Editing Doo-wop (section)

==Doo-wop and racial relations==
The synthesis of music styles that evolved into what is now called rhythm and blues, previously labeled "race music" by the record companies, found a broad youth audience in the postwar years and helped to catalyze changes in racial relations in American society. By 1948, RCA Victor was marketing black music under the name "Blues and Rhythm". In 1949, [[Jerry Wexler]], a reporter for ''Billboard'' magazine at the time, reversed the words and coined the name "Rhythm and Blues" to replace the term "Race Music" for the magazine's black music chart.<ref name="Gulla2008">{{cite book|author=Bob Gulla|title=Icons of R & B and Soul: An Encyclopedia of the Artists who Revolutionized Rhythm|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=pLgqFaYmgw8C&pg=RA1-PR11|date=16 January 2008|publisher=ABC-CLIO|isbn=978-0-313-34044-4|pages=xi–xii}}</ref>

One style of rhythm and blues was mostly vocal, with instrumental backing that ranged from a full orchestra to none. It was most often performed by a group, frequently a quartet, as in the black gospel tradition; utilizing close harmonies, this style was nearly always performed in a slow to medium tempo. The lead voice, usually one in the upper register, often sang over the driving, wordless chords of the other singers or interacted with them in a [[call-and-response]] exchange. Vocal harmony groups such as the Ink Spots embodied this style, the direct antecedent of doo-wop, which rose from inner city street corners in the mid-1950s and ranked high on the popular music charts between 1955 and 1959.<ref name="Modleski1986" />

Black and white young people both wanted to see popular doo-wop acts perform, and racially mixed groups of youths would stand on inner city street corners and sing doo-wop songs ''a capella''. This angered white supremacists, who considered rhythm and blues and rock and roll a danger to America's youth.<ref name="Hill1997">{{cite book|author=Mike Hill|title=Whiteness: A Critical Reader|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=lvwEfesT2jQC&pg=PA138|date=July 1997|publisher=NYU Press|isbn=978-0-8147-3545-9|page=138}}</ref><ref name="Peddie2020">{{cite book|author=David M. Jones|editor=Ian Peddie|title=The Bloomsbury Handbook of Popular Music and Social Class|chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=8GfDDwAAQBAJ&pg=PT768|date=6 February 2020|publisher=Bloomsbury Publishing|isbn=978-1-5013-4537-1|page=768|chapter=23, "Bring It on Home": Constructions of Social Class in Rhythm and Blues and Soul Music, 1949-1980}}</ref><ref name="Taruskin2006">{{cite book|author=[[Richard Taruskin]]|title=Music in the Late Twentieth Century: The Oxford History of Western Music|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=mWFmDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA313|date=14 August 2006|publisher=Oxford University Press|isbn=978-0-19-979593-2|pages=313–314}}</ref>

The development of rhythm and blues coincided with the issue of [[Racial segregation in the United States|racial segregation]] becoming more socially contentious in American society, while the black leadership increasingly challenged the old social order. The white power structure in American society and some executives in the corporately controlled entertainment industry saw rhythm and blues, rooted in black culture, as obscene,<ref name="Bertrand2000">{{cite book|author=Michael T. Bertrand|title=Race, Rock, and Elvis|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=keafptPvxYcC&pg=PA66|year=2000|publisher=University of Illinois Press|isbn=978-0-252-02586-0|pages=66–68}}</ref> and considered it a threat to white youth, among whom the genre was becoming increasingly popular.<ref name="Absher2014">{{cite book|author=Amy Absher|title=The Black Musician and the White City: Race and Music in Chicago, 1900-1967|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=amfAAwAAQBAJ&pg=PA101|date=16 June 2014|publisher=University of Michigan Press|isbn=978-0-472-11917-2|pages=101–103}}</ref>