s. Prices as low as a few pence to a few shillings. Many later converted into cinemas or pulled down.
Ê Emquege of ‘Excuse Me’ and changing partners. Women could dance with women but men had to request a dance.
Ê Died with the 1950s and the end of swing. New pop music had a different set of social rules and a new set of dance types. Many not involving a couples embrace.
Music Halls Ê The home of light or variety entertainment before television. Early
television took over the forms and stars of the music hall.
Ê Music halls developed aker 1852 -‐ but became biggest in the era before and aker ww1 and the arrival of radio. First Music Hall behind the Canterbury Arms in Lambeth.
Ê All large towns had music halls and impresarios who ran them for profit.
Ê Every kind of entertainment was available -‐ comedians, ventriloquists, jugglers, strong men, dancers, etc. Also popular singers.
Ê You paid to enter and then could drink at the bar and see the show.
Music in the Music Hall Ê The most common form of entertainment was the popular singer -‐ or a comedian that
included song as part of his/her act.
Ê A band of some form would be present and oken a pit was built in.
Ê The best known stars -‐ Marie Lloyd, George Leybourne, Gracie Fields (1898-‐1979), Dan Leno, etc, were hugely famous.
Ê Many early Film industry stars came out of the music hall -‐ Chaplin, Laurel, etc. A Bri]sh phenomena -‐ but there was an equivalent in America. Video of Chaplin
Dan Leno
More
Ê Many fine theatres were built for music hall primarily.
Ê Female impersonators as well as male impersonators. Vesta Tilley.
Ê Later music of this material came to be called simply variety.
Ê Importance in Britain of seaside resorts -‐ pavilions and piers.
Ê Command performances. Becomes known as ‘variety’ and was a mainstay of early television.
Ê Video Gus Ellen
Gus Elen
Dan Leno
Ê A great star of his day -‐ but forgogen now.
Ê Would perform quick rou]nes in many different halls in one night -‐ traveling by cab from one to another.
Ê Had several different personali]es -‐ many of whom sang humorous songs.
Ê Charlie Chaplin in many ways moddled his character on Leno. video
Dan Leno
Josephine Baker – From St Louis to Paris
Ê Born in St Louis
Ê Gravitated to Paris aker WW1 – In ]me for Jazz craze.
Ê Introduced hot jazz to Paris with La Revue Negre in 1925.
Ê Dark Star of the Folies-‐Bergere.
Ê Listen to a recording of her.
Gracie Fields – From Rochdale to Hollywood
Ê Huge popularity in the 1930s
Ê War service -‐ entertaining the troops.
Ê Film Career.
Ê Marriage and life in Capri.
Ê Successful music hall ar]st from Lancashire who made to the big screen.
Ê Songs oken very humorous and complicated.
Ê Nostalgia and patrio]sm.
Ê Recording.
Gracie Fields
Ê Lancashire cogon worker with a fine voice. Tremendous poten]al as a classical singer.
Ê Early appearances at the Rochdale Hippodrome.
Ê 1920s stage shows and revue to Hollywood, then war appearances followed by gravita]on to Italy -‐ 300 records.
Ê Gravitated to music halls and then to London.
Ê Songs wrigen by her husband -‐ she made films and was important in the war effort.
Ê By the 1950s she had re]red to Capri.
Sally in our Alley
America in the 19th century
Ê Slavery
Ê Conquest of the West – Expansion in all direc]ons
Ê Immigra]on
Ê Industrialisa]on
Ê Crea]on of a na]on
Ê Entertainment – Minstrelsy, Vaudeville and Tim Pan Alley
Ê Songs of George Forster
Stephen Forster Songs
New Orleans before Jazz The Jim Crow Acts
11. Minstrels
Ê Throughout 19th century the mainstay of popular entertainment was the minstrel band. Ê A caricature of the untrained black musician who had music in his soul. Ê Minstrels were also whites who blacked up and imitated blacks. This was a huge component of popular entertainment from 1840s-‐1920s and even un]l the 1960s later. Ê New Cristy Minstrels. Performed thoughout America and Europe aker the first world war. Ê Video of Minstrel Music. The first American form of mass popular entertainment -‐ like TV.
