Musical Elements Of The Vietnam War

John Fahey’s 1966 masters thesis A textual and musicological analysis of the repertoire of Charley Patton has the distinction of being the first book-length analysis of the music of Charley Patton. Fahey’s text focused primarily on assembling the historical facts of Patton’s life, while the analytical portions —written with the aid of Dr. David Morton, UCLA —-focused on systematizing Patton’s repertoire based on modal constructs present in his vocal melodies. Fahey’s biographical information focused on characterizing Patton as an entertainer; However, the analytical portion omits significant lines of inquiry that result in an incomplete picture of Patton’s repertoire. Fahey notes the utilitarian function of Patton’s music, but does not detail musical examples of this utility, especially in relation to the guitar. That is the purpose of this document.

Protest poems and songs are, and have been throughout history, an effective medium of expressing their composer’s concerns or protests to a wide audience. The main themes behind each of these creative media are influenced heavily by the context in which they were created and focus on the composer’s opinions about controversial issues of that time. Poet Bruce Dawe, through his poem ‘homecoming’ and singer-songwriter Barry Maguire, through his song ‘Eve of destruction’ were able to explore and express their similar concerns about the harsh and dehumanising aspects of war and the effects on society, with Maguire focussing on the ignorance of society toward the detrimental effects of war and Dawe reflecting on emotional trauma experienced by those who lost love ones to the brutality of war.

During times of harsh government rulings or unfair taxes and laws, people used their artistic abilities to start uprisings. Examples include, poetry, dramas, paintings/drawings, and especially music to get the attention of the oblivious citizens during the Revolutionary War. Music transitioned from calm, peaceful melodies to thundering tunes that carried battle cries and rallied for the start of a rebellion. As times changed and revolutions turned into wars, the music took a turn as well. It slowed it to a depressing beat that outpoured dreary lyrics, casting a melancholy mood on anyone who merely thought about the gory conflicts. Yet, when the turmoil finally came to an end, the villagers were overjoyed and celebrated with music and dancing.

Artists have throughout history conveyed their thoughts, experiences, and opinions through their songs, whether these were for better or worse. In 1970, an artist by the name of Edwin Starr released his song, “War.” In 1971, Marvin Gaye released his song, “What’s Going On.” In 1965, P.F. Sloan released his song, “Eve of Destruction.” In 1963, Bob Dylan released his song, “Blowing in the Wind.” The artists wrote, recorded, and released these songs with the purpose to express their feelings of dislike against war, especially the Vietnam War and the racial wars occurring within America concurrently. The four songs listed above were all around the same era of time and were written, recorded, and inspired by the major events that occurred in

The Vietnam War (1955-1975) was the longest war the United States has ever fought in and also the most controversial. Many Americans protested against sending their children across seas to fight in a war that did not involve the United States. Millions asked for a return to isolationism such as the 1920s. Meanwhile many protests went viral as the National Guard interfered, killing four at Kent State University in 1970. Acts such as these convinced the American Citizens that the government was not to be trusted as anti-war enthusiasts took the advantage to further demonstrate against the government. Issues such as the My Lai massacre also promoted people in the United States to speak out against what they were doing in Vietnam. All forms of culture were changed by the issues in Vietnam. Two of the most convincing cultures that formed at the time were cartoons and music. Music and Cartoons throughout the Vietnam War era reflect the issues brought forth by the war as rock and roll became more popular after massacres such as My Lai, cartoons became increasingly more graphic as anti-Vietnam fighters pushed for an end to the war, and social views of college students were forever changed, they were from then on considered hippies to music which went against the government.

Rhetoric of the protest songs has a very extensive history. The oldest protest song on record is "The Cutty Wren" from the Peasants’ Revolt of 1381 against feudal oppression, nearly six hundred years ago (Songs of Work and Protest 9). Protest music has developed over the years and has made its presence in history. The protest music of Vietnam War is the concentration of this paper. The two main artists of focus are Bob Dylan and John Lennon. Their songs will be analyzed and criticized naritively.

