History
Rautalanka emerged in the early 1960s. The Finnish national broadcasting company Yleisradio had a monopoly on radio in Finland and played little in the way of pop music. However, foreign radio stations played pop music around that time. Those stations were eagerly listened to in Finland, the most popular being Radio Luxembourg. It aired guitar music, which prompted the Finnish youth to set up bands and play this music. Bands such as The Shadows and The Ventures served as examples for rautalanka bands.
Rautalanka was the first youth-oriented style of music, played by young people, to receive mass distribution in Finland. Before rautalanka, music recording and live performing had been more or less monopolized by (often older) professional musicians.
The golden age of rautalanka in Finland lasted from early 1961 to late 1963, at which point the interest of youth at large shifted away from the Finnish style to merseybeat, led by The Beatles. While instrumental rock music was popular all around Europe, the term rautalanka is used only in Finland, Sweden (taggtråd) and Norway (piggtråd). It refers to instrumental music which is too melodic and clean to be true rock music, but also too rhythmic to be folk music.
Worldwide, the best known representative of this style is the British band The Shadows, who have visited Finland several times, most recently in 2009. Their best known song is "Apache". Their American counterparts are The Ventures, whose song "Walk, Don't Run" was a hit in Finland and used by Yleisradio as their theme melody. The first real Finnish rautalanka hit was "Emma" by The Sounds, which became the image of Finnish rautalanka music. Many bands employed folk music and other styles of popular music as inspiration for their musical pieces. While rock music eventually superseded both Merseybeat and rautalanka in Finnish youth culture, the style survived as background music for many Finnish popular music performers, and Hank Marvin has been the example for many modern Finnish rock musicians.
Jazz guitar may refer to either a type of electric guitar or a guitar playing style in jazz, using electric amplification to increase the volume of acoustic guitars.
In music performances, rhythm guitar is a technique and role that performs a combination of two functions: to provide all or part of the rhythmic pulse in conjunction with other instruments from the rhythm section ; and to provide all or part of the harmony, i.e. the chords from a song's chord progression, where a chord is a group of notes played together. Therefore, the basic technique of rhythm guitar is to hold down a series of chords with the fretting hand while strumming or fingerpicking rhythmically with the other hand. More developed rhythm techniques include arpeggios, damping, riffs, chord solos, and complex strums.
Instrumental rock is rock music that emphasizes instrumental performance and features very little or no singing. Examples of instrumental music in rock can be found in practically every subgenre of the style. Instrumental rock was most popular from the mid-1950s to mid-1960s, with artists such as Bill Doggett Combo, The Fireballs, The Shadows, The Ventures, Johnny and the Hurricanes and The Spotnicks. Surf music had many instrumental songs. Many instrumental hits had roots from the R&B genre. The Allman Brothers Band feature several instrumentals. Jeff Beck also recorded two instrumental albums in the 1970s. Progressive rock and art rock performers of the late 1960s and early 1970s did many virtuosic instrumental performances.
Romania has a multicultural music environment which includes active ethnic music scenes. Traditional Romanian folk music remains popular, and some folk musicians have come to national fame.
Anatolian rock, or Turkish psychedelic rock, is a fusion of Turkish folk music and rock. It emerged during the mid-1960s, soon after rock groups became popular in Turkey. Most known members of this genre includes Turkish musicians such as Barış Manço, Cem Karaca, Erkin Koray, Selda Bağcan, Fikret Kızılok alongside bands such as Moğollar, Kurtalan Ekspres, 3 Hürel, and Altın Gün.
Bassline is the term used in many styles of music, such as blues, jazz, funk, dub and electronic, traditional, and classical music, for the low-pitched instrumental part or line played by a rhythm section instrument such as the electric bass, double bass, cello, tuba or keyboard.
Accompaniment is the musical part which provides the rhythmic and/or harmonic support for the melody or main themes of a song or instrumental piece. There are many different styles and types of accompaniment in different genres and styles of music. In homophonic music, the main accompaniment approach used in popular music, a clear vocal melody is supported by subordinate chords. In popular music and traditional music, the accompaniment parts typically provide the "beat" for the music and outline the chord progression of the song or instrumental piece.
