Your wedding day is now passé, you have the blues. Your baby has now been delivered, you have the blues. The weekend is so-yesterday, you, yet again, have those dreaded hangover-meets-the-blues. The blues as we know it, “ain't nothing but a good man feelin' bad” if we had to quote Leone Redbone, and has had, in fact, quite a colourful past given the tumultuous social landscape it emerged from – a valid explanation for the visceral and emotional renditions the blues are usually known for.
Some time in the 1890s, the blues took form as an African-American form of music in the deep south of the United States when slaves, ex-slaves and descendants of slaves and share-croppers were seen crooning songs while they toiled in cotton fields. Given that the years that followed were a transitory phase for the US – with the shift in black and white race relations, the blues can effectively be called a force in shaping popular American culture as we know it today. Between 1910 and the 1940s, with a large number of African Americans leaving the south in hopes of leading better lives in the North, the blues went along with them, slowly paving their ways through urban centres of the United States, mainly Chicago. The Blues were not single-handedly invented by anyone and eventually were electrified with the help of the drums and the piano in the late 1940s.
Think of the story of the Blues as the history of African Americans narrated through their most popular music, the history of racial relations, a documentation of struggle, an account of struggle. These work sounds were belched out rhythmically while their tasks were being done. By calling and responding phrases with the help of a lead singer, African slaves combined the folk music of white European settlers to produce a style of music that has influenced pretty much every other style of music we know today. Ironically, the same 'black' Blues have been a driving force for much of the 'white' rock music that exists now.
Swaying to some of Eric Clapton's tunes? The Blues. Making fun of your parents' dance moves to Elvis Presley? Definitely the Blues. Quoting the White Stripes? Well then, hear hear, we're looking at some Blues again. And no points for guessing the influence behind RnB or what is also known as Rhythm and Blues...
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