Musical Influences in the U.S.

"They supposed the whole heaven to be a harmonica and a number," said Aristotle in describing music.1 Arthur Schopenhauer contended that music was concerned with the will itself, the nature of which it expresses directly and imediately.2 The significant role of music in life, thus, is well recognized and accepted.

In the United States, all musical forms may be found, and most of these forms may be found in a commercial context. Many of the more commercial forms of music found in this country, however, owe their origins to gospel music generally, and to black gospel music particularly.

Although it is often difficult to perceive (with evidence to the contrary seemingly around every corner one turns), American culture is becoming increasingly more integrated in

1 2the late1980s. In part, this phenomenon is occurring because of the rapid increase in immigration from countries whose peoples were not present in the United States in proportionately large numbers prior to 1980. The socalled fourth wave of American immigration is bringing into the country in ever increasing numbers the peoples of Asia and Latin America.3

There is, however, another significant causal factor for the increasing cultural integration which is occurring in the United States. However reluctant white America may be to accept cultural integration, and however unaware white Americans as a group may be of the process, many of the cultural values and chara

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corporated into musical performance in the sanctified churches. The characteristics of such musical performance included hand clapping, foot stomping, callandresponse, rhythmic complexity, persistent beat, melodic improvisation, heterophonic textures, percussive accompaniments, and ring shouts. The evolution of black gospel music within the context of the sanctified churches brought the introduction of longmeter hymns (very slow tempo), shapenote singing (lead note singing with instrumental accompaniment, and, eventually, the use of instrumental ensembles (piano, melodeon, guitar, saxophone, trombone, violin, drums, or tambourines, or any combination thereof) not typically found in churches, which had traditionally relied heavily on organ music. Black gospel singing developed along with the development of the music. When hundreds of thousands of black Americans migrated from rural areas in the south to urban areas in the north during and after the Second World War, black gospel music 15also migrated to these urban areas. The urban environment changes black gospel music in the 1950s, much as white urbanization changed the spirituals a century earlier. It was also found that a broad perspective of participative manag
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Some common words found in the essay are:
ORGANIZATION Drucker, Michael Fein, World War, Nemours Co, THEORY MANAGEMENT, Pont Company, Baptists Methodists, Mercer Koester, STRUCTURE BEHAVIOR, INFORMATION AGE, middle manager, black gospel, contingency approach, gospel music, profit sharing, approach management, organizational structure, contingency approach management, black gospel music, gainsharing concept, black gospel singing, middle management, gospel singing, function middle manager, middle manager perceived,
Approximate Word count = 8065
Approximate Pages = 32 (250 words per page)

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