Your Two Favorite Decades for Music

[BeBop]

This is just a curiosity for me. Decades are arbitrary and don't match up to musical developments/eras. And two is an arbitrary number. I'll be capricious and ask respondents to think in terms of "modern" music. (Yes, after the Council of Trent banned sequences in 1563, in Gregorian chants entered a period lasting up through the Editio Medicia in 1614...)

So yes, a (early) pointless exercise...apart from my curiosity.

[A Lark Ascending]

The decade leading up to WWI has some of my favourite classical music - Mahler, Elgar, Strauss, early RVW, Bridge, Sibelius, Stravinsky, Ravel, Debussy, the dissolvings of Schoenberg and Co. etc (though I'm also keen on the decade that followed).

The decade from around 1966-76 - but that was when I was young and everything sounded new, fresh, alive and an opening to new worlds (I suspect we all feel like that about the decade of our teenage to early 20s years).

I've really enjoyed the last couple of decades too - lots happening in various musical areas; especially nice to see new, young talent emerge.

Edited April 16, 2014 by A Lark Ascending

[John Tapscott]

'45-'54;

'55-'64 (or 5)

95% + of the music I listen to is jazz and the jazz that I enjoy most comes from those years or has roots in that era. (I also enjoy jazz rooted in the earlier swing era).

[BillF]

Jazz in the period 1945 to 1965. I remember saying this twenty years ago to the late Ed Dipple, proprietor of Mole Jazz in London and he agreed with me. Nowadays I would add my admiration for contemporary jazz musicians who share my enthusiasm for the jazz of 1945 to 1965.

[Clunky]

Sticking to decades, I'd go for

1920s-----so much wonderful hot jazz by the music's pioneers.

1960s-------as noted in the other thread , the 60s produced an abundance of incredible music.

[Simon8]

What John and Bill said !

[Chuck Nessa]

Sticking to decades, I'd go for

1920s-----so much wonderful hot jazz by the music's pioneers.

1960s-------as noted in the other thread , the 60s produced an abundance of incredible music.

Me too.

[felser]

1956-1976. The birth,ascendancy, and decline of Rock, the prime of R&B and electric Blues, the Folk movement, hard bop/post-bop/early (and the only good) jazz-rock fusion/the whole spiritual jazz movement in Jazz.

[Neal Pomea]

For me

1920s for jazz, blues, and Cajun

1950s for blues, rhythm & blues, country-western, bluegrass, rock and roll, and Cajun

If I knew anything about so called "song" and "Great American Songbook" I might say something different.

Edited April 16, 2014 by Neal Pomea

[Rooster_Ties]

Jazz: 1963-1973, or if two decades: 1956-1976.

Classical: 1910-1920 was pretty darn amazing, but so too was the last quarter of the 19th century (a wee but more than a decade, too hard to narrow down beyond 1875-1900, or maybe 1865 or 1870 might be an even better starting point).

My rock/pop/alternative interests are too all-over-the-map to tie to any one decade. 1968 to whenever Radiohead's last album would be about as narrow as I could go there.

[xybert]

Jazz = 2003 - 2013, other than that it's changing all the time... previously probably would have said the sixties, but increasingly there's stuff from the fifties and forties and earlier that i can't live without...

Hip Hop = 1985 - 2005

Rock = sixties, nineties

[BeBop]

Thanks for all the responses already provided. I'll hold off just a little longer before I share my specific curiosity. But I'm finding this interesting.

[GA Russell]

I would say that most recordings I enjoy are from 1952 - 1972.

However, I think the '40s produced the most great melodies.

[paul secor]

I couldn't begin to decide. There has been too much great music of all kinds in too many decades for me to make any kind of choice.

[Jim R]

The decade from around 1966-76 - but that was when I was young and everything sounded new, fresh, alive and an opening to new worlds (I suspect we all feel like that about the decade of our teenage to early 20s years).

I tend to agree, except that I also identify with the popular music I was exposed to during my pre-teen years. So, I would probably say '56 to '76. For me, popular music began to sharply decline at the end of that 20-year period. Fortunately, that was just about that time that I got into blues, R&B, and jazz, which occupied me quite nicely as rock and pop were becoming less than appealing (to put it kindly).

[Shawn]

1970s

1960s (entire decade for jazz, 1967 and later for pop/rock)

[A Lark Ascending]

The decade from around 1966-76 - but that was when I was young and everything sounded new, fresh, alive and an opening to new worlds (I suspect we all feel like that about the decade of our teenage to early 20s years).

I tend to agree, except that I also identify with the popular music I was exposed to during my pre-teen years. So, I would probably say '56 to '76. For me, popular music began to sharply decline at the end of that 20-year period. Fortunately, that was just about that time that I got into blues, R&B, and jazz, which occupied me quite nicely as rock and pop were becoming less than appealing (to put it kindly).

My teenage years didn't officially start until 1968 so I'm including a bit of pre-teen there. To be honest I remember little before the arrival of the Beatles (and then more as a phenomena than being actively interested in the music) apart from novelty songs like 'Itsy Bitsy...' and 'Sitting in the Back seat Kissing and a-Huggin' with Fred'. When I became aware of Rock n' Roll I just thought of it as old people's music (like jazz!).

Edited April 17, 2014 by A Lark Ascending

[Indestructible!]

Primarily:

Jazz = 1955-1965

Punk = 1976-1986

Can't be without:

Ska/Rocksteady/Reggae = 1964-1974

If I could pick any two specific eras in time to see live music, though, it would be:

1.) Emergence of Bop (to see Bird, Bud, Monk, Diz in the early days would've been magic).

2.) Emergence of Punk (I sort of lived this, but was just a bit too young... to see the Clash live in 1977, for example, would've been insane).

[sidewinder]

1955-75

Edited April 17, 2014 by sidewinder

[David Ayers]

I guess for me it is fifties for jazz, sixties for 'avant-garde'. Jazz as such struggles a bit in the 60s.

[Big Beat Steve]

As I have to limit myself to TWO decades, I'd say this:

Jazz, Blues/R&B, Country/Western Swing: 1935 to 1955

Rock'n'Roll/Rockabilly (i.e. REAL rock'n'roll, not the US definition of "rock'n'roll" extending past Beatlemania to include what would otherwise just be labeled "rock";)): 1954 to 1964 and then again 1990 to 2000 (though the latter might move forward or backward in 5-year intervals depending on my mood)

[porcy62]

Hard job, but if I have to:

Rock 1965-1975

Jazz 1955-1965.

And the nineties for the huge amount of output on cd: new historical recordings, "world music", new "classical" stuff, avantgarde, etc, overall the decade I discovered most music, new and old.

Edited April 17, 2014 by porcy62

[The Magnificent Goldberg]

For which music, eh?

For Gospel: 1947-57 (quartets) and 1985-95 (choirs)

For R&B: 1943-53 (jump blues) and 1959-69 (soul)

For Djeliya: 1970-80 (Government bands) and 1992-2002 (Indies)

For Mbalax: 1980-2000 (&2001-2013 )

For Jazz: 1959-1979 (soul jazz & disco)

MG

[Steve Reynolds]

Jazz: 90's & 00's

[Larry Kart]

Classical: The 1310s and the 1470s

Jazz: When Madame Zajj was at home