The Rhythm and Blues (R&B) Protest Songs of the Civil Rights Movement: Outlining the Natural Alignment Between the Foundational R&B Recordings Artists and the African-American Church During the Movement

Author(s)

Michelee JonesFollow

Date

10-2016

Department

Worship and Music - Ethnomusicology

Degree

Master of Arts (MA)

Chair

Katherine Morehouse

Keywords

Civil Rights Movement, Music During the Civil Rights Movement, R&B Artists During the Civil Rights Movement, R&B Protest Songs

Disciplines

Ethnomusicology | Music | Musicology | Music Performance | Other Music

Recommended Citation

Jones, Michelee, "The Rhythm and Blues (R&B) Protest Songs of the Civil Rights Movement: Outlining the Natural Alignment Between the Foundational R&B Recordings Artists and the African-American Church During the Movement" (2016). Masters Theses. 429.
https://digitalcommons.liberty.edu/masters/429

Abstract

This study examines the R&B protest songs performed during the Civil Rights Movement and outlines their stories and musical characteristics for the purposes of highlighting a natural alignment that existed between several of the R&B recording artists that laid the foundations of R&B music and the agendas of the African-American church during the Civil Rights Movement. This study includes lyric and music analyses of some of the more popular R&B songs released during the Civil Rights Movement between 1960-1968 in which these analyses are compared with one another to form some general themes as to how these songs outlined the stories of the Civil Rights Movement and how they display that several of R&B music’s foundational recording artists naturally aligned their music with the agendas of the African-American church during the Civil Rights Movement in spite of pursuing careers within secular music.