How Did Blues Music Develop

When most people think of the blues they usually don’t think of Africa or Africans but what might surprise you is that Blues music was developed by African Americans in the early 19th century and the early 20th century. Blues evolved from a genre of unaccompanied vocal music sung by destitute African-American workers. In America Blues music originated from “African spirituals, African chants, work songs, field hollers, rural fife and drum music, revivalist hymns, and country dance music.” Blues in America originated on southern plantations, where the slaves would sing songs as they worked in the cotton and vegetable plantations.” www.allaboutjazz.com
So unlike jazz, blues music didn’t spread out as significantly from the South to the Midwest until 1930 and 1940. The Delta blues, which was the earliest version of the blues, started at this time. . This type of blues originated in the Mississippi Delta, a region
We have Boogie-woogie Blues which is basically a form of blues that consists of a piano style that developed from the stride piano. This style was especially famous during WWII. Another type of blues is the Chicago blues. The Chicago= blues is described as the amplified. The west side of Chicago blues style used high energy guitar work. The third type of blues is the country blues. The country blues can be described as “a hybrid category that includes elements of R&B, Louisiana swamp boogie, Piedmont, gospel, and country.”. The fourth type of blues is called Delta blues. Delta blues is the earliest type of blues. They use guitar and harmonica. The last type of blues I'm going to talk to is called New Orleans Blues. “Louisiana Blues is a style that includes many different types of rhythms, including Latin rhumba and the almost country-like zydeco beat. New Orleans was the melting pot of most musical influences in America, so the music of Louisiana combines Cajun, Creole, Zydeco Latin, marches, swing, and