Music through the years…

Over the last few centuries, music has changed tremendously. If we compare the music from two centuries ago, we see how it has changed; the genres, the sounds, the artists, the styles. As music has changed, the people and their thoughts on what is good music and what is not have evolved as well. There are genres like classical, band & swing, jazz, blues, country, pop, hip-hop, rhythm & blues, reggae, alternative, rock, metal, latin, etc. All here to be experimented with and tampered to create a new sound.

Two centuries ago the popular music that was out became known as classical music. There were composers like Ludwig Van Beethoven and John Braham that created masterpieces known today in various cartoons and is still used in symphonies. What composers of that time created was artistry of symphonic expression. Some of the popular pieces of art were expressionist styles. Expressionist styles were styles that made visualization of unconscious emotions and created a dream-like state. This means that the music was so luring that it made you visualize its story without a need for words.
The nineteenth century also produced a new way to record sound. In April of 1877 a Frenchman, Charles Cros, a poet and inventor of photographic colour processes proposed that Leon Scott’s method is improved by photoengraving the trace onto metal with the possibility of retracing the pattern resulting in the replay of the original sound. In July, Thomas Alva Edison, the prolific American inventor, discovered a method of recording and replaying sound having followed a somewhat different line of research from Scott or Cros. He filed a provisional specification for a British patent 2909/1877. On December 24, Edison applied for the U.S. Patent 200 521 which covered talking machines and sound writers to be known as Phonographs. By 1878, Edison considered the use of compressed amplifiers to overcome the problem of lack of replay volume. The Englishmen, Horace Short and C.A. Parsons (the steam turbine expert) succeeded in perfecting the compressed air amplifiers known as Auxetophones but they were eventually used for other purposes. And from 1878 to 1896 those ideas for music recordings slowly, but surely transformed into technology that would play and record music. This became the beginning of the music business.

By the 20th century, composers and musicians were more willing to experiment in different musical styles and used technology to further enhance their works. From this willingness to experiment and the increased access to the radio, new genres were produced. The early 1900s still contained classical music but became more contemporary.  The 1920s produced opera, blues, and ragtime which evolved into jazz. People like Louis Armstrong and Josephine Baker became well known. The 1930s produced people like Billie Holiday and Ella Fitzgerald. It also produced a genre of band & swing; which was a new form of jazz. The 1940s produced folk, early rock and roll, as well as the reoccurring genres of jazz, swing, classical, and blues. The 1950s produced performers like Lena Horne, Ray Charles, Sam Cooke, Elvis Presley and Miles Davis. Jazz and blues remained very popular; however rock n roll and doo-wop music became increasingly popular as well. The 1960s produced artists like the Supremes, the Miracles, Temptations, James Brown, Jimi Hendrix, Rolling Stones and the Beatles. The genres that became popular were funk, heavy metal, psychedelic soul, and the beginning of rhythm & blues (r&b) as well as pop. Now the 1970s was a different type of era. It developed country rock, punk rock, more soul, disco, hip-hop and funk. Popular artists were people such as Donna Summer, Barry White, Sly and the Family Stone, Dionne Warwick, Smokey Robinson and Gladys Knight & the Pips. The 1980s was an era that is still popular to the present time with its style. The 1980s had artists like Michael Jackson, Janet Jackson, Prince, Luther Vandross, Whitney Houston and Cyndi Lauper. Popular genres of that time period were pop, rock, hip-hop and the beginning of rap. The 1990s were known for hip-hop, rap, and r&b. It was also known for girl groups as well as male groups like TLC, Boyz II Men, Kid N Play,  Dru Hill, Destiny’s Child and SWV. And the 2000s produced people that we currently listen to like Beyonce, Lil Wayne, Drake, Trey Songz and Nicki Minaj. All the genres that were previously produced remain apart of our music today. And we have access to the different artists to choose what type of music we like and what we do not. Music is also heard in different ways; once it was through radio, record players, 8-tracks, boom boxes, walkmans, CD players and eventually i-pods. Each allowing us to enjoy the music of any genre, any artist and any sound.

Also published on Medium.