Origins of Popular Music

Dominic Vautier 1/7/2011

The year was 1892 and some hot new songs appeared. The upper classes scoffed at the music. Just like rap music, they did not understand it it at all, they did not like it, and they did not care to be associated with it. It was seen as being directed to the lowest of society, bereft of any redeeming or “uplifting” quality. It was mediocre, empty of spiritual and artistic merit, composed by a bunch of second hand hacks who had no idea of musical form, and the street music had no socially redeeming value whatsoever. The lyrics were even worse, dealing with earthy and undignified topics, often tasteless and moony. These Americans who took their social position seriously felt that members of the rising middle class, who seemed to be particularly taken in by this music, should instead embrace the higher standards of people with “taste and breeding.” But the new middle class insisted on dragging this cheap and degrading music of the lower classes up with them to a higher social status. It was all wrong.

But people of all social levels and religious persuasions did however, have to admit that an industry was coming to life with all this cheap low brow music. Suddenly everyone wanted to buy sheet music. It started selling in very large quantities, millions of copies to be precise. Not surprisingly, publishers suddenly started getting very rich. This phenomenon was not just happening in the cities. The country as a whole was falling under the impelling grip of this new music fad that was apparently designed to appeal to the lowest of tastes.

America at this time was endowed with all kinds of music so why another fad?. The older, classical, more established music discredited any need for or legitimacy of such an entirely new type. After all, Extravaganzas[1] were enjoying more popularity than ever before, and so were pantomimes[2] and especially English Operettas. In 1878, H.M.S. Pinafore opened to packed houses across the country and brought on a rage of American operettas that lasted for almost 20 years. Vaudeville houses were thriving in every big city on the East Coast. By 1892, Tony Pastor, the king of vaudeville, had been playing to full houses for five years solid. The revue, a theatrical spectacle, was starting up and doing well. New musical comedies were hitting Broadway. Burlesque shows were popular and were being presented in most large cities. Minstrel shows were playing to packed houses. There was an insatiable desire for entertainment. In the south, Jazz was emerging, and St. Louis had its very own music called ragtime. America was ablaze with song. But prior to 1892, not much of it was truly American Popular music in the Foster tradition. This was to change.

By that time most of the writers of popular music tended to live in New York, occupying the beat-up and otherwise unused brick buildings along 28th Street between 5th Avenue and Broadway in Manhattan. These buildings had been abandoned years earlier by wealthier classes, who had migrated to open country further north. This area came to be known after 1909 as the “Tin Pan Alley” district. Songwriters and musicians were drawn here because of the proximity of publishers, the availability of cheap rent, the exposure to people of the same trade, and a general acceptance of musicians from the local inhabitants. And besides there were so many rich sources of subject material close by: the Tenderloin, with its cheap brothels and taverns; the Bowery, with its theaters and Vaudeville houses; the Lower East side with its vast immigrant diversity; and the Great White Way (Broadway) with its shows and musicals.

Then a Bomb exploded.

Sources of American Popular Music

Minstrelsy

Minstrel shows began in 1844, around the same time that Foster started publishing. Minstrelsy was a type of musical theater that followed a set format and used a predefined set of characters. It became very popular just before the Civil War.

The great pioneer in this field was Edwin Christy, who developed what was considered the standard format. Minstrelsy utilized basic ideas of Greek Drama. The blackface and whiteface were masks or “persona” which transformed an individual into something else, a stage actor. For a more complete discussion see Minstrelsy.

Vaudeville

Vaudeville is a non-stop variety show featuring different acts, songs, dances, burlesques, and skits. Through this type of entertainment, the customer is exposed to a continuous array of entertainment, like going to movies in the old days when few were concerned with start times or ending times, and came at their own convenience.

There were jugglers, acrobats, animal acts, skits, burlesque, singers, strong men, magicians, slapstick, and the occasional and often pre-planned audience participation. For more on this see Vaudeville.

Broadway

Musical Comedy in the U.S. developed into a completely American type of musical theater that was able to tightly integrate music and story. For more on this see Broadway.

Other Sources

Popular music borrows from whatever musical tradition it can find. There was a lot to borrow from, especially in New York. Some of the forms of music that existed had a fairly minor effect on it's overall development but can be briefly looked at here in Minor Sources of Popular Music.

Put it together

Here are some other links in this article:

Origins of Early Popular Music

     Minstrelsy
     Broadway
     Vaudeville
     Other sources

People Growth - the First Baby Boom and it's effect

How Dancing Helped Music

Women and Early Music

Some Early Songwriters

Some Songs

The Influence of the Piano

[1] Early musical theater that was the forerunner to the musical comedy.
[2] A kind of theater that had set pre-defined characters. There was dialogue and song but it’s name comes from the exaggerated use of hand motions.