Notes
- Dickson , Lovat . 1975 . Radclyffe Hall at the Well of Loneliness , 45 – 46 . London : Collins .
- See Whitcomb Ian After the Ball Penguin Harmondsworth 1972 and Charlie Gillett, The Sound of the City, London: Souvenir Press, 1971.
- Terms used by an American congressional Committee on song publishing, cited in Etzkorn K. Peter On esthetic standards and reference groups of popular songwriters Sociological Inquiry 1966 36 1 39 47
- Etzkorn , K. Peter . 1963 . Social context of songwriters in the United States . Ethnomusicology , VII ( 2 ) : 103 – 104 .
- Peatman , J.G. 1942–3 . “ Radio and popular music ” . In Radio Research , Edited by: Lazersfeld , P.F. and Stanton , F. New York : Duell, Sloan & Pearce . in
- Mooney , H.F. 1954 . Song, singers and society, 1890–1954 . American Quarterly , 6 : 226 – 226 .
- Mooney , H.F. 1968 . Popular music since the 1920s . American Quarterly , 20
- Mooney . 1954 . Popular music since the 1920s . American Quarterly , 20 : 232 – 232 .
- See Horton D. The dialogue of courtship in popular song American Journal of Sociology 1957 62 J.T. Carey, “Changing courtship patterns in the popular song”, American Journal of Sociology, 74, 1969; R.R. Cole, “Top songs in the sixties: a content analysis”, American Behavioural Scientist, 14, 1971. In recent years the most prolific content analyst, B. Lee Cooper, has traced a variety of ideological issues through pop and rock songs, though he seems less concerned to chart changing values than to point to the recurring problems of American ideology. For a summary account of his work see his A Resource Guide to Themes in Contemporary American Song Lyrics, London: Greenwood, 1986. Very little similar work seems to have been done in Britain but for the 1950s/1960s contrast see Antony Bicat: “Fifties children: sixties people”, in V. Bogdanor and R. Skidelski (eds), The Age of Affluence 1957–64, London: Macmillan, 1970, and for the rock/punk contrast in the 1970s see Dave Laing, One Chord Wonders, Milton Keynes: Open University Press, 1985, p. 63–73.
- For an interesting use of music hall material this way see Jones G. Stedman Working-class culture and working-class politics in London 1870–1900 Journal of Social History 1974 7 4
- Di Maggio , P. , Peterson , R.A. and Esco , J. 1972 . “ Country music: ballad of the silent majority ” . In The Sounds of Social Change , Edited by: Denisoff , R.S. and Peterson , R.A. Chicago : Rand McNally . in
- Haralambos , M. 1974 . Right On: From Blues to Soul in Black America , 117 – 117 . London : Eddison .
- Haralambos , M. 1974 . Right On: From Blues to Soul in Black America , 125 – 125 . London : Eddison .
- “Real closeness” is a term used by Richard Hoggart to distinguish authentic from commercial working-class ballads — see The Uses of Literacy Penguin Harmondsworth 1958 223 224
- Hughes , D. 1964 . “ Recorded music ” . In Discrimination and Popular Culture , Edited by: Thompson , D. 165 – 165 . Harmondsworth : Penguin . in
- Hoggart . 1958 . The Uses of Literacy , 229 – 229 . Harmondsworth : Penguin .
- Mellers , W. 1964 . Music in a New Found Land , 384 – 384 . London : Faber .
- Lee , E. 1970 . Music of the People , 250 – 250 . London : Barrie & Jenkins . For a Marxist reading of the “genteely romantic” bourgeois ideology of British pop music until rock ‘n’ roll began to use blues and folk idioms that expressed “bottom dog conciousness” and to “speak for the excluded and rebellious”, see Eric Hobsbawm: Industry and Empire, Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1968, p. 284.
- Harker , Dave . 1980 . One for the Money , 48 – 48 . London : Hutchinson .
- Harker , Dave . 1980 . One for the Money , 61 – 61 . London : Hutchinson .
- Goddard , T. , Pollock , J. and Fudger , M. 1977 . “ Popular music ” . In Is This Your Life? , Edited by: King , J. and Stott , M. 143 – 143 . London : Virago . in
- Greer , Germaine . 1971 . The Female Eunuch , 164 – 164 . London : Paladin .
- Hoggart . 1958 . The Uses of Literacy , 163 – 163 . Harmondsworth : Penguin .
- Harker . 1980 . One for the Money , 129 – 129 . London : Hutchinson .
- Hayakawa , S.I. 1955 . Popular songs vs. the facts of life . Etc. , 12 : 84 – 84 .
- Newton , Francis . 1961 . The Jazz Scene , 162 – 162 . Harmondsworth : Penguin .
- Eisler , Hans . 1978 . A Rebel in Music , 191 – 191 . New York : International Publishers .
- Palmer , R. 1974 . A Touch of the Times , 8 – 8 . Harmondsworth : Penguin . 18, and A.L. Lloyd, Folk Song in England, London: Paladin, 1975, p. 158, 170.
