Professor Krugman
Theater Rocks
11/1/15
Electric Guitars in Rockabilly
Rockabilly is one of the oldest styles of rock and roll. It blends rock and roll with the music genre of bluegrass and country music, with the rhythm of blues music. It can be known for “hillbilly” music, but with the influence it has on today's music, it would not be labeled for “hillbillies”, and yet it had the beat of swing. In the book, “The Appearance of the Electric Bass Guitar: A Rockabilly Perspective” written by Roy C. Brewer, He writes about the different basses that were used in rockabilly which gave the genres sound. He explains how in the early 1950s, rockabilly was popular due to the fact they were one of the first genres to introduce rock …show more content…
Musicians would slap their instruments while they played to create a unique style and the roughness influenced later styles of rock and roll music. Different types of guitars and basses were used throughout this genres era. Once rockabilly died out, musicians tried to revive it in the 1970s and eventually rockabilly officially ended in the 1980s since classic rock and R&B was the new music genre craze at the time. The rockabillys aftermath caused the study of effects in technology. Mostly involving the electric instruments. The electric guitar was recognized slowly by popular music and was influenced by a man named Rickenbacker, who created a more amplified guitar. “So long before the early 1950s, when Leo Fender created his solid bodied Broadcaster and Gibson developed the Les Paul model, the electric guitar had begun a period of assimilation into vernacular musical styles. By 1954, electric guitarists had been influenced by the swinging low-string styles of Arthur "Guitar Boogie" Smith, single-note solo passages by Hank Williams's Sammy Pruett, and the finger-picking styles of Merle Travis and Chet Atkins.” (C.Brewer). Rockabilly also influenced R&B music because the genre adopted the instrument and uses it as the main source for its