Music within the Vietnam War The war in Vietnam, which lasted from 1955 to 1975, has gone down as one of the influential and controversial wars in United States history. The nation as a whole began an uproar over the war and the major consequences of the war. Public opinion steadily turned against the war following 1967 and by 1970 only a third of Americans believed that the U.S. had not made a mistake by sending troops to fight in Vietnam (Sperlich). Not to mention, many young people protested because they were the ones being drafted while others were against the war because the anti-war movement grew increasingly popular among the counterculture and the drug culture in American society and its music (Sperlich)”. Other people just

As stated above, one of the sources of media used was the song recorded by the band The Animals called, "We gotta get out of this place". This song was created to place music in the hearts of the American experiences in Vietnam. The purpose of this song was to say that there is no life to live in Vietnam during the war. "We gotta get out of this place if it's the last thing we ever do, we gotta get out of this place cause, girl there's a better life for me and you." The troops were thinking that if they ever got out of the war, they would most definitely live a better life with their loved ones waiting for them at home. The way this song describes Vietnam is accurate in the sense that there are a numerous amount of trees blocking the sun from

According to the US Institute of Gallup, in the 1964-1972 biennium. namely the war in Vietnam ranked first among the most important problems that agitated the public.

Music, particularly folk, was at the heart of the anti-war movement. In the 1960s, music was “tied to social change” and Americans were “emotionally close…to sixties music”, despite there being “little agreement on what folk music is”. Joan Baez “got the whole ethic of nonviolence at an early age” from her Quaker upbringing. In addition to her pacifist background, Baez took an interest in Ghandi and Martin Luther King from a young age. After hearing King speak at a high school event at fifteen, Baez said King ““solidified what I had already felt from learning about Ghandi”” and that ““[h]earing about the boycotts…hearing this man speak and knowing he was a part of it—brought the actuality of [nonviolence] into my life for the first time””. Baez and her family moved from California to Massachusetts, where Baez became a “coffeehouse sensation and then [went] to the Newport Folk Festival where she establishes herself as a star”. Through her musical activism, Baez embodies the New Left’s involvement in the civil rights movement and the anti-Vietnam war protests, particularly through nonviolence means.

The song consists of three different stages; before the war; during the war; the end of the war.

From an ethnographic and historiographical point of view WWI songs, like war songs at large, are documents of remarkable interest.

Due to its widespread influence, music has often been described as “the universal language”, and its allure has inspired the creation of various works in other forms of art - such as film or literature. Roman Polanski’s film The Pianist follows the true story of the Jewish pianist Wladek Szpilman during the Holocaust, while the novel The Cellist of Sarajevo by Stephen Galloway tells the fictional story of three Sarajevan citizens during the siege of Sarajevo, whose lives have all been impacted by the music of a cellist. Both stories exemplify the valuable power of music during wartime, unveiling its remarkable ability to influence one’s identity, foster hope, and encourage individuals to be merciful.

The song Leningrad is of interest to me because I am a musician myself and I play the piano as does Billy Joel. Music has always played a substantial role in my life so I decided to use a music as the artifact of this assignment. To me, it is interesting to find out how a popular song can change and affect the opinions and thinking of its listeners through the use of a mass media outlet. The average person does not typically take an analytical approach to a song to figure out the message behind it. It is also interesting that a listener can still be persuaded by a song’s message whether the listener knows it is happening or not. The use of song as a way to shed light on social situations has been around for many years and frequently these songs usually focus on issues on a more minor scale. Leningrad does the exact opposite by not only being used for entertainment but also by using a war that most people had grown up through and showing how we can help resolve these issues that caused the war. Approaching the song Leningrad from a theoretical understanding is useful in that it shows how Billy Joel uses his words and experiences with the Russian people to persuade and change the opinions that the American people have towards the Russian’s system of

As of 2015, 75% of people reportedly listen to music on a daily basis. In contrast, only a small 6.7% of people read poetry yearly (Ingraham, 2015). These statistics prove poems are becoming outdated, so to rectify this, I will be speaking about the relevancy of poems still to this day, by comparing it to a contemporary song. Good morning Power of the Poem, the poem and song I will be comparing are Futility and 21 Guns. Futility is a poem by the famous poet, Wilfred Owen. Wilfred illustrates a comrade attempting to awake a fallen fellow soldier, however, as the title suggests, the attempt is futile. The poem emphasises the pointlessness of war. Therefore to reinforce the relevancy of poems, I will be comparing it to the song 21 Guns by Green Day. 21 Guns also talks about the unnecessariness of war and repeatedly asks the reader the point of war to ‘lay down their arms’. Therefore, the theme of my poem and song is that war is gratuitous and unnecessary, therefore fighting should cease because war is inessential. I will be explaining the relevancy of the poem, Futility by describing the tone, language and sound devices used, and comparing it to the tone, language, and sound devices in the song 21 Guns.