Historical Events Essay

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Blues, Jazz and Folk Music
Music is a universal form of entertainment that is well spread all over the world. It is the art of sound that is used to express emotions and thoughts in a particular way. Among the famous genres include blues, classical music, dance music, opera music, rock, rap, electronic, reggae, jazz blues and folk. Let’s pay some particular attention to jazz, blues and folk. Blues is a type of music that originated among African-Americans in the United States. It is a type of personal conversation, but that is not private. Blues a unique kind of music whereby a singer narrates a sad story through the use of well-arranged verses. (Mccann 23). On the other hand, folk music is a type of music that has its roots in the United States, and it is known as world music because unknown artists composed it and it has been passed from one generation to another generation orally among the poor working class. Jazz music a music type based on emotional experience instead of intellectual experience. It is a music class that centered on information rather than the tune because the artist is always motivated by individual emotional experience to compose the song but not his or her creativity.
Slavery which started in 1619 is the key historical event that led to the development of jazz, blues and folk music (Mccann 25). Due to the increased number of Africans in America, there were several meeting among Africans where they used to perform their favorite traditional songs and dance using improvised string equipment and drums.

Two types of African American music led to the development of jazz, blues and folk music. These include spirituals and work songs. Spirituals was a kind of music that African slaves sang to express their desire for freedom in the working fields while work songs were used to organize work in a group because the group leader used to call out while the rest of the members responded giving birth to what we know as call-and-respond pattern in jazz music (Chevan 24-28).
The end of slavery in 1808 marked a new beginning for these three genres. With the newly acquired freedom, the first set of slave songs was published. After that followed Victors black music publication after which the first blues song was recorded in 1912. Being free black Americans continued to produce this music till to date. The end of slavery also meant that the blacks and the whites could come together to provide the music which is mainly a mixture of the two cultures (May 21-32).
The invention of the electric guitar in 1931 by George Beauchamp was a milestone in the music world of jazz. The guitar was a very significant historical event that revolutionized the industry. With the introduction of the electric guitar, the music industry developed because they were used to create better music tunes and rhythms as compared to the years when guitar had not been introduced in the industry (Takabayashi 2130). This meant that artists did not have to use improvised string equipment like they used to do in the initial stages.
In summary, historical events have played a significant role in the development of these three genres of music. They have both have triggered these styles of music to advance to the next level. From historical events, they were created and through historical events they have propagated hence their growth.
Works cited.
Chevan, David. “Musical literacy and jazz musicians in the 1990s and 1992”.
May, L. F. “Early Musical Development Of Selected African American Jazz Musicians In Indianapolis In The 1930S And 1940S”. Journal of Historical Research in Music Education 27.1 (2005): 21-32. Web.
Mccann, Paul. “Performing primitivism: disarming social threat of jazz in a narrative fiction of the early sixties.” Journal of popular culture.
Takabayashi, Youjiro. “Electric Guitar.” The Journal of the Acoustical Society of America 67.6 (1980): 2130. Web.