Bo Diddley
By: Ashley Tobin
By: Ashley Tobin
The
1950s brought about many changes in music and society as a whole. The change from swing to rock was due
to many different things. One
contributor was the technological changes that “laid the foundations for
music’s evolution”, as stated by Ann Arbor. Local radio stations were able to extend their signals
and more powerful signals were attained as well. Another technological change was the way that arrangers and producers
were able to manipulate the sounds in amazing ways. Also during the 1950s, artists began to cover other songs so
there were multiple versions of one song available. This happened a lot by whites that covered unknown black
artists’ songs and earned profits from them. Rock ‘n’ Roll gained “its first icons as teenagers” across
the country began buying a huge amount of records.
One major contributor to these changes is Bo
Diddley. He was born with the name
Ellas Bates then later became Ellas McDaniel, but he became Bo Diddley in high
school named after an inverted “diddley bow,” which was a one-stringed
instrument. He was born outside of
Clarksdale, Mississippi the moved to Chicago as a young child where he began
taking classical violin lessons.
The violin lessons led to the persona of Bo
Diddley, which began by him making his own red rectangular guitar in high
school. He began working for Chess
Records that was a major record company in Chicago at the time. When he finally got the chance to
record his own song, he released “Bo Diddley,” which Charles Hughes describes
as a “series of self-aggrandizing rhymes punctuated by a highly distinctive
rhythm.” Bo Diddley was able to manipulate
the sound of his “electric lines” to replicate the sounds of African
drums.
Not only was Bo a unique and creative musician, he
also was the first to bring the “persona of a sexual trickster” to rock and
roll. He was very aware of where
he came from and the African roots he possessed. This was made clear because he oftentimes made tribute to
many of the most dynamic traditions in black America. However, Bo Diddley did not have very many hits and his
“moment of prominence was neither as sizable nor as lengthy” as that of others
during this time. His biggest
chart performer was “Say Man” and he reached the lower ranks of Billboard’s
charts a few other times. Bo
changed many aspects of Rock ‘n’ Roll, but he was not extremely famous during
his lifetime.
Rock ‘n’ Roll “absorbed rhythm and blues while
incorporating” (Ann Arbor) a more simple style of lyrics. This era of music was a process, it did
not just occur overnight. It
combined elements of different types of music, while creating other parts of
their music, while transforming other aspects of music.
These
three videos give an idea of Bo Diddley and the kind of music he created until
his death in 2008:
Work Cited
Hughes, Charles. "The Boogie-Woogie Rumble." Popular Music & Society Feb. 2009: 113+.
Music Index. Web. 15 Nov. 2012
LUDWIG, ALEXANDER RAYMOND. "I Don't Sound Like Nobody: Remaking Music In 1950S America." Notes 68.2 (2011): 373-375. Music Index. Web. 15 Nov. 2012.
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