Music of Minnesota

The music of Minnesota has played a role in the historical and cultural development of Minnesota. As with the culture of Minnesota in general, the state's music scene centers on the Minneapolis-Saint Paul area, and most of the Minnesotan artists who have become nationally popular either came from that area or debuted there. Rural Minnesota has also produced a flourishing folk music scene, with a long tradition of traditional Swedish, Finnish and Norwegian music which merged to become Scandinavian.

Minneapolis, the northernmost major city on the Mississippi River, has produced a number of famous popular music and folk music performers and recording studios since the 1950s. Former critic Martin Keller said of the city between 1976 and 1984—during what has been termed the Dark Ages of quality American pop music in all other U.S. cities—"It was the best of times. It was the best of times."

Minneapolis' most influential contributions to American popular music happened in the 1980s, when the city's music scene "expanded the state's cultural identity" and launched the careers of acclaimed performers like the multi-platinum soul singer Prince, and The Replacements and Hüsker Dü who set off the alternative rock boom of the 1990s. In the 1990s and 2000s, the Twin Cities played a role in the national hip hop scene with artists such as Atmosphere.

History

Music in Minnesota extends prior to historical documentation, with the music of the Native Americans of the area. The Dakota musical traditions of what is now Minnesota are generally based around vocal, percussive and dance music; folk songs among the Dakota can be celebratory, martial or ceremonial. European settlers to Minnesota brought their own tradition of folk and classical music, especially choral and Christian-themed music, opera, and various kinds of ethnic folk music, most prominently including Scandinavian styles. Traditional dance music is based mostly around schottisches, polkas and waltzes with instrumentation including fiddle, mandola, accordion and banjo.

The first singing school in Minnesota was in St. Anthony (now part of Minneapolis), opened in 1851. Later in the century, the Plymouth Congregational Church of Minneapolis began a singing group in 1857, followed by the first such club for women only, the Lorelei Club (later the Ladies' Thursday Musical Chorus), in 1892.

1920 image from the MacPhail Center for Music yearbook

Thousands of Norwegians settled in Minnesota between 1825 and 1925. Subcultures formed based around village of origin (bygde), and then formed organizations to maintain their home dialect and musical traditions. These organizations held annual meetings (stevne) which featured folk dancing, singing, fiddling and poetry. In the late 1860s, male choirs with primarily Norwegian and Swedish singers formed in cities and Lutheran colleges in Minnesota. These choirs sang a variety of popular and patriotic songs, hymns and folk tunes. In the 1880s, these choirs inspired the organization of singing societies that sponsored music festivals; in 1886, five singing clubs joined to become the Union of Scandinavian Singers, and the Norwegian Singers Association of America has met biannually since 1910.

The end of the 19th century also saw the foundation of two long-running music groups, the Thursday Musical Chorus and the Apollo Men's Musical Group. Two of the most important Minnesota institutions were founded in the early 20th century, namely the MacPhail School of Violin (1907, later becoming the MacPhail Center for Music) and the Minneapolis Symphony Orchestra (1903, later the Minnesota Orchestra).

Judy Garland in The Wizard of Oz (1939)

Minneapolis became a home for vaudeville comedy known as bondkomik (rustic humor) and featured multi-act plays, dances, songs and monologues. Vaudeville shows usually ended with social dancing. Minneapolis' most famous performers were the descendants of Norwegians Eleonora and Ethel Olson and Ernest and Clarence Iverson (Slim Jim & the Vagabond Kid), and Swedish immigrant Hjalmar Peterson whose company dominated the stage for two decades until the Great Depression. After World War I, Scandinavian musical pride diminished in the face of intense propaganda and agitation against foreign influence, a process accelerated by economic decline in the 1930s and by the outbreak of World War II; rural and regional dance music slowly died out and became largely unknown. During this era, however, the Leikarring movement (song-dances without instrumental accompaniment) began, which celebrated national Norwegian folk dance and song through musical societies like Minnesota's Norrona Leikarring.

Judy Garland who was born in Grand Rapids, Minnesota said, "That's the only time I ever saw my mother and father happy, in that wonderful town." She became an entertainer through vaudeville, and later starred in The Wizard of Oz—"now a universal reference point, beyond language and national identity."

