The Bee Gees were a Popular Group but Revived Shakespeare and Gregorian Music

by Leon Craats
21/05/2012
 
Born in the Island of Man, the Bee Gees  boys, enriched British, American, Australian and World Music.
Most authors argue "that they did not go so far as to offer the vague philosophical advice or quotations from classic literature that might have made it art rock but they did provide a different kind of bridge between pop songs" and other popular songs (Hughes, Andrew - Tales of the Brothers Gibb).


According Ray Broadus Browne, the songs How Deep is Your Love and Stayin' alive, the Bee Gees helped to define a disco era. Furthermore, Pat Browne  (2001) recorded that some rock historians believe they were an important source for the gradual merging of folk and rock music.However, some people would not regard DISCO as one of the most important genres in music history. During the 1980s and 1990s this grew in size and importance, as world music and some of the most popular dance music was referred to as British, the sound of the British/Australian boys who were sometimes confused as Americans, due to its popularity in the USA.


One could even say that the Bee Gees could be the object of sociological studies as they remained on top for many generations, appealing to the most varied public. Their amazing success in the US is a story apart, considering that disco musicians and their audiences, were mostly associated with the American minority such as Latinos, women, gays, etc.(David Nicholls, 1998).


On the other hand, the Harvard Dictionary has mentioned the Bee Gees as representative of contrary motion in discant composition (popular in Gregorian times) and stressed its importance in music theory (Don Michael Randel, 2003). The band had a radical extension of system of mutations. Melody and melodic songs were above all the focus of these amazing Trio. The  revived a style of singing voice which was a kind of Discant or Descant , which means above the book. In other words, the Bee Gees sung a kind of music known in old latin as supra librum" which is a kind of Gregorian chant. They sung in falsetto, which refers to the highest part of a man's voice. (Jo Thompson, Nigel Nelson, 2004).

 

The Bee Gees could also be defined as the last of the romantics. Some of their lyrics were a modern version of Shakespeare sonets:


" I believe in you, you know the door to my very soul. You're the light in my deepest darkest hour, you're my savior when I fall".


"It's only words and words are all I  have to take your heart away".


"I finally died which started the whole world living"

 

"I started a joke, which started the whole world crying. But I didn't see that the joke was on me"

It all seem to be like a "comedy of errors", crossed star loves in the most Shakespearian style, when love triumphs but only after a series of false and sad events. (Richard Burt, 2007).

The Trio actually have released songs with a typical Shakespearian inspiration "Too Much Heaven", Tragedy and "Love you Inside Out".

 

They named a song after a Shakespeare quotation, "To be or not to be" ( 1965). Howeber the Bee Gees weren't the only ones to cite Shakespeare in their songs, The Beatles (Let it be)   and The Band (Ophelia), just to name a few. (Arthur F. Kinney, 2012).

 

One might hope, that their songs will continue inspiring people to create melodies where the actual voice of the singer (s) will be the most important thing in the song. When the Bee Gees started, one had to have a voice!

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Hi Hannah,

Thanks for mentioning my project on the Bee Gees Tribute.

I hope I will see more comments here. Robin Gibb was very important

and had a unique voice as well as his brothers. I think we will all miss

this great talent!

 

 

 

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