Music Through The Decades

Rock music emerged in the second half of the 20th century, forever altering the landscape of popular music. The new sound, articulated the passions and beliefs of a new generation, and has since influenced a wide range of genres, from folk to disco to hip-hop. The musical stylings that have accompanied the social, cultural, and political developments of the late 20th and early 21st centuries form the subjects of these entertaining and informative volumes.

1920’s – 1940’s

In the mid-1920’s, jazz was being played in dance halls, roadhouses, and radios all over the country. Radios and phonograph records were bringing jazz to locations so remote that no band could reach them. And the music itself was beginning to change. The popular dance music of the time was not jazz, but there were early forms taking shape in the evolving blues-ragtime experimental area that would soon turn into jazz. Popular Tin Pan Alley composers like Irving Berlin incorporated ragtime influence into their compositions, though they rarely used the specific musical devices that were second nature to jazz players. The 1920's were Broadway's prime years, with over 50 new musicals opening in just one season. Record numbers of people paid up to $3.50 for a seat at a musical. It was also a decade of incredible artistic developments in the musical theatre. The Broadway shows were produced by showmen who took musical theatre seriously and tried to provide quality entertainment while making a profit at the same time. This attitude kept the musical theatre booming right through the 1920s. Among the hundreds of popular musical comedies that debuted on Broadway in the early 1920s, two classic examples of the Broadway musical of that era are Sally and No, No, Nanette. The music of the 1930's wasn’t sad and depressing, it was jazzy and happy, and so it gave people inspiration and cheered them up during the Great Depression. The popular kind of music was still jazz. The main instruments were