where i got my musical taste
I’m the only person I’ve ever known whose fave music genres are–wait for it–folk and R&B. Go figure.
I figure it’s a matter of having been raised by lefty liberal ‘rents who brought me up on their impressive record collection, some of which were the pre-33+1/3 78 RPMs discs that included everything from very traditional music (the likes of Richard Dyer-Bennett, pre-pop Burl Ives, Woody G, Seeger, The Weavers, Josh White, Leadbelly, Jean Ritchie to Bach (and the rest of the classical gang), Rodgers & Hammerstein musicals, West Side Story, My Fair Lady, songs of the Spanish Civil War, to Harry Belafonte and pre-straight-ahead (i.e., I don’t think they owned any Trane albums) jazz.
Get it? Their taste was the definition of eclectic. And you couldn’t live in the Philly area without being exposed to a lot of what we called “soul,” though later I learned it was known as “R&B” in most of the world. I still remember having The Four Tops’ Sugar Pie Honey Bunch lyric stuck in my head when it was a hit while I sat bored in typing class in high school. (Not surprisingly, my idea of a great rock band is the most evidently R&B-influenced Young Rascals, who became the Rascals.)
Philly, along with Memphis, Detroit, New Orleans, et al., was an active place on the R&B/Soul map.) Oddly enough, despite Philly’s “toughness” as a city, the sound of its music is “softer” than that of the other places on the R&B map. Think Teddy Pendergrass, Patti LaBelle, The O'Jays, The Delfonics …
As I look back, my favorite place on said map is Memphis. Hard to beat their crew: Otis Redding, Al Green, Wilson Pickett, Sam & Dave and more. While accompanying my younger son at an AAU basketball tourney there while he was in 7th?/8th? grade, I visited the church where Al Green was pastor. Alas, The Reverend was not present. Al’s hits were not ordinary musically. Think Let’s Stay Together, Tired of Being Alone, Love and Happiness, I’m Still in Love With You and more.
On the other proverbial hand, I never stopped being deeply moved by compelling folk music. It helped to be hitting my teen years in the midst of the early ‘60s folk revival. Some guy who started out as “Zimmerman” exploded on the scene, with him, Ms. Baez, Tom Paxton, Phil Ochs and others grabbing a mic and moving on to topical songs from the trad stuff that the likes of The Kingston Trio and The Limeliters had brought to our attention. It’s hard to beat the “compellingness” of that era’s protest music—‘twas like a “topical” ointment. When the likes of The Byrds came along and rockified those tunes, there was no resisting the sound.
Then some group from Liverpool came along with a punny name combining a musical and insect reference. They showed us that the rock sound didn’t have to be formulaic. And their main Brit competitors, using a name taken from a song by bluesman Muddy Waters, taught those of us on this side of the pond to better appreciate our gutsy blues/R&B tunes.
Interestingly (to me, at least), because my musical taste before the family’s move in ‘68 from Philly to Chapel Hill included that old folk sound, upon making the move I was captivated by the strong local Old Time (see also bluegrass, Appalachian, et al.) music scene. The catalog brought to mind so much of the folk music I’d grown up falling for.
Finally, a mere 20 or 30 years ago, I learned to appreciate what those hip enough call straight-ahead jazz, and figured out that the greatest musical geniuses of all time are Johann Sebastian Bach, Miles Davis, Thelonius Monk and John Coltrane, with the latter two being from right here, meaning the Tar Heel State.
What an odysseyesque journey! In case you weren’t aware, music is extremely good for you, especially when times (such as these) are fraught.
Rob Gelblum is a recovering lawyer and practicing musician.