1950s
CULTURE
EQ: What was life like for Americans in the 1950s? How can we see this reflected in the music of the period?
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NOTE
Any time you see this marker in the slides that means you will need to reflect as a group on the questions being asked. Respond on your whiteboard.
POST WAR CONFORMITY
CONFORMITY: the act of matching attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors to group norms, politics or being like-minded.
During the 1950s, a sense of uniformity pervaded American society. Conformity was common, as young and old alike followed group norms rather than striking out on their own. Though men and women had been forced into new employment patterns during World War II, once the war was over, traditional roles were reaffirmed. Men expected to be the breadwinners; women, even when they worked, assumed their proper place was at home.
POST WAR CONFORMITY
CONFORMITY: the act of matching attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors to group norms, politics or being like-minded.
Little Boxes
song by Pete Seeger
IS THIS SONG SUPPORTING 50S CONFORMITY OR CRITICAL OF IT?
Baby Boom
White Collar Jobs
Keeping up with the Jones
Suburbs
Franchises
Gender Expectations
EXAMPLES OF CONFORMITY IN THE 1950S
CAN YOUR GROUP LIST ALL 6 EXAMPLES OF CONFORMITY THAT I JUST SHOWED YOU?
1950s a Time of Change
Birth of Rock n’ Roll
MOTHER OF ROCK & ROLL
Sister Rosetta Tharpe
WATCH
CHUCK BERRY
“There’s only one true king of Rock and Roll. His name is Chuck Berry.” — Stevie Wonder
“If you tried to give Rock and Roll another name, you might call it ‘Chuck Berry.' — John Lennon
“There’s not a lot of other ways to play Rock and Roll other than the way Chuck plays it; he’s really laid the law down.” — Eric Clapton
“Chuck Berry is the greatest of the rock and rollers.” — Music critic Robert Christgau
What do these quotes suggest about Chuck Berry’s role as a Rock and Roll pioneer?
PERFORMING
Berry's incredible success is due to his ability to articulate the concerns and attitudes of his audience in his music. At the height of his success, Berry was a 30-year-old black man singing to a mostly white, teenage audience. Dubbed the ‘Eternal Teenager,’ Chuck Berry's knowledge of the pop market made it possible for him to break color barriers and play to an integrated audience.”
-- From chuckberry.com, The Official Site of Chuck Berry
race. Why was it an important turning point for a Black artist to become so popular with white teenagers in this period?
Stolen
Music
Little Richard
WHO SANG IT BETTER?
LITTLE RICHARD
PAT BOONE
WHO SANG IT BETTER?
BIG MAMA THORNTON
ELVIS PRESLEY
“Hound Dog” was written specifically for Thornton by Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller, a white, Jewish songwriting team with a love for R&B music, a genre generally associated with black audiences. The recording was produced by Johnny Otis, the son of Greek immigrants who grew up in an African-American community and identified as black. The mixing between races did not reflect the norms of segregated 1950s American life, but behind the scenes in music culture, such mixing was possible. The recording became the biggest hit of Thornton’s career, reaching No. 1 on the Billboard R&B chart and staying there for seven weeks.
WHO SANG IT BETTER?
RICHARD BERRY THE KINSMEN
WHO DANCED IT BETTER?
Mya Johnson/Chris Cotter & Addison Rae
Black TikTok Creators Are On Strike To Protest A Lack Of Credit For Their Work
TEENAGE DELINQUENCY
The children born during the early years of the postwar “baby boom” were becoming teenagers by the late 1950s. middle-class teens had more leisure time and more spending power than previous generations of young people. The number of crimes committed by teenagers was, in fact, rising throughout the nation. Teenagers seemed to be challenging the social fabric of America. Many questioned, and even blamed, movies, comic books, and 🎥Rock and Roll for its influence on the rising misbehavior of youth.
“screamed, and quivered, and shut their eyes”
WOW! NOT OK!
THE TEENAGERS
RITCHIE VALENS
WATCH then respond:
Why might Valens have been reluctant to record the song? Why might he have wanted to record the song?
READ then respond:
DESI ARNAZ
NEW FORM OF MASS MEDIA IN THE 1950s IS THE TELEVISION.
