As it heads towards 3 million tracks, I thought I’d see how broad Spotify’s range of music was: could I build a playlist that had tracks to represent each key musical genre, from the beginning of recorded music up until today? Turns out I could get pretty close:
This Spotify playlist provides a spotted history of humankind’s music: from the very first beat to the invention of musical instruments; from mouth music to dark age medievals and the classical symphonies, then the 20th century goes rock, pop, and electro.
Each song in this playlist demonstrates the introduction of a new popular musical form or style: from music hall, ragtime, and country, through calypso, swing, and rock & roll; from reggae and punk to disco, electro-pop, rap, funk, and indie. Finally the samplers pump up the volume, while madchester, grunge and britpop bring us in to our own century. Viva la Musica!
Also uploaded to:
http://www.sharemyplaylists.com/afronts-sensational-history-of-popular-music/
UPDATE (20 March 2009)
Here is a track-by-track breakdown with notes on why each song was chosen:
| YEAR | TRACK | NOTES |
| 0 | Unspecified – Human Sounds – Heartbeats | The first beat. |
| 2 | Joe Legwabe – zana shiri | The second beat. |
| 3 | Shambukaw player from Eritrea – Flute Solo | The flute is the oldest known musical instrument. |
| 4 | Early Music Consort Of London – Lyre – Goliard melody (O Roma nobilis) | The lyre is the oldest known stringed musical instrument. Eventually evolves into the electric guitar. |
| 1000 | Penguin Café Orchestra – Organum | The Middle Ages sees the invention of true polyphonic music, a texture consisting of two or more independent melodic voices. |
| 1500 | Dead Can Dance – Saltarello | Medieval Europe’s pop pick, especially in Italian discos. |
| 1707 | Bach – Toccata and Fugue in D minor BWV565: Toccata | One of the most famous pieces of organ music from the classical Baroque period. |
| 1808 | Beethoven – Symphony No. 5 in C minor, Op. 67 (Beethoven’s Fifth) | Da da da daaah. |
| 1893 | The Patriotic Orchestra – The Liberty Bell | Sousa’s military march was one of many spawned from the new tradition of playing marches as a source of entertainment. |
| 1902 | Scott Joplin – The Entertainer | Ragtime, the first American musical genre. |
| 1926 | Al Jolson – I’m Sitting On The Top Of The World | Al Jolson came from Vaudeville to become a superstar who introduced African-American musical innovations like jazz, ragtime, and the blues to white audiences. |
| 1927 | Jimmie Rodgers – Blue Yodel # 1 (T. For Texas) | This song was a smash hit when it came out, mostly because no-one had ever heard yodeling before. Co-incidentally, it also invents Country and Western music. |
| 1937 | Benny Goodman – Sing, Sing, Sing | Big-Band and Swing grows from Jazz; this extended mix required both sides of a 12-inch 78 to hold it. |
| 1941 | The Ink Spots – I Don’t Want To Set The World On Fire | We’re still enjoying the fallout of this wonderful cover from this band that invented Doo-wop. |
| 1941 | The Andrews Sisters – Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy | A wartime radio song, boogie-woogie’s blues sound grew from music hall and swing. |
| 1945 | Joe Liggins & His Honeydrippers – The Honeydripper (Part 1) | Ostensibly an R&B song, this track is clearly proto-Rock & Roll. |
| 1956 | Harry Belafonte – Banana Boat Song (Day-O) | This song brought Jamaican calypso (albeit a commercialized version) to the masses. The album this track came from was the first LP ever to sell over a million copies. |
| 1956 | Carl Perkins – Blue Suede Shoes | Rock and Roll finally arrives, although it’s still called rockabilly. |
| 1958 | Buddy Holly – True Love Ways | Rock and Roll’s golden age ends with this beautiful and poignant song, an early example of Pop Baroque. |
| 1968 | Os Mutantes – Panis et Circenses | Rock’s gone global and psychedelic – this song also demonstrates the evolution of recording techniques and the fusion of musical styles. Alternatively, play a track from Sgt. Pepper. |
| 1968 | Lee Perry – People Funny Boy | Reggae and dub evolves from mento and ska. This Lee “Scratch” Perry song came out before reggae even had a name. |
| 1968 | Archie Bell & the Drells – Tighten Up | A massive hit, this proto-disco track also heralds the arrival of funk and soul. |
| 1968 | Blue Cheer – Summertime Blues | Probably the first heavy metal song; that fact that it’s a cover of a classic Rock ‘n’ Roll song only |
| 1968 | White Noise – Your Hidden Dreams | Experimental electronica, The White Noise pioneered cut-and-paste composition and the use of the first British synthesizer, the EMS Synthi VCS3. |
| 1970 | Marc Bolan – Ride A White Swan | The birth of glam rock. |
| 1974 | Queen – Stone Cold Crazy | The first thrash-metal song. |
| 1974 | Kraftwerk – Autobahn | An electronic revolution cruises by from Germany. |
| 1977 | Sex Pistols – Holidays In The Sun | Punk is still not dead. |
| 1977 | Donna Summer – I Feel Love | Electronic disco and arrives, Giorgio Moroder’s production also invents hi-nrg, synthpop, house and techno along the way. |
| 1979 | Gary Numan – Are ‘Friends’ Electric? | The first synthesizer-based song to top the charts (much to the annoyance of The Human League’s Phil Oakey). |
| 1979 | Bauhaus – “Bela Lugosi’s Dead” | Rock goes gothic. |
| 1982 | Afrika Bambaataa & The Soul Sonic Force – Planet Rock | Rap music arrives, as well as hip-hop, electro, and freestyle. It began in Germany, but was born in New York City. |
| 1982 | Michael Jackson – Billie Jean | Dance-pop R&B conquers the world. |
| 1984 | The Smiths – William It Was Really Nothing | Alternative rock or indie pop? Either way, The Smiths post-punk sound brought 80s indie to the masses. |
| 1987 | M/A/R/R/S – Pump Up The Volume | The first British house music hit, M/A/R/R/S’s pioneering use of music sampling meant they were doomed to die under a pile of lawsuits. |
| 1988 | S’Express – Theme From S’Express | Not the first, but perhaps the best-known acid house song from that second summer of ecstatic love. It also showed that sampling is here to stay. |
| 1990 | Happy Mondays – Step On | Indie-rock and dance combine in Madchester. |
| 1991 | Nirvana – Come as You Are | Grunge shoots its load from Seattle and goes mainstream. |
| 1994 | Blur – Girls And Boys | Perhaps just a re-brand of UK indie, Britpop’s success shows why the UK remains the 2nd largest producer of popular music in the world. |
| 2003 | Beyoncé feat. Jay-Z – Crazy in Love (feat. Jay-Z) | Contemporary R&B now slickly dominates the world, liberally borrowing from pop, funk, soul, and hip-hop. |
| 2008 | Coldplay – Viva la Vida | Pop returns to Baroque, from the number 1 artist on Spotify, Last.fm, and MySpace. I met Chris at a gig back in 1998, before their first album came out. Shook his hand, told him I thought they’d go far. Nice guy. Viva la Musica. |