RnB 1920-40s

RAGTIME is the genre that African-American musicians gave after the Civil War to piano music for salon, dance, marches or society events. A precursor to jazz, ragtime benefited in 1895-1910 from the emblematic success of musician-composers Ernest Hogan, Scott Joplin and James Scott, success then notably conveyed by the mechanical reproduction medium of the piano roll. DIXIELAND JAZZ and BOOGIE WOOGIE emerged in the 1910s from Ragtime culture, as aptly illustrated by the three versions below of Artie Matthews' 1915 composition "Weary blues". With the advent of radio and recording technology, music began to be broadcast and distributed en masse in the 1920s. Dixieland and Boogie-woogie were the first genres of African-American music to compete with other contemporary instrumental styles, and Louis Armstrong and Sydney Bechet were the first musicians to let the trumpet and soprano saxophone sound the way they did.

RAGTIME    ∙  1895  ∙  La Pasmala (Ernest Hogan)  ∙  1899/1902  ∙  Maple leaf rag / The entertainer (Scott Joplin)  ∙  1906/1909  ∙  Frog legs rag / Grace and beauty (James Scott)  ∙  1908/1915  ∙  Sensation / Ragtime nightingale (Joseph Lamb (US Irish))  ∙  1915  ∙  Weary blues (Artie Matthews)  ∙  1923  ∙  Dizzy fingers (Zez Confrey)  ∙

BOOGIE WOOGIE   ∙  1924  ∙  Chicago stomp (Jimmy Blythe)  ∙  1929  ∙  Pine Top's boogie woogie (Pine Top Smith)  ∙  1938  ∙  Roll 'em Pete (Joe Turner & Pete Johnson)  ∙  1939  ∙  Woo woo (Albert Ammons)  ∙  How long blues (Jimmy Yancey)  ∙  1940  ∙  Honky tonk train blues (Meade 'Lux' Lewis)  ∙  Boogie woogie on St Louis blues (Earl Hines)  ∙  1946  ∙  Bumble boogie (Jack Fina)  ∙  1968  ∙  Weary blues boogie-style (Claude Bolling, orig. 1915 Artie Matthews)  ∙

DIXIELAND JAZZ  ∙  1917  ∙  Livery stable blues / Tiger rag (Original Dixieland Jazz Band)  ∙  Boogie rag (Wilbur Sweatman)  ∙  1919  ∙  Weary blues (Louisiana Five, orig. 1915 Artie Matthews)  ∙  1923  ∙  The Saints (Paramount Jubilee Singers)  ∙  Wild cat blues / Kansas City man blues (Clarence Williams' Blue Five ft Sydney Bechet)  ∙  Canal Street blues / Sweet lovin' man (King Oliver's Creole Jazz Band ft Louis Armstrong)  ∙  Tin roof blues (Original Memphis Five)  ∙  1924  ∙  Everybody loves my baby (Clarence Williams' Blue Five ft Louis Armstrong)  ∙  1925  ∙  Cake walking babies from home  (Red Onions Jazz Babies ft. Sydney Bechet & Louis Armstrong)  ∙  1925/1927/1928  ∙  Gut bucket blues /  Hotter than that / Basin Street blues (Louis Armstrong's Hot Five)  ∙

With the advent of recording technology and radio, music began to be broadcast and mass-marketed in the mid-1920s. Vocal songs built on blues and jazz gradually became a genre in its own right in the late 1920s. Along with jazz, Vocals became one of the most important African-American musical genres and successfully competed with other contemporary styles.

DELTA BLUES, DEEP SOUTH BLUES

Blues music developed in the second half of the 19th century in the region called "The Delta", the alluvial floodplain stretching from Memphis to Vicksburg between the Mississippi and the Yazoo River. By the end of the 19th century, it had spread throughout the eight states - from Texas to Florida - known as the Deep South.

URBAN BLUES

Urban blues developed in the late 20s in Memphis, Detroit and Chicago and later in other major American cities, first as an elaborate version of country-blues performed by duos or trios and in the mid-30s in the form of amplified jazz-infected blues performed by larger bands.

Christian music with dominant a capella vocals and choirs has been ubiquitous in the Afro-American communities since the 17th Century, and started to be called "gospel song" in the 1890s. Popular gospel music began to be recorded in the early 1930s and reached mainstream audience in the early 1940s with the two groups 'The Golden Gate Quartet' and 'The Jubalaires'. From 1946/47, Mahalia Jackson and Sister Rosetta Sharpe became the genre’s superstars.

The first tracks of rock appeared in 1946-47 as outspreads from swing-jazz, boogie-woogie, jump-blues and honky-tonk country music. Upon becoming a music-genre in its own right in 1948-49, rock 'n'roll did not only revolutionize American folk and country music but also blues, popular vocals and gospel, while marking the end the era for Swing-jazz, Big band jazz and Boogie-woogie. In the following years, each of these musical genres integrated in its own way the moods, rhythms and instruments of rock music.

RnB 1920-40s

JOURNEY THROUGH 800 RnB SOUL SONGS

RnB SOUL  ∙  1920-40s  ∙  50s  ∙  60s  ∙  70s  ∙  80s  ∙  90s  ∙  Neo Soul 2000s-2010s  ∙