Re: Name of the genre?

Date: 16 May 2003 01:37:57 -0700
Newsgroups: rec.music.rock-pop-r+b.1950s
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Cathy D <email-address-deleted> wrote in message news:<email-address-deleted>...
> > To me, "Pop" conjures up images of the likes of Madonna, Michael
> > Jackson, NSYNC, Britney Spears, et al. (When today's newspapers and
> > tabloids label someone a "Pop Tart" or a "Pop Princess" they're not
> > talking about Joni James.)
>
> Now you are talking a whole 'nother ball game! But I think that "Teen
> Pop" covers them, and, as you said, you know they aren't talking about
> Joni James, etc. when those terms are used. I think you do need to draw
> the line some place and since today's "Pop" music is so vastly
> different from the "Pop" music from the Pop music of the mid-40's to
> mid-50's that there really should be any confusion if you clarify it by
> using the term "Adult Pop."
Actually, I think we need to draw the line with the boldest, darkest
strokes possible. Would you want your favorite music sharing its name
with today's teenie fare? (Like if we started calling Michael
Jackson, Madonna, Eminem and Justin Timberlake "Current Top 40 Teen
Fare" and referring to 50s R 'n' R as "Yesterday's Top 40 Teen Fare.")
I daresay you would not.
> > Nor does the insertion of such adjectives as "Adult" and "Teen" help
> > the matter any. Rock 'n' Roll would easily classify as "Teen Pop," as
> > well. As, again, would Jo-Lo, Justin Timberlake and Eminem. "Adult
> > Pop" would be Barry Manilow, Rod Stewart and Whitney Houston.
>
> Some R & R can be classified as "Teen Pop" but not all of it. Only
> artists suchs as Pat Boone, Patience & Prudence, etc. should really be
> classified as "Teen Pop." There is no way that artists such as Little
> Richard, Chuck Berry, etc. can be called "Teen Pop." Their records
> aren't even close to "Pop" music!
"But they'll be rockin' on Bandstand (Pop tv show)/Philadelphia,
PA/Deep in the heart of Texas (Pop song)/And on the Frisco Bay..."
Come on.
Little Richard and Chuck Berry are definitely Pop (Rock 'n' Roll var.,
but Pop all the same).
The trouble is that you are assigning negative connotations to Pop --
and allowing only such Rock 'n' Roll artists as you believe to be
square beyond all squareness to suffer under that label.
> As to the other artists you mention: Barry Manilow, etc., I think most
> people would call their music "soft rock" or "adult comtemporary" not
> "adult pop." Since the goal here is to come up with a term that allows
> the discussion of the music of artists like Perry Como with others
> oudside of this group you need to find a term that they would
> understand and find acceptable, not a term that only you find
> acceptable.
We need a term that those of us who *like* the music would find
acceptable. Rock 'n' Roll fans don't ask for my blessing when they
refer to their music by the name of their choice.
> The only other term that I could think of would be "Traditional Pop,"
> but I think that has already been suggested and rejected.
(Pardon any hyperbole in the following, but I'm a lover speaking from
the heart.)
How about "Great American Music"? That's how I've always thought of
it.
The music of this period certainly embraced *all* the great American
musical traditions: Al Jolson kicked off the 50s by cutting an album
of Stephen Foster songs and Jo Stafford put out an American Folk album
at that time; other singers were drawing from Jazz, R and B, Pop
Standards from the 30s, Show Tunes, Tin Pan Alley songs from the turn
of the century, Gospel, and the music from various countries and
cultures (in perfect keeping with America's image as the Great Melting
Pot).
Perhaps the reason no one has ever been able to come up with a
suitable name for this music is because it is so all-inclusive and
diverse.
And, on a technical level, it was music of a caliber that I fear we
shall never know again. The musicians and vocalists were coming from
the Big Band era -- and were all well-trained, first class
professionals (not like today's "bands" who get all their "training"
in a garage). These were brilliant songs -- both the new ones and
those taken from other periods -- executed as perfectly as humanly
possible.
And there is something distinctly American about it -- all of it --
even those derived from foreign songs. They don't just capture an era
-- they capture a people, a spirit (not just patriotism -- but the
spirit of men like Mark Twain, Scott Joplin and Jerome Kern).
And there is a timelessness to them. Their arrangements are done in
such a perfect manner that they seem to have existed in this form
since the dawn of time itself. They are the aural equivalent of
Monument Valley, Mount Rushmore and Yellowstone National Park. They
are the Rocky Mountains, the Mississippi and old New Orleans.
They are not just the songs of our life: they are the songs of our
people, our culture, our landscape.
Great American Music - that's what they've always been to me, and such
they shall forever remain.
Much as I like 50s R 'n' R, it strikes me as a passing fad -- a
pleasant fad, but a fad nonetheless. The world could go on unaffected
had there never been a TUTTI FRUITI or a THAT'S ALRIGHT MAMA. But it
would not be the same world without OLD MAN RIVER, THAT LUCKY OLD SUN,
WHITE CHRISTMAS, MONA LISA, LET ME GO LOVER, SPRINGTIME IN THE
ROCKIES, UP A LAZY RIVER, THE LITTLE WHITE CLOUD THAT CRIED, TENNESSEE
WALTZ, etc.
Something is missing from the rock songs. Some almost indefinable
element. Something almost mythic, grand, eternal, spiritual...
I remember the first time I heard THE CHRISTMAS SONG. It was sometime
in the mid-60s, and my parents had just purchased our first color tv.
I must've been either 2 or 3 at the time...4 tops. When we turned on
the tv, the first thing I heard was Nat Cole singing this song. It
appeared to be part of a commercial (quite possibly one of the
stations self-promotional spots), because it played quite a bit as I
recall (and I believe it played in the following year as well).
Well the first time I heard that song, I knew ...*knew*... that there
was something special, timeless, perfect, immortal about it. I loved
it then, and I love it today -- over 35 years later.
"Wop-bam-a-loo-bop-a-wop-bam-boom" just doesn't affect me on this
level. Go figure.