In addition to being a popular Latin musician during the 1940s and 50s, Arnaz’s character on television, Ricky Ricardo, was also a Cuban-American bandleader. I Love Lucy ran from 1951 to 1957 and was the most-watched show on American television for four of its six seasons. I Love Lucy have affected mainstream America’s familiarity with Latin American music during the 1950s.
LISTEN
Learn about the noted topic then decide which song best connects. Explain your reasoning.
PLAYLIST
SONG | A | B | C | D | E | F |
TITLE | ROCKET 88 | Talking Unamerican Blues | The Last Hotel & Some of Dharma | SANTA BABY | JAILHOUSE ROCK | STRANGE FRUIT |
ARTIST | Jackie Brenston | Betty Sanders | Jack Kerouac | Eartha Kitt | Elvis Presley | Billie Holiday |
AUDIO | | | | | | |
LYRICS |
The 1950s greaser subculture originated in the United States after World War II when American youths were looking for excitement and forms of self-expression. It began in working-class communities and especially in Italian American, Mexican American, and other Latino communities. Participants of the movement included young men who were sometimes in street gangs or motorcycle biker gangs, but women also participated. The "greaser" term was originally an ethnic slur, but as the youth subculture spread, the term came to describe their unique style, and specifically, their hairstyles.
Often blamed for society's problems
2. BEATNIKS
In the late 1940s and into the 1950s, a group of writers shared a deep distaste for American culture and society as it existed after World War II (1939–45). This was a time of consumer culture and conformity. These writers included Allen Ginsberg (1926-1997), Jack Kerouac (1922-1969), William F. Burroughs (1914-1997), John Clellon Holmes (1926-1988), and Lawrence Ferlinghetti (1919–). In an era when many Americans were content to pursue consumer culture, the Beats—or Beatniks—sought out experiences that were more intensely "real." Sometimes "real" experiences meant physical pleasures such as sex and drugs or more spiritual pursuits such as Eastern religions, particularly Buddhism. They listened to cool jazz and bebop which influenced the poetry read at coffee houses.
Beat = Beat down by society
3. RED SCARE
The Red Scare was hysteria over the perceived threat posed by Communists in the U.S. during the Cold War between the Soviet Union and the United States, which intensified in the late 1940s and early 1950s. (Communists were often referred to as “Reds” for their allegiance to the red Soviet flag.) The Red Scare led to a range of actions that had a profound and enduring effect on U.S. government and society. Federal employees were analyzed to determine whether they were sufficiently loyal to the government, and the House Un-American Activities Committee, as well as U.S. Senator Joseph R. McCarthy, investigated allegations of subversive elements in the government and the Hollywood film industry. The climate of fear and repression linked to the Red Scare finally began to ease by the late 1950s.
4. CAR CULTURE
After the Allied powers achieved victory the U.S. was in a unique position not to rebuild from the destruction caused by the war, but rather to expand. As soldiers returned home and began to buy houses and start families, suburban communities developed around cities, necessitating not only new roads, but an abundance of brand new cars to drive those roads. By the time civilian auto production resumed in 1946, many Americans had not owned a new car since before the Depression — if they had ever owned a car at all. With the postwar economy surging, car sales in the United States skyrocketed. The creation of an interstate highway system in 1956 further transformed where people lived, how they got around, who they socialized with, and how they spent their money. A rising population of teenagers, born after the war into a country enjoying an unprecedented surge of prosperity, soon forged an intense and energetic relationship with cars as they became old enough to receive their driver’s permits.
6. CONFRONTING RACISM
The NAACP’s legal strategy against segregated education culminated in the 1954 Supreme Court’s landmark Brown v. Board of Education decision. African Americans gained the formal, if not the practical, right to study alongside their white peers in primary and secondary schools. The decision fueled an intransigent, violent resistance during which Southern states used a variety of tactics to evade the law.
In the summer of 1955, a surge of anti-black violence included the kidnapping and brutal murder of fourteen-year-old Emmett Till, a crime that provoked widespread and assertive protests from black and white Americans. By December 1955, the Montgomery, Alabama, bus boycott led by Martin Luther King, Jr., began a protracted campaign of nonviolent civil disobedience to protest segregation that attracted national and international attention.
6. CONSUMERISM