The Genesis of Music Videos
So this is the History of Music Videos Blog. It's basically a collection of essays that will one day be collected and published.
This book is dedicated to the artistry of music videos. It is an often-overlooked medium, as many videos are vapid commercials for the musician. But we are going to take a look at the artistry involved in creating them and how they have influenced film, television and culture over the last forty years. This book serves to celebrate collaborations between directors and performers, inspect the techniques used to make the videos, and certain videos' impact on culture and media.
This book is dedicated to the artistry of music videos. It is an often-overlooked medium, as many videos are vapid commercials for the musician. But we are going to take a look at the artistry involved in creating them and how they have influenced film, television and culture over the last forty years. This book serves to celebrate collaborations between directors and performers, inspect the techniques used to make the videos, and certain videos' impact on culture and media.
The Beginning,
a brief overview,
1890's - Thomas Edison and the Lumiere brothers are credited with inventing the motion film and the projectors used to watch them. In fact it wasn't Edison whose hands were on the invention, it was William K.L. Dickson who Edison hired to run the team that would make the first Strip Kinetiscope.
Kino - movement
Scope - to see,
Strip - because a strip of film was reeled behind the eyepiece to make the motion picture.
The first motion picture shown in public was Dickson Greeting in 1891. But the first film recorded with sound was Dickson Experimental Sound Film, in 1894. In this we see Dickson playing violin into a phonograph which recorded the sound and was played to sync with the film. The videos they made were presented at Black Maria studios, which was cool as balls. Why? Because there wasn't a light bright enough to project the film, so they had to funnel sunlight through the roof into the projectoscope. Here's the link to see Edison and Dickson's work http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cn2HGPG1n7M&feature=plcp
I know I wan’t going to talk about ancient history and being that this is just old enough to almost be civil war memorabilia, it’s getting pretty close. But I mention this because William didn't move on after inventing the film camera, he pursued it with a vigor that allowed him to be the first to do many things with film, including be the first visual effects artist and create the first colored film in Annabele Serpentine Dances in 1895. These films were shown on the projectoscope, which become what we now call Tell Lie Vision.
Though Dickson was the first to do many visual effects, he was not the best. That award goes to Georges Milies. Techniques they invented then like compositing footage on top of each other and rotoscoping are still used today, though in a digital medium. Milies was a magician and cartoonist before he became the first awesome video effects artist. Shit these guys were making color films long before Dorothy was dropped through a cyclone and had sound in their film long before Alan Jolson put on black face in The Jazz Singer. They were the lone rangers of the film world and they're still a trip to watch. Check out some of Milies' and others' work here at http://classicmediafiles.blogspot.com/
Fun Fact for Columbia locals. The first movie theatres were called Nickelodeons, as our own theatre alludes, so called because it only cost a nickel to see a movie and "odeon" is Greek for theatre. So stick that in your hipster face and bring it up next time you're having an intellectual talk at the Nick.
1930s -Sergei Eisenstein’s 1938 film Alexander Nevsky is often argued as being the first music video as it was one of the first films with music accompaniment throughout the movie. It’s hilarious to watch this biblical-looking film set around cheap tricks, 2-D back drops and smoke machines. The film’s biggest redeeming quality is the same as Akira Kurosawa’s Kagemusha, which are the huge fuck battles with what seems like hundreds of guys running at each other and fighting, before they all became CGIified in later movies like Troy and Lord of the Rings.
1940s - Perhaps the best place to see music videos was on a visual jukebox called a panoram in the 1940s, the music videos were called soundies and were mostly jazz music. Soundies were located in bars and clubs as a sort of visual juke box. Some of the most amazing videos shown on the panoram were Dorothy Dandridge's work like Chattanooga Choo Choo. This film seems to have been taken in a single shot, though there are cuts. The dancing is amazing and the panning movements was something rarely seen at the time. The entertainers move and feel like the cartoons around at the time, they're over the top, comical and inexplicably remarkable at moving around with jello legs.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g9sa75SQ4Oo&feature=plcp
1950's - Music videos have been used wherever music has been since its advent. Between television shows music videos would be played to fill up air time because sometimes TV stations didn't have enough programs to run through the whole day. This was in the early 1950s. Of course music videos have always been used for promoting the band but this was especially true in the 50's. Snader Telescriptions was a program that filmed live shows of a music artist and then played them on television between other TV shows. These were pretty great. Each music video was recorded in a single take with live cameras and no lip syncing whatsoever. These short videos could be a minute long or could be strung together to fill up to fifteen minutes of empty space between regular programming back when TV didn’t have much material to put on the air.
Some fashionable artists involved were: George Shearing, Nat King Cole, Tex Williams, Cole Porter, and Ginny Simms who seems to have introduced Auto Tune to TV in One Track Mind. Look her up, her videos may be the first to go all out
a brief overview,
1890's - Thomas Edison and the Lumiere brothers are credited with inventing the motion film and the projectors used to watch them. In fact it wasn't Edison whose hands were on the invention, it was William K.L. Dickson who Edison hired to run the team that would make the first Strip Kinetiscope.
Scope - to see,
Strip - because a strip of film was reeled behind the eyepiece to make the motion picture.
