Friday, August 31, 2012

Minor but interesting figures leading up to 1955.

Harry the Hipster Gibson performing 4-F Ferdinand about a bad school kid who ends up marrying his teacher.

Notable for his boogie woogie and stride playing, he was a more frantic player than Fats Waller who discovered him. His songs were offbeat tales usually involving seedy characters who dabbled in drugs and sex.  Harry himself was a user and it ultimately led to the decline of his career after his song "Who put the Benzadrine in Mrs. Murphy's Ovaltine?" got him blacklisted from the industry. Also note that he's got a wild and flamboyant playing style, often standing instead of sitting. His harmonic vocabulary, while deeper than the rock and roll pianists to follow him, leans more towards the I-IV-V blues progression than it does to the harmonic vocabularies of jazz, stride, and big band that were prevalent during WWII when Harry was coming into notoriety in Manhattan. In other words, he was doing Jerry Lee Lewis and Little Richard at least 15 years prior and he was dirtier and more dangerous as well.

Jackie Wilson - He predates Elvis as he replaced Clyde McPhatter in Billy Ward and the Dominoes before he went solo. He was also unintentionally instrumental in Berry Gordy's career as the future head of Motown by cowriting a song with him that became a hit. Elvis liked his moves. Check out this clip especially at 1:08 on.


What do you think? Could he possibly be an influence on Elvis in terms of stage presence? Maybe vocally too? I think Elvis' croon has more in common with Jackie Wilson than with other early rock and rollers such as Little Richard, Jerry Lee Lewis, Chuck Berry, Buddy Holly or Bill Haley.  Check out the first song of three from this t.v. performance on Ed Sullivan... yes it's from the 60s, but keep in mind that Jackie Wilson had been active since the early fifties, and Elvis had gone on record as being exceedingly complimentary of Jackie Wilson.


In the previous blog entry, I linked to Bill Haley and His Comets, but not to the other artists, so here are some choice clips.

Notice how Little Richard and Jerry Lee Lewis both stand. Also, note Little Richards vocal octave jumps which both John and Paul imitated.  Jerry Lee Lewis really loves to do big greasy slides up and down the piano.



Chuck Berry Duck Walking





Also, just for fun. Gene Vincent and his Blue Caps performing their hit, Be Bop A Lula
That's slightly suggestive, huh?

Thursday, August 30, 2012

Early Important figures in Rock and Roll

Leo Fender - Creator of iconic guitars like the Telecaster, the Stratocaster (first favored by Buddy Holly who was iconic to many british guitarists. Other notable strat users include Eric Clapton and Jimi Hendrix, arguably the first two rock guitar gods.) He also was famous for the P-Bass and the J-Bass. James Jamerson, a session player for Motown, favored the P-Bass. Joe Osborn played a J-Bass on countless sessions in L.A. as part of The Wrecking Crew, a group of ace session musicians. The P stands for Precision, as it was marketed to upright bassists as a portable solution that was easy to play in tune due to the use of frets. The J stands for Jazz bass, although most jazz players in the 50s and 60s favored the upright bass.

You can read more about Leo Fender at http://www.allmusic.com/artist/leo-fender-mn0001319188

Les Paul - Jazz guitarist and inventor. Gibson's iconic Les Paul guitar was designed by him. He also was an inventor who was instrumental in pioneering multi-track recording which was a huge step forward in the recording world. Originally from Wisconsin, he was based in NYC for much of his life and held a weekly gig almost up to his death this decade.

You can read more about Les Paul at http://www.allmusic.com/artist/les-paul-mn0000818559

There is also a fantastic documentary about him titled "Les Paul: Chasing Sound!" which you can watch for free at http://www.hulu.com/watch/91100 .  I love documentaries because I'm a nerd, and this one is especially good. If I manage to live that long, I'd like to keep gigging like he did.

Bill Haley and His Comets - predated Elvis with Rock Around the Clock. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bIJrYnvUU_k

Elvis Presley - Elvis was never my favorite but I can see why he was the king of rock and roll. I like his early work for Sun Records alot more than his output for RCA records as it sounded alot more dangerous and exciting to my ears. Some people favor his later Vegas era output but that always struck me as cheesy and insincere, although his band of that era, the TCB (taking care of business) were astoundingly good players. However, despite my personal preferences, one cannot diminish his importance to the history of rock and roll as an artist, and as a rock and roll icon in movies.

