Soul music is a sub-genre that flourished from about 1962-1967
and was the product of several studios, especiallyStax-Volt in Memphis and
teh Motown studios of Berry Gordy in Detroit . The Stax studio was
founded by two Memphis bankers, Jimmy Stewart and his sister Estelle Axton
(you get Stax by combining the first two letters of their last names).
Soul was strongly influenced by the gospel tradition and built on
foundations laid by Ray Charles and James Brown. It can be thought of as
secularized Black church music and it was a powerful instrument of African
American pride during the difficult decade that saw the assassinations of
not only John F. Kennedy and his brother but also Malcolm X and Martin
Luther King.
The soul sound was defined by the session musicians that worked at the
studio (mainly Booker T. and the MGs along with the Memphis Horns) and
singers like Solomon Burke, Otis Redding, Wilson Pickett, Joe Tex, and
Aretha Franklin. The music is celebrated in movies like The Commitments
and the Blues Brothers.
The music had a raw, sincere quality to it that was partially the result
of the informal process that often went into creating the songs. Charts were
seldom used and arrangements were worked out on the spot in the studio.
Soul music's decline was coincident with the death of Otis Redding in
1967 and Martin Luther King's assassination the following year. For a
classic soul sound listen to Wilson Pickett's Mustang Sally or Aretha
Franklin's Respect.
