Pop music and Rap

Popular music of the United States in the 1980s saw New Wave entering the year as the single biggest mainstream market, with heavy metal, punk rock and hardcore punk, and hip hop achieving big success. With the demise of punk rock, a new generation of punk-influenced genres arose, including Gothic rock, post-punk, alternative rock, emo and thrash metal. Hip hop experienced its first change, with Miami bass, Chicago hiphop, Washington DC go-go, Detroit ghettotech, Los Angeles electroclash and the golden age of old school hip hop in New York City. House music grew in Chicago, techno music developed in Detroit which also saw the flowering of the Detroit Sound in gospel. This helped inspire the greatest crossover success of Christian Contemporary Music as well as the Miami Sound of Cuban pop.

Wicked

Wicked is a musical with music and lyrics by Stephen Schwartz and a book by Winnie Holzman. It is based on the 1995 Gregory Maguire novel “Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West”, a similar novel of the 1939 film “The Wizard of Oz” and L. Frank Baum’s classic story “The Wonderful Wizard of Oz”. The musical is told from the perspective of the witches of the Land of Oz; its plot starts before and continues after Dorothy’s arrival in Oz from Kansas and includes several references to the 1939 film and Baum’s novel. Wicked tells the story of two unlikely friends, Elphaba, who is the wicked witch of the West and Glinda, who is the good witch of the North, who struggle through opposite personalities and viewpoints, rivalry over the same love-interest, reactions to the Wizard’s corrupt government, and, ultimately, Elphaba’s public fall from grace.

Produced by Universal Pictures in association with Marc Platt and David Stone, the Joe Mantello-directed and Wayne Cilento-choreographed original production of Wicked premiered on Broadway at the Gershwin Theatre in October 2003, after completing pre-Broadway SHN tryouts at San Francisco’s Curran Theatre in May 2003. Its original stars included Idina Menzel as Elphaba, Kristin Chenoweth as Glinda, and Joel Grey as the Wizard. The original Broadway production won 3 Tony Awards and 6 Drama Desk Awards while its cast album received a Grammy Award. It has since celebrated its ninth anniversary on October 30, 2012, and played for 3,741 performances, making Wicked the 12th longest-running Broadway show in history.

The success of the Broadway production has produced several other productions worldwide, including various North American productions, a long-running Laurence Olivier Award-winning West End production and a series of international productions. Since its 2003 debut, Wicked has broken box office records around the world, currently holding weekly-gross-takings records in Los Angeles, Chicago, St. Louis, and London. In the week ending January 2, 2011, the London, Broadway, and both North American touring productions simultaneously broke their respective records for the highest weekly gross. In the first week of 2012, the Broadway production broke this record again, earning $2.7 million. Both the West End production and the North American tour have been seen by over two million patrons each.

 

Musical Theatre

Musical theatre is a form of theatre that blends songs, spoken dialogue, acting, and dance. The story and emotional subject of the piece – humor, pathos, love, anger – are communicated through the words, music, movement and technical features of the entertainment as an integrated whole. Although musical theatre overlaps with other theatrical forms like opera and dance, it may be classified by the equal importance given to the music as compared with the dialogue, movement and other elements of the works. Since the early 20th century, musical theatre stage works have been called, simply, musicals.

Although music has been a part of dramatic presentations since ancient times, modern Western musical theatre came about during the 19th century, ending with the works of Gilbert and Sullivan in Britain and those of Harrigan and Hart in America. These were followed by the numerous Edwardian musical comedies and the musical theatre works of American creators like George M. Cohan. The Princess Theatre musicals and other smart shows like “Of Thee I Sing” were artistic steps forward beyond revues and other entertainments of the early 20th century and led to such groundbreaking works as, “Show Boat” in 1927 and “Oklahoma!” in 1943. Some of the most famous and iconic musicals through the decades that followed include “West Side Story” in 1957, The “Fantasticks” in 1960, “Hair”  in 1967, “A Chorus Line”  in 1975, “Les Misérables”  in 1985, “The Phantom of the Opera”  in 1986, “Rent”  in 1994, “The Producers” in 2001 and “Wicked” in 2003.

Musicals are performed all around the world. They may be presented in large venues, such as big budget West End and Broadway theatre productions in London and New York, or in smaller theatres, Off-Broadway or regional theatre productions, on tour, or by amateur groups in schools, theatres and other performance spaces. In addition to Britain and North America, there are lively musical theatre scenes in many countries in Europe, Latin America, Australasia and Asia.

