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Salsa Music

Salsa music

Salsa music is a diverse and predominantly Caribbean and Latin genre that is popular across Latin America and among Latinos abroad; the style is the primary music played at Latin danceclubs and is the "essential pulse of Latin music", according to author Ed Morales . Salsa incoporates multiple styles and variations; the term can be used to describe most any form of popular Cuban-derived genres (like chachachá and mambo). Most specifically, however, salsa refers to a particular style developed by the mid-1970s groups of New York City-area Cuban and Puerto Rican immigrants to the United States, and stylistic descendants like 1980s salsa romantica. Some people have claimed that salsa's style is primarily Cuban, though it is a hybrid of various Latin styles mixed with pop, jazz, rock and R&B . Salsa's most close relatives are Cuban mambo and the son orchestras of the early 20th century, as well as Latin jazz. The line between Latin jazz and salsa is not always clear, with many musicians, especially prior to the 1970s, sometimes considered a part of either field .

Characteristics

Salsa music is a very broad term that can be used with various meanings depending on the context; its exact meaning is the subject of many arguments among aficionados . Celia Cruz, a well-known salsa singer, has said "(s)alsa is Cuban music with another name. It's mambo, chachachá, rumba, son... all the Cuban rhythms under one name" . Author Ed Morales has said the obvious, most common perception of salsa is an "extravagant, clave-driven, Afro-Cuban-derived songs anchored by piano, horns, and rhythm section and sung by a velvety voiced crooner in a sharkskin suit". He also defines it as "nothing more than a new spin on the traditional rhythms of Cuban music" and "at once (both) a modern marketing concept and the cultural voice of a new generation", representative of a "crystallization of a Latino identity in New York in the early 1960s" . In addition, Morales cites singer Rubén Blades as claiming that salsa is merely "a concept" , as opposed to a definite style or rhythm. Some musicians are doubtful that the term salsa has any useful meaning at all, with the bandleader Machito claiming that salsa was more or less what he had been playing for forty years before the style was invented, while Tito Puente once responded to a question about salsa by saying "I'm a musician, not a cook" (referring to salsa's original use to mean sauce) . At its root, however, salsa is a mixture of Spanish and African music, filtered through the music histories of Cuba and Puerto Rico, and adapted by Latin jazz and Latin popular musicians for Latino populations with diverse musical tastes . The basic structure of a salsa song is based on the Cuban son, beginning with a simple melody and followed by a coro section in which the performers improvise . Ed Morales has claimed that the "key staples" of salsa's origins were the use of the trombone as a counterpoint to the vocalist and a more aggressive sound than is typical in Cuban music .

Rhythm

Salsa music always has a 4/4 meter, i.e., 4 beats per bar. The music is phrased in groups of two bars, i.e. 8 beats, for example by recurring rhythmic patterns, and the beginning of phrases in the song text and instruments. Typically, the rhythmic patterns played on the percussion instruments are rather complicated, often with several different patterns played simultaneously. Salsa music often has around 180 beats per minute, although it can be both much slower or much faster. percussion instrument A rhythmic element that forms the basics in salsa is the clave rhythm, generally played on claves. The most common clave rhythm in salsa is the so called 2-3 son clave:

1.2.3.4.5.6.7.8.   (count)
..
 - .
 - ...
 - ..
 - ..
 - .   (
 -  = clave strikes)

The clave is not always played out directly but forms the basis that most other percussion instruments as well as song and accompaniment uses as a common rhythmic ground for their own phrases. For example, this is a common rhythmic pattern played on the cowbell:

1.2.3.4.5.6.7.8.   (count)
+.
 - .+.
   - +.
   - +.
   -    (+/
 -  = low/high-pitched cowbell strikes)

Instrumentation

The most important instrumentation in salsa is the percussion, which is played by a wide variety of instruments, including claves, cowbells, timbales and conga . Apart from percussion, a variety of melodic instruments are commonly used as accompaniment, such as a guitar, trumpets, trombones, the piano, and many others, all depending on the performing artists.

History

piano, "the group with the longest duration."]] In the 1930s, 40s and 50s, Cuban music within Cuba was evolving into new styles derived primarily from son and rumba, while the Cubans in New York, living among many Latinos from Puerto Rico and elsewhere, began playing their own distinctive styles, influenced most importantly by African American music . Their music included son and guarachas, as well as tango, bolero and danza, with prominent influences from jazz . While the New York scene continued evolving, Cuban popular music, especially mambo, became very famous across the United States. This was followed by a series of other genres of Cuban music, which especially effected the Latin scene in New York. The result, by the mid-1970s, was what is now known as salsa music. Salsa evolved steadily through the later 1970s and into the 80s and 90s. New instruments were adopted and new national styles, like the music of Brazil, were adapted to salsa. New subgenres appeared, such as the sweet love songs called salsa romantica, while salsa became a major part of the music scene in Venezuela, Mexico and as far away as Japan. Diverse influences, including most prominently hip hop music, came to shape the evolving genre. By the turn of the century, salsa was one of the major fields of popular music in the world, and salsa stars were international celebrities.

Origins

Salsa's roots can be traced back to the African ancestors that were brought to the Caribbean by the Spanish as slaves. In Africa, it is very common to find people playing music with instruments like the conga and la pandereta, instruments commonly used in salsa. Salsa's most direct antecedent is Cuban son, which itself is a combination of African and European influences . Large son bands were very popular in Cuban, beginning in the 1930s; these were largely septetos and sextetos . By the end of the 1940s, these bands grew much larger, becoming mambo and charanga orchestras led by bandleaders like Arsenio Rodriguez and Felix Chappotin . In New York City, at the center for mambo in the United States, the Palladium Dancehall, and in Mexico City, where a burgeoning film industry attracted Latin musicians, Cuban-style big bands were formed by Cubans and Puerto Ricans like Machito, Perez Prado, Tito Puente and Tito Rodriguez . Mambo was very jazz-influenced, and it was the mambo big bands that kept alive the large jazz band tradition while the mainstream current of jazz was moving on to the smaller bands of the bebop era . Throughout the 1950s, Latin dance music, such as mambo, rumba and chachachá was mainstream popular music in the United States and Europe . The 50s also saw a decline in popular for mambo big bands, followed by the Cuban Revolution of 1959, which greatly inhibited contact between New York and Cuba. The result was a scene more dominated by Puerto Ricans than Cubans. The New York Latin music of the early 1960s was led by the bands of musicians such as Ray Barretto and Eddie Palmieri, influenced by imported Cuban fads such as pachanga and charanga; after the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962, however, Cuban-American contact declined even more precipitously . A hybrid Nuyorican identity developed, primarily Puerto Rican but influenced by many Latin cultures as well as the close contact with African Americans . The growth of modern salsa, however, is said to have begun in the streets of New York in the late 1960s. By this time, Latin pop was no longer a major force in American music, having lost ground to doo wop, R&B and rock and roll; there were a few youth fads for Latin dances, such as the soul and mambo fusion boogaloo, but Latin music ceased to be such a major part of American popular music . The Manhattan based recording company, Fania Records, introduced many of the first-generation salsa singers and musicians to the world . Founded by Dominican flautist and band-leader Johnny Pacheco and impresario Jerry Masucci, Fania's illustrious career began with Willie Colón and Héctor Lavoe's El Malo in 1967 . This was followed by a series of updated son montuno and plena tunes that evolved into salsa by 1973.

