Hi Dave,
Well yes there are differences, of course, in the various Sinatra epochs, but nonetheless, then it was more a matter of words - maybe lyrical poetry? - than it has been for decades now. And naturally, he never seemed to have lost his timing, his phrasing. (I accept that there are generally many takes to get the whole, but that whole is all I get to hear.)
R'n'R, for me, ended with Chuck Berry going (c)old and making dud songs like My Ding a Ling - his greatest seller, apparently - which says more about the fans coming late to the party than about him; he always was into the money: apparently he distrusted cheques and took it all home in suitcases. And who could blame him. Before R'n'R came along I was into New Orleans jazz, hated 'modern' and now it's pretty much gone the other way, with a great liking for almost anything with Ben Webster. R'n'B is something else, and I really do listen to quite a lot of that if the mood gets me; mostly, though, I just listen to a Louisiana radio station throwing out swamp pop rock, which is a nice mixture of so much else, but basically with a Fats Domino triplets(?) thing going down as the bottom line to pretty much everything.
Jerry Lee I didn't like much as a frenetic R'n'R act but took very greatly to with his C'n'W material; again, as with Sinatra's torch songs, country can be beautiful because of its honesty. Three chords and the truth? Why the early exponents had to have straw coming out of their ears and hairstyles that posed threats to low-flying aircraft is another mystery best forgotten. But let's not forget the big swing bands - who, who lived in those days, can ever forget Glenn Miller? That music comes on and an entire era is instantly alive, along with the dancing that went with it.
You had a different heritage in the U.S. to the one we 'enjoyed' in the U.K. In Britain's 50s it was part of the muso union/BBC regulations that American artists got very limited airtime; our home-grown R'n'R artists were a pretty feeble bunch with the exception of, perhaps, Cliff Richard, who never cracked the States, and then went mainstream, made pots of money and lost me.
By the time the supergroups came along, post Beatles and early Stones, I lost interest. I suppose I also ran out of patience after the sixties. Disco? I'm afraid not. I admit it can be infectious enough, but I find it without any soul whatsoever. Like some contemporary fashion and beauty photographers, then. Surface.
Thank goodness, though, that even Seniors are different, one from the other!
;-)
Rob C
