Skip to main content

Dinah Washington - I Only Know

The style of music that came to be known as rock ’n roll grew out of many other American musical styles, most notably blues, played mostly, but not only, by African Americans, and country, played primarily, but not only, but whites. Perhaps the clearest musical predecessor of rock ’n roll is the jump blues and swing style of the 1940s, typified by the music of Louis Jordan and Louis Prima. Once electric guitars gained wider use, they replaced the saxophone as the small band’s lead instrument, this change was one of the most important developments in rock ’n roll.

After a brief period of popular success, things went wrong for most of rock ’n roll’s early stars... And important dance/radio disc jockey Alan Freed, the man many credit for naming rock ’n roll, faded from the scene in disgrace after a payola, accepting bribes to play specific songs on the radio, scandal.

Meanwhile, big business had discovered that there was a market for this thing called rock ’n roll, so in the absence of many of rock’s original heroes, they manufactured new ones to take their place. This teen idol era featured many disposable, often musically and visually interchangeable, artists, but behind the scenes, true creativity was at work. The so called Brill Building style of pop songwriting launched the careers of many important songwriters who would go onto fame in their later years.


Dinah Washington - I Only Know
  • Released in: 1950
  • Genre: Jazz, Blues
  • Written by: Dinah Washington and Richard Johnson

"Although best known as singer, Dinah Washington also wrote two of her Top 10 R&B hits. No matter what style of music she was singing, she displayed a tough, totally unsentimental grasp of the heartbreaking theme of lost love."

See previous Song of the Day 

Labels:
Location: United States

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Copyrights and Public Domain

Copyrighting and Public Domain Music A song is the combination of melody and words. Each is protected by copyright, the melody as a musical work and the lyrics as a literary work. One or the other could be used separately and still be protected. Image by Markus Spiske Public Domain Music Public domain essentially covers creative works that are no longer protected by intellectual property laws, compositions and musical recordings in which the claim to intellectual property has either expired, been forfeited, or been waived. Most people recognize the term public domain in reference to published works, including sheet music or musical recordings, which once were protected by copyright, but the copyright expired several decades after the artist’s death or a considerable length of time after the work’s creation. Once copyright expires on a work like a recorded song, you can use it for any purpose without paying the publisher, the artist, or another institution. The Two Types of Copyright ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Cannonball Adderley - Willow Weep for Me

The positivity and uplifting effect of the musical product is more likely to mean the musician is cheering themselves and everybody up rather than that the musician is telling us they are happy. This can largely be applied to attitudes to the performance of jazz and other Black cultures in the Western world. Whilst some of the aforementioned jazz pioneers, like Ella Fitzgerald, stayed clean, several had a history of drug abuse... which often resulted in premature deaths. Louis Armstrong, who used the infinitely safer drug marijuana throughout his 69 years... Whilst drug use was not uncommon among musicians in general, this pattern that many of the greats of jazz died young due to addictions speaks of a consistent level of turmoil, and alludes to their common experience of racism as a depressive factor in 20th Century America. Source: A Soft Reminder of Where Jazz Came From by Tom Platts Cannonball Adderley - Willow Weep for Me Released in: September 1955 Genre: Jazz Label: Savoy "...
Post a Comment
Read more

The Waterboys - Carolan's Weird Welcome

The blues developed during the mid 20th century as technology brought new instruments like the electric guitar, better microphones, and amplifiers to the live music scene. This new form of electric blues started in the Mississippi Delta and Chicago, but soon spread to other parts of the United States. Blues rock and British Blues developed, and soon the blues had spread to most popular genres. Rock was born from the blues, and hard rockin’ blues music is still a staple of club bands around the world. Early British rockers were avid collectors and imitators of early blues records. There’s no denying the blues stylings of modern stars like Adele. Pop star Christina Aguilera loves singing traditional blues songs, most notably her rendition of At Last at Etta James’s funeral. An incredible fusion of traditional African music, African American songs, and folk music, the blues had a worldwide impact that continues to flow through the melodies and harmonies of musical artists today. With its ...
Post a Comment
Read more