Sunday, 21 June 2015

History of music video

This blog post will look back at the significant moments in music video history.

The gramophone invented in 1877 by Thomas Edison enabled people to listen to music with out going to a concert for a live performance. This was a major break through in terms of music entertainment.






1940: Walt Disney releases the film Fantasia which consists of animated sequences which are combined with a piece of classical music which showed the correct impression for the animated piece, including emotional and physical pace.



The 1960's: This was the defining era for the music stars of the 1960's to use their music and perform them in video's. Notably the band "The Beatles" did this by airing on music shows such as the BBC hit programme "Top of the pops" where they and other bands in the 1960's would perform in front of a live audience.  This brought about new camera angles which adds to Goodwin's conventions. Cameras used High, low and close ups to show the artists at work singing their new single.

The 1970's: The 70's began to see change for music video's for the better. Top of the pops still brought the top stars to perform. The bands whom could not make it on to the show had made music video's along with the physical to be shown as cuts to show the audience. The main change for the music videos was the length. this was seen with Queens "Bohemian Rhapsody".



This was iconic because not only of the length but because of new uses of camera angles and special effects which this music video is full of.

The 1980's: On the 1st of August 1981 the brand new MTV. The first song which was shown by the new channel was by the Buggles– ‘Video killed the radio star’. For the first ever song to be played on this new channel it was quite clever because it was showing how television is going to hit big and this idea of seeing everything on television is going to kill the idea of radio because the idea of seeing what the viewers were listening to is fresh and new. This paved a way for the new era of music video's as now the hottest new music videos now can be shown on this channel, no matter about the length. In the early to mid 1980's , artists started to use more sophisticated effects in their videos, and added a storyline or plot to the music video. Michael Jackson was the first artist to create the concept of the short film. A short film is a music video that has a beginning, middle and end. He did this in a small way with Billie Jean , directed by Steve Barron , then in a West Side Story way with director Bob Giraldi's Beat It , but it wasn't until the 1984 release of the Thriller short film that he took the music video format to another level. 


Modern Day: Music video's have changed now with the introduction of  new technology, most notably with the internet (Web 2.0) and YouTube where 2 billion people a day watch these new and old music videos which increases audiences for the artists. With the change of technology comes with new ways to present the music video i.e. " Californication" by the red hot chilli peppers which used CGI and live performance to show the high intensity of modern day music and  gives meaning to its lyrics. 

This is just a brief history of music video. There is so much more on music video history which backs up todays music video's and music from the early 20th century.  
  

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