Crooning

Crooner is an American nickname given to male singers of pop standards, mostly from the Great American Songbook, either backed by a full orchestra, a big band or by a piano. Originally it was an ironic term representing an emphatically sentimental, often emotional singing style made possible by the use of microphones. Some performers, such as Russ Colombo, did not accept the term in an interview. Frank Sinatra said that he did not consider himself or Bing Crosby “crooners”.

This popular vocal style corresponded with the advent of radio broadcasting and electrical recording. Before the Invention of the mcrophone, popular singers like Al Jolson had to project to the rear seats of a theater, as did opera singers, which made for a very loud vocal style. The microphone made possible the more personal style. Al Bowlly, Gene Austin and Art Gillham are often credited as inventors of the crooning style but Rudy Vallee became far more popular, beginning from 1928. He could be heard by anyone with a phonograph or a radio.

His first film, “The Vagabond Lover”, was promoted with the line, “Men Hate Him! Women Love Him!” while his success brought press warnings of the “Vallee Peril” this “punk from Maine” with the “dripping voice” required police to beat back screaming, swooning females at his vaudeville shows.

By the early 1930s the term “crooner” had taken on a bad meaning. Both Cardinal O’Connell of Boston and the New York Singing Teachers Association publicly denounced the vocal form, O’Connell calling it “base”, “degenerate”, “defiling” and un-American and the NYSTA adding “corrupt”. Even The New York TImes expected that crooning would be just a passing fad. The newspaper printed, “They sing like that because they can’t help it. Their style is pleading to go out of fashion”. Voice range shifted from tenor (Vallée) to baritone (Russ Columbo and Bing Crosby).  Still, a 1931 record by Dick Robinson, Crosby, Columbo & Vallee, called upon men to fight “these public enemies” brought into homes through radio

The genre enjoyed approval within the former  Soviet Union with Mark Reizen, Leonid Utyosov, Sergey Lemeshev, Ivan Kozlovvsky, Pavel Lisisian, Goerge Ots, Oleg Anofriyev, and Muslim Magomayev leading the way. Their performances had a mixture of influences including Ballads and swing. They were included in popular film soundtracks. “These public enemies” brought into homes through radio.

Beyonce Knowles

One of my most favorite artists would have to be Beyonce. She has been such a great inspiration to all young girls who listen to her. She also has many achievements in her life.

Born Beyonce Giselle Knowles on September 4, 1981, in Houston, Texas, Knowles started singing at an early age. As a child, she competed in local talent shows, and won many of these events by impressing audiences with her natural singing and dancing abilities.
Teaming up with her cousin, Kelly Rowland, and two classmates, Beyonce formed an all-female singing group. Her father, Matthew Knowles, served as the band’s manager. The group went through some name and line-up changes before landing a record deal in 1997 with Columbia Records. Destiny’s Child soon became one of the most popular R&B acts, with the release of their first, self-titled album. The group scored its first number one single on the pop charts with “Bills, Bills, Bills,” offs their second album. The recording also featured another smash hit, “Say My Name.” While enjoying her group’s success, Beyonce began exploring other projects. She made her first acting debut in 2001 with a starring role in MTV’s “Carmen: A Hip Hopera.” She then co-starred with Mike Myers in the spy parody “Goldmember” the following year. On the musical front, Beyonce took center stage as a solo artist, releasing her first album, “Dangerously in Love”, in 2003. The recording became a huge accomplishment for her, both commercially and critically. It sold millions of copies and won five Grammy Awards. On the album, Beyonce worked with a number of different artists, including Missy Elliott, Sean Paul and Jay-Z. She was rumored to be dating Jay-Z around this time, but the couple did not publicly admit their relationship. Destiny’s Child released their last studio album, “Destiny Fulfilled”, in 2004, and officially broke up the next year.
On her own, Beyonce continued to enjoy great success. Her second studio album, 2006’s “B’Day” featured such hits as “Irreplaceable” and “Beautiful Liar.” On the big screen, she starred opposite Jennifer Hudson, Jaime Foxx and Eddie Murphy in “Dreamgirls”. The film was adjusted from the hit Broadway musical of the same name.
In 2008, Beyonce married rapper and music mogul Jay-Z in a small, private ceremony in New York City. Among the guests seen at the wedding were Beyonce’s mother Tina Knowles; her father and manager Matthew; her sister Solange; Destiny’s Child members Kelly Rowland and Michelle Williams; and friend Gwyneth Paltrow.
The newlywed continued to work as hard as ever, endorsing her latest effort, “I am … Sasha Fierce” in 2008. Beyonce scored two big hits off the album which were “Single Ladies (Put a Ring On It)” and “If I Were a Boy.” She also returned to the big screen that year, starring as R&B legend Etta James in “Cadillac Records.” The following January, Beyonce sang James’ trademark song, “At Last,” for President Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama at his inaugural ball.
In addition to acting and performing, Beyonce runs a clothing line called House of Dereon with her mother. She also presented her own fragrance, Heat, in 2010. During her career, Beyonce has served as a spokesperson and model for several other brands, including L’Oreal and Tommy Hilfiger.
Beyonce found herself under fire for performing a private concert for Libyan leader Muammar Qaddafi on New Year’s Eve in 2010. She later donated her fee from the event to help victims of the Haitian earthquake. According to some reports, Beyonce said that her father had been liable for arranging the Libyan concert. She decided to drop her father as her manager in March 2011.Despite this passing dispute, the future looks bright for Beyonce. She began working on a new album, and was signed on as the headlining act at the Glastonbury Festival in southwest England.
Married to Jay-Z since 2008, Beyonce was the focus of many pregnancy rumors over the years. In 2011, however, the extremely private couple went public with the news of their coming new arrival. Beyonce showed off her growing baby bump at the MTV Video Music Awards that August.By the end of 2011, there had been several false reports of Beyoncé delivering her baby. She and Jay-Z finally welcomed their daughter, Blue Ivy Carter, on January 7, 2012. The couple spared no expense to maintain their privacy during this special time—renting out a floor of New York’s Lenox Hill Hospital.

