For my scavenger hunt, I wanted to look into the origin of rock and roll and I found some interesting results. I wanted to find the earliest reference of rock and roll music and used the Google Ngram Viewer. From 1900 to about 1950, rock and roll music was barely a thing. I was lucky enough to come across a book called “Dancing in Your Head: Jazz, Blues, Rock, and Beyond” that was published in 1944. In the book, it is said that Chuck Berry is one of the Founding Fathers of Rock and Roll. I looked into that claim further and found the Berry actually started playing guitar and performing at night clubs in St. Louis. While searching for a record deal, Berry actually met famous artist Muddy Water who suggested he go to meet with a record label named “Chess Records” and boom, a legend was born. He recorded a single a few weeks later. It also says that genres like rock and roll and heavy metal were strictly “off-limits” to black people. That was interesting to me since there were many famous black artists such as Chuck Berry himself and also Ray Charles.
There were not many other results before 1950 but from 1953-1960, the trend started to rise. This was about the time Ray Charles, Elvis, and Buddy Holly started becoming big names. We have listened to a few Ray Charles songs in class and I would never have guessed that he was a “rock and roll” artist. He has a great voice but compared to what is considered rock and roll nowadays, they are just two very different things. Even compared to Elvis Presley, the KING of Rock and Roll, Charles has such a different sound. Everyone knows of Elvis, and though he is as great as everyone says he is, he kind of overshadows the others who contributed to rock and roll. Others including, but not limited to, Jerry Lee Lewis, Johnny Cash, and Bo Diddley. A lot of them “popped up” around the same time and made a name for themselves.
A question that came up from researching was the difference between “rock and roll” and “heavy metal”. While writing about Chuck Berry and Ray Charles, I listened to their music to see what 1950’s rock was like. It was very different than what I personally think is considered rock and roll but maybe it’s because I have been listening to heavy metal. Around the 1980’s, bands like Metallica, Black Sabbath, and Iron Maiden make their debut and they are considered heavy metal; other bands like Led Zepplin and Pink Floyd are rock and roll. I think these two genres are thrown together a lot and people constantly mistake what is rock and roll and what is heavy metal.