Education

MacPhail Center for Music designed by James Dayton, who worked for five years for Frank Gehry

In Minnesota, by statute, public elementary and middle schools must offer at least three and require at least two of the following four arts areas: dance, music, theater and visual arts. Public high schools must offer at least three and require at least one of the following five arts areas: dance, media arts, music, theater or visual arts.

Music education is part of the curriculum at Minnesota public schools. Students may take music at the elementary and middle school ages and many choose to take it as an elective in high school, where schools often organize marching bands, choruses or other performance opportunities. The Perpich Center for Arts Education is a school of choice which draws students from all over the state and has an extensive modern and classical music education program. MacPhail Center for Music offers classes on 35 different instruments and classes in the Suzuki method and art therapy, by instructors from all over the world, to more than 7,200 students at 45 locations.

Higher education in music is an important part of the programs at several of Minnesota's universities, including the University of Minnesota, which offers the Bachelors of Music degree in music education, therapy or performance, and graduate degrees in education, conducting and musicology. The Duluth campus offers a Bachelor of Fine Arts in musical theatre. McNally Smith College of Music, a preeminent college of contemporary music based in Saint Paul, offers Bachelors of Music in music performance and music business, and Associates Degrees and diploma programs in recording technology as well as the nation's first diploma in hip hop.

Venues

First Avenue nightclub

Large venues frequently hosting widely popular national music acts in Minnesota include the Target Center, Xcel Energy Center, and, more rarely due to poor acoustics, the Metrodome.

The most important musical venue in the Twin Cities is First Avenue, a nightclub that was managed by Steve McClellan, Dan Lessard and Jack Meyers. Alan Fingerhut initially opened the club (as The Depot) in 1970; it was soon renamed Uncle Sam, and became a franchise of the American Events Company, before becoming Sam's and finally becoming First Avenue & 7th Street Entry in 1980. Its central location in the heart of downtown on 1st Avenue and historic value of launching renowned acts such as Prince solidifies its importance in the current local scene and in Minnesota music history.

The Twin Cities is also home to older traditional theaters of about 2,000 capacity including The Historic Orpheum Theatre, Pantages Theatre, and State Theatre, all in Minneapolis and the Ordway Center for the Performing Arts in Saint Paul. Northrop Auditorium on the University of Minnesota campus has a limited capacity of about 5,000. The Guthrie Theater holds over 1,000. The Cedar Cultural Center holds 465.

Northrop Auditorium

In keeping with the state's philanthropic roots, the Minnesota Student Association at the University of Minnesota's began a concert series known as Lend a Hand, Hear the Band. Established in 2007, University students who complete 10 hours of community service in the Twin Cities area are given a ticket to a concert at Northrop Auditorium.

The region also contains youth music venues, many of which operate as youth centers by day, including THE GARAGE in Burnsville, Depot Coffee House in Hopkins, Enigma Teen Center in Shakopee, and on some occasions the Apple Valley Teen Center. Also, a few venues catering to all ages crowds, now gone, are remembered as significant to the Twin Cities music scene. These include the Foxfire Coffee Lounge in downtown Minneapolis and the Fireball Espresso Café in Falcon Heights, St. Paul.

Defunct but historically important venues include the Pence Opera House, the Coffeehouse Extempore or Extemporé, the Uptown Bar, and the ballrooms including the Prom Ballroom and Treasure Inn in Saint Paul and the Marigold Ballroom and the Flame Cafe in Minneapolis, which featured prominent jazz, rock, country and other bands in the mid-20th century. Outside of Minneapolis and Saint Paul, important local venues include Big Reggie's Danceland (now defunct) owned by Ray Colihan in Excelsior, the NorShor Theater (now a strip club) in Duluth, Chisholm's Ironworld U.S.A. (renamed the Minnesota Discovery Center), which hosted major country stars until it closed in 2009, and Ralph's Corner, which closed in 2005 but was for many years one of the premier indie rock clubs in the Fargo-Moorhead area.

Radio

Minnesota Public Radio in St. Paul

Independent Public Radio (IPR) is a state-wide network of twelve independently-owned noncommercial stations that play music by local artists. These stations include KAXE, KBEM, KFAI, KMOJ, KUMD, KMSU, KMSK, KQAL, KSRQ, KUMD, KUMM, KUOM (Radio K) and KVSC and WTIP, located in the Twin Cities, Mankato/Austin, Winona, Thief River Falls, Duluth, Morris, St. Cloud and Grand Marais.

Of the 38 radio stations in the state, seven are owned by conglomerate Clear Channel Communications, who employs four lobbyists in Minnesota.

