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Blues music gave birth to Jazz, and both genres of music stem from the work songs of the first generation of African slaves in America. As slave owners forbade their slaves to chant and sing their ritualistic music, in fear of a rebellion, the original African slaves were forced to change their work songs in the field.
Some characteristics, however, were present prior to the creation of the modern blues, and are common to most styles of African American music. The earliest blues-like music was a "functional expression, rendered in a call-and-response style without accompaniment or harmony and unbounded by the formality of any particular musical structure". [6]
Blues is a music genre [3] and musical form that originated amongst African-Americans in the Deep South of the United States around the 1860s. [2] Blues has incorporated spirituals, work songs, field hollers, shouts, chants, and rhymed simple narrative ballads from the African-American culture.
Blues dancing originated in the dances brought to America by enslaved Africans, who followed sub-Saharan African music traditions.There is no documented evidence across the history of pre-colonial sub-Saharan African dance for sustained one-on-one mixed-gender partnered dancing; African cultures apparently considered this type of dancing to be inappropriate.
Some [which?] scholars and ethnomusicologists have speculated that the origins of the blues can be traced to the musical traditions of Africa, as retained by African-Americans during and after slavery. [2] Even though the blues is a key component of American popular music, its rural, African-American origins are largely undocumented, and its ...
The origins of the blues are also closely related to the religious music of the African-American community, the spirituals. The first appearance of the blues is often dated to after the ending of slavery, with the development of juke joints occurring later. It is associated with the newly acquired freedom of the former slaves.
African Journey: A Search for the Roots is a blues album by an American historian Samuel Charters and an attempt to trace the roots and influences of American blues from the 1920s and 1930s back to the tribal music of West Africa. He draws connections and similarities through song content and instrument type and usage.
Black music began to reflect urban environments through amplified sounds, social concerns, and cultural pride expressed through music. It combined blues, jazz, boogie-woogie and gospel taking the form of fast paced dance music with highly energized guitar work appealing to young audiences across racial divides. [4]