Popular Music, Unpopular Musicology

Abstract

Abstract In June of 1956, singer/song-writer and prototypical rock guitarist and performer Chuck Berry released a single entitled ‘Roll Over Beethoven’. A few years before this single became a hit on radios and juke-boxes across the country, a war of cultures had broken out in the United States, a phenomenon often referred to as the ‘teen rebellion’; middle-class American youth were rejecting the culture of their parents, and insisting on creating a culture that addressed their own specific interests and needs. Films such as The Wild One (1953) and Rebel without a Cause (1955) featured youthful principal characters—played by Marlon Brando and James Dean, respectively—in open rebellion against white middle-class values.

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