The word salsa

Salsa means sauce in the Spanish language, and has been described as a word with "vivid associations but no absolute definitions, a tag that encompasses a rainbow assortment of Latin rhythms and styles, taking on a different hue wherever you stands in the Spanish-speaking world" . The term has been used by Cuban and Puerto Rican immigrants in New York analogously to swing . World music author Sue Steward has claimed that the word was originally used in music as a "cry of appreciation for a particularly piquant or flashy solo", coming to descibe a specific style of music in the mid-1970s "when a group of New York-based Latin music began overhauling the classic big-band arrangements popular since the mambo era of the 1940s and 50s". She cites the first use in this manner to an unnamed Venezuelan radio DJ ; Ed Morales, on the other hand, cites it to a New York-based editor and graphic designer named Izzy Sanabria . Morales also mentions the word's prior use to encourage a band to increase the tempo and "put the dancers in high gear", and to "acknowledge a musical moment's het (and) express a kind of cultural nationalist sloganeering, celebrating the 'hotness' or 'spiciness' of Latin American culture" ; he also mentions Johny Pacheco, a Dominican performer who released a 1962 album called Salsa Na' Ma, which Morales translates as "it just needs a little salsa, or spice" .

1970s

Salsa Na' Ma From New York, salsa quickly expanded to Cuba, Puerto Rico, the Dominican Republic, Colombia, Mexico, Venezuela, and other Latin countries. Musicians and singers such as Tito Puente and Celia Cruz became household names, not only in North American Latino homes but all over the Caribbean. Later, groups like El Gran Combo and The Apollo All Stars with Roberto Roena among others, followed suit. The 1970s saw a number of musical innovations among salsa musicians. The Puerto Rican cuatro guitar was introduced by Yomo Toro and the electric piano by Larry Harlow, while vocalists like Cheo Feliciano, Soledad Bravo, and Celia Cruz adapted Brazilian songs to the genre. Ray Barretto, Tipica 73, Conjunto Clasico, Rubén Blades and Eddie Palmieri were other important artists of the era, while Peregoyo y su Combo Vacano brought Colombian influences to salsa and brought the music to their homeland. By the 1980s, Fania Records' long-time leadership of salsa was weakened by the arrival of TH-Rodven and RMM.

1980s

The 1980s was a time of diversification, as popular salsa evolved into sweet and smooth salsa romantica, with lyrics dwelling on love and romance, and its more explicit cousin, salsa erotica. José Alberto's 1984 Noches Calientes is considered the beginning of this era, which was soon dominated by Puerto Rican stars. By the late 1980s, salsa had influenced Latin rap and found artists like Sergio George returning the music to its mambo roots and adding a prominent trombone section. Salsa during the 1980s also expanded to Mexico, Argentina, Peru, Europe and Japan, where (Japan) it was popularized by the famous Orquesta Del Sol. Orquesta del Sol, or Orchestra of the Sun, became famous in many Latin American countries, too. Colombia continued its salsa innovations through the 1980s, and artists like Fruko, Los Nemus del Pacifico and Latin Brothers added cumbia influences, while the 1990s saw Carlos Vives mix vallenato into Colombian salsa. Joe Arroyo (formerly of Fruko) and Sonora Carruseles became major attractions in Colombia during the 1990s, and the city of Cali styled itself "salsa capital of the world". Cuban-born Roberto Torres invented charanga-vallenata in the 80s, making Miami a salsa center. This status helped launch the career of Gloria Estefan, a Cuban who was a mainstream American star, and others who helped invent the Miami Sound, a mixture of rock and pop. Venezuelan salsa has also become popular, especially Oscar D'Leon, while others, like Nelson Pueblo, added native llanera music influences. Cano Estremera became a popular Salsa singer during the late 1980s.

1990s to the present

Cano Estremera Evolving out of salsa from Cuba, timba drew on songo rhythms and was invented by bands like Los Van Van and NG La Banda. By the 1990s, this form of Cuban-born salsa was known as timba and became popular across the world. Another form of Cuban salsa is songo-salsa, with extremely fast rapping. Salsa has registered a steady growth and now dominates the airwaves in many countries in Latin America. In addition, several Latino artists, notably Marc Anthony, and most famously, the Cuban-American singer Gloria Estefan, have had success as crossovers, penetrating the Anglo-American pop market with Latin-tinged hits, usually sung in English. The most recent innovations in the genre include hybrids like mereng-house and salsa-merengue, alongside salsa gorda. Since the mid-1990s, African artists have also been very active through the super-group Africando, where African and New York musicians mix with leading African singers such as Bambino Diabate, Ricardo Lemvo, Ismael Lo and Salif Keita. Salsa is only one of many Latin genres to have traveled back and influenced West African music.

References

- Steward, Sue. "Cubans, Nuyoricans and the Global Sound". 2000. In Broughton, Simon and Ellingham, Mark with McConnachie, James and Duane, Orla (Ed.), World Music, Vol. 2: Latin & North America, Caribbean, India, Asia and Pacific, pp 488-506. Rough Guides Ltd, Penguin Books. ISBN 1-85828-636-0
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-
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Notes