The Ventures are an American instrumental rock band formed in Tacoma, Washington, in 1958, by Don Wilson and Bob Bogle. The band, which was a quartet for most of its existence, helped to popularize the electric guitar across the world during the 1960s. While their popularity in the United States waned in the 1970s, the group remains especially revered in Japan, where they have toured regularly. The classic lineup of the band consisted of Wilson, Bogle, Nokie Edwards, and Mel Taylor (drums).
Beat music, British beat, or Merseybeat is a British popular music genre that developed, particularly in and around Liverpool, in the late 1950s and early 1960s. The genre melded influences from British and American rock and roll, rhythm and blues, skiffle, traditional pop and music hall. It rose to mainstream popularity in the UK and Europe by 1963 before spreading to North America in 1964 with the British Invasion. The beat style had a significant impact on popular music and youth culture, from 1960s movements such as garage rock, folk rock and psychedelic music.
Lead guitar is a musical part for a guitar in which the guitarist plays melody lines, instrumental fill passages, guitar solos, and occasionally, some riffs and chords within a song structure. The lead is the featured guitar, which usually plays single-note-based lines or double-stops. In rock, heavy metal, blues, jazz, punk, fusion, some pop, and other music styles, lead guitar lines are often supported by a second guitarist who plays rhythm guitar, which consists of accompaniment chords and riffs.
In jazz, comping is the chords, rhythms, and countermelodies that keyboard players, guitar players, or drummers use to support a musician's improvised solo or melody lines. It is also the action of accompanying, and the left-hand part of a solo pianist.
A guitar solo is a melodic passage, instrumental section, or entire piece of music, pre-written to be played on a classical, electric, or acoustic guitar. In 20th and 21st century traditional music and popular music such as blues, swing, jazz, jazz fusion, rock and heavy metal, guitar solos often contain virtuoso techniques and varying degrees of improvisation. Guitar solos on classical guitar, which are typically written in musical notation, are also used in classical music forms such as chamber music and concertos.
A rhythm section is a group of musicians within a music ensemble or band that provides the underlying rhythm, harmony and pulse of the accompaniment, providing a rhythmic and harmonic reference and "beat" for the rest of the band. The rhythm section is often contrasted with the roles of other musicians in the band, such as the lead guitarist or lead vocals whose primary job is to carry the melody.
Flatpicking is the technique of striking the strings of a guitar with a pick held between the thumb and one or two fingers. It can be contrasted to fingerstyle guitar, which is playing with individual fingers, with or without wearing fingerpicks. While the use of a plectrum is common in many musical traditions, the exact term "flatpicking" is most commonly associated with Appalachian music of the American southeastern highlands, especially bluegrass music, where string bands often feature musicians playing a variety of styles, both fingerpicking and flatpicking. Musicians who use a flat pick in other genres such as rock and jazz are not commonly described as flatpickers or even plectrum guitarists. As the use of a pick in those traditions is commonplace, generally only guitarists who play without a pick are noted by the term "fingerpicking" or "fingerstyle".
An organ trio is a form of jazz ensemble consisting of three musicians; a Hammond organ player, a drummer, and either a jazz guitarist or a saxophone player. In some cases the saxophonist will join a trio which consists of an organist, guitarist, and drummer, making it a quartet. Organ trios were a popular type of jazz ensemble for club and bar settings in the 1950s and 1960s, performing a blues-based style of jazz that incorporated elements of R&B. The organ trio format was characterized by long improvised solos and an exploration of different musical "moods".
Agents is a Finnish band formed in 1979, playing rautalanka, schlager and rock'n'roll music. The head figure and musical director of the band is solo guitarist Esa Pulliainen.
The Knack was an American garage and psychedelic rock band from Los Angeles, California who were active in the 1960s. They are not to be confused with either the American band of the same name who became popular in the late 1970s, nor the British band of the same name in the 1960s. They were noted for their melodic and instrumental finesse and secured a recording contract with Capitol Records. The band nevertheless failed to break through to a national audience. In the intervening years their work has come to the attention of 1960s music collectors and enthusiasts, especially with the release of the Time Waits for No One anthology.
Heavy metal guitar is the use of highly-amplified electric guitar in heavy metal. Heavy metal guitar playing is rooted in the guitar playing styles developed in 1960s-era blues rock and psychedelic rock, and folk harmonic traditions and it uses a massive sound, characterized by highly amplified distortion, extended guitar solos and overall loudness. The electric guitar and the sonic power that it projects through amplification has historically been the key element in heavy metal. The heavy metal guitar sound comes from a combined use of high volumes and heavy distortion.