- Lloyd . 1975 . Folk Song in England , 369 – 369 . London : Paladin .
- For full discussion of these issues see Harker Dave Fake Song Open University Press Milton Keyes 1985 and Vic Gammon, “Folk song collecting in Sussex and Surrey, 1843–1914”, History Workshop, 10, 1980.
- See Harker One for the Money Hutchinson London 1980 189 189
- Taylor , J. and Laing , D. 1979 . Disco-pleasure-discourse . Screen Education , 31 : 46 – 46 .
- Oliver , Paul . 1963 . Meaning of the Blues , 68 – 68 . New York : Collier . And see Iain Lang, Background of the Blues, Workers' Music Association, London, 1943, and Samuel Charters, The Poetry of the Blues, New York: Oak, 1963.
- Keil , Charles . 1966 . Urban Blues , 74 – 74 . Chicago : University of Chicago Press .
- Oliver . 1963 . Meaning of the Blues , 133 – 134 . New York : Collier . 140 and Newton, op. cit., p. 145–6.
- Johnson , Linton Kwesi . 1976 . Jamaican rebel music . Race and Class , 17 : 398 – 398 .
- See Ames R. Protest and irony in Negro folk song Science and Society 1949 14
- Newton . 1961 . The Jazz Scene , 150 – 150 . Harmondsworth : Penguin . and Johnson, op. cit., p. 411.
- Garon , Paul . 1975 . Blues and the Poetic Spirit , London : Eddison .
- Garon , Paul . 1975 . Blues and the Poetic Spirit , 21 – 21 . London : Eddison . 26, 76, 64.
- Ames . 1949 . Protest and irony in Negro folk song . Science and Society , 14 : 197 – 197 .
- Garon . 1975 . Blues and the Poetic Spirit , 167 – 167 . London : Eddison .
- Hoare , Ian . 1975 . “ Mighty Mighty Spade and Whitey: black lyrics and soul's interaction with white culture ” . In The Soul Book Edited by: Hoare , I. 157 – 157 . New York in 162.
- Lang . 1943 . Background of the Blues , 39 – 39 . London : Workers' Music Association . For a suggestive general study of “oral poetry” see Ruth Finnegan, Oral Poetry, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1977.
- See Brown Claude The language of soul Black America Resh R. D.C. Heath Lexington 1969 in Ulf Hannerz, Soulside, New York: Columbia University Press, 1969; Geneva Smitherman, Talkin' and Testifyin', The Language of Black America, Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1977; David Toop, The Rap Attack, London: Pluto, 1984.
- For an unusually intelligent version of this argument see Guaralnick Peter Feel Like Going Home Vintage New York 1971 22 23
- Pichaske , David . 1981 . Beowulf to the Beatles and Beyond , xiii – xiii . New York : Macmillan . (quoting the 1972 edition). And see Richard Goldstein, The Poetry of Rock, New York: Bantam, 1969; B.F. Groves and D.J. McBain, Lyric Voices: Approaches to the Poetry of Contemporary Song, New York: John Wiley, 1972; Bob Sarlin, Turn It Up (I Can't Hear the Words), New York: Simon & Schuster, 1973; Matt Damsker (ed.), Rock Voices! The Best Lyrics of an Era, New York: St Martins Press, 1980.
- For a brilliantly detailed discussion of Dylan's poetic sources see Gray Michael Song and Dance Man: The Art of Bob Dylan Hamlyn London 1981
- Rosenstone , R.R. 1969 . ‘The Times they are A-Changing’: the music of protest . Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science , 382 The English poet Thom Gunn, writing in 1967, suggested that the Beatles represented a completely new pop sensibility, and had at last seen off Tin Pan Alley, “the fag-end of the Petrarchan tradition”. The change had come with the line “I've been working like a dog”. “As soon as that line had been written immense possibilities became apparent. For what lover in a Sinatra song ever works at a job?” (The Listener, 3 August 1967).
- Nelson , Paul . 1979 . “ The pretender ” . In Stranded , Edited by: Marcus , G. 120 – 120 . New York : Knopf . in
- Gershwin , Ira . 1977 . Lyrics on Several Occasions , 112 – 113 . London : Elm Tree .
- Riesman , David . 1950 . Listening to popular music . American Quarterly , 2 : 360 – 361 .
- Denzin , Norman . 1969 . Problems in analysing elements of mass culture: notes on the popular song and other artistic productions . American Journal of Sociology , 75 And see J. Johnstone and E. Katz, “Youth and popular music: a study of taste”, American Journal of Sociology, 62, 1957.
- Robinson , J.P. and Hirsch , P.M. 1972 . “ Teenage responses to rock and roll protest songs ” . In The Sounds of Social Change , Edited by: Denisoff and Peterson . 231 – 231 . Chicago : Rand McNally . in R.S. Denisoff and M. Levine, “Brainwashing or background noise? The popular protest song”, in the same collection; S. Frith, The Sociology of Rock, London: Constable, 1978.
