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20th-century music underwent a series of large-scale transformations related to broader social and technological changes. The musicians revolution, the long-standing conventions of tonality, rhythm, and harmony, social tensions, and the advent of tape recording all contributed to new music (Bonds 360). One of the revolutionary novelties in 20th-century music in the US was the rise of the blues genre. It originated in the Delta region of the Mississippi and gave a voice to oppressed and segregated Blacks (Bonds 405). However, blues served as a unifying ground for people of all colors, managing to close the divide, at least in the artistic field.
If one looks at the notable characteristics of blues songs, they typically include the use of the solo guitar as an accompaniment, a raw, gramophone-like sound with noises, great variety of the musicians use of their voice tone, and a 12-bar text pattern. Besides, experts note the use of blue notes in the majority of blues songs the ones stretching beyond the standard major scale and integration of witty humor and metaphors in the text (Bonds 406-409).
An illustrative example of these features is the song Terraplane Blues by Robert Johnson. Its recording sounds very noisy and authentic, which implies poor recording quality, but it is, in fact, cherished by blues fans. It follows the 12-bar blues text pattern, though with a slight deviation in the middle of the song, and contains a witty metaphor for a love misfortune with an unfaithful woman. For comparison, one may take the famous song Mean Old Bed Bug Blues, recorded by Furry Lewis in 1927. It also follows the classical 12-bar textual pattern of a blues song and contains elements of guitar effects (like slide guitar). Other unifying elements include witty humor about the misfortunes of the African people, with the metaphorical portrayal of white oppressors as mean bed bugs. Still, it has little voice variation like in the song of Johnson due to the fact that Johnson and Lewis had distinct manners of blues performance.
Works Cited
Bonds, Mark Evan. Listen to This. 4th ed., Pearson, 2017.
Lewis, Furry. Mean Old Bed Bug Blues. Vocalion, 1927.
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