The Origins of the Electronic Music Genre


Electronic music is a genre that has been around since the 1940s. It has evolved into one of the most popular genres of today. There are many subgenres of electronic music, the most popular being house, trance, and techno. Each style brings something different to this genre. The origins of electronic music can be traced back to the early 1900s when people started experimenting with sound waves and electricity.

Today, electronic music is a part of pop culture with many artists being involved in its creation and production process. Electronic music is often made using computers or synthesizers to create a range of different sounds from basslines to melodies and even vocals. The possibilities are endless! Electronic music producers use different types of software called “DAWs” (digital audio workstations)

Electronic music is a broad range of percussive electronic music genres made entirely with electronic musical instruments or electronic music technology. It emerged from the industrial, avant-garde and disco scenes in the mid-to late 1970s. The first electronic musical instruments were developed in the early 20th century, and electric musical instruments were popularized in the 1920s with the release of many different electric guitar, bass guitar and electric violin models. Purely electronic sound generation was used in magnetic audio tape recorders in the 1940s and 1950s, and it was during the 1960s that electronic music became widely used in modern popular music, with rock bands such as The Beatles and Pink Floyd using electric guitars, drums machines and synthesizers. By the 1970s, electronic instrumentation became more prevalent among some genres of pop music that had grown tired of traditional instruments.

In the 1980s, electronic dance music (EDM) was often played at illegal underground rave parties held in secret locations, for example, warehouses, abandoned aircraft hangars, fields and any other large, open areas. From then on EDM continued to grow in popularity among teenagers and young adults who would often attend raves at nightclub venues (dance clubs). As EDM began to grow into a

The history of electronic music dates back to the invention of sound-producing devices such as musical instruments and the phonograph. The first electronic instruments were developed at the end of the 19th century, and shortly afterward Italian futurists explored sounds that had not been considered musical. During the 1920s and 1930s, electronic instruments were introduced and the first compositions for electronic instruments were made. By the 1940s, magnetic audio tape allowed musicians to tape sounds and then modify them by changing the tape speed or direction, leading to the development of electroacoustic tape music in the 1940s, in Egypt and France. Musique concrète, created in Paris in 1948, was based on editing together recorded fragments of natural and industrial sounds. Music produced solely from electronic generators was first produced in Germany in 1953. Electronic music was also created in Japan and the United States beginning in the 1950s. An important new development was the advent of computers for the purpose of composing music. Algorithmic composition with computers was first demonstrated in Australia in 1951. In America and Europe, live electronics were pioneered in the early 1960s. During the 1970s to early 1980s, the monophonic Minimoog became once the most widely used synthesizer at that time in both popular and electronic

Electronic music is a term that encompasses a range of different genres and styles, but for simplicity purposes I will focus on the genre as it is known today. Electronic music has been around for a long time, dating back to the 1920’s. That would be from early developments in the technology of sound creation. In the late 40’s and 50’s, composers such as Pierre Schaeffer and Stockhausen created music using new technologies such as audio tape and turntables. This was sort of the first electronic music.

In the ‘80s, hip-hop artists started using turntables to sample drum breaks (a short section in songs) to loop overtop of their songs. This was the first time sampling technology was used to create music. Fast forward to 1990’s and you have what is known as the “Golden Age” of electronic music, this is when dance music became popular in Europe. In 1993 an event called The World Party took place in Berlin, Germany. It was attended by 3 million people and this launch electronic dance music into the mainstream culture in Europe.

The most recent form of electronic dance music is a sub genre called EDM (electronic dance music). EDM gained

Electronic music refers to music that emphasizes the use of electronic musical instruments or electronic music technology as a central aspect of the sound of the music. Historically, electronic music was considered to be any music created with the use of electronic musical instruments or electronic processing, but in modern times, that distinction has been lost because almost all recorded music, even if it doesn’t include electronic instruments, is created with some sort of electronic technology (such as mixing boards).

Electronic music also includes music created by purely electronic means through the use of computer programming or sampling. The first live performance of this type of electronic music was by Max Mathews in 1960 and it was played on a computer synthesizer called MUSIC IV. Since that time, live performances have become more common and more sophisticated.

Electronic genres are styles of electronic music based on the types of sounds used. Some electronic genres include house, industrial and jungle. Each genre uses a different style of sound to create a different style of song. Some styles are more popular than others and this can be determined by what type of song is being played or what type of style is being used for that particular song.

Electronic music is the music that employs electronic musical instruments and electronic music technology in its production. In general a distinction can be made between sound produced using electromechanical means and that produced using electronics only.

Electronic music was once associated almost exclusively with Western art music, but from the late 1960s on the availability of affordable music technology meant that music produced using electronic means became increasingly common in the popular domain. Today electronic music includes many varieties and ranges from experimental art music to popular forms such as electronic dance music.

One of the earliest composers to use electronic instruments in classical music was Joseph Schillinger, who in 1929 composed First Airphonic Suite for Theremin and Orchestra, which premièred with the Cleveland Orchestra with Leon Theremin as soloist. A more recent example is composer Harold Budd, whose 1968 album The White Arcades has been called “one of the most important avant-garde ambient works of the 20th century”.

From the early 1950s through the 1970s, electronic music was a small but growing part of the larger underground world. These sounds were woven into numerous genres, and shared with like-minded individuals through underground networks. In the late 1970s, punk rock and disco gave way to new wave and post-punk, which brought with it new forms of electronic music. The growing popularity of hip-hop in the 1980s helped change perceptions about electronic music as well.

The term “electronic dance music” (EDM) first began to appear in the United States in the late 1980s, when rave culture began to take shape. At this time, disco had fallen out of favor, and electronic dance music was beginning to take hold on both sides of the Atlantic. By the early 1990s, this new genre had begun to dominate popular music festivals in Europe, while also gaining traction in North America.

As a result of these developments, many record labels began to sign artists who were making electronic dance music. Many of these artists would go on to have highly successful careers, including Daft Punk and The Chemical Brothers. Others would have considerably less success but still became well known for their contributions to the genre , such as Moby and Fatboy Slim.


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