You can read more about Elvis Presley at http://www.allmusic.com/artist/elvis-presley-mn0000180228

Chuck Berry - An african american guitarist from St. Louis who wrote such hits as Johnny B. Goode, Roll Over Beethoven, Maybelline, You Never Can Tell (re-popularized by Quentin Tarantino in Pulp Fiction during the dance competition at Jack Rabbit Slim's with Uma Thurman and John Travolta). However, most of his success came from other artists, notably British artists such as the Beatles and the Rolling Stones covering his songs. He was a savvy business man who re-invested his earnings in his home town, but then was imprisoned in the late fifties for giving an employee a ride home across the Mississippi River into Illinois. Many think that this arrest was racially motivated. He has been imprisoned a couple of times since for tax evasion and other indiscretions but is still alive and playing today.

You can read more about Chuck Berry at http://www.allmusic.com/artist/chuck-berry-mn0000120521 and you should definitely watch some early live performances on youtube as he is quite entertaining and animated.

Buddy Holly - Born Charles Hardin Holley in Lubbock, Texas and died too young in a plane crash (which also claimed Ritchie Valens and the Big Bopper), Buddy Holly was a gifted writer and guitarist whose recordings showed divergence from the standard I-IV-V blues progressions and four on the floor boogie woogie beat that his contemporaries were noted for. He was hugely influential on The Beatles.  Note that Buddy Holly's band was The Crickets. The Beatles were originally named The Quarrymen (for the high school that they attended), and changed their name to The Silver Beetles in homage to The Crickets, and finally became The Beatles. He might be my favorite songwriter of the 50s.

You can read more about Buddy Holly at http://www.allmusic.com/artist/buddy-holly-mn0000538677

Little Richard - Born Richard Penniman Jr. in Macon, Georgia, Little Richard was a flamboyant pianist who wrote songs such as "Good Golly Miss Molly", "Lucille", and "Tutti Frutti". He had a powerful voice and could switch into his falsetto with a high pitched "woo" quite often, which was a vocal tic that both Paul McCartney and John Lennon adopted. He left rock and roll to pursue a religious life in the seminary, only to return to rock and roll in the sixties. He is still active as a performer today.

You can read more about Little Richard at http://www.allmusic.com/artist/little-richard-mn0000824022

Jerry Lee Lewis - From Farriday, Louisiana, Jerry Lee Lewis should have been the king of rock and roll.  With songs like "Whole Lotta Shakin Going On" and "Great Balls of Fire" and a stage persona that bordered on insane, he was given nicknames like The Farriday Fireball, and The Killer. He was expelled from bible school in Waxahachie, TX for playing hymns in a boogie woogie style, and was on wife number three by age 21. Unfortunately for him, wife number three was his 13 year old first cousin Myra, and the british press and the american public shunned him when it became common knowledge. He has been married 8 times, and it is widely believed that he has murdered at least three of those wives although it has never been proven. He is still recording albums and playing to this day, and is still quite the character.

Also of note, he learned to play piano as a kid with his cousins Jimmy Swaggart (famous televangelist who fell from grace) and Mickey Gilley (country star featured as a guest on The Dukes of Hazzard and owner of the bar that was the major setting of Urban Cowboy starring John Travolta).

You can read more about Jerry Lee Lewis at http://www.allmusic.com/artist/jerry-lee-lewis-mn0000332141

More to come...


Monday, August 20, 2012

Students: First day of class To Do list.

First off,
Welcome. I'm looking forward to teaching you this year. We're going to try something different, and we'll see how it goes. As this class is primarily about turning you into a fully functioning human being that's capable of forming and defending your own opinions in an adult fashion, we're going to exploit your generation's love for the internet.