Frank Sinatra

Francis Albert “Frank” Sinatra was born December 12, 1915, in Hoboken, New Jersey. He was the only child of Sicilian immigrants. Sinatra decided to become a singer after watching Bing Crosby perform. He dropped out of high school, where he was a member of the glee club, and began to sing at local nightclubs. Radio exposure brought him to the attention of bandleader Harry James, with whom Sinatra made his first recordings, including “All or Nothing at All.” In 1940, Tommy Dorsey invited Sinatra to join his band. After two years of chart-topping success with Dorsey, Sinatra decided to strike out on his own.
Between 1943 and 1946, Sinatra’s solo career grew. The singer charted 17 different Top 10 singles. The mobs of bobby-soxer fans Sinatra attracted with his dreamy baritone earned him such nicknames as “The Voice” and “The Sultan of Swoon.” Sinatra made his first appearance in movie acting in 1943, in “Higher and Higher.” In 1945, he won a special Academy Award for “The House I Live In”, a 10-minute short made to support racial and religious tolerance on the home front. Sinatra’s popularity began to slide in the postwar years, however, leading to a loss of his recording and film contracts in the early 1950s. In 1953, he made a successful comeback, winning an Oscar for his portrayal of the Italian-American soldier Maggio in “From Here to Eternity”. Although this was his first non-singing role, Sinatra quickly found a vocal outlet when he received a new recording contract with Capitol Records in the same year. In his music, the Sinatra of the 1950s brought a more mature sound with jazzier varieties in his voice. Having reclaimed stardom, Sinatra enjoyed continued success in both film and music for years to come. He received critical praise for his performance in the original film of “The Manchurian Candidate” in 1962 and an Academy Award nomination for his work in “The Man with the Golden Arm” in 1955. In the meantime, he continued to chart Top 10 singles. When his record sales began to drop by the end of the 1950s, Sinatra left Capitol to start his own record label, Reprise. In association with Warner Bros., which later bought Reprise, Sinatra also set up his own independent film production company, Artanis.
By the mid-1960s, Sinatra was back on top again. He received a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award and headlined the 1965 Newport Jazz Festival with Count Basie’s Orchestra. This period also marked his Las Vegas debut, where he continued on for years as a main attraction at Caesars Palace. As a founding member of the “Rat Pack,” beside Sammy Davis Jr., Dean Martin, Peter Lawford and Joey Bishop, Sinatra came to embody the hard-drinking, womanizing, gambling swinger–an image constantly reinforced by the popular press and Sinatra’s own albums. With his modern edge and timeless class, not to mention hits like 1968’s iconic “My Way,” even the radical youth had to pay Sinatra his due.
After a short-term retirement in the early 1970s, Sinatra returned to the music scene with the album “Ol’ Blue Eyes Is Back” in 1973 and also became more politically active. Having first visited the White House in 1944 while campaigning for Franklin D. Roosevelt in his bid for a fourth term in office, Sinatra worked enthusiastically for John F. Kennedy’s election in 1960 and later supervised JFK’s inaugural gala in Washington. The relationship between the two turned, however, after the president canceled a weekend visit to Sinatra’s house due to the singer’s connections to Chicago mob boss Sam Giancana. By the 1970s, Sinatra had neglected his long-held Democratic loyalties and accepted the Republican Party, supporting first Richard Nixon and later his close friend Ronald Reagan, who presented Sinatra with the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation’s highest civilian award, in 1985. In 1939 Frank Sinatra married his childhood sweetheart, Nancy Barbato,. They had three children together before their marriage failed in the late 1940s. In 1951, Sinatra married actress Ava Gardner; after they split, Sinatra remarried a third time, to Mia Farrow in 1966. That marriage, too, ended in divorce, and Sinatra married for a fourth and final time in 1976 to Barbara Blakely Marx, the widow of comedian Zeppo Marx. The two remained together until Sinatra’s death more than 20 years later.

