The blues music

During the 1800s, African Americans worked long days in the fields of the American South. They sang songs that they had brought from Africa while working. One person sang a line. Then a group of workers repeated it. The song’s words told about the hardships that people suffered. They clapped their hands and stomped （以重踏步方式跳舞） their feet to the music.

In the 1860s, the music changed greatly. African American music took new forms. It was also influenced by dance music, which had great rhythm. Banjos became popular. A blues singer usually sang a line and then played the banjo in reply. By the early 1900s, the guitar had taken the place of the banjo in the blues music.

The blues music has many obvious characteristics. One of them is that the musical notes are often “bent”. That is, they are changed slightly to give a song more strength.

Lyrics are the words of a song. Blues lyrics describe everyday life. The lyrics are often about the relationships between men and women. They tell about sadness and overwork. They tell about finding and losing love, having money or being poor, being happy or sad and lonely. They almost always use the rhythms of everyday speech. A group of blues lyrics usually has three lines. The second line repeats the first line. The third line has different words.

By the 1940s, large numbers of African Americans moved to Chicago. There, a new kind of “Chicago” blues began. The new music was excellent dance music. Chicago blues led to the birth of a new music style—rock and roll.