- Hirsch , Paul . 1971 . Sociological approaches to the pop music phenomenon . American Behavioural Scientist , 14 and R.A. Peterson and D.G. Berger, “Three eras in the manufacture of popular music lyrics”, in Denisoff and Peterson, op. cit., p. 283, 296.
- Hirsch , Paul . 1971 . Sociological approaches to the pop music phenomenon . American Behavioural Scientist , 14 : 298 – 298 . and see J. Ryan and R.A. Peterson, “The product image: the fate of creativity in country music songwriting”, Sage Annual Review of Communication Research, 10, 1982.
- For a very interesting discussion of Bob Dylan's “meaning” in Germany see Anderson Dennis The Hollow Horn: Bob Dylan's Reception in the US and Germany Hobo Press Munich 1981 chs. 9, 20.
- For detailed readings of lyrics in performance see, for example, the comparison of Kate Bush's “The Kick Inside” and Millie Jackson's “He Wants to Hear the Words”, in Frith S. McRobbie A. Rock and sexuality Screen Education 1978 29 and the psychoanalytical account of Buddy Holly's “Peggy Sue” in B. Bradby and B. Torode, “Pity Peggy Sue”, Popular Music, 4, 1984. For general discussions see S. Frith, Sound Effects, New York: Pantheon, 1981, p. 34–38; Alan Durant, Conditions of Music, London: Macmillan, 1984, p. 186–95, 201–11; and the introduction to Mark Booth, The Experience of Song, New Haven: Yale University Press, 1981.
- This approach has been developed most interestingly in the Italian work of Franco Fabbri and Umberto Fiori. See, for example, Fabbri's A theory of musical genres: two applications Popular Music Perspectives Horn D. Tagg P. IASPM Gothenburg and Exeter 1982 in From a continental European perspective one of the more intriguing aspects of contemporary pop lyrics is their use of a “foreign” language, English. One of the defining features of the punk music that swept Europe in the late 1970s was its use of the different performers' “native” tongues — the question rose as to what, in pop and rock, is a native tongue. Dave Laing suggests that even in Britain it meant bands determinedly not singing in “American” — see Laing, op. cit., p. 54–9.
- See Winner L. Trout mask replica Stranded Marcus Knopf New York 1979 120 120 in
- Lodge , D. 1980 . “ Where it's at: California language ” . In The State of the Language , Edited by: Michaels , L. and Ricks , C. 506 – 506 . Berkeley : University of California Press . in and see C. Ricks, “Clichés” in the same collection; B. Bergonzi, Reading the Thirties, London: Macmillan, 1978, ch. 6; and C. Ricks, “Can this really be the end?”, in E.M. Thompson (ed.), Conclusions on the Wall: New Essays on Bob Dylan, Manchester: Thin Man, 1980.
- James , Clive . 1972 . The Beatles . Cream , October
- Fuller , Roy . 1973 . Professors and Gods , 86 – 86 . London : André Deutsch . Compare Ace's solution to the same problem in their hit song, “How Long?” Their more maudlin emphasis is on the initial syllable: “Hów lňg, hăs this beěn góiňg ōn.” Stephen Sondheim suggests another example of the precise attention to words necessary in good lyric writing: The opening line of Porgy and Bess by Dubose Heyward is “Summertime and the livin' is easy” — and that “and” is worth a great deal of attention. I would write “Summertime when” but that “and” sets up a tone, a whole poetic tone, not to mention a whole kind of diction that is going to be used in the play; an informal, uneducated diction and a stream of consciousness… The choices of “and”s and “but”s become almost traumatic as you are writing a lyric — or should anyway — because each one weighs so much. (S. Sondheim, “Theatre Lyrics”, in G. Martin (ed.), Making Music, London: Muller, 1983, p. 75.)
- Laing , D. 1971 . Buddy Holly , 58 – 59 . London : Studio Vista .
- Quoted in Mellers Music in a New Found Land Faber London 1964 379 379
- Horton . 1957 . The dialogue of courtship in popular song . American Journal of Sociology , 62 : 577 – 577 .
- Elvis Costello interview in New Musical Express 1982 August 10 10 21 And see Steve Coombes, “In the mood”, Times Educational Supplement, 12 February 1982, p. 23. He writes: Writing for shows, thirties lyric writers were in both the best and worst senses of the word in the business of creating fictions. The moods of their lyrics do not reflect emotions they had actually felt nor that they expected anyone to think that they had felt nor even that they expected anyone else to feel for that matter. Nothing would have disturbed the cosmopolitan Cole Porter more than the idea that people might think that he actually did sit and moon over lost love — that emphatically was not his style. The moods of thirties lyrics are about what you ought to have felt or more accurately what you might like to have felt given the chance to think about it. Paradoxically, then, the tone is at the same time extremely sophisticated yet highly idealised.
- Quoted in Eisler A Rebel in Music International Publishers New York 1978 189 190