Edward Kennedy “Duke” Ellington

Edward Kennedy “Duke” Ellington was an African American composer, pianist and jazz band leader. He was born into a middle-class family in Washington, D.C. on April 29, 1899. For nearly half a century Duke Ellington led the premier
American big band, and through his creations and performances he brought artistic credibility to African American jazz. Ellington played the piano, but his orchestra was his true instrument. Although best recognized for composing, leading and performing about 2,000 “big band” jazz pieces, Ellington also created orchestral, chamber and solo piano works in the classical genre.

When Edward was younger he began learning the piano at age seven. He was about 17 years old when he began playing piano professionally. By age 20 he was a bandleader, playing at social events. In 1922 Ellington moved to New York City, where he played with both theater orchestras and jazz bands. His first Broadway score was for a 1924 musical Chocolate Kiddies, a show which did not fare well. Also in 1924, Ellington became the leader of a six-member jazz band previously known as the Elmer Snowden Band. Within two years the Ellington Orchestra had eleven musicians in its ranks. In the fall of 1927 the Ellington orchestra got a long-term appearance at the Cotton Club, New York City’s most high-status nightclub, which was wired to permit “live” remote radio broadcasts that gave Ellington nationwide recognition. During the position at the Cotton Club the band was called the Cotton Club Orchestra.

Ellington created the unique style of his orchestra a series of recordings in 1927-28. The titles included Ellington’s 1928 composition Black Beauty and became a continuing part of the orchestra’s repertoire. The group gained additional national publicity from its performance in the 1930 film Check and Double Check. Ellington’s first longer recording was of his composition Creole Rhapsody. It was 8 1/2 minutes long and took up two sides of a 78 r.p.m. record.

Ellington and his orchestra toured the U.S. often during the 1930s and enjoyed success in Europe during tours there in 1933 and 1939. In 1938 the orchestra took on Billy Strayhorn, who became Ellington’s closest partner for the next 30 years.

 

Pachelbel

Today in class we listened to a video where a man made fun of Pachelbel. I was surprised to find out that alot of different types of songs all have the same chords. I looked up songs with the same Pachelbel’s chords and a long list of different songs came up. the list I got had different types of music not just one genre. the list I got was:

• Spiritualized – Ladies and Gentlemen we are Floating in Space
• Green Day – Basket Case
• Vitamin C – Graduation Friends Forever
• Dennis Lambert & Brian Potter – One Tin Soldier
• Belle & Sebastian – Get Me Away From Here, I’m Dying
• My Chemical Romance – The Black Parade
• Blues Traveler – Hook
• Goldfinger – Superman
• The Polyphonic Spree – Light And Day / Reach for the Sun
• Coolio – C U When U Get There
• Joe Jackson – Hometown
• Tupac – Life Goes On
• Therapy Sisters – Pachelbel’s Tantrum
• The Farm – All Together Now
• First Class – Beach Baby
• Mary-Kate and Ashley – Imagine
• Relient K – Operation
• Happa-tai – Yatta
• Delerium – Paris
• Aphrodite’s Child – Rain and Tears
• Lutricia McNeal – Rise
• [several artists, including Paliament] – Oh Lord, Why Lord?
• Menelik – Je Me Souviens
• Libera – Sanctus
• Arianne – Komm, Susser Tod
• Bob James – In the Garden
• Brian Eno – Fullness of Wind
• Akon – Don’t Matter
• Pet Shop Boys – Go West
• Eternity – Wonderful World
• Eternity – Love
• Eternity – You Smile
• Sweetbox – Life is Cool
• Emiri Miyamoto – Break
• Bond – Lullaby
• Alain Barriere – Tout s’en va déjà
• Oscar Benton – I Believe In Love
• All Angels – Salve Regina
• El Bosco – Nirvana
• Fahrenheit – Xin Li You Shu
• Redsox – Sweet Dream
• Sarah Connor – Love Is Color Blind
• Philip Wesley – Ode to a composer
• Die Firma – Die Eine
• 2 Brothers On The 4th Floor – There is a key
• 2 Brothers On The 4th Floor – Christmas Time
• Theresia – Moonlight
• Valensia – Bruxelles
• Arthur – Pipo
• DJ Angel – Flowrish
• Claire Hamill – Someday We Will All Be Together
• Karnak – Juvenar
• Leftover Crack – Crack City Rockers
• twenty47 – Get A Life, Again
• Byul – Like a Star
• Terry FU – Two Different Worlds
• Luca Zeta – Over The Clouds
• M2M – The Day You Went Away
• N-Dubz ft. Bodyrox – We Dance On
• Nicki Minaj – Girls Fall Like Dominoes
• Shane Filan – Beautiful in White
• Ashram – Last Kiss

