The History of Blues and Rock 'N' Roll

Blues vs. Rock and Roll “You can’t play the blues, until you’ve paid your dues” (Spencer 41), said by the originator of the blues W.C. Handy. The blues is a music style that influenced America in many ways eventually coming to create rock and roll. The true originators of the blues go back to African slaves brought to America to work on plantations. As these slaves gained freedom and acceptance in the big cities blues developed its own unique style. This unique style gained popularity amongst the white community creating an opportunity for record labels to make a profit. Once the blues went nationwide white musicians took the blues style and techniques creating rock and roll. Some argue that rock and roll was only a lame attempt at duplicating the blues which could never be understood in the white community. Others argue that rock and roll artists stole the creativity of blues musicians to make their own profit. My argument is to find out whether or not the blues was stolen from African Americans and whether the blues was the property of African Americans not to be used by whites. Whatever the case, the blues changed how other’s viewed music and brought a whole new vibe to its white listeners.
To settle the argument over whether or not the blues was something that belonged to blacks we must find out where the blues came from. If you want to find the origin of the blues you must look back to West Africa before its people were introduced to the European and American society. African Natives were isolated from the rest of the world, because it was too early to have technology for travel. Due to this isolation they created their own unique form of speech and music. The key element of West African music was rhythm, not melody and harmony. Instead of the European melodic harmonies, West African music was surrounded by rhythm. “The core of European music was to embellish a melody with a number of melodic instruments, and incidentally set a rhythm. The European aspect