After the Second World War the music industry exploded with the youth of countries turning to music to occupy their free time. The period immediately following the war saw young people starting to express themselves in the music that they listened to and what they wore. Prior to the war it was a very different story. A lot of the popular music was played to the sounds of the big bands that was fronted by an individual male or female singer. Many of the tops singers could also act and dance. And they would often release records that had previously been a success in a musical.
The increasing popularity of these performers saw the emergence of the new pop stars. Fred Astaire, Bing Crosby and Shirley Temple soon became household names as they sold more records as well as appear in the films. This time also saw a number of the top British music acts emerge from the Music Halls. Performing regularly in front of live audiences, performers such as George Formby, Marie Lloyd and Gracie Fields all took advantage of their popularity to take advantage of the new invention that was the record player.
The popularity if the dance bands and jazz music spread over from the United States and there were many famous dance bands. The music developed into a form of swing but it was tame compared to the American bands. However band leaders such as Ted Heath became popular figures, and their music survived the Second World War. Traditional folk singers were popular during this period. This included the country and western singers in the US and the developing blues artists. Gene Autry gained fame as a result of being a singing cowboy. As well as appearing in 93 films he was also one of the most important pioneers of country and western music.
One of the first musical stars of Country and Western were the Carter family. The group consisted of A.P. Carter his wife Sara and his sister in law, Maybelle Carter. Many of their recordings including “Wabash Cannonball” and “Wildwood Flower” were some of the best-selling early Country and Western records. During the 1930s there were no charts to show how records were selling. A performer’s popularity would be reflected by the amount of times they would be heard on the radio. Roy Acuff was heard a great deal on the radio and he became known as the “King of Country Music”. His music reflected the hardships experienced in the south of the country by the rural white population and he was earning as much as 200,000 dollars a year as a result of his record sales.
If Country and Music at this time was the mouthpiece of the southern whites the then “the blues” genre reflected the poverty that the black population were experiencing in the same region. Even before the 1930s many singers started to emerge singing songs that were a mix of African traditional music and European folk tunes.
In the 1930s some of the most popular blues performers were the female singers. Besse Smith was at the height of her popularity during the 1920s and early 1930s, and her style influenced future jazz singers. She made over 160 records and appeared regularly throughout the nation on the radio. Billie Holiday first appeared on the stages in Harlem, New York in the early 1930s. She found fame as a Jazz singer appearing on the radio, in movies and selling countless records. Her first movie appearance came in 1935 when she appeared in Duke Ellington’s short movie “Symphony in Black: A Rhapsody of Negro Life”.
Ellington was a band leader whose band appeared at the Cotton Club in New York, and employed many famous jazz singers such as Holiday and Billy Strayhorn to perform as the lead singers. The music industry was very much gathering popularity with new genres regularly being created as the Second World War approached. The era after the war created more social freedom for the younger generations which allowed the music industry to flourish.