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Impressionism
Late 19th century towards the start of the 20th centuary -
Ragtime Music
Originated in 1985 but peaked in popularity in early 1900's -
Igor Stravinsky finished his work The Firebird.
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World War 1
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Charles Ives completed his Fourth Symphony.
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Theremin invented
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Jazz Age
Ended with Great Depression -
In New York, Julliard School opened and George Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue premiered. In Paris, Maurice Ravel's Bolero opened.
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The Great Depression
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Arnold Schoenberg composed his Piano Suite, Opus 25 which was his first 12-tone work.
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Billie Holiday's stature as jazz singer was established.
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The debut of electric guitars.
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World War 2
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Frank Sinatra established himself as a solo performer.
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In 1951, Little Richard Penniman began recording for RCA Records in the jump blues style of late 1940s Joe Brown and Billy Wright.
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Elvis Presley establishes himself as the icon of rock n' roll.
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Vietnam War
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Motown Music
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The Beatles were an English rock band that formed in Liverpool, in 1960
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Folk Music Revival
By the 1960s, the scene that had developed out of the American folk music revival had grown to a major movement, utilizing traditional music and new compositions in a traditional style, usually on acoustic instruments. In America the genre was pioneered by figures such as Woody Guthrie and Pete Seeger and often identified with progressive or labour politics. In the early sixties figures such as Bob Dylan and Joan Baez had come to the fore in this movement as singer-songwriters. -
British musical movement
By the end of 1962, the British rock scene had started with beat groups like the Beatles drawing on a wide range of American influences including soul music, rhythm and blues and surf music -
Surf Rock
In the early 1960s, one of the most popular forms of rock and roll was Surf Rock, which was characterized by being nearly entirely instrumental and by heavy use of reverb on the guitars. The spring reverb featured in Fender amplifiers of the day, cranked to its maximum volume, produced a guitar tone shimmering with sustain and evoking surf and ocean imagery. -
British Pyschedelia
British psychedelia emerged during the mid-1960s, was influenced by psychedelic culture and attempted to replicate and enhance the mind-altering experiences of hallucinogenic drugs. The movement drew on non-Western sources such as Indian music's ragas and sitars as well as studio effects and long instrumental passages and surreal lyrics. Established British artists such as Eric Burdon, the Who, Cream, Pink Floyd and the Beatles produced a number of highly psychedelic tunes during the decade -
Garage Rock
Garage rock was a raw form of rock music, particularly prevalent in North America in the mid-1960s and is called such because of the perception that many of the bands rehearsed in a suburban family garage.Garage rock songs often revolved around the traumas of high school life, with songs about "lying girls" being particularly common -
Rise of Disco
In North America, Europe, and Oceania, the decade saw the rise of disco, which became one of the biggest genres of the decade, especially in the mid-to-late 1970s -
Country begins to mix and combine with Rock
Country rock, formed from the fusion of rock music with Country music, gained its greatest commercial success in the 1970s, beginning with non-country artists such as Bob Dylan, Gram Parsons, and The Byrds. By the mid-1970s, Linda Ronstadt, along with other newer artists such as Emmylou Harris and The Eagles, were enjoying mainstream success and popularity that continues to this day. The Eagles themselves emerged as one of the most successful rock acts of all time, producing albums that included -
Punk Rock
The mid-1970s saw the rise of punk music from its protopunk-garage band roots in the 1960s and early 1970s. The Ramones and Blondie were some of the earliest American Punk rock acts to make it big in both the United Kingdom and the United States. -
Soft Rock
Some of the more notable pop/soft rock groups during the 1970s were the Carpenters, the Jackson 5, Bay City Rollers, The Guess Who, The Osmonds, and Queen. -
R&B and urban
Along with disco, funk was one of the most popular genres of music in the 1970s. Primarily an African-American genre, it was characterized by the heavy use of bass and "wah-wah" pedals. Rhythm was emphasized over melody. Artists such as James Brown, The Meters, Parliament-Funkadelic and Sly And The Family Stone pionered the genre. -
Rise of new genres with the new decade
The 1980s saw the emergence of pop, dance music and new wave. As the term disco fell out of fashion in the decade's early years, genres such as post-disco, Italo disco, Euro disco and dance-pop became more popular. Rock music continued to enjoy a wide audience. Sub-genres such as new wave,soft rock, and glam metal and shred guitar characterized by heavy distortion, pinch harmonics and whammy bar abuse became very popular. Adult contemporary, quiet storm, and smooth jazz gained -
Rap rising in popularity, new instruments used in music more often
The 1980s are commonly using digital recording, associated with the usage of synthesizers, with synthpop music and other electronic genres featuring non-traditional instruments increasing in popularity. Also during this decade, several major electronic genres were developed, including electro, techno, house, freestyle and Eurodance, rising in prominence during the 1990s and beyond. Throughout the decade, R&B, hip hop and urban genres were becoming commonplace, particularly in the inner-city area -
Popstars becoming very famous
The 1980s saw the reinvention of Michael Jackson, the superstardom of Prince and the emergence of Madonna, Whitney Houston, & Janet Jackson—who were all the most successful musicians during this time. -
Alternative Rock
By 1984, a majority of groups signed to independent record labels were mining from a variety of rock and particularly 1960s rock influences. This represented a sharp break from the futuristic, hyper rational post-punk years. -
Bob Marley's birthday is celebrated as a holiday for the first time in Jamaica
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Nirvana emerges as new Rock stats
With the breakthrough of bands such as Nirvana and the popularity of the grunge and Britpop movements in the 1990s, alternative rock entered the musical mainstream and many alternative bands became commercially successful during the 1990s. -
Kurt Cobain's death
This marked a decline in the rise of Grunge music
