Blues and Modern Music

Essay # 57887

Music Studies > Blues, Jazz

An examination of the influence of blues on modern music.

2,010 words () | 22 sources | MLA | 2002 United States

Paper Summary:

This paper examines how the development of blues in the first half of the 20th century paved the way for the musical styles of modern music. In order to understand these influences, it breaks them down into the five main categories of country and rockabilly, early rhythm and blues (R&B), British rock, American rock, and punk rock.

From the Paper:

"Early blues has also influenced rockabilly. Rockabilly is the basic fusion of rock and roll and country blues. Around 1965 a new group was forming on the west side of Jacksonville, Florida. A pair of brothers named Lacey and Ronnie VanZant started Lynyrd Skynyrd, a roughed-up group of high school students who did their best to rebel against societies standards. Ronnie and Lacey grew up singing in the all black choir at their church as well as sitting on the porch of Shorty Medlocke's house listening to him play his raucous "swamp country" blues. They also both remember listening to the AM radio in their father's old diesel truck when they would go on trips up and down the Eastern Seaboard (American). They pooled these styles together to form the sound for which they became famous."