# Morales, pg. 33 # Morales, pg. 33 Morales claims that many Afro-Cuban purists continue to claim that salsa is a mere variation on Cuba's musical heriateg (but) the hybridizing experience the music went through in New York from the 1920s on incorporated influences from many different branches of the Latin American tradition, and later from jazz, R&B, and even rock. Morales' essential claim is confirmed by Unterberger's and Steward's analysis. # Unterberger, pg. 50 # Morales, pg. 55 # Cruz, cited in Steward (with ellipsis), no specific source given # Morales, pg. 55 # Morales, pg. 55 If mambo was a constellation of rhythmic tendencies, then, as leading salsa sonero (lead singer) Rubén Blades once said, salsa is a concept, not a particular rhythm. # Morales, pg. 56 # Steward, pg. 488 # Morales, pg. 55 # Morales, pg. 60 Morales cites the Venezuelan scholar César Miguel Rondón, in El Libro de la Salsa, as noting that Eddie Palmieri's arrangement of the trombone in a way that they always sounded sour, with a peculiarly aggressive harshness. # Unterberger, pg. 50 # Morales, pg. 33 # Morales, pg. 34 # Steward, pg. 488 # Steward, pg. 488 # Steward, pg. 488 # Steward, pgs. 488-489 # Morales, pg. 57 # Steward, pg. 489 # Morales, pg. 57 # Morales, pg. 57 # Steward, pg. 489 # Steward, pg. 489 # Steward, pg. 489 # Steward, pg. 488 # Jones and Kantonen # Steward, pg. 488 # Morales, pg. 56 # Morales, pg. 56 So when in 1932 Ignacio Piñeiro, the pioneering Cuban bassist and orchestra leader, shouted out "salsa" on Échale salsita, he was saying "Put some salsa on it," telling his band to shift the tempo and put the dancers into high gear. Later in that decade, renowned vocalist Beny Moré would merely shouted (sic) "salsa!" to acknowledge a musical moment's heat, as well as perhaps to express a kind of cultural nationalist sloganeering, celebrating the "hotness" or "spiciness" of Latin American cultures" # Morales, pgs. 58-59

Caribbean music

The music of the Caribbean is a diverse grouping of musical genres. They are each syntheses of African, European, Indian and native influences. Some of the styles to gain wide popularity outside of the Caribbean include reggae, zouk, salsa and calypso.
- The Bahamas (see music of the Bahamas)
- Junkanoo
- Rake amd Scrape
- Goombay
- Cuba (see music of Cuba)
- Abwe
- Areito
- Batá
- Batá-rumba
- Bolero
- Chachachá
- Charanga
- Conga
- Comparsa
- Danzón
- Habanera
- Mambo
- Mozambique
- Nueva trova
- Rumba
- Salsa
- Son
- Son-batá
- Timba
- UPA
- Dominican Republic (see music of the Dominican Republic)
- Bachata
- Gaga
- Merengue
- Salve
- Haiti (see music of Haiti)
- Cadence rampa
- Konpa direct
- Merengue
- Rara
- Jamaica (see music of Jamaica)
- Dancehall
- Dub
- Lovers rock
- Mento
- Ragga
- Reggae
- Rocksteady
- Roots reggae
- Ska
- Martinique and Guadeloupe (see music of Martinique and Guadeloupe)
- Biguine
- Kadans
- Zouk
- Puerto Rico (see music of Puerto Rico)
- Bomba
- Danza
- Décima
- Plena
- Reggaeton
- Salsa
- Trinidad and Tobago (see music of Trinidad and Tobago)
- Calypso
- Chut-kai-pang
- Chutney
- Chutney-soca
- Pan music
- Parang
- Pichakaree
- Rapso
- Soca
- Steel Pan
- Dominica
- Jing-Ping

External links

- [http://www.radioblack.com/caribbean_webcast.html Carribbean music radio stations] Category:Caribbean music

Music genre

A music genre is a category (or genre) of pieces of music that share a certain style or "basic musical language" (van der Merwe 1989, p.3). Music can also be categorised by non-musical criteria such as geographical origin. Such categories are not strictly genre and a single geographical category will often include a number of different genre. Categorizing music, especially into finer genres or subgenres, can be difficult for newly emerging styles or for pieces of music that incorporate features of multiple genres. Attempts to pigeonhole particular musicians in a single genre are sometimes ill-founded as they may produce music in a variety of genres over time or even within a single piece. Some people feel that the categorization of music into genres is based more on commercial and marketing motives than musical criteria. John Zorn, for example, a musician whose work has covered a wide range of genres, wrote in Arcana: Musicians on Music that genres are tools used to "commodify and commercialize an artist's complex personal vision." Other artists feel that it is an artist's fault themselves if they make a body of work that can easily be put into a class shared with others. Some genre labels are quite vague, and may be contrived by critics; post-rock, for example, is a term devised and defined by Simon Reynolds. Another example of this is video game music, which while defined by its media, can also represent its own style, as well as that of any other musical genre. Dividing music by genre does make it easier to trace threads through music history, and makes it easier for individuals to find artists that they enjoy. music history]] Although there are many individual genres, it is possible to group these together into a number of overlapping major groupings. The rest of this page attempts to do that for a number of widely agreed areas. These definitions are relatively short and simple, referring to further articles as needed. See also: List of music genres, Genealogy of musical genres, :Category:Musical genres

Classical music (or art music)

The term classical music refers to a number of different, but related, genres. Without any qualification, the usual meaning of "classical music" in the English language is European classical music (an older usage describes specifically the Western art music of the Classical music era). It can also refer to the classical (or art) music of non-Western cultures such as Indian classical music or Chinese classical music. In a Western context, classical music is generally a classification covering music composed and performed by professionally trained artists. Classical music is a written tradition. It is composed and written using music notation, and as a rule is performed faithfully to the score. Art music is a term widely used to describe classical music and other serious forms of artistic musical expression, Western or non-Western, especially referring to serious music composed after 1950.

Gospel

Gospel is a genre that includes songs that have lyrics strong in religious terms, particularly Christian. Despite its religious context, gospel music is one of the most popular non-pop music genres. Even though Christian spirituals and hymns have existed for hundreds of years, gospel music didn't really come into being until the 1920s, when Thomas A. Dorsey recorded his first religious song, "If You See My Savior." Mahalia Jackson and the Soul Stirrers were major gospel acts of the 40s and 50s, which were also the years when gospel music became popularized. By this time, singers with gospel backgrounds became stars in the secular arena. These included: Elvis Presley, Jerry Lee Lewis, Ray Charles, Little Richard, and Sam Cooke (who was also a member of the Soul Stirrers). By the late 60s, a different type of gospel music called "Jesus music" was popularized by the youth, mostly among college students. Jesus music featured styles of white rock by such artists as Larry Norman. Andrae Crouch, however, was the most popular black gospel as well as mainstream artist of the 70s. By the late 70s and early 80s, Contemporary Christian Music had begun to replace black gospel music as the most popular style of gospel. Artists such as Amy Grant, Michael W. Smith, and Steven Curtis Chapman were artists that not only appealed to their Christian fans, but also found a mainstream audience. There has been is a revival of Southern Gospel Harmony and Family Groups such as The Freemans, The Staton's, The Crabb Family among others. Music that has quite a following, examples of Inspirational music was another popular type of gospel in the 1980s, led by artists like Sandi Patti and Dallas Holm, but it had largely been replaced by praise & worship in the 90s and 00s.

