This course, part 1 of a 2-course sequence, examines the history of rock, primarily as it unfolded in the United States, from the days before rock (pre-1955) to the end of the 1960s. This course covers the music of Elvis Presley, Chuck Berry, Phil Spector, Bob Dylan, the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, Jimi Hendrix, Cream, and many more artists, with an emphasis both on cultural context and on the music itself. We will also explore how developments in the music business and in technology helped shape the ways in which styles developed. Rock emerged in the mid 1950s as a blending of mainstream pop, rhythm and blues, and country and western--styles that previously had remained relatively separate. This new style became the music of the emerging youth culture and was often associated with teen rebellion. We will follow the story of how this rowdy first wave of rock and roll (1955-59) was tamed in the early 60s but came roaring back with the Beatles and the Rolling Stones and then went psychedelic by the end of the decade.
The Folk Revival
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From the course by University of Rochester
History of Rock, Part One
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From the lesson
The Demise of Rock and the Promise of Soul (1959-63)
Was this era the dark ages for rock music or was it a golden era cut short by the British invasion? The music of teen idols, the folk revival, early surf music, sweet soul, rockabilly pop, and girl groups. The Brill Building songwriters and the rise of the producer. Playlets and splatter platters.
Meet the Instructors
John CovachProfessor of Music and Director
Institute for Popular Music
Folk music has an interesting past in, American popular music.
in terms of our discussion, we're going to think about Folk music as it emerged,
in the late 1950s, into the 1960s as a kind of Folk revival.
Next week when we talk about, the Beatles and the British Invasion, we'll often
talk, we'll also talk about a style, a kind of Folk revival they had in the UK
which we never really experienced here called Skiffle.
In fact their folk revival happened a little earlier than our folk revival did.
Theirs was already going in 1957 with Lottie Donegan and the Rock Island Line
here with us and the Kingston Trio and other folks like that.
It isn't until 1958 or 1959 that we really get started.
Now in this country, folk music had certainly been popular before the late
50's when we have the folk revival. But what we want to talk about here is
how this folk revival constitutes one of the first splits in this new youth market
that we're going to see. Remember that the idea is that during the
55 through 59 period, what was demonstrated was that there was a youth
market at all. That is a market for youth records as
opposed to basically just any kind of mainstream pop record.
And you shouldn't expect that people like Frank Sinatra and some of the more
traditional musicians weren't continuing to sell records while rock 'n' roll was
going on. I mean, rock 'n' roll was one part of the
market, but it wasn't the entire mainstream pop market.
Anyway, that, that was, that youth market was already a kind of a split away from
the, the mainstream pop market. Now, within the youth market, there's a
split, where the teenage kids, the high school kids, maybe the preteen kids, and
the college age kids, who used to be fans of Elvis Presley, and now have moved on
to college, and were interested in putting their childish things behind
them, and impressing everybody with how, dog gone serious they were and
Folk music, is in many ways one of the places that those folks went.
Now, a lot of other college kids got involved into jazz and they liked jazz a
lot. Jazz, was of course the music of the beat
generation, beat poetry. A lot of people got interested in
classical music, as well. but folk music was a kind of music that
you know you could sort of if you are a man, stroke your beard to, and sort of
think about the importance of the lyrics and the kinds of things they were saying.
It dealt with more serious issues and more sort of serious problems in the
world than teenage love and romance and ideal boyfriends, and this kind of thing.
a kid goes off to college, wants to be taken seriously.
starts to read Niche and grows a little beard, smokes a pipe and wears a sweater
and all of a sudden wants to be taken seriously.
And folk music sort of really fit that pretty well for these kids.
There's a, a real appeal to populism. The idea in folk music that you know,
we're sort of all in this together. We're all equals.
There's a real kind of non-commercial emphasis.
Although it turns out that folk music as a popular style is just a commercial as
every other music when it comes to actually selling it.
But the image is that it's not commercial and it's often socially conscience or
even activist at a certain kind of way. Now the roots of folk go back to the 40s
and into the early 1950s. With people like the Weavers, Woody
Guthrie, Pete Seeger, writing music that was really about social problems and a
kind of an approach to everybody sharing in things together, this land is your
land, this land is my land. But, and some of those early songs are
tunes like The Weavers, Good Night Irene, which was a number one hit on the pop
charts in 1950 or On Top of Old Smoky, a number two hit in 1951.
But with the rise of McCarthyism in this country and the seeking out or trying to
flash or flash out all the possible communist or communist sympathizers in
the country. Right, wrongly, or whatever way you make
thing about that. A lot of folk musicians were, were under
scrutiny, because they were seen as communists or communist sympathizers.
And that was sometimes true, actually. It wasn't always true of everybody, but
it actually was true. I mean, some really did believe in
communism. but that tend to sort of put a damper on
their ability to sell records to a mainstream pop audience.