I found this so interesting that completly diffrernt artist and genre of music would have the same chords. Im also noticing that i listen to my music a little more closely and see what songs also have the same chords.

George Gershwin

George Gershwin was born in Brooklyn in 1898, the second of four children from a close-knit immigrant family. He began his musical career as a song-plugger on Tin Pan Alley, but was soon writing his own pieces. Gershwin’s first published song, “When You Want ‘Em, You Can’t Get ‘Em,” demonstrated new techniques, but only made him five dollars. Soon after, however, he met a young lyricist named Irving Ceaser. Together they composed a number of songs including “Swanee,” which sold more than a million copies. In the same year as “Swanee,” Gershwin join forces with Arthur L. Jackson and Buddy De Sylva on his first complete Broadway musical, “La, La Lucille”. Over the course of the next four years, Gershwin wrote forty-five songs; among them were “Somebody Loves Me” and “Stairway to Paradise,” as well as a twenty-five-minute opera, “Blue Monday.” Written in five days, the piece contained many musical sayings, but it also offered hints of growths to come. In 1924, George worked together with his brother, lyricist Ira Gershwin, on a musical comedy “Lady Be Good”. It included such values as “Fascinating Rhythm” and “The Man I Love.” It was the beginning of a partnership that would continue for the rest of the composer’s life. Together they wrote many more popular musicals including “Oh Kay!” and “Funny Face”, staring Fred Astaire and his sister Adele. While continuing to put together popular music for the stage, Gershwin began to lead a double life, trying to make his mark as a serious composer. When he was 25 years old, his jazz-influenced “Rhapsody in Blue” premiered in New York’s Aeolian Hall at the concert, “An Experiment in Music.” Gershwin followed this success with his orchestral work “Piano Concerto in F, Rhapsody No. 2″ and “An American in Paris”. Some rejected his work as dull and tiresome, but it always found favor with the general public. In the early thirties, Gershwin tried  some new ideas in Broadway musicals. “Strike Up The Band”, “Let ‘Em Eat Cake”, and “Of Thee I Sing”, were innovative works dealing with social issues of the time. “Of Thee I Sing” was a major hit and the first comedy ever to win the Pulitzer Prize. In 1935 he presented a folk opera “Porgy and Bess” in Boston with only slight success. Now recognized as one of the influential works of American opera, it included such memorable songs as “It Ain’t Necessarily So,” “I Loves You, Porgy,” and “Summertime.”In 1937, after many successes on Broadway, the brothers decided go to Hollywood. Again they teamed up with Fred Astaire, who was now paired with Ginger Rogers. They made the musical film, “Shall We Dance”, which included such hits as “Let’s Call the Whole Thing Off” and “They Can’t Take That Away From Me.” Soon after came “A Damsel in Distress”, in which Astaire performed with Joan Fontaine. After becoming ill while working on a film, he had plans to return to New York to work on writing serious music. He planned a string quartet, a ballet and another opera, but these pieces were never written. At the age of 38, he died of a brain tumor. Today he remains one of America’s most beloved popular musicians.

Early Jazz

I usually don’t like to listen to any old music that goes further back
the 1990s because music from the 1990’s is what I mostly grew up listening to,
but listening to jazz today in class made me realize that I wouldn’t mind
listening to jazz. We played two types of jazz today, jazz that was played by a
white jazz band and jazz that was played by a black jazz band. I have to admit
that I favored the jazz that was played by the black jazz band. The beat in the
song was catchy and the way the singer started to “spat” really
caught my attention. I like songs that I listen to have a catchy vibe to keep
my attention and jazzed played with a Louis Armstrong feel definitely kept my
interest. The Dixie Jazz Band was a tad bit different. The instrumentals seemed
like they tried to mimic the black jazz band they didn’t quite get it. The
white jazz band did not “spat” in their music which was something I didn’t
like