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Beginnings of R & B | |
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Beginnings of R & B | |
The Rhythm & Blues began near the late 1940's. It probably started when blues musicians moved from the southern United States up to Chicago and other northern cities. There they developed a new style of music--Rhythm & Blues.
It was a mixure of elements of blues and black folk music. R&B was different from traditional blues because artists used electrically amplified instruments rather than acoustic guitars.R&B got its roots from the blues. Some principles of the blues were taken like the lyrics. Blues lyrics contained some revealing autobiographical statement in the Western musical tradition.
Blues lyrics:
- were intensely personal
- contained a lot of times sexual references
- dealt with pain of desertion, betrayal, and unrequited love
- were about unhappy situations such as hunger, being jobless, being broke
- were about loneliness or being broken-hearted because of an unfaithful lover
- were a humorous and defiant reaction to life's troubles.
