The British Musical Experience

While in London our group traveled to a place called the O2, it was this massive area in the shape of a bubble, its outside was nothing compared to its insides. Outside it looks very normal, yet huge, but when you step inside, the bubble (as we call it) continued to grow. There were so many different things inside, I just wanted to venture off and explore everything, but I wasn't there for that, I had come to experience the British Musical Experience. At the British Musical Experience, I found that you experience a lot more than just fun and games. I had the chance to experience both musical evolution from the 1940's to the 00's, and the chance to "evolve" my own musical abilities. I felt as though I was time traveling from era to era, witnessing the changes progressing through the years. The Beatles are our main focus for the class, but the amount and type of information given was so different and up close it was hard not to stray away.

I found that the things that drew me in the most were the different musical instruments incorporated throughout the years. Having played flute and switching to a brass instrument I was able to connect on how it may have been difficult for the singers and song writers to have switched back and forth and incorporate these new instruments and styles. In the era From 1945 to 1962, you would find that more brass instruments were used, for example trumpets, saxophones and trombones. This era had a big jazzy feel and most of the music seemed to be very conservative, it was fun, upbeat, and fun to dance to, for example Chuck Berry. As mentioned Lonnie Donegan was one main attraction to the music scene. He is considered a main contributor to this era by performing in a skiffle band, which was a rock and roll inspired band that used cheap guitars and washboards. In and around this time rock and roll started to become more and more prone to attract the audience, so the jazzy bits were "jazzed" up a bit by a little more fast passed, guitar action, for example Elvis Presley. In 1962 to around 1966 the the typical music groups seemed to have been stripped back down to what would be considered a traditional band, a guitarist, drummer, bassist and singer. This was considered the time of "the British invasion" and where The Beatles really started to make their mark on history. In 1966-1970 I would personally consider a "hippie" type era, this is where you would start to see banjos, flutes, violins and occasionally a sitar. Around the time between 1970 and 1985 music started to become more populated by being electric guitar based. Music around this time became for focused on the fun and excitement of life. One of my favorite era of music began to appear around the time 1985 to 1993, this era tended to use music instruments of a more electric feel. It became very poppy, techno with fun dance beats and epic cheesy love songs. Approaching the end of the timeline in the British musical experience it was around the 90's to the 00's, here it seemed as though music had gained a little bit of everything through the years, electric sounds, original sounds, plain sounds, rock and roll sounds, jazzy sounds all incorporated into one major era. Brilliance I tell you, brilliance.

Guitars are probably one of the most common and famous instruments around, their sound along with the different things they can do are what make them so unique and compatible with voices, musical styles, and other instruments. This is one of the main instruments that The Beatles have started out on. Throughout the years, music may have changed its different instruments used, but the guitar was the one thing that stuck around. The guitar can even be shown as evolving itself. From being acoustic, to electric, and having different sounds evolve from it.

It's easy to tell that The Beatles impacted many groups and styles of music. In the way they dressed, wore their hair, sang their songs, wrote their songs, and even the way their personalities were. It's easy to say that many people are inspired by The Beatles, even if they weren't musical at all. I think it's just that they were not afraid to try something different, or imitate someone else, but by doing it in a different way. So I would say that the one thing I have gained from learning about the Beatles thus far, is just to challenge yourself, because you cannot go wrong from there.