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Music

Timeline

1900–1919 ∼ Changing Culture and Wartime Years

Rise of ragtime / Cohan’s musicals / Development of dissonance / Emergence of the Country Blues

MILESTONES: Director D.W. Griffith produces the first feature length film, The Great Train Robbery, which lasted eleven minutes (1903) • Last yellow fever epidemic in the U.S. strikes New Orleans (1905) • Gibson Girl anticipates the modern woman’s wardrobe (1909) • First voice communication by radio (1914)

1920–1929 ∼ The Jazz Age

Tin Pan Alley Music Publishers / Irving Berlin’s songwriting / Cole Porter’s sophisticated songwriting / Harlem Renaissance / Experimental art music / Louis Armstrong and King Oliver / Development of “Stride” Piano Music / Trend Toward “Sweet Jazz” / Urban or Vaudeville Blues / Hillbilly Music / Rise in recording and radio broadcast

MILESTONES: Commercial sponsors advertise on radio programs (1920s) • Helena Rubenstein and Elizabeth Arden start their cosmetic business (early 1920s) • Bessie Coleman becomes first African American female pilot, earning her license in France because of segregation in the U.S. (1921) • The Jazz Singer, first talking picture, is released (1927) • Vladimir Zworykin, a Russian, demonstrates the first completely electronic practical television system (1929)

1930–1939 ∼ Don’t Sing Me No Depression Blues

Vaudeville / Blues / Sweet Jazz / Big Bands and Swing / Popularity of Gospel Music / Latin Big Band Sound emerges

MILESTONES: Unemployment is 24.9 percent; 9,000 banks fail; 100,000 businesses fail (1932–1933) • Alcoholics Anonymous founded in New York City (1935) • Jesse Owens wins four gold medals at the Olympic Games (1936) • African American Marian Anderson sings before 75,000 at the Lincoln Memorial (1939)

1940–1949 ∼ War and Peace

Swing / Electric Blues / Country-Western / Bluegrass / Cajun and Zydeco, Modern Jazz and Bebop

MILESTONES: World War II restricts production of consumer goods (1941–1945) • Five million women join the workforce (1942–1944) • Frank Sinatra draws thousands of “bobby-soxers” to concerts (1943) • First television sets go on sale (1946)

1950–1959 ∼ Nashville

Progressive Jazz / Development of Rhythm and Blues / Emergence of the Nashville Sound / Rockabilly / Elvis Presley releases first single (1956)

MILESTONES: Korean War (1950–1953) • First coast-to-coast television broadcast (1951) • I Love Lucy premieres (1951) • Disneyland opens (1955) • Montgomery Bus Boycott propels Martin Luther King, Jr.

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