THIS IS THE BLUES

Blues is a genre and musical form created by African Americans in the far south of the USA around the end of the 19th century. The genre is specific from roots of African musical traditions, African American work songs, spiritual and traditional music.

Blues is the cornerstone of American root music. It is considered a musical genre and folk music. Blue Grass, Country music, Jazz, Jug Band, Rag time, Rhytm and Blues are derivative forms of the Blues.

The Blues in essence is the music of blacks taken from Africa to the US to work as slaves on cotton plantations in the south of the country. With the Blues came the main characteristic of jazz, an improvisation.

The Blues form, ubiquitous in jazz, rhytm and blues, and rock ‘n’ roll, is characterized by call and response pattern, blues scale, and specific chord progressions of which twelve-bar is the most common. .

Blue Note is a note sung or played with a timbre slightly lower than that of the major scale, which makes the note sound distinctly sad and melancholy. The very word “blues” in English is synonymous with melancholy. Prominent blues figure, Robert Johnson is considered the father of the Blues, and responsible for the beginning of the spread of the genre, traveling from the South to the North of the USA spreading the blues. Many others continued with this work of spreading the rhythm, the best known being B.B. King (1925-2015).

A highlight is the diffusion of rhythm throughout the USA, creating quite expressive strands such as the Chicago Blues, represented by figures such as John Lee Hoocker and Buddy Guy, with a spicier and nastier form of lyrics in the songs. THIS IS THE BLUES!

Riley Ben King, mais conhecido como B. B. King, (Itta Bena, 16 de setembro de 1925 – Las Vegas, 14 de maio de 2015) foi um guitarrista de blues, compositor e cantor estadunidense. O “B. B.” em seu nome significa Blues Boy, seu pseudônimo como moderador na rádio W. Foi considerado, ao lado de Eric Clapton e Jimi Hendrix, um dos melhores guitarristas do mundo pela revista norte-americana Rolling Stone. Ao longo da sua carreira, B.B. King foi distinguido com 15 prémios Grammy, tendo sido o criador de um estilo musical único e que faria dele um dos músicos mais respeitados e influentes de blues, tendo ganho o epíteto de Rei dos Blues.