Listening Journal - Week 4

The music in this week’s listening is much more familiar to me than some of the others, as we move closer to the modern Rock and Roll Era.

I am a huge fan of Frank Sinatra.  Most of my familiarity of his music comes more from the “Rat Pack” era of the 60s, and I found “Nancy (with the Laughing Face)” to be a very sweet, tender piece of music.  Sinatra’s performance is understated, almost melancholy.  It fits very well with the style here, and the strings of the accompaniment really bring a lot to the style and mood of the piece.

“Choo Choo Ch’Boogie” was a charming blues number, and I was particularly impressed with the piano solo.  The form was a straight forward verse-chorus with interludes between the verses.  The moving bass line of the 12-bar blues kept the energy high and drove the piece throughout.  Interestingly, I could hear shades of where Elvis Presley would be influenced throughout this recording.

Chuck Berry’s “Maybellene” and Little Richard’s “Long Tail Sally” are outstanding examples of the next phase of the Rhythm and Blues and early Rock and Roll movement.  They both have energy and a stronger emphasis on the guitar.  The tempi of these pieces are very swift, compared to a lot of music of the time.  The forms are simple (verse-chorus) that make the songs very accessible to the “average” listener. 

Elvis Presley’s “Don’t Be Cruel” is very familiar to me.  It’s one of those songs that you hear anywhere and everywhere.  Listening to it this time and reading about it in the text, it’s really the first time I have ever paid special attention to the background singing (the “bops” and “aahs”).  This provides an interesting mix of the newer Rock and Roll style and the older style popular on the radio (even back into the 40s). 

The Coasters’ “Charlie Brown” is another example of a piece that is bridging the gap between Rhythm and Blues and the emerging Rock and Roll (like “Maybellene” “Long Tail Sally”).  The piece starts with a typical AABA form.  Something interesting in the verse is that there is just a unison pulse on beats 1 and 3, until the 2 beats before the chorus, where the bass line finally ascends.  The harmony in the bridge (B section) changes significantly from the rest of the piece, offering a nice contrast to the verse and chorus.  The artificial manipulation of the voices on “Yeah, you!” during the bridge section is very interesting.  Nowadays, manipulating voices is as simple as clicking a button.  Back then it was a much more complicated process, but it adds a nice touch of humor to the piece.  As time goes on, more and more recordings will utilize some kind of sound manipulation.