There are a wide range of different popular music genres: jazz, be-bop, rock, soul, blues, country, Cajun, calypso, gospel, punk, heavy metal, hip-hop, and rap. Each of these genres is continually evolving so it is difficult to define an ideal version of a particular genre.

Yahoo Directory: Music Genres
Indiana University: Genres and Types of Music

Internet Underground Music Archive (clips from different genres)

Webquest: select a genre for music for a theme park

Music Maps provides you with image maps of the evolution of certain genres over time with links to sample songs/artists.

The History of Rock Music.com provides a history of different genres.

The Seattle EMP Music Museum [topics/themes/artists related to the history of popular music]

Kingwood College Library: American Music From 1950 to Present [lots of useful links]

For further reading:

Starr, L., & Waterman, C. A. (2002). American popular music: From minstrelsy to MTV. New York: Oxford University Press.

O’Brien, L. (2002). She bop 2: The definitive history of women in rock, pop and soul.S New York: Continuum Press.

Content of song lyrics

These genres have also changed in terms of the content of song lyrics. Analysis of lyrics from the 1950s to the present indicates that the focus of lyrics in the 1950s was on love relationships, which, during the late 1960s shifted to more social and political themes. Moreover, while there has been a consistent focus on relationships from the 1950s to the present, the focus shifted from emphasis of emotional aspects of love to more physical/sexual aspects of love (Christenson & Roberts, 1998).

Students could study song lyrics as a form of poetry, examining the uses of figurative language, sound, pauses, and rhythm, as well as the underlying ideas and themes. By doing oral interpretations of the lyrics, they could examine how variations in performance influences the meaning of there lyrics.

Webquest: A Search for Poetry in Music

Webquest: Song Analysis Webquest

Webquest: Poetic Devices in Music

Webquest: Bringing Lyrics to Life: The Multimedia Music Book

Music Theory for Song Writers

Adolescents’ musical preferences

As adolescents age, they begin to have more specialized and less centrist preferences for certain music genres (Christenson & Roberts, 1998). Students could identify their particular musical preferences in terms of specific artists and genres, noting reasons for those preferences.

Module 9: Word document

The Value of Studying Popular Music

Purposes for Studying Popular Music as Media

Development of Recorded Popular Music

Different Music Genres

Rock

Jazz

Soul/Motown

Blues

Hip Hop/Rap

Punk

Folk

Country

Cajun/Zydeco

The Music of Protest

Music Videos

Film Music

The Economics of the Popular Music Industry

Studying Radio

Teaching Activity

References