Genre Breakdown: The OG Rhythm and Blues

Collage by Doug Siegel

The last genre I explored was The Blues, an Iconic time in music during the late 1800's to early 1900's. The story of the Blues continues however into the Rhythm and Blues a new spin on the genre. Rhythm and Blues is hard to pin down, the term was coined in 1940's by Jerry Wexler (reporter for Billboard Magazine) to replace the quite unromantic term of "Race music" which referred to African American styled music. Unfortunately that was just the kind of language being thrown around during that time. Thankfully Rhythm and Blues (RnB) became the new title for jazz and blues styled music coming out of the enormously talented and evocative African American people of America. RnB today however can be class as any pop music with a hip-hop influence mostly produced by African Americans. Even though over the years RnB meant different things to different people I'm talking in this blog about the root of it all, the OG Rhythm and Blues.

Now some of you might be thinking, you already wrote about The Blues and this time period but how is RnB different to The Blues? So glad you asked, let me explain...

The Difference between The Blues and Rhythm and Blues

The Blues was an iconic time for African American singer and songwriters, finally having the freedom to live your life and do as you choose many chose to write music about what many had to go through. This obviously is soulful and melancholy as was the time period hence the name The Blues. Each song used a similar structure and lyrically was quite similar to poetry, slow methodical and evocative is the name of the game for the Blues. If you're still lost read my last blog or listen to the song below.

So know that we know what the Blues is let me kick it into the Rhythm and Blues off the bat.

“It’s true that rhythm and blues comes from a noisier world than blues. But for me, music is more like a river: It’s connected to a source, it goes around, it replenishes itself, and the boundaries we try to impose on it often don’t stand up. One way to think of it is that the blues is essentially a vocal music, while R&B is more instrumental...” (Bibb E, 2014) - (Modern day bluesman)

An anonymous quote I found online basically sums it up quite nicely "You can drink to the Blues but you dance to the Rhythm and Blues." With that thanks for reading...

Ok there's a bit more to it than that obviously but thats the underlying difference. RnB contains much more focus on having a catchy tune and enchanting beat that people can dance to. It's usually faster contains more instruments and of course the tone is much more cheerful. That's the overall difference of the two but RnB will always be more of an evolution of the Blues rather than a separate genre, they're linked through soul and spirit. But how and when did the Blues change into this cheery bouncy sensation? Again thanks for asking!

The History of the Rhythm and Blues

Much like the blues it's hard to pinpoint exactly who, when and where RnB started but it began roughly around the 1930's in urban cities like Chicago, New York and Detroit. We know from my last blog that the Chicago blues was one of the first examples of the blues going electric and many people think this is where the blues started to change.

When it got to such noisy places, all honking horns and grinding gears, the low moan of the blues could not make itself heard. It added the saxophone, drum kit, and piano, and thus amplified, the blues, now rhythm and blues, took on the swagger of a young man with money in his pocket far away from home, and happier for it... (McNamee G, 2014)

In the 1950's RnB finally became it's own genre and the people loved it especially household names like Ruth Brown and Ray Charles RnB were blowing up big time. As the times changed from the slow and depressing early 1900's to the roaring 1950's a new energy shone from the African American community. Finally breaking free from their slow soulful somberness, the singing and dancing started carrying on late into the night but never losing the soul. Ruth Brown specifically started the craze with her simple jazzy scores and gospel vocals, capturing the attention of labels like Atlantic records. After they realised there was money to be had here RnB artists started being gobble up left and right to everyone's joy. Still at the time however RnB was targeted at primarily African American audiences, however the white audience was finally getting curious and artists like Elvis Presley started record their own versions of iconic RnB tracks, but I'll cover that later on...

Two Iconic early examples of RnB

The Structure of RnB

The defining characteristics of RnB is the first word in the name Rhythm. Ever RnB song contains a very powerful rhythm which leads on the forefront of all the other elements. Drums and bass within these songs are very important and usually very jazz keeping 4/4 time with emphasis on the second and fourth beats of each bar (Usually snare hits on beat 2 and 4). This made each song very easy to dance to which is easily the biggest difference it has from the Blues. However the blues does have a huge influence on the vocals within RnB, it maintains the classic call and answer style vocals with many different voices and the addition of back up singers now as well. It's rare to have a solo vocalist and no one else singing along after all the core feel of RnB is the urban feel of togetherness through thick and thin that gives this music it's 'soul'. The lyrical content also took a page out of the book of blues as well having repeating lines similar to the poetical style of the blues lyrical delivery. The instruments of RnB in this early period was heavy jazz based involved lots of brass instruments mainly, trombones, saxophone and of course trumpets. There was also lots of piano, double bass and now electric bass guitar as well. The bass usually following the basic walking jazz bass line as in the video below. The bass is really important as it is in jazz music, it's the beating heart that keeps everything else in time. Put all this together and you get early RnB a Jazzy soul filled experience that makes you wanna swing and shout.

So I hope you learned something about RnB, it's a pretty broad genre and I barely scratched the surface. I hope to go into the next step in the history of music during this time and talk about the transition from RnB to Rock and Roll as the history around that time is quite interesting to me. As always thank you for reading and let me know if you have any feedback for me.

References:

Brown, R. (2008). RUTH BROWN - Mama He Treats Your Daughter Mean. [video] Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HnmbJruEkKw [Accessed 9 Apr. 2019].

Charles, R. (2006). Hit the road Jack!. [video] Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q8Tiz6INF7I [Accessed 9 Apr. 2019].

Johnson, L. (2009). Lonnie Johnson - Another Night To Cry. [video] Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n8fyb9vpIc0 [Accessed 9 Apr. 2019].

McNamee, G. (2014). Blues vs. Rhythm and Blues | VQR Online. [online] Vqronline.org. Available at: https://www.vqronline.org/blues-vs-rhythm-and-blues [Accessed 9 Apr. 2019].

Nero, M. (2018). The American Musical Art Form of Rhythm and Blues. [online] ThoughtCo. Available at: https://www.thoughtco.com/what-is-randb-music-2851217 [Accessed 9 Apr. 2019].

The Chords (2007). The Chords - Sh-Boom. [video] Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SBgQezOF8kY [Accessed 9 Apr. 2019].

White, D. (n.d.). Rhythm & Blues: Definition, History, Artists & Songs | Study.com. [online] Study.com. Available at: https://study.com/academy/lesson/rhythm-blues-definition-history-artists-songs.html [Accessed 9 Apr. 2019].

Discover Double Bass (2017). Essential Walking Bass Line Patterns. [video] Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yty57-Nfrh4 [Accessed 15 Apr. 2019].