Soul Music - Getting To the Roots

Who can resist music that speaks directly to our soul? Soul music simply permeates into us making us close your eyes, forcing us to swing and sway thinking of our love. Soul music is one of the most popular genres of music whose origin is attributed to African Americans. Though all of us love soul music, not many of us know the roots of this music and its origin. Getting to know a bit of history of soul music will help us appreciate this genre of music even better.

Though this form of music originated in 1950s, the term ‘soul music’ was not used to refer this genre until 1960s. Soul music is a combination of Rhythm and Blues and Gospel Music. The term was rightly used for this genre of music as it always had intense feelings of the soul. Often the theme of soul music was ‘love’. The initial form of soul music was given birth by musicians like Ray Charles and James Brown. During that time Gospel music was taking the music industry by storm and this form of music was combined with Rhythm and Blues to talk about love, women and the related passionate feelings. Soul music carries with it a chronic longing for love that all of us have felt at one time or the other and that is one of the reasons why this genre has become one of the most popular forms of music. It helped us to sing out our bottled up emotions relating to love and passion. All of us will readily be able to identify ourselves with such intense feelings expressed through soul music.
 
Knowing the potential of soul music a number of music companies started producing soul music albums, which boosted the fast growth and popularity of soul music. Initially soul music was confined to the South but with its increasing popularity many young soul artists carried it to the Northern cities and popularized it there. Motown in Detroit and Stax-Volt in Memphis had a great role to play in the popularization of soul music. Other popular names besides James Brown and Ray Charles include Sam Cooke and Aretha Franklin.
 
Stax-Volt originated in 1959 through the efforts of Jim Stewart and Estelle Axton. It is around the same time Berry Gordy created Tamla and Motown in Detroit. Though Stax and Motown were considered to be major rivals of 60s and 70s, their contribution gave shape to the soul music. Both of them considered that soul music as Black music from soul.

It did not take too long for white music lovers to fall for soul music. Soul music soon started becoming a universal American genre. Today soul music has moved far beyond the US and it is acclaimed worldwide. You can find some of the rarest collections of soul music at Raresoulgrooves.com. You will find hundreds of best soul music tracks and albums that are not easily available in the market today. Raresoulgrooves.com is one of the best hubs for high quality soul music on the web.