So, there's a kind of a silence that happens in folk music at the, at the,
into the 1950s. And when folk music starts to revive in
the late 1950s, it really stays away from political issues.
the most important group in this part of this vocal revival is a group of out San
Francisco called the Kingston Trio. they take their name, the Kingston Trio
from this fascination we had for calypso music at about the same time Harry
Belafonte sing singing tunes about a Jamaica Farewell, or the Banana Boat
song, the Day O song, that kind of thing. and so Kingston was kind of, you know,
kind of in the air and kind of a hip thing to do, so they were the Kingston
Trio, even though their music had nothing to do with calypso music or Jamaica.
anyway, their approach, three guys singing and playing acoustic instruments,
guitars and banjo, singing in harmony, producing very professional performances
that never really seemed really professional.
They almost give, give the image of just three guys that could be anybody that
picked up these instruments and they're just sort of singing and playing.
But if you listen to the recording, you'll see there's an awful lot of
production, an awful amount of talent and an awful lot of thought to the
arrangement that goes into them. A good example is their big number one
hit from 1959, Tom Dooley, which is a traditional song 19th century song that
deals with a murder and this kind of thing, but it doesn't get into issues of
of, of of civil rights or, or social economic problems, or issues or politics
or anything like that. It deals with these kinds of serious
issues from a historical perspective. Which is kind of safe to do at the time,
because like I say, there had been a, a big scare with the McCarthyism thing.
the, the Kingston Trio were on Capitol Records, out of Los Angeles.
And in the period between 1959 and 1965, had ten singles in the top 40.
they were very, very big during this period.
And when somebody thought of, what is folk music?
In the period before the arrival of Bob Dillon and Roger McGuine and all these
guys with folk rock in 1965. Folk music probably meant, either the
Kingston Trio or a group we are going to talk about in just a minute, Peter, Paul
and Mary. It's important for us to realize, that
somebody like Bob Dillon, didn't really have a professional performing career,
even though he did records, he wasn't really sort of star of a performer until
1965. So, folk music really meant The Kingston
Trio. in, in many cases, they were very, very
successful. other groups of note that are sort of
similar to the Kingston Trio would be the Highwaymen, the Rooftop Singers, or
perhaps most importantly, the New Christie Minstrels.
All of these groups very polished, happy kind of folk sound that stayed way clear
of any kind of controversy of political affiliation.
if you're interested in the whole scene around that, there's a fantastic movie by
Christopher Guest, called A Mighty Wind, which takes a kind of a satirical view of
all this. But much of like a lot of those
Christopher Guest movies, much of what's in there is a pretty accurate
representation of a lot of what went on. Even if the characters themselves are,
are sort of, you know, comedic, and not, not accurate representations of anybody
in particular. let's talk about Peter, Paul, and Mary.
Here's a group that, really, like the Kingston Trio were really at the top of
this, of this Folk Revival. formed in Greenwich Village in 1961, for
a long time, in the early 60s Greenwich Village was the home of folk music, and
so they came out of that Greenwich Village, scene.
were put together on purpose to have a vocal trio.
and had a whole series of hits, If I Had a Hammer in 1962, Puff The Magic Dragon
in 1962, and Blowin' In the Wind by Bob Dylan.
Bob Dylan of course, nobody would have heard Dylan sing that song.
the version they would've known would've been the Peter, Paul and Mary tune.
of course Dylan at the very beginning of his career was more of a songwriter then
a performer. So the point I really want to drive home
with regards to this folk revival, is that while we think of people like Bob
Dylan and Joan Baez, as being important folkies during the 1960s, that really
doesn't happen until the second half of the decade.
The beginning of the decade it's really about this sort of milder more commercial
form of folk music, which all the same is posing itself as not being very
commercial characterized by groups like The Kingston Trio and Peter, Paul, and
Mary. As far as Bob Dylan is concerned it, it's
probably worth considering that during these years when these performances by
these other groups, like the Kingston Trio; Peter, Paul, and Mary; were so
polished vocally, and and so arranged, somebody like Dylan, with the voice of
his, and the harmonica playing and all that, was thought of as really too
amateurish for prime time. I mean, it was fine for coffeehouses in
Greenwich Village and for people who were folk enthusiasts, but it just really
wasn't polished enough to be part of the folk the folk music as it was understood
in the first half of the decade. So Dylan was largely relegated to being a
very talented writer of songs that other people performed.
Now as folk begins to unfold into the decade and to 1963, 1964, it's
increasingly involved with the civil rights movement.
In fact, the famous I Have a Dream speech that was done by Martin Luther King
Peter, Paul and Mary Dillon, Joan Baez, all those people were there, sort of
locked, holding arms at the Lincoln monument, when he did that speech.
And so, this return back to politics starts to make it's way into folk music,
as the 60s unfold. First, through the civil rights movement
and then through the protest movement around the Vietnam War.
It isn't long before we get to 1967 and 1968 and folk music.
Is right back to its sort of politically concerned the politically concerned kind
of attitudes that it had back when it got in trouble with the, the, the McCarthy
folks back in the 1950s. So there's this period of of neutrality,
and then a sort of slow move back to getting involved with social issues.
Well let's move on now to the, the next the next lecture, and consider what
happens to Rockabilly during this period, and consider these Rockabilly popsters.
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