Doowop: The Chicago Scene (Music in American Life)

Basses burbled low, tenors soared, leads wailed, and choruses chanted in harmony in the earliest doowop groups as this cutting-edge early rock 'n' roll music captured the atmosphere of the era, a long-ago sound that touches the emotions even today. Doowop rose out of teen culture on the streets of Chicago and other big cities in the 1950s, creating a new type of music that largely supplanted the old forms of rhythm and blues and pop music. The wailing, the soaring harmonies, and the wild vocal riffing - which many listeners scorned - represented the creativity of youth and their love of vocal harmony and rock 'n' roll. Robert Pruter has mined sources ranging from fanzines to the Chicago Defender and conducted extensive interviews in putting together Doowop, which provides fresh and welcome insights into this vibrant chapter in American music. Readers of Pruter's work will learn about not just major acts such as the Spaniels, the Dells, the Flamingos, and the Moonglows, but virtually every Chicago doowop group that contributed to that era.