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CONTEMPORARY RnB. 2000s - 2010s.
RnB really means almost everything on this page, but mostly it's understood as a soulful vocal style with a little more kick to the beats than blues proper.
REGGAETON RnB STYLE. 2000s - 2010s.
A lot of other cross-over genres are borrowing the vocal style of RnB artists today - including coming from reggaeton, dancehall, afrobeats, hip-hop, & trap.
DANCEHALL RnB STYLE. 2000s - 2010s. Jamaican.
Jamaican dancehall with a contemporary RnB vocal style.
AFRO BEATS, UK RnB style. 2000s - 2010s.
Rhythms used in W. African music ('afrobeats'), becoming a growing source of new samples & instrumentals for club and dance tracks in the London 2010s scene.
AFRO BEATS (West African). 2000s - 2010s.
Just to show some of the afrobeats acts from West Africa. <EDIT>. There's a lot of cross-overs happening spurred on by London's cultural melting pot.
FUNKTRONICA. 2000s - 2010s.
It's funk riffs in a fairly synthetic track maybe 80s onwards, and especially if the vocals sound like they're
electronically distorted. Always needs a funk riff too.
POST-DISCO. 80s.
Not a big genre really. But disco proper fizzled out around 1980. A few artists carried on producing disco style tracks into the 80s. And some still do (like the Scissor Sisters).
DISCO. 1970s.
The main
dance craze of the 1970s - everything was a literal Disco. With acts like Chic headlining glastonbury in 2017, it might be making a comeback.
NORTHERN SOUL. 1960s - 1970s.
Huge scene in the North of England in the 60s, surviving into the 70s til overtaken by disco. Particularly associated with club nights in Wigan.
SOUL. 1960s - 1970s.
60s producers especially from Detroit ("Motor Town"/MoTown) took advantage of new multitrack recording to create luscious songs based on Gospel or blues, with a dance act, lead singer, backing singers, and instrumentation.
CLASSIC FUNK. 1950s - 80s.
Funk comes direct from the style of talented Jazz musicians or those making a cross-over to pioneering Rock, such as Little Richard, Fats Domino, and then of course James Brown. Carried on through the 80s by Michael Jackson & Prince.
CLASSICS FROM RnB PIONEERS. 1940s - 50s.
RnB in the 50s was a rich melting pot of styles coming from gospel, blues, jazz, and combining to the new backing group ideas being formed with the earliest rock bands. These r the people who pretty much kicked it all off.
JUMP BLUES. 1930s - 40s.
Faster take on The Blues, this genre is v close linked to kicking off the rock band rhythm and style (in 50s "Rock n Roll").
BLUES
(in the jazz/RnB style).
Blues has a lot of styles in it's own right. Just picked out a few tracks that r closer to the sound of Rhythm n blues or to the jazz sound.
DOO WOP. 1940s - 1950s.
Not really a rhythm and blues style at all. But the typical Doo-Wop outfits kind of set the model for the 60s soul groups, and therefore later outfits such as Disco groups, which then led into the fast early 80s House dance sound.
JAZZ VOCALS. 1930s - present
Just like blues, jazz lies under so many of the genres that came later - and contributed to sounds like Ska & Rocksteady
in the caribbean. Never mind just RnB - jazz even lies under Drum n Bass. Many MC's set their tracks on jazz samples and aesthetics eg New York groups, such as A Tribe called Quest.
JAZZ INSTRUMENTALS. 1930s - present
Jazz doesn't need a singer - jazz piano and trumpet are the most popular lead instrument styles, with double bass & drums backing at that very least, with a few famous clarinettists and others too, though it can be any instrumentation at all really. To get from jazz to rock typically the drum kit & singer stays in place, the double bass is swapped for a pair of guitars, & the brass is lost.
SWING ERA & CONTEMPORARIES. 1930s - 50s.
Dance bands were kind of jazz "supergroups" - almost a full orchestra of jazz musicians creating a big swing sound. Hence 'BIG BAND'. The style had a huge effect in setting the stage for the explosion of all the modern music styles we know and love today.