1950's Music

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Old fashioned country music

Hit Parade

Music Of Our Era

When I grew up one could hear a beat, generally be sent a usable message, and walk away the the tune in your head. 60 years later it seems most music has degenerated into noise and vocalists scream to try and be heard over drums and guitars. Give me the 4-'s, 50's and early 50's.

Memories

Many musical styles flourished and combined in the 1940s and 1950s, most likely because of the influence of radio had in creating a mass market for music. World War II caused great social upheaval, and the music of this period shows the effects of that upheaval.

In the 1940s, the major strands of American music combined to form what would eventually be coined as rock and roll. Based most strongly off an electric guitar-based version of the Chicago blues, rock also incorporated jazz, country, folk, swing, and other types of music; in particular, bebop jazz and boogie woogie blues were in vogue and greatly influenced the music style. The style had developed by 1949, and quickly became popular among blacks nationwide (see 1949 in music). Mainstream success was slow to develop, though (in spite of early success with Bill Haley & His Comets' "Rock Around the Clock"), and didn't begin in earnest until Elvis Presley ("Hound Dog") began singing rock, R&B and rockabilly songs in a devoted black style. He quickly became the most famous and best-selling artist in American history, and a watershed point in the development of music.

Rock & Roll

Rock music is a loosely defined genre of popular music that entered the mainstream in the mid 1950s. It has its roots in 1940s and 1950s rhythm and blues, country music and other influences. In addition, rock music drew on a number of other musical influences, including folk music, jazz, and classical music.

Bluegrass

The 1950s also saw the popular dominance of the Nashville sound in country music, and the beginning of popular folk music with groups like The Weavers. Country's Nashville sound was slick and soulful, and a movement of rough honky tonk developed in a reaction against the mainstream orientation of Nashville. This movement was centered in Bakersfield, California with musicians like Buck Owens ("Act Naturally"), Merle Haggard ("Sing a Sad Song") and Wynn Stewart ("It's Such a Pretty World Today") helping to define the sound among the community, made up primarily of Oklahoman immigrants to California, who had fled unemployment and drought. A similarly hard-edged sound also arose in Lubbock, Texas (Lubbock sound).

DooWop

In addition, doo wop achieved widespread popularity in the 1950s. Doo wop was a hormonaly complex style of choral singing that developed in the streets of major cities like Illinois, New York, and, most importantly, Baltimore. Doo Wop singers would work a cappella without backing instruments, and practice in hallways of their schools, apartment buildings, or alleys to achieve echo effects on their voices, and lyrics were generally innocent youthful observations on the upsides of teen love and romance. Groups like The Crows ("Gee"), The Orioles ("It's Too Soon to Know") and Brooklyn's Frankie Lymon & the Teenagers ("Why Do Fools Fall in Love") had a string of hit songs that brought the genre to chart domination by 1958 (see 1958 in music).