The Blues Essay - 866 Words

The Blues I. Introduction Todays forecast; gloomy, and there is no sunshine in sight. If you had any form of depression, that is what it would seem like everyday. Depression is defined as a total body illness that affects a persons thoughts, feelings, behavior, physical health and appearance. It affects all areas of a persons life, including a persons home, work, school, and social life. Depression is a real illness, and its described as a feeling of sadness, worthlessness, or gloominess that can last from several months, to several years. While its only human to experience feelings of sadness and gloominess every now and then, clinical depression occurs when these feelings last for long periods of time. Depression of†¦show more content†¦When people refer to depression, they are usually referring to clinical or major depression. This type of depression is when a person experiences the characteristics of depression within a certain degree of intensity, either in a single episode, or that keep reoccurring over time. Another common type of depression is bipolar disorder, or as others refer to it as manic depression. Manic depression involves cycled periods of severe depression with times of extremely elevated or irritable mood known as mania. Many people also under go dysthymia. People with dysthymia go through life almost always feeling mildly depressed, which can greatly impair their ability to enjoy the positives in life. There is also seasonal affective disorder, unipolar depression, cyclothymia, and atypical depression. Season affective disorder is a depressive illness that has to do with a persons reaction to the amount of natural light a person receives. This illness mainly affects the bodys sleep cycle and biological clock. Unipolar depression is described when a person can feel perfectly fine, but other times, they feel depressed, slowed down, or in a fog. A person may have only one or two episodes, or may continue to have these episodes throughout their lifetime. Then there is atypical depression. Its basically when a person can have fun and experience pleasure if an opportunity presents itself, but the feeling is short lived. You might be asking yourself, How do I getShow MoreRelatedSonnys Blues1264 Words   |  6 PagesSonny s Blues A captivating tale of a relationship between two troubling brothers in Harlem, Sonny s Blues is told from the perception of Sonny s brother, whose name is never mentioned. Baldwin s choice of Sonny s brother as a narrator is what makes Sonny s Blues significant in terms of illustrating the relationship and emotional complications of Sonny and his brother. The significance of Sonny s Blues lies in the way Sonny s brother describes their relationship based on what heRead MoreThe Ragtime And The Blues1184 Words   |  5 PagesBoth ragtime and the blues were essential and influential in their contributions to the development of jazz. Together, they served as the primary predecessors to the later, more complicated genre. Key elements from each brand are incorporated and mixed to create jazz. Without the creative geniuses of ragtime such as Scott Jopin and James Reese Europe and Blues propagators W.C. Hady and Robert Johnson, the distinctive genre of jazz would not have emerged. Ragtime and blues are both unique in theirRead MoreSonnys Blues1514 Words   |  7 PagesHow does Baldwins real-life experience connect to his short story, Sonnys Blues? The writer was a poor boy growing up. He was also a Negro, so things were bad for him and his family in white America. He probably felt sad every day of his childhood so he turned to books for entertainment and maybe escape. When he started reading, he found that he liked it and wanted to create stories for other people to enjoy, but he was a poor Negro boy who could not expect help from the whites, so he taughtRead More Comparing the Blues in Hughes The Blues Im Playing and Baldwins Sonnys Blues625 Words   |  3 Pages The Blues: in Hughes The Blues Im Playing and Baldwins Sonnys Bluesnbsp;nbsp; In Langston Hughes The Blues Im Playing, the blues are the source of Oceolas life and her choices. Langston is trying to illustrate the conflict between life and art. The art in this story is represented in a confined manner, as a disciplined career with a white woman acting as the overseer in the young ladys life. Art to Oceola, with its profit, convenience and privileges offers an array of benefits, butRead MoreThe Music Style Of The Blues1129 Words   |  5 Pagesmusic style known as the Blues emerged in the American South during the 1890s. It drew on a mix of many African-American music styles with others. Some of the styles it drew upon include African-American spirituals, traditional songs, European hymns, folk ballads, work songs and hollers, and contemporary dance music. By the 1910s, the time period when the first recorded blues were published as sheet music, the blues had taken the form that is recognized today; the 12 bar blues form.(Shmoop) The musicRead MoreMusic, Blues And Ragtime1337 Words   |  6 Pages and Creoles, i.e. multiracial Africans. Within the mixing of cultures came the mixing of music styles as well. Two of the styles of music which added to the development and birth of jazz were the blues and ragtime. I argue that Jazz as a genre was a coalition between two popular forms of music, blues and ragtime. These two genres created jazz together through their origins, musical characteristics, and large number of performers. Ragtime’s origins can be seen as a major reason towards its developmentRead MoreSonnys Blues Essay989 Words   |  4 Pages In James Baldwins, Sonnys Blues, the title itself is symbolic of the blues in the matrix of the African-American culture of music and suffering. To understand the significance of the blues, one must first define the blues, where the blues originated, and how it is related to suffering and how it is communicated in music. The American Heritage Dictionary defines blues as (1) a state of depression or melancholy, and (2) a style of jazz evolved from southern American Negro secular songs. ItRead MoreThe Ragtime Vs. The Blues1616 Words   |  7 Pages ¬Ragtime vs. The Blues In the city of New Orleans emerged one of the most influential music genres in U.S. history. At the time, New Orleans was known for being a melting pot of people or rather, a region where people from all over the world came together in one place. This city served as a key seaport in the U.S. allowing for goods to be imported and exported. The purpose of this city was not only strategic to the growth of the country, but also, the atmosphere allowed for the incredible mixingRead MoreStylistic Characteristics Of The Blues880 Words   |  4 PagesCH11 Question 1 There are several stylistic characteristics of the blues. The first one is the blue notes, which is the bent technique for lowering the pitch of third and seventh scale degrees in the major scale(259). The next one is the blue chorus, which is three-line lyrics, and it contains fill which is the instrument response of the call and response between vocal and instrument. The third feature is the blue progression which is the form of the combination between tonic(I), subdominant(IV)Read MoreSonnys Blues in Harlem896 Words   |  4 PagesEveryone is born in different times with different opportunities. Some of us have to struggle to make ends meet and others are born with money at their feet already. â€Å"Sonny’s Blues† opens up in Harlem with the narrator on a bus reading a newspaper learning that his brother, Sonny, has been arrested for selling heroin. Sonny’s brother takes him in after he is released from jail. However, his brother is scared if he lets him back into his home he will fall into his old ways. Sonny’s true passion in