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Rock music began in the United States, but it has
influenced and in turn been shaped by a broad field of cultures and musical
traditions, including gospel music, the blues, country-and-western music,
classical music, folk music, electronic music, and the popular music of Asia,
Africa, and Latin America. In addition to its use as a broad designation, the
term rock music commonly refers to music styles after 1959 predominantly
influenced by white musicians. Other major rock-music styles include rock and
roll, the first genre of the music; and rhythm-and-blues music (R&B), influenced
mainly by black American musicians. Each of these major genres encompasses a
variety of substyles, such as heavy metal, punk, alternative, and grunge. While
innovations in rock music have often occurred in regional centers—such as New
York City, Kingston, Jamaica, and Liverpool, England—the influence of rock music
is now felt worldwide.
The central musical instrument in most kinds of rock music is the electric
guitar. Important figures in the history of this instrument include jazz
musician Charlie Christian, who in the late 1930s was one of the first to play
the amplified guitar as a solo instrument; Aaron Thibeaux “T-Bone” Walker, the
first blues musician to record with an amplified guitar (1942); Leo Fender, who
in 1948 introduced the first mass-produced solid-body electric guitar; and Les
Paul, who popularized the instrument in the early 1950s with a series of
technologically innovative recordings. Rock-and-roll guitarist Chuck Berry
established a style of playing in the late 1950s that remains a great influence
on rock music. Beginning in the late 1960s a new generation of rock guitarists,
including Jimi Hendrix, Eric Clapton, and Carlos Santana, experimented with
amplification, feedback, and various electronic devices, extending the musical
potential of the instrument.
Other instruments commonly used in rock music include the electric bass guitar
keyboard instruments such as the electric piano, organ, and synthesizer; and the
drum set, an African American innovation that came into rock music from jazz and
R&B music. Instruments that play important roles in certain rock-music genres
include the saxophone—prominent in jazz-rock and soul music—and a wide
assortment of traditional instruments used in worldbeat music. The microphone
also functions as a musical instrument for many rock singers, who rely upon the
amplification and various effects obtainable through electronic means.
Rock music also shares more complex technical aspects. Most rock music is based
on the same harmonies as Western music, especially the chords known as tonic,
subdominant, and dominant. The chord progression (series of chords) known as the
12-bar blues is based on these chords and has figured prominently in certain
styles, especially rock and roll, soul music, and southern rock. Other common
harmonic devices include the use of a drone, or pedal point (a single pitch
sustained through a progression of chords), and the parallel movement of chords,
derived from a technique on the electric guitar known as bar-chording. Many
elements of African American music have been a continuing source of influence on
rock music. These characteristics include riffs (repeated patterns), backbeats
(emphasizing the second and fourth beats of each measure; see Musical Rhythm:
Pulse and Meter), call-and-response patterns, blue notes (the use of certain
bent-sounding pitches, especially those related to the third and fifth degrees
of a musical scale), and dense buzzy-sounding timbres, or tone colors.
The musical form of rock music varies. Rock and roll of the late 1950s relied
heavily upon 12-bar blues and 32-bar song forms. Some rock bands of the late
1960s experimented with more flexible, open-ended forms, and some rock bands of
the 1970s developed suite forms derived from classical music. Another important
formal development in rock music has been the so-called concept album, a
succession of musical pieces tied together by a loose narrative theme.
Much rock music is performed at high volume levels, so the music has been
closely tied to developments in electronic technology. Rock musicians have
pioneered new studio recording techniques, such as multi-tracking—a process of
recording different song segments at different times and layering them on top of
one another—and digital sampling, the reproduction by a computer of the patterns
of a particular sound. Rock concerts, typically huge events involving thousands
of audience members, often feature high-tech theatrical stage effects, including
synchronized lighting.
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