Jazz

Jazz is a musical form that grew out of a cross-fertilization of folk blues, ragtime, and European music, particularly band music. It has been called the first native art form to develop in the United States of America. The music has gone through a series of developments since its inception. In roughly chronological order they are Dixieland, swing/big band, bebop, hard bop, cool jazz, free jazz, jazz fusion and smooth jazz. Jazz is primarily an instrumental form of music. The instrument most closely associated with jazz may be the saxophone, followed closely by the trumpet. The trombone, piano, double bass, guitar and drums are also primary jazz instruments. The clarinet and banjo were often used, especially in the earlier styles of jazz. Although there have been many renowned jazz vocalists, and many of the most well-known jazz tunes have lyrics, the majority of well-known and influential jazz musicians and composers have been instrumentalists. During the time of its widest popularity, roughly 1920 to 1950, jazz and popular music had a very intimate connection. Popular songs drew upon jazz influences, and many jazz hits were reworkings of popular songs, or lyrics were written for jazz tunes in an attempt to create popular hits. The single most distinguishing characteristic of jazz is improvisation. Jazz also tends to utilize complex chord structures and an advanced sense of harmony. These characteristics in combination with the use of improvisation require a high degree of technical skill and musical knowledge from the performers. The art form today is a widely varied one, using influences from all of the past styles, although the root of modern jazz is primarily bebop. Modern jazz can also incorporate elements of electronica and hip-hop. Jazz was a direct influence on Rhythm and blues, and therefore a secondary influence on most later genres of popular music. Modern American art music composers have often used elements of jazz in their compositions.

Latin American

Latin American Music, music of Mexico, Central America, South America, and the Caribbean (see West Indies). The region of Latin America contains a rich variety of cultural and musical heritages, including those of lowland Native Americans in the Amazon River area and parts of Central America; those of highland Native Americans in Mexico, Guatemala, and the Andes; those of African Americans, especially in the Caribbean, Ecuador, Suriname, Guyana, French Guiana, coastal Venezuela, Colombia, and northeastern Brazil; and those of people of Spanish and Portuguese descent. Certain types of Latin American music represent fairly direct lines of continuity with the original cultural sources. Throughout the region there have been composers and musicians working in the European classical tradition since the colonial period (beginning about the 16th century), and there are also ballad, dance, and dance-drama traditions that can be traced directly from Europe. Various lowland and highland peoples maintain distinctive indigenous musical traditions, and African American populations continue to perform both sacred and secular music that is directly linked to specific West African and Central African traditions. The most prevalent musical styles in much of Latin America, however, are the result of various types and degrees of fusion of these different cultural heritages and musical resources.

Blues

Blues is a vocal and instrumental music form which emerged in the African-American community of the United States. Blues evolved from West African spirituals, work songs, field hollers, shouts and chants and has its earliest stylistic roots in West Africa. This musical form has been a major influence on later American and Western popular music, finding expression in ragtime, jazz, big bands, rhythm and blues, rock and roll and country music, as well as conventional pop songs and even modern classical music . Due to its powerful influence that spawned other major musical genres originating from America, blues can be regarded as the root of pop as well as American music.

Rhythm and blues

Rhythm and blues is a name for black popular music tradition. When speaking strictly of "rhythm 'n' blues", the term may refer to black pop-music from 1940s to 1960s that was not jazz nor blues but something more lightweight. The term "R&B" often refers to any contemporary black pop music. Early-1950s R&B music became popular with both black and white audiences, and popular records were often covered by white artists, leading to the development of rock and roll. A notable subgenre of rhythm 'n' blues was doo-wop, which put emphasis on polyphonic singing. In the early 1960s rhythm 'n' blues took influences from gospel and rock and roll and thus soul music was born. In the late 1960s, funk music started to evolve out of soul; by the 1970s funk had become its own subgenre that stressed complex, "funky" rhythm patterns and monotonistic compositions based on a riff or two. In the early to mid 1970s, hip hop music (also known as "rap") grew out of funk and reggae (see below). Funk and soul music evolved into contemporary R&B (no longer an acronym) in the 1980s, which cross-pollinated with hip-hop for the rest of the 20th century and into the 21st century.

Rock

Rock, in its broadest sense, can refer to almost all popular music recorded since the early 1950s. Its earliest form, rock and roll, arose from multiple genres in the late 1940s, most importantly jump blues. Although invented by Chuck Berry, it was first popularized by performers like Bill Haley, Buddy Holly, and Elvis Presley, who fused the sound with country music, resulting in rockabilly. In addition, gospel music and a related genre, R&B (rhythm and blues), emerged later in the decade. R&B soon became one of the most popular genres, with girl groups, garage rock and surf rock most popular in the US, while harder, more blues-oriented musicians became popular in the UK, which soon developed into British blues, merseybeat, mod and skiffle. Starting the mid-1960s, a group of British bands that played variations on American R&B-influenced blues became popular on both sides of the Atlantic -- the British Invasion, a catchall term for multiple genres. These groups, including the Beatles, fused the earlier sounds with Appalachian folk music, forming folk rock, as well as a variety of less-popular genres, including the singer-songwriter tradition. Early heavy metal and punk rock bands formed in this period, though these genres did not emerge as such for several years. The most popular genre of the British Invasion was psychedelic music, which slowly morphed into bluegrass-influenced jam bands like the Grateful Dead and ornate, classically-influenced progressive rock bands. Merseybeat and mod groups like The Yardbirds and The Who soon evolved into hard rock, which, in the early 1970s specialized into a gritty sound called glam rock, as well as a mostly underground phenomenon called power pop. In the early to mid-1970s, singer-songwriters and pop musicians led the charts, though punk rock and krautrock also developed, and some success was achieved by southern rock and roots rock performers, which fused modern techniques with a more traditionalist sound.

Country music

Country music is usually used to refer to honky tonk today. Emerging in the 1930s in the United States, honky tonk country was strongly influenced by the blues, as well as jug bands (which cannot be properly called honky tonk). In the 1950s, country achieved great mainstream success by adding elements of rock and roll; this was called rockabilly. In addition, Western swing added influences from Swing and bluegrass emerged as a largely underground phenomenon. Later in the decade, the Nashville sound, a highly polished form of country music, became very popular. In reaction to this, harder-edged, gritty musicians sprung up in Bakersfield, California, inventing the Bakersfield sound. Merle Haggard and similar artists brought the Bakersfield sound to mainstream audiences in the 1960s, while Nashville started churning out countrypolitan. During the 1970s, the most popular genre was outlaw country, a heavily rock-influenced style. The late 1980s saw the Urban Cowboys bring about an influx of pop-oriented stars during the 1990s. Modern bluegrass music has remained mostly traditional, though progressive bluegrass and close harmony groups do exist, and the sound is the primary basis for jam bands like the Grateful Dead .