Minstrelsy and the War between the States
Rag]me -‐ Prehistory of Jazz
Ê Congo square dances of black slaves in early 19th century New Orleans. The ring shout. Rhythmic content of African music.
Ê Rag]me and Scog Joplin. Starts in the 1890s as a piano style full of syncopa]on. Died with Joplin in 1917. Revived in the 1960s and 70s.
Ê Extract 1 – Maple Leaf – by Scog Joplin
Rag]me
By 1900
Ê Many aspects of the modern popular culture industry in place in America.
Ê 1. Record companies, 2. Tin Pan Alley, 3. Vaudeville, 4. Rag]me and 5. Minstrel Show Networks.
Ê 1900-‐1920 – 1. Film Industry based on Hollywood, 2. Broadway (from 1890s but not a concentra]on of theatres un]l 1920) and The Musical, 3. Jazz.
Ê First Hollywood studios in 1911.
12. Rise of Vaudeville and Height of Tin Pan Alley
Ê Jubilee Singers – success of ‘Negro Spirituals Swing Low, Steal Away,
Ê Oh My Darling by Percy Montrose.
Ê Rise of Zeigfeld Follies – from 1907.
Ê Between 1890-‐1907 sheet music produc]on tripled – Tin Pan Alley 28th Street – warren of small rooms with a piano.
Ziegfeld Follies
Burlesque -‐ Vaudeville
Ê American equivalent of Music Hall.
Ê Bigger emphasis on music and novelty -‐ less on stand up comics.
Ê Lots of acts blacked up as minstrels. Banjo players and nonsense and novelty songs. Also dancing troupes and solo singers.
Ê Less important than in Europe perhaps because of the importance of the movie industry and musicals -‐ Zeigfield Follies -‐ Gypsy Rose Lee.
Ê Judy Garland -‐ singer who moved from Vaudeville to Broadway to Films.
The Musical
From Vaudeville to the Musical Ê Revue and vaudeville with a storyline and an
integrated show.
Ê The Black Crook 1866 -‐ an epic bringing together music and melodrama plus specialty acts and dancing.
Ê Oscar Hammerstein and Jerome Kern came together with Show Boat 1927 bringing together European operega tradi]on with American Vaudeville.
Ê The Gerswins developed the style and form towards serious art music.
Jazz Age
Ê From the first recordings included all manner of material -‐ but dominated by serious art music.
Ê The development of Jazz and the dance craze of the 20s saw the first big increase in popular music record sales.
Ê The gramophone was there to dance to.
Ê Video of Creoles and brass bands. New Orleans.
Early Jazz – New Orleans
Broadway, Hollywood and The Great American Songbook
Ê Both have great influence on popular music in America (and indirectly in Britain).
Ê The development of popular song. Big stars because universally known through film.
Ê Of mass culture in general.
Ê On the musical in par]cular.
Great American Song Book
Ê Term used for the developing tradi]on of popular song associated with shows and films from 1900-‐1950.
Ê Gerswins, Jerome Kern, Ervin Berlin, Richard Rogers and Hart, Cole Porter.
Ê Increasingly complicated harmonies and piano style.
Ê Always assessable but arguably art music.
Showboat 1927 – Film 1935
Race and Hillbilly Music
Popular singers
Ê Josephine Baker
Ê Blues -‐ Ma Rainie, Bessie Smith, Billie Holliday
Ê Paul Whiteman, Bing Crosby, Frank Sinatra -‐ movie clip of Crosby and the Singer with the band.
Ê In Britain -‐ George Formby,
Bing Crosby
America
Ê All Bri]sh popular forms looked to some extent to America.
Ê Rag]me, Jazz, Blues, Musicals, Folk, Rhythm and Blues, Rock and Roll -‐ all come from America and are imitated in Britain.
Ê There are always differences however and the tradi]ons and never quite the same.
Essay Title
Ê Review the contribu]on of the various forms of Mass entertainment in Britain and America.
Ê How well did they integrate and work together?
Ê Bing Crosby one of the first to be able to link up all the important strands of mass media by 1930 – as a primarily a popular singer – he could do it all.
