Chapters 7 & 8-Listening Journal #4

 

                This week’s Listening Journal focuses on Chapters 7 and 8 in the book American Popular Music. The Chapters focused on the emergence of the big solo singers after World War 2 to the beginning of Rock N’ Roll from 1946-1959. During the course of my readings, I also listened to several different songs that were written around the same period. I learned about several musicians from these eras such as Frank Sinatra, The Weavers, Nat King Cole as well as Ricky Nelson, Chuck Berry and Elvis Presley from the Rock N’ Roll era.

                One of the first recordings I listened to was “Nature Boy” by Nat King Cole. This song was first recorded in 1948. This recording was the first to feature Cole with a full orchestra accompaniment. This was the era of the big solo singers such as Frank Sinatra and Cole. This song has a free flowing tempo from start to finish. The song starts off with an instrumental intro before Cole starts to sing.. This song is short and feature an ABAB structure. Cole begins each verse for a small falsetto at the beginning of each phrase and seems not to take a breath at all. His voice seems to have a lot of timbre and versatility in pitch as well. Some instruments that you hear in the recording are a Flute, an Oboe and a French Horn.

                “Hound Dog” was a cover song first recorded by Elvis Presley in 1956. This song was on the opposite side of the same record as “Don’t be Cruel” which topped the charts for eleven weeks in a row during the summer and fall of 1956. However, “Hound Dog” proved just to be as popular as “Don’t Be Cruel”. The tempo of the song is straight forward. The drum set helps keep the steady tempo and does a 16^th note triplet fill at the end of each verse when Elvis says “Ain’t No Friend of Mine”. There is also a guitar solo during the course of the song as well as vocal back-up singing during the guitar solo.

                                During the course of my readings and other listening, I learned that many of the popular songs of early country music as well as the mambo craze of the 1950’s. “Mambo” was a popular Latin dance in the United States just before the rise of Rock N’ Roll. This dance was a branch of some Cuban tradition. Two popular Mambo dances I listened to were “Mambo Number 5” and “Mambo Italiano”. Mambo songs have straight-forward syncopated rhythm sections. Many mambo songs also had syncopated saxophone and trumpet parts.