The first motion picture shown in public was Dickson Greeting in 1891. But the first film recorded with sound was Dickson Experimental Sound Film, in 1894. In this we see Dickson playing violin into a phonograph which recorded the sound and was played to sync with the film. The videos they made were presented at Black Maria studios, which was cool as balls. Why? Because there wasn't a light bright enough to project the film, so they had to funnel sunlight through the roof into the projectoscope. Here's the link to see Edison and Dickson's work http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cn2HGPG1n7M&feature=plcp
I know I wan’t going to talk about ancient history and being that this is just old enough to almost be civil war memorabilia, it’s getting pretty close. But I mention this because William didn't move on after inventing the film camera, he pursued it with a vigor that allowed him to be the first to do many things with film, including be the first visual effects artist and create the first colored film in Annabele Serpentine Dances in 1895. These films were shown on the projectoscope, which become what we now call Tell Lie Vision.
Though Dickson was the first to do many visual effects, he was not the best. That award goes to Georges Milies. Techniques they invented then like compositing footage on top of each other and rotoscoping are still used today, though in a digital medium. Milies was a magician and cartoonist before he became the first awesome video effects artist. Shit these guys were making color films long before Dorothy was dropped through a cyclone and had sound in their film long before Alan Jolson put on black face in The Jazz Singer. They were the lone rangers of the film world and they're still a trip to watch. Check out some of Milies' and others' work here at http://classicmediafiles.blogspot.com/
Fun Fact for Columbia locals. The first movie theatres were called Nickelodeons, as our own theatre alludes, so called because it only cost a nickel to see a movie and "odeon" is Greek for theatre. So stick that in your hipster face and bring it up next time you're having an intellectual talk at the Nick.
1930s -Sergei Eisenstein’s 1938 film Alexander Nevsky is often argued as being the first music video as it was one of the first films with music accompaniment throughout the movie. It’s hilarious to watch this biblical-looking film set around cheap tricks, 2-D back drops and smoke machines. The film’s biggest redeeming quality is the same as Akira Kurosawa’s Kagemusha, which are the huge fuck battles with what seems like hundreds of guys running at each other and fighting, before they all became CGIified in later movies like Troy and Lord of the Rings. 1940s - Perhaps the best place to see music videos was on a visual jukebox called a panoram in the 1940s, the music videos were called soundies and were mostly jazz music. Soundies were located in bars and clubs as a sort of visual juke box. Some of the most amazing videos shown on the panoram were Dorothy Dandridge's work like Chattanooga Choo Choo. This film seems to have been taken in a single shot, though there are cuts. The dancing is amazing and the panning movements was something rarely seen at the time. The entertainers move and feel like the cartoons around at the time, they're over the top, comical and inexplicably remarkable at moving around with jello legs.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g9sa75SQ4Oo&feature=plcp
1950's - Music videos have been used wherever music has been since its advent. Between television shows music videos would be played to fill up air time because sometimes TV stations didn't have enough programs to run through the whole day. This was in the early 1950s. Of course music videos have always been used for promoting the band but this was especially true in the 50's. Snader Telescriptions was a program that filmed live shows of a music artist and then played them on television between other TV shows. These were pretty great. Each music video was recorded in a single take with live cameras and no lip syncing whatsoever. These short videos could be a minute long or could be strung together to fill up to fifteen minutes of empty space between regular programming back when TV didn’t have much material to put on the air.
Some fashionable artists involved were: George Shearing, Nat King Cole, Tex Williams, Cole Porter, and Ginny Simms who seems to have introduced Auto Tune to TV in One Track Mind. Look her up, her videos may be the first to go all out
1960s - If you’ve talked to anyone who saw a young Mickey Rooney in theatres then they’ll tell ya that movie trailers weren’t the only thing that played before a movie. Often short films would play, including government propaganda, big news, and short music videos to promote musicians that may be coming to play in your area or were releasing an album. Bing Crosbey, Ricky Nelson, and of course the Beatles. Their famous Hard Day's Night came out. Top of the Pops is one of the major Music Video engines at as music was swinging into regular television. This TV series began in 1964 and brought in major artists to play live sets at their studio in quick succession. Between each set, prerecorded music videos would be aired to bide time. We’re talking Diana Ross, the Beatles, The Kinks, The Beejees, the Monkees, etc, you get the idea, a lot of british bands, a lot of american music videos. The Foundations, Julie Driscoll, Sandie Shaw, Procol Harum, Theresa Brewer. This made music video production more competitive, as more people were vying to win the audiences at home above the live bands that were playing for the studio audience.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ESPh2Izcqt4&feature=plcp
To Be Continued and updated
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ESPh2Izcqt4&feature=plcp
To Be Continued and updated
*If you want to learn more about the invention of film and Edison and see a picture of the Black Maria, check out this link http://www.nps.gov/edis/forkids/motion-pictures.htm
Sources:
inventors.about.com
The Film Book, A Complete Guide to Cinema by Eyewitness Companions
classicmediafiles.blogspot.com
acadamia.edu
http://www.1940.co.uk/acatalog/soundies.html
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