Electronic music

Grateful Dead Electronic music started long before the invention of the synthesizer with the use of tape loops and analogue electronics in the 1950s and 1960s. Well known examples include the theme music to the TV series Doctor Who, recorded in 1963 by Delia Derbyshire and Dick Mills. Some subcategories of electronic music include electronic dance music, space, new age, ambient, and the catch-all "electronica," which can sometimes include all of the above electronic sub-genres, but usually refers to electronic music without lyrics. One of the first people to popularize the synthesizer was Wendy Carlos who performed classical music on the synthesizer on the recording Switched-On Bach. Space music was popularized by the group Tangerine Dream, among others, as a precursor to new age music. New age music served to support and perpetuate the values of the new age movement. Though there is some overlap between the various sub-genres of electronic music, Brian Eno, the creator of ambient music, claimed that ambient had a bit of "evil" in it, whereas new age music did not. Eno's creation was less values-driven than new age; his goal was to create music like wallpaper, insofar as the listener could listen to or easily ignore the music. Naturally, many people have met electronic music also in the form of video game music.

Electronic dance music

Although many artists in the 50s and 60s created pure electronic music with pop structures, fully formed electronic dance music as we know it today really emerged in 1977 with Giorgio Moroder's From Here to Eternity album. There are now many subgenres of electronic music, these include: techno (mechanical sounding dance music featuring little melody and more noise), trance music (with a distinct style of instrumentation focused on complex, uplifting chord progressions and melodies), Goa trance (spawning from industrial music and tribal dance, focusing on creating psychedelic sound effects within the songs), house music (fully electronic disco music), big beat (using older drum loops and more melodic elements sampled and looped), drum and bass (an offshoot of hardcore and Jamaican dancehall, utilizing quick tempos with sampled break beats, most notably the amen break and the funky drummer), gabber or gabba, (a Dutch development on techno, which features extremely high tempos and lots of overdrive and distortion on the music, especially the base drum being distorted into a square wave tone), happy hardcore (a slightly more palatable version of Gabba, fusing elements of drum and bass as well), synthpop (features strong pop songwriting/melodies with roots in 1980's dance music), and electro. Of these subgenres, trance and house are probably the most widespread. Electronic dance music is often composed to fit easily into a live DJ set.

Electronica

Electronic music that does not fall into the new age, techno or dance categories are often referred to as "left-field" or "electronica" (although there are critics who maintain that the term "electronica" is an invention of the media). Styles of electronica include ambient, downtempo, illbient and trip-hop (among countless others, see list of electronic music genres), which are all related in that they usually rely more on their atmospheric qualities than electronic dance music, and make use of slower, more subtle tempos, sometimes excluding rhythm completely. IDM (an abbreviation for intelligent dance music) is an elusive and confusing genre classification that can only be truly defined by flagbearers and flagburners like Aphex Twin and Autechre. All electronic music owes at least its historical existence to early pioneers of tape experiments known as musique concrète, such as John Cage, Pierre Schaeffer and Karlheinz Stockhausen, as well as early synthesists like Wendy Carlos, Jean-Michel Jarre, and Morton Subotnick . (See electronic art music).

Melodic music

Melodic music is a term that covers various genres of non-classical music which are primarily characterised by the dominance of a single strong melody line. Rhythm, tempo and beat are subordinate to the melody line or tune, which is generally easily memorable, and followed without great difficulty. Melodic music is found in all parts of the world, overlapping many genres, and may be performed by a singer or orchestra, or a combination of the two. In the west, melodic music has developed largely from folk song sources, and been heavily influenced by classical music in its development and orchestration. In many areas the border line between classical and melodic popular music is imprecise. Opera is generally considered to be a classical form. The lighter operetta is considered borderline, whilst stage and film musicals and musical comedy are firmly placed in the popular melodic category. The reasons for much of this are largely historical. Other major categories of melodic music include music hall and vaudeville, which, along with the ballad, grew out of European folk music. Orchestral dance music developed from localised forms such as the jig, polka and waltz, but with the admixture of Latin American, negro blues and ragtime influences, it diversified into countless sub-genres such as big band, cabaret and Swing. More specialised forms of melodic music include military music, religious music. Also video game music is often melodic. Traditional pop music overlaps a number of these categories: big band music and musical comedy, for example, are closely allied to traditional pop.

Reggae, dub, and related forms

In Jamaica during the 1950s, American R&B was most popular, though mento (a form of folk music) was more common in rural areas. A fusion of the two styles, along with soca and other genres, formed ska, an extremely popular form of music intended for dancing. In the 1960s, reggae and dub emerged from ska and American rock and roll. Starting the late 1960s, a rock-influenced form of music began developing -- this was called rocksteady. With some folk influences (both Jamaican and American), and the growing urban popularity of the Rastafari movement, rocksteady evolved into what is now known as roots reggae. In the 1970s, a style called Lovers rock became popular primarily in the United Kingdom by British performers of ballad-oriented reggae music. The 1970s also saw the emergence of Two Tone in Coventry, England, with bands fusing ska and punk, as well as covering original ska tracks. Punk band The Clash also used Dub and reggae elements. Dub emerged in Jamaica when sound system DJs began taking away the vocals from songs so that people could dance to the beat alone. Soon, pioneers like King Tubby and Lee Scratch Perry began adding new vocals over the old beats; the lyrics were rhythmic and rhyme-heavy. After the popularity of reggae died down in the early 1980s, derivatives of dub dominated the Jamaican charts. These included ragga and dancehall, both of which remained popular in Jamaica alone until the mainstream breakthrough of American gangsta rap (which evolved out of dub musicians like DJ Kool Herc moving to American cities). Ragga especially now has many devoted followers throughout the world. Reggaeton is a fusion of reggae and rap, popular in Latin America, but gradually appearing in the mainstream charts.

Punk music

Punk rock is a subgenre of rock music. The term "punk music" can only rarely be applied without any controversy. Perhaps the only bands always considered "punk" are the first wave of punk bands, such as The Clash, The Sex Pistols and the Ramones. Before this, however, a series of underground musicians helped define the music throughout the 1970s -- see Forerunners of punk music. Punk is often considered especially important for its "Do-it-yourself" philosophy. Many punk musicians encouraged their fans and audience members to learn to play instruments and form their own bands, and doing so was implicitly encouraged by the apparent simplicity of the music. Since punk bands were often ignored by major labels, the definitions of the many sub-genres, and the question of which groups belong in which sub-genres, is often a subject of heated debate. These "sub-genres" can be roughly grouped into four general styles -- hardcore punk, New Wave, post-punk and alternative rock. See those articles and their associated categories (look near the bottom of the article pages) for more information on the many punk sub-genres.

