Traditional Blues

Traditional Blues is a genre of music that originated in the late 19th and early 20th centuries in the southern United States. It is a combination of African-American spirituals, work songs, field hollers, shouts, and chants, and rhymed simple narrative ballads. The lyrics often deal with the struggles of African-Americans in the early 20th century, and the music is characterized by a call-and-response pattern, a twelve-bar structure, and a strong, repetitive beat. Traditional Blues is the foundation of many other genres of music, including jazz, rock and roll, and rhythm and blues.