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Reservation Blues Research Paper

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Reservation Blues Research Paper
The Function of Music in Reservation Blues

Definition Popular Music:
Popular music is music belonging to any of a number of musical styles that are accessible to the general public and are disseminated by one or more of the mass media.

Popular Music In General:
- the music since industrialization in the 1800's that is most in line with the tastes and interests of people à extremely wide range of music from vaudeville and minstrel shows to heavy metal
- abbreviated to pop music àoften used for a narrower branch of popular music

Popular Music and the Business:
- product of the modern business enterprise
- try to select and cultivate the music that will have the greatest success with the public àmaximize their
…show more content…
- a vocal and instrumental form of music based on the use of the blue notes
- the word blue is often associtaed with melancholy, depression and sadness

Origin of the Blues:
- early form of blues-like music was a call-and-response shouts
- a form of this pre-blues was heard in slave field shouts and hollers
- expression of suffering and depression
- at the end of the 19th century the blues was diffused in rural areas of the south

Prewar Blues:
- the blues became popular between 1911-1914
- W. C. Handy popularized the blues by realeasing a composition called "Memphis Blues" àFather of the blues
- 1920s became a major element of African American American popular music
- the blues evolved from informal performances in bars to entertainment in theaters
- In the 30s and 40s the blues went north
- famous bluesmen (Muddy Waters/Willie Dixon) played in Chicago or Detroit

Impact of the blues:
- in the early 60s many young American or European discovered the blues àThe Rolling Stones, Cream, Fleetwood
…show more content…
Thomas Builds-the-Fire
2. Victor Joseph
3. Junior Polatkin
4. Robert Johnson
5. Big Mom
6. Chess Warm Water
7. Checkers Warm Water
8. Father Arnold
9. Betty and Veronica

Minor Characters:
Thomas‘ dad: Samuel
The-man-who-was-probably-Lakota
David WalksAlong (Tribal Council Chairman)
Michael WhiteHawk
Phil Sheridan & George Wright

The Blues in Reservation Blues
Ralph Ellison's famous definition: the speakers "autobiographical chronicle of personal catastrophe"

Alexie: individual & general problems

Hybridity: mixture
→ essential ingredient in the blues as well as in American culture

1. The Band (Spokane, Flathead, White)
2. Repertoire of the Band (Blues, Country, Punk; Poem; Story)
3. Spokane Tradition and Catholicism:
"You cover all the Christian stuff, and I`ll do the traditional Indian stuff. We'll make a great team." (Big Mom)

Robert Johnson. „King of the Delta Blues Singers."

His Music struck a Chord that continues to resonate.
His Blues adressed Generations he would never know and made Poetry of his Visions and

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