Step 1.
If you don't already have an email address that is in the format of mylastname.myfirstname@somethingthatisn'tembarassing.com

I am going to require that you get a gmail address that is in the format of myfirstname.mylastname@gmail.com

This will be for a completion grade. This is due before the next time I see you. You either get a 100% for doing it in time, or a 50% for doing it late, or a 0% for not doing it at all.

Step 2.

You're going to e-mail me at mr.ajjarapu@gmail.com and notify me if your address is different than what I would expect to see based on what I am looking at in Gradespeed (i.e. you go by your middle name, or nobody uses your given name for whatever reason, or perhaps you have a very common name and your address is now Michael.Smith276@gmail.com or something else that I would need to know).  Your e-mail should say something like...

"Hello Mr. Ajjarapu,
This is ______________ from your ___ period history of rock class. Please not that my e-mail address is exactly/not exactly what you would expect based on what you see in Gradespeed.

Sincerely,
________________"

This will be another completion grade. Spelling counts. Grammar counts. Being appropriately formal counts. This will also be due before I see you next, and the same grading applies.

As you get to know me, it'll seem wierd that I'm requiring this of you, but keep in mind that it's only because I care. Most of your classmates either don't know how to write well, or don't care to prove that they are capable. These are skills that you will need at some point in your life, and not just because you're getting tested on them in order to graduate.

Step 3.
Go to blogger.com and sign up for a blog with an appropriate name. You can be clever, but be clean. You will e-mail me your blog's address, and we'll share that with all of the classes. This is where you will post twice weekly for completion/content grades. You may blog more than that for extra credit if you have poor grades that you would like to raise. You may not cram a bunch of blog entries in at the end of the six weeks to inflate your grade.  Your two entries are due by Saturday morning, when I will read them over coffee and breakfast.  No late assignments will be accepted. It's either on time, or it isn't. I think that that is more than fair.  Extra credit blog entries will have a maximum grade of 90%. They will be averaged into your grade as if they were regular assignments, so a bunch of poorly done extra credit blogs will LOWER your average. Your zeros, or other lower grades, will also be averaged, they will not be dropped. I hope that that is clear enough.

At least one of your blog entries per week will be about what we listened to in class. You may cite allmusic.com but you may not cite wikipedia.org.  Both of your blog entries may be about what we listened to in class. No more than one of your blog entries may be about current music that you're listening to, IN THE WEEK THAT YOU ARE LISTENING TO IT.  Keep it current and start hipping us to new stuff. In new music blog posts, you may reference other blogs of note or music industry magazine sites and reviews.

If you don't know what to talk about when it comes to classic recordings that we are going to listen to in class, start learning to talk about music in terms of influences, texture, complexity and other musical and sonic qualities. Start reading lyrics at home, and listen to the albums on spotify so that you can start registering an opinion on lyrics. Do NOT just say, I like it because it rocks, or I hate it because it sucks. That is a surefire way to get a zero for a completion grade.

If you don't have access to a computer or the internet, you should figure out where our library is and when you can use it that isn't during your classes. What I'm saying is, you don't have an excuse to not do this, and if you really feel like you do... please drop my class and save us both the headache.

This is your chance to write about something that matters to you, and about a bunch of albums that might not mean anything to you.  Still, those albums meant something to someone once, and it might benefit you to ask and answer the question "Why?".

Twice a week for a completion/content grade. A finished blog with proper grammar and spelling is worth a passing grade of 70%. If you're mildly entertaining, and slightly insightful, that's an 80%. If you're actually intelligent, funny, and draw novel conclusions, or state daring opinions that you then defend, that's a 90%. If you do all of that, and you make me chuckle or laugh at what a smart cookie you are, that's a 100%. Easy enough?

That's four grades for the first week, plus two grades a week for the next five weeks after for a total of 14 grades for the first six weeks. There might be more assignments than that, but I'll call audibles from the line of scrimmage as needed.  Some people are great at participating in class, and some people aren't, so this is kind of the great equalizer.

Get to work, but don't work ahead.

Mr. A.

p.s. Get a spotify account so you can listen to most of the albums we cover outside of class. You can sign in with your facebook account. You're responsible for any information you miss in class in the case of a quiz or a test. Allmusic.com is your friend, and you should bookmark it.