Hip hop / Rap

Hip hop music (also commonly referred to as "rap") can be seen as a subgenre of R&B tradition (see above). Hip hop culture, the movement from which the music came, began in inner cities in the US in the 1970s. The earliest recordings, from the late-1970s and early 1980s, are now referred to as old school hip hop. In the later part of the decade, regional styles developed. East Coast hip hop, based out of New York City, was by far the most popular as hip hop began to break into the mainstream. West Coast hip hop, based out of Los Angeles, was by far less popular until 1992, when Dr. Dre's The Chronic revolutionized the West Coast sound, using slow, stoned, lazy beats in what came to be called G Funk. Soon after, a host of other regional styles became popular, most notably Southern rap, based out of Atlanta and New Orleans, primarily. Atlanta-based performers like OutKast and Goodie Mob soon developed their own distinct sound, which came to be known as Dirty South. As hip hop became more popular in the mid-1990s, alternative hip hop gained in popularity among critics and long-time fans of the music. De La Soul's 3 Feet High and Rising (1989) was perhaps the first "alternative hip hop" blockbuster, and helped develop a specific style called jazz rap, characterized by the use of live instrumentation and/or jazz samples. Other less popular forms of hip hop include various non-American varieties; Japan, Britain, Mexico, Sweden, Finland, France, Germany, Italy and Turkey have vibrant hip hop communities. In Puerto Rico, a style called reggaeton is popular. Electro hip hop was invented in the 1980s, but is distinctly different from most old school hip hop (as is go go, another old style). Some other genres have been created by fusing hip hop with techno (trip hop) and heavy metal (rapcore). In the late 1980s, Miami's hip hop scene was characterized by bass-heavy grooves designed for dancing -- Miami bass music. Horrorcore, or Acid Rap is mainly credited to Detroit and the Midwest. There are also rappers with Christian themes in the lyrics -- this is Christian hip hop. Perhaps the most recent development in hip hop is the Backpacker sub-genre. Charachterized by a renewed focus on poetry and Hip Hop Culture, it includes artists such as Sage Francis, Atmosphere, and Eyedea and Abilities.

Contemporary African music

Since the 1960s, most African popular music incorporates traditional local vocal, instrumental, and percussive styles, but also draws heavily on rock, reggae, and/or hip hop. For example raï, which originated in Algeria and spread throughout North Africa and to the North African diaspora, especially in France, began with topical songs based in the local traditional music, but, starting around 1980, began to incorporate elements of hip hop. Other notable contemporary African genres include Zulu jive (South Africa), highlife (Ghana) and in Nigeria jùjú music (now nearly a century old, and constantly evolving) and Afrobeat. Many African countries have also developed their own versions of reggae and hip hop.

Subjectivity

One of the problems, though, with the grouping of music in to genres and genres in general is that it is a subjective process that has a lot to do with the individual's personal understanding and way of listening to music. This is especially true in sub-genres. One example is the band Green Day. They can be called punk, and they could also be called pop.

References

- van der Merwe, Peter (1989). Origins of the Popular Style: The Antecedents of Twentieth-Century Popular Music. Oxford: Clarendon Press. ISBN 0193161214. Category:Musical genres Category:Genres

Chachachá

:For the dance, see Cha-cha-cha (dance). ---- The Cha-cha-cha (in Spanish chachachá) is a Latin American style of dance music derived from the rumba and mambo in 4/4 meter.

History

The term "cha-cha" comes from Haiti, where it referred to a component of a bell which made a "cha-cha" noise when it was rubbed. The device was kept and used as an instrument. The music of cha-cha-cha, however, evolved from mambo. In the late 1940s, Mambo dance was wildly popular across the United States, but its music was very fast and difficult to dance to. Orchestras slowed down the mambo, and cha-cha-cha was one of the results. In 1951, Cuban composer and violinist Enrique Jorrín introduced the cha-cha-cha rhythms under this name to Cuban dance floors while playing with Orquestra America. Some say that he came to this idea as early as in 1948 while being with Antonio Arcaño's orchestra. In 1953, his La Engañadora and Silver Star became recorded hits. In early days, this dance and its music were both known as "triple mambo" or "mambo with guiro rhythm". Category:Cuban styles of music

1970

1970 (MCMLXX) was a common year starting on Thursday. 1970 is the Unix epoch time.

Events

January-February

- January 1 - Construction begins on Arcosanti, by Paolo Soleri, in Mayer, Arizona, located 65 miles north of Phoenix, Arizona.
- January 1 - Unix epoch at 00:00:00 UTC.
- January 12 - Biafra capitulates, ending the Nigerian civil war.
- January 15 - After a 32-month fight for independence from Nigeria, Biafran forces under General Effiong formally surrender to General Yakubu Gowon.
- January 15 - Muammar al-Qaddafi is proclaimed premier of Libya.
- January 16 - Buckminster Fuller receives the Gold Medal award from the American Institute of Architects.
- February 11 - Launch of Japan's first satellite Osumi with a Lamba-4 Rocket.
- February 17 - MacDonald family massacre at Fort Bragg, North Carolina - Jeffrey MacDonald kills his wife and children and tries to claim that "hippies" did it

March

- March 1 - Rhodesia severs its last tie with the British crown and declares itself a racially segregated republic.
- March 4 - Nigerian Francis Okechukwu Ohanyido, Poet/Philosopher born in Jos.
- March 5 - A nuclear non-proliferation treaty goes into effect after ratification by 43 nations.
- March 11 - Henry "Dickie" Marrow is murdered in a violent hate crime in Oxford, N.C..
- March 16 - The Expo '70 world's fair opens in Suita, Osaka, Japan.
- March 16 - Publication of complete New English Bible.
- March 16 - Birth of Stephen Martin.
- March 17 - My Lai massacre: The United States Army charges 14 officers with suppressing information related to the incident.
- March 18 - Lon Nol ousts Prince Norodom Sihanouk of Cambodia.
- March 18 - Post Office strike in USA - 210,000 out of 750,000 US postal employees walk out. President Nixon assigns military units to New York City post offices. Strike lasts two weeks.
- March 21 The first Earth Day proclamation is issued by San Francisco Mayor Joseph Alioto.
- March 25 - The Concorde makes its 1st supersonic flight (700 mph /1,127 km/h).
- March 31 - Explorer I spacefract re-enters atmosphere, after twelve years in orbit.

April

- April 1 - President Richard Nixon signs the Public Health Cigarette Smoking Act into law banning cigarette television advertisements in the United States starting on January 1, 1971.
- April 1 - American Motors introduces the Gremlin.
- April 10 - Paul McCartney announces that the Beatles have disbanded.
- April 11 - US spaceflight Apollo 13 launches for the moon, carrying James Lovell, Fred Haise, and Jack Swigert. On April 13, an oxygen tank in the spacecraft explodes, forcing the crew to abort the mission. The crew returns to earth safely on April 17
- April 22 - First Earth Day celebrated.
- April 29 - U.S. invades Cambodia to hunt out Viet Cong. Massive protests against the war continue in the U.S.

