Have you ever thought what it would be like if music never evolved? You’re just sitting down, listening to Pandora or something, and all you can hear are Gregorian chants. It may be a bit epic at first, but there’s only so much praising you can do to a deity while chanting in Latin. Thank said deity for allowing music to become so much more. Music sure has come a long way since Gregorian chants were it, and even more so in the past century. In fact, new music styles are being born every day, forcing new genres and subgenres to be made to keep up with all the new material being brought forth. But it didn’t always use to be such a melodic paradise, as today.
Way back in the 17th and 18th centuries, the world was coming out of the Renaissance, and becoming more industrialized, and more centric to being intellectual and scientific, with exact processes and theories in how to do research, and to design most anything. This era bore fruit for music as well, as it marked the beginning of Victorian Era music, which is most commonly referred to as classical. This was the era for which great composers would live in, such as Bach and Mozart. This was the era that laid the foundation, musically, for the rest of the music industry. It defined how to write music, and how to have many instrumentalists and singers work together, to bring out beautiful harmonies. Even now, you can hear the subtle undertones that Beethoven and Chopin created within modern music. Classical was the dominant music genre for over 300 years, and is still displayed prominently all the way from high school bands, to world-class orchestras and symphonies.
Early in the 1900s, there came a new music style that was derived from music that the former slaves used to sing in the fields. This new music was what would later be known as jazz and the blues. They used a lot of the same basic principles as classical, but beyond that, these new genres were completely different. Instead of being “sophisticated”, these were music genres would be ones that made you want to dance, or cry, or both. They were songs that touched your soul, even when the actual music only made it as far as the eardrum. A new, slightly unexpected feature that came with these new music styles was that it split the population into the traditionalists, who preferred their more classical songs, and the new agers, who liked the new beats and soul-touching lyrics that were becoming so popular. This created a rift in the populace, but not one defined by race or religion, but rather age. The older folks of the previous generations had all been classical enthusiasts, so why couldn’t the new generation just conform to the age-old standard. This marked the first way for children to rebel, not with violence or ill words, but with clashing music tastes with the generation before them.
Then comes around the 1950s. Oh what a time! Rock and roll was just getting its start, along with Country, both getting their start from older folk music, and so sounding quite similar to each other. It is from these two genres that almost all other genres have stemmed from. Rock turned into hard rock, metal and soft rock. Soft rock then turned into 70’s pop, which formed the basis for all pop afterwards. Hard rock became grunge, and then went closer back to roots with what is now modern rock. Metal became scream-o music, and all other subsequent genres which can be traced back to scream-o. Country evolved into folk country, 70’s country and soft country. Soft country eventually merged with soft rock, to help build the modern country genre, which also has a few roots in pop as well. Folk country eventually died out around the 80’s, and the remnants which remained merged with what was then 80’s country. 80’s country died out near the end of the 80’s into the early 90’s, due to the rise of popularity for rock and pop based music. Country did resurface later into the 2000’s, coming from pop, rock and the few remnants of country that somehow survived the 90’s.
Music has ever evolved, and has grown from simple chants, to full-blown 200,000 strong concerts. Music today is more diverse, and since we also have the past to listen to as well, we have the single largest music library to have ever graced this earth. Millions of songs, and thousands more being made each year, it only adds to the rich mosaic of our musical history.
