The History of Harmony: The '50s
Rock 'n' roll may have been built on lone-wolf rebellion, but it would never have gotten anywhere if not for the voices that joined to harmonize over all those rocking riffs. Even the roughest, edgiest corners of the rock universe incorporate some sort of vocal harmony amid all the raucous rave-ups. This is the first installment in a series that breaks down the history of harmony in rock 'n' roll, decade by decade.
From the very first rumblings of rock in the ‘50s, vocal harmony was not just a crucial component of the toolkit, it was sometimes the only component. Teenagers who gathered around street-corner lampposts or in high school bathrooms gave us some of rock 'n' roll’s earliest airings in the form of doo-wop, with their voices occupying the spaces where instruments would have been. And even when a full band was backing them up, the ‘50s vocal groups still found plenty of ways to work their magic, from the dreamy devotion of The Flamingos’ “I Only Have Eyes for You” to the turbulent locomotion of The Turbans’ “When You Dance.”
