Music From Around the World

In my last post I talked about some of the earliest forms of music and how it first spread around the world, so today I thought I would continue on to talk about a few of the different music genres that are typically associated with different parts of the world and explain how and why they originated in that area.

Country Music:
Where was country music first played? If you said Nashville, you would be wrong. Even though it is known as the 'Music City', it actually derived in Bristol, Tennessee by fiddle players around 1910. These early Bristol recordings laid the groundwork for much of the country music that followed. Because Bristol is not usually thought of as the place where country music began, it was especially important that the U.S. Congress recognised its contribution to music history. In 1998, Congress passed a resolution declaring Bristol as the "Birthplace of Country Music". Jimmie Rodgers, now known as the "Father of Country Music", was an instant success. He was the first country artist ever to get 1 million record sales for his single 'Blue Yodel'. The cowboy films of the 1930's and 40's also greatly aided the evolution and spreading of country music. 

Bollywood:
The name 'Bollywood', also referred to as Hindi cinema, comes from Bombay (former Mumbai) and Hollywood, the centre of the biggest film industry in the world. The music of Bollywood is generally what many viewers associate as one of the defining characteristics of Bollywood films and because of this, the music is just as important as the costumes. The history of Bollywood films goes as far back as any other film industry with the first feature film being produced in 1913, and by the 1930's, over two hundred films were being produced every year. Bollywood film changed dramatically when it became possible to record the music and the image of the film separately and the connect them at a later stage, as it allowed producers to let the public see their favourite actors while hearing their favourite singers. It soon became rare that the people on screen were who the audience was actually hearing, as often even the speech had to be dubbed because the filming equipment was so loud. 

Irish Music:
Seeing as I am Irish, I thought it was only fitting that I talked about Irish music as my final international genre. In the past couple of decades, Irish music has gained a great amount of international recognition, however its roots can be traced back to almost two thousand years ago when the Celts landed in Ireland. With them, they brought their music from Eastern Europe, and it is even speculated that the iconic Irish harp originated in Egypt. On their travels, the Celts left their mark almost everywhere they went, but it's here in Ireland that the traditions have survived the strongest. The first written collection of Irish music is from 1762, containing 49 songs by the Neale brothers in Dublin. When the Great Irish Famine struck in the 1840's, it led to millions of people emigrating to America and the UK, bringing with them their songs and music, so the Irish traditional music quickly spread to major cities such as New York, Boston and London. Up to the 1960's, Irish music was still mainly only in the houses and pubs of the rural areas of Ireland being danced to, however now in the twenty first century, with traditional music making a comeback, it seems as if its future is secure.

Sources:
http://countrymusic.about.com/od/trivia/tp/HistoryofCountryMusic.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Music_of_Bollywood
http://jillbrary.wordpress.com/bollywood-and-libraries/brief-history-of-bollywood/
http://www.discoverdublin.ie/musical-pub-crawl/story-of-irish-music/

The Origins of Music

Have you ever wondered whether some of the first humans on earth had music? What instruments they played? And where on earth was the beginning of music? These are some of the questions I hope to answer in this post, while hopefully also teaching you a thing or two in the process. 

          To answer these questions, I am going to be bringing you back to prehistoric times, to before any written records were ever kept. The answer to my first question, did some of the first humans on earth have music, is actually yes. Experts in the field believe that the origins of music probably came from naturally occurring sounds and rhythms. It is likely that mankind subconsciously mimicked the sounds around them, creating the earliest forms of music. We still do this today, with some cultures around the world imitating natural sounds in their songs. 

Some of the earliest paleolithic bone flutes
https://storify.com/WindofEpiphany/paleolithic-flute

          The earliest musical instruments, if you could even call them that, were in the form of simply tapping rocks and stones against each other, and other percussion sounds that could be composed using materials found in the surrounding areas. One of the first instruments that would be recognisable to you or I nowadays, is a paleolithic bone flute made from a cave bear's femur which is estimated to be over 30,000 years old. 

          Now, as for where on earth all of this was happening, the first humans evolved in Africa so it began there, and as time went by and mankind dispersed around the world, different countries began to devise their own cultures and therefore their own music types and genres. It was a slow process but over thousands of years, we now have the thousands of distinctive kinds of music that can be found in every corner of the earth.

          However, one way that music hasn't changed in the past 50,000 years is that even then, it served as a form of entertainment, just as it is today for billions of people all around the world. Another more practical use for music all that time ago would have been to lure animals in hunt, a tactic that would have been crucial to their survival because they were reliant on hunting and gathering as a source of food. In a way, they were almost dependent on music.

A Neanderthal Man
http://geniusofancientman.blogspot.ie

          To put all of this into perspective, just try imagining these people living on earth up to 60,000 years ago, residing in makeshift tents handmade out of animal skins, hunting and gathering all of their food, the English language still tens of thousands of years away from being created, and yet in many ways, mankind hasn't changed at all. We still love music just as much as some of the very first humans on earth, and just as they subconsciously hummed to the rhythms around them, we still mindlessly hum our favourite songs every day.