May-June

Viet Cong
- May 4 - The Kent State shootings: Four students at Kent State University in Ohio are killed and 9 wounded by National Guardsmen at a demonstration protesting against the incursion into Cambodia.
- May 5 - Earthquake in Yungay, Peru below Hauscaran Mountain buries the city
- May 6 - Charles Haughey and Neil Blaney are dismissed as members of the Irish Government due to accusations of their involvement in a plot to import arms for use in Northern Ireland.
- May 9 - 100,000 people demonstrate in Washington DC against the Vietnam War.
- May 14 - Ulrike Meinhof helps Andreas Baader escape.
- May 17 - Thor Heyerdahl sets sail from Morocco on the papyrus boat Ra II to sail the Atlantic Ocean.
- May 26 - The Soviet Tupolev Tu-144 becomes the first commercial transport to exceed Mach 2.
- May 27 - British expedition climbs south face of Annapurna I.
- May 31 - The Ancash earthquake causes a landslide that buries the town of Yungay, Peru; more than 47,000 people are killed.
- June 2 - Norway announces that it has rich oil deposits off its North Sea coast.
- June 4 - Tonga gains independence from the United Kingdom.
- June 10 - President Nixon signed a measure lowering the voting age to 18.
- June 11 - The United States gets its first female Generals: Anna Mae Hays and Elizabeth P. Hoisington.
- June 18 - Edward Heath is elected Prime Minister of United Kingdom.
- June 21 - Brazil defeats Italy 4-1 to win the Football World Cup 1970
- June 24 - The United States Senate repeals the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution.
- June 28 - US ground troops withdraw from Cambodia.

July-August

- July 4 - Chartered Dan-Air Comet crashes into mountains north of Barcelona - at least 112 dead.
- July 11 - The first tunnel under the Pyrenees links the Basque towns of Aranoutes and Biesma.
- July 21 - Aswan High Dam in Egypt completed.
- July 30 - Damages awarded to Thalidomide victims,
- August 7 - Harold Haley, Marin County Superior Court Judge taken hostage and murdered in an effort to free George Jackson from police custody.
- August 17-18 - US sinks 418 containers of nerve gas into the Gulf Stream near the Bahamas
- August 17 - Venera program: Venera 7 is launched. It will later becomes the first spacecraft to successfully transmit data from another planet.
- August 26- The Women's Strike For Equality takes place down Fifth Avenue in New York City.
- August 26- August 30- The Isle of Wight Festival 1970 takes place on East Afton Farm off the coast of England. 600,000 people attend the largest rock festival of all time. Artists include Jimi Hendrix, The Who, The Doors, Chicago, Richie Havens, John Sebastian, Joan Baez, Ten Years After, Emerson Lake & Palmer and Jethro Tull.

September

- September 1 - Assassination attempt against king Hussein of Jordan
- September 3-6 - Israeli forces fight Palestinian guerillas in southern Lebanon.
- September 5 - Vietnam War: Operation Jefferson Glenn begins - The United States 101st Airborne Division and the South Vietnamese 1st Infantry Division initiate a new operation in Thua Thien Province (operation ends in October 1971).
- September 7 - An anti-war rally is held at Valley Forge, Pennsylvania, attended by John Kerry, Jane Fonda and Donald Sutherland.
- September 7 - Fighting between Arabic guerillas and government forces in Amman, Jordan
- September 8-10 - Jordanian government and Palestinian guerillas make truces that keep breaking.
- September 9 – Guinea recognizes East Germany.
- September 10 – Cambodian government forces break the blockage around Kompong Tho after a 3-month siege.
- September 11 - The Ford Pinto is introduced.
- September 13 - First running of the New York City Marathon.
- September 15 - King Hussein of Jordan forms a military government with Muhammad Daoud as the prime minister.
- September 18 - Jimi Hendrix dies of barbiturate overdose in London
- September 20 - End of term for Ismail Nasiruddin Shah ibni Almarhum Sultan Zainal Abidin III as the 4th Yang di-Pertuan Agong of Malaysia.
- September 20 - Syrian armored forces cross Jordanian border.
- September 20-21 - Luna 16 lands on the Moon and lifts off the day later with samples. Lands on Earth September 24.
- September 21 - Palestinian armored forces reinforce Palestinian guerillas in Irbidi, Jordan.
- September 21 - Tuanku Al-Mutassimu Billahi Muhibbudin Sultan Abdul Halim Al-Muadzam Shah ibni Almarhum Sultan Badlishah, Sultan of Kedah becomes the 5th Yang di-Pertuan Agong of Malaysia.
- September 26 - Laguna Fire starts in San Diego County burning 175,425 acres (710 km²).
- September 27 - Richard Nixon begins a tour in Europe and visits Italy, Yugoslavia, Spain, United Kingdom and Ireland.
- September 28 - Gamal Abdal Nasser dies - vice president Anwar Sadat is named temporary president of Egypt.
- September 29 - US Congress gives president Richard Nixon authority to sell arms to Israel.
- September 29 - In Berlin, Baader-Meinhof Gang members rob three banks, loot totaling over DM200.000.

