The Blues

The Blues

The blues is a genre of music that was created in the African- American communities deep in the heart of the south in the United States towards the end of the nineteenth century. Some songs that are considered blues are work songs, field hollers, spirituals, and simple rhyming ballads. To be considered blues, a song has to follow the blues form. It has to follow the twelve bar blues chord or the blues note chord. These songs are played or sung in this way for expression and are usually flat or gradually bent in relation to the pitch of the major scale. Lyrics, bass lines, and instruments are also specifics of the blues. The blues got its name from “the blue devils” which is meant to mean sadness or melancholy. Blues sung by African- Americans in the late 19th century usually repeated one single line four times. Most African- Americans sung these blues in call and response style. They were sung in complete melody with out accompaniment and they were not sung with any particular musical structure. The blues also rooted from spirituals. A spiritual is a religious song with its roots in the camp meeting of the Great Awakening. Both spirituals and the blues giving the feeling of sadness and misery to the listener. In contrast, the blues are more specific the performer, whereas spirituals are more broad and are about sadness in general. The two can not easily be separated despite these difference meaning most spirituals are considered to be blues as well.

word count: 257

"Blues -." Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Web. 03 Jan. 2010. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blues>.

"Origins of the blues -." Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Web. 04 Jan. 2010. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Origins_of_the_blues>.