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===Blues and gospel=== {{Main|Blues|gospel music}} {{Listen |filename = Maple Leaf RagQ.ogg |title = "Maple Leaf Rag" |description = Ragtime composition by Scott Joplin |filename2 = |title2 = "Down by the Riverside" |description2 = Popular song by gospel singer Mahalia Jackson }} [[File:Philip Paul Bliss, 1838-1876, head-and-shoulders portrait, facing left LCCN2005678063.jpg|thumb|upright|left|[[Philip Paul Bliss]]]] The blues is a genre of African American folk music that is the basis for much of modern American popular music. Blues can be seen as part of a continuum of musical styles like country, jazz, ragtime, and gospel; though each genre evolved into distinct forms, their [[origins of the blues|origins]] were often indistinct. Early forms of the blues evolved in and around the Mississippi Delta in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The earliest blues music was primarily [[Call and response (music)|call and response]] vocal music, without harmony or accompaniment and without any formal musical structure. Slaves and their descendants created the blues by adapting the field shouts and hollers, turning them into passionate solo songs.<ref>Garofalo, p. 36.</ref> When mixed with the Christian [[spiritual (music)|spiritual]] songs of African American churches and revival meetings, blues became the basis of [[gospel music]]. Modern gospel began in African American churches in the 1920s, in the form of worshipers proclaiming their faith in an improvised, often musical manner (testifying). Composers like [[Thomas A. Dorsey]] composed gospel works that used elements of blues and jazz in traditional hymns and spiritual songs.<ref>Kempton, p. 9β18.</ref> [[File:BB King onstage (Toronto, 2007).jpg|thumb|right|Blues singer [[B.B. King]]]] Ragtime was originally a piano style, featuring syncopated rhythms and [[chromaticism]]s.<ref name="Rolling"/> It is primarily a form of dance music utilizing the [[walking bass]], and is generally composed in [[sonata form]]. Ragtime is a refined and evolved form of the African American [[cakewalk]] dance, mixed with styles ranging from European marches<ref>Schuller, Gunther, p. 24, cited in Garofalo, p. 26.</ref> and popular songs to [[jig]]s and other dances played by large African American bands in northern cities during the end of the 19th century. The most famous ragtime performer and composer was [[Scott Joplin]], known for works such as "Maple Leaf Rag".<ref name="Garofalo">Garofalo, p. 26.</ref> [[File:Janis Joplin - Cash Box 1968.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[Janis Joplin]] known for her raw, soulful voice and emotional delivery.]] Blues became a part of American popular music in the 1920s, when [[classic female blues]] singers like [[Bessie Smith]] grew popular. At the same time, record companies launched the field of [[race music]], which was mostly blues targeted at African American audiences. The most famous of these acts went on to inspire much of the later popular development of the blues and blues-derived genres, including the legendary [[delta blues]] musician [[Robert Johnson]] and [[Piedmont blues]] musician [[Blind Willie McTell]]. By the end of the 1940s, however, pure blues was only a minor part of popular music, having been subsumed by offshoots like rhythm & blues and the nascent rock and roll style. Some styles of electric, piano-driven blues, like [[boogie-woogie]], retained a large audience. A bluesy style of gospel also became popular in mainstream America in the 1950s, led by singer [[Mahalia Jackson]].<ref name="Werner">Werner.</ref> The blues genre experienced major revivals in the 1950s with [[Chicago blues]] musicians such as [[Muddy Waters]] and [[Little Walter]],{{sfn|Gilliland|1969|loc=show 4}} as well as in the 1960s in the [[British Invasion]] and [[American folk music revival]] when [[country blues]] musicians like [[Mississippi John Hurt]] and [[Reverend Gary Davis]] were rediscovered. The seminal blues musicians of these periods had tremendous influence on rock musicians such as [[Chuck Berry]] in the 1950s, as well as on the [[British blues]] and [[blues rock]] scenes of the 1960s and 1970s, including [[Eric Clapton]] in Britain and [[Johnny Winter]] in Texas.
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