October

- October 2 - Wichita State University loses most of its football team in a plane crash.
- October 3 - In Lebanon, government of the prime minister Rashid Karami resigns.
- October 4 - In Bolivia, army commander general Rogelio Miranda and group of officers rebel and demand resignation of the president Alfredo Ovando Candía – president fires him.
- October 4 - Janis Joplin dies of a heroin overdose inside her hotel room in Los Angeles, California
- October 5 - Nixon's European tour ends.
- October 5 - The Front de Libération du Québec (FLQ) kidnap James Cross in Montreal and demands release of all its imprisoned members. The next day the Canadian government announces it won't accept the demand - first stirrings of Quebec's October Crisis.
- October 6 - Bolivian president Alfredo Ovando Candía resigns – general Rogelio Miranda takes over but resigns soon after.
- October 6 - French president Georges Pompidou visits Soviet Union.
- October 7 - General Juan José Torres becomes the new president of Bolivia.
- October 7 - Anwar Sadat accepted as Egyptian president.
- October 8 - US foreign office announces that it renews its arms sales to Pakistan.
- October 8 - Soviet author Alexander Solzhenitsyn is awarded Nobel Prize for Literature.
- October 8 - Vietnam War: In Paris, a Communist delegation rejects US President Richard Nixon's October 7 peace proposal as "a maneuver to deceive world opinion."
- October 9 - The Khmer Republic is proclaimed in Cambodia.
- October 9 - Divorce law in Italy.
- October 10 - Fiji becomes independent.
- October 10 - October Crisis: In Montreal, Quebec, a national crisis hits Canada when Quebec Vice-Premier and Minister of Labour Pierre Laporte becomes the second statesman kidnapped by members of the FLQ terrorist group.
- October 11 - 11 French soldiers are killed in a shootout with rebels in Chad.
- October 12 - Vietnam War: US President Richard Nixon announces that the United States will withdraw 40,000 more troops before Christmas.
- October 13 - Canada and the People's Republic of China established diplomatic relations.
- October 13 - Saeb Salam's government forms in Lebanon.
- October 14 - Chinese nuclear test in Lop Nor.
- October 15 - In Egypt, referendum supports Anwar Sadat 90.04%.
- October 15 - 35 construction workers are killed when a section of the new West Gate Bridge in Melbourne collapses into the river below.
- October 16 - Canadian government declares state of emergency and outlaws Quebec Liberation Front.
- October 17 - Pierre Laporte is found killed in south of Montreal.
- October 17 - Cholera epidemic in Istanbul.
- October 17 - Anwar Sadat becomes officially president of Egypt.
- October 20 - Soviet Union launches Zond 8 lunar probe.
- October 20 - Algerian ex-minister Krim Belkacem is found strangled in his hotel room in Frankfurt.
- October 20 - Egyptian president Anwar Sadat names Mahmoud Fawzi as his prime minister.
- October 21 - US Air Force plane makes an emergency landing near Leninakan, Soviet Union. Soviets release the American officers, including two generals, November 10.
- October 22 - Chilean army commander Rene Schneider is shot in Santiago – government declares state of emergency. Schneider dies October 25.
- October 24 - Salvador Allende is elected President of Chile.
- October 26 - US and Soviet space researchers meet in Moscow.
- October 26 - Garry Trudeau's comic strip Doonesbury, debuts in approximately two dozen newspapers in the United States.
- October 28 - In Jordan, government of Ahmed Toukan resigns – next prime minister is Wasfi Al-Tal.
- October 28 - Cholera outbreak in eastern Slovakia – Hungary closes its border with Czechoslovakia.
- October 28 - Gary Gabelich drives the rocket-powered Blue Flame to an official world land speed record of 622.287 mph (1,001.452863 km/h) on the dry lake bed of the Bonneville Salt Flats in Utah. The record, the first above 1,000 km/h, stands for nearly 13 years.
- October 30 - In Vietnam, the worst monsoon to hit the area in six years causes large floods, kills 293, leaves 200,000 homeless and virtually halts the Vietnam War.

November

- November 1 - Fire destroys Le Cinq Sept dance hall in St. Laurent Du Pont, France – 144 dead.
- November 4 - Vietnam War: Vietnamization - The United States turns control of the air base in the Mekong Delta to South Vietnam. Genie "the Wild Child" discovered in her house at the age of 13 after being in complete isolation for 10 years with no language skills.
- November 4 - Social authorities in California, USA, take custody of Genie, a girl who had been kept in solitary confinement since her birth
- November 5 - Vietnam War: United States Military Assistance Command in Vietnam reports the lowest weekly American soldier death toll in five years (24 soldiers died that week, which was the fifth consecutive week the death toll was below 50; 431 were reported wounded that week, however).
- November 8 - Egypt, Sudan and Libya announce their intentions to form a federation.
- November 9 - Charles de Gaulle dies – he is buried November 13.
- November 9 - Soviet Union launches Luna 17.
- November 9 - Vietnam War: The Supreme Court of the United States votes 6 to 3 to not hear a case by the state of Massachusetts asking to allow the state the ability to enforce its law granting Massachusetts residents the right to refuse military service in an undeclared war.
- November 10 - Vietnam War: Vietnamization - For the first time in five years, an entire week ended with no reports of American combat fatalities in Southeast Asia.
- November 12 - Soviet author Andrei Amalrik sentenced for three years for anti-Soviet writings.
- November 12 - The Oregon Highway Division (now known as the Oregon Department of Transportation) is given the task of removing a rotting beached Grey whale, leading to the now infamous exploding whale incident.
- November 13 - Military coup in Syria – Hafez al-Assad takes the power.
- November 13 - 1970 Bhola cyclone: A 120-mph tropical cyclone hits the densely populated Ganges Delta region of East Pakistan (now Bangladesh), killing an estimated 500,000 people (this is regarded as the 20th century's worst cyclone disaster).
- November 14 - fatal airplane accident in Wayne County, West Virginia, claims the lives of the entire Marshall University football team.
- November 17 - Vietnam War: Lieutenant William Calley goes on trial for the My Lai massacre.
- November 17 - Luna program: The Soviet Union lands Lunokhod 1 on Mare Imbrium (Sea of Rains) on the Moon. This is the first roving remote-controlled robot to land on another world and was released by the orbiting Luna 17 spacecraft.
- November 18 - US President Richard Nixon asks the U.S. Congress for US$155 million in supplemental aid for the Cambodian government (US$85 million was for military assistance in order to help prevent the overthrow of the government of Premier Lon Nol by the Khmer Rouge and North Vietnam).
- November 18 - United Nations Security Council demands that no government should recognize Rhodesia.
- November 19 - EEC prime minister meeting in Munich.
- November 21 - Syrian Prime Minister Hafez al-Assad forms a new government but retains the post of defense minister.
- November 21 - in Ethiopia, Eritrea Liberation Front kills an Ethiopian general.
- November 21 - Vietnam War: Operation Ivory Coast - A joint Air Force and Army team raids the Son Tay prison camp in an attempt to free American POWs thought to be held there (there were zero Americans killed, but the prisoners had already moved to another camp; All US POWs were moved to a handful of central prison complexes as a result of this raid).
- November 22 - Guinean president Sekou Toure accuses Portugal of an attack when hundreds of mercenaries land near capital Conakry. Guinean army repels the landing attempts in November 23-24. November 25-29 UN delegation arrives to investigate the situation. In December 4 UN announces that Portuguese navy and army units are responsible.
- November 25 - In Japan, world-famous author and Tatenokai militia leader Yukio Mishima and his followers take over Inchigaya HQ of the Japan Self-Defense Forces and take general Kanetoshi Mashita hostage. When Mishima's speech fails to sway public opinion towards his right-wing political beliefs, he commits seppuku.
- November 26 - East Pakistan leader sheik Mujibur Rahman accuses central government of negligence in catastrophe relief.
- November 26 - Pope Paul VI begins an Asian tour.
- November 27 - Bolivian artist Benjamin Mendoza tries to assassinate Paul VI during pope's visit in