National Public Radio's largest affiliate, Minnesota Public Radio (MPR) led by Bill Kling is also a major part of the Minnesota radio industry. MPR is one of the most successful public radio organizations in the country, and has grown from a small station associated with St. John's University in Collegeville in 1967, to a part of the American Public Media Group and is now the dominant network of radio stations in the state. In 2005 MPR launched a new station, KCMP 89.3, The Current, which has gained a cult following throughout the country and indeed throughout the world thanks to its Internet presence.

Recording studios and record stores

Minneapolis has been home to several important recording studios. The first studio in the state was Kay Bank, established by Amos Heilicher (who with his brother Daniel did "rack jobbing", jukebox distribution and owned the Musicland chain), Vern Bank and studio engineer Bruce Swedien in 1955. The studio had big hits from The Trashmen ("Surfin' Bird") and Dave Dudley ("Six Days on the Road"), The Underbeats, The Chancellors, The High Spirits, The Castaways ("Liar, Liar" in 1965), which helped popularize Soma Records and a distinctive Kay Bank style based on using three-track recording and echo effects.

Herb Pilhofer and Tom Jung worked at Kay Bank before founding the world's first digital recording studio, Sound 80 in 1969. Sound 80 recorded numerous local artists over the years, ranging from part of Bob Dylan's Blood on the Tracks to works from Dave Brubeck. The studio is now Orfield Labs' anechoic chamber labeled the "quietest place on Earth" by the Guinness Book of World Records in 2005.

Other important studios in Minneapolis include the Dove studio, which released several cult classic psychedelic and garage rock recordings in the 1960s, and Blackberry Way, founded by Paul Stark, who would later co-found the Twin/Tone record label.

In 1983, Prince fired Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis from The Time because their producing career took much of their efforts. Their Flyte Tyme Productions began to gain national attention for the Minneapolis sound, and excelled at mainstream urban contemporary music often shunned by critics. The pair's first big break was Janet Jackson's Control in 1986, which launched her career and spawned numerous projects between Jam and Lewis with artists as varied as Mint Condition, Michael Jackson, Sounds of Blackness, New Edition, Boyz II Men, Patti LaBelle, and many others. Flyte Tyme moved to Santa Monica, California in 2004.

The Twin Cities are home to a few independent record stores, Oar Folkjokeopus (now Treehouse Records) and the Electric Fetus, as well as other stores such as Fifth Element and Cheapo. Let It Be Records, although its storefront has closed, still sells vinyl in occasional public sales and by mail order. The now defunct Northern Lights Music (and before it, Harpo's/Hot Licks) also carried many local and alternative artists during the 80s and 90s on Hennepin above 6th Street on Block E. Northern Lights then moved to 700 Hennepin, in the space that was home for many years to another record store, Music City.

Genres

Classical and opera

Orchestra Hall, Nicollet Mall, Minneapolis

Music institutions in modern Minnesota include the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra, the only full-time professional chamber orchestra in the country, and the Minnesota Orchestra, a pioneering institution that was among the first orchestras to perform on the radio and to record. The Minnesota Orchestra was founded in 1903 as the Minneapolis Symphony Orchestra. The Minnesota Orchestra is widely respected in the classical music world, and has toured widely; As of 2009, the orchestra is led by music director Osmo Vänskä, a Finnish conductor, who launched a program to record the complete works of Ludwig van Beethoven.

The Minnesota Opera is an important local music institution, co-founded as Center Opera by Dominick Argento in 1963, as part of the Walker Art Center. With an early reputation as "progressive (and) 'alternative'" when it merged with Saint Paul Opera in 1975, the Minnesota Opera began to include traditional works in its repertory.

Folk music

Ruth Adams and The World's Most Dangerous Polka Band, Nye's Polonaise

Minnesota is home to many ethnic groups, but the state's folk music is best known in the areas of Swedish, Finnish and Norwegian musics because these immigrants settled in rural farming areas in communities that retained Old World social and religious patterns and the context for music performance. These ethnic communities frequently settled near each other, in Minnesota and in Iowa, Wisconsin, Illinois, North Dakota and South Dakota, and their musical and cultural identities grew blurred. Norwegians and Swedes very frequently lived near each other in Minnesota, for example, and their music merged into a perceived Scandinavian identity, rather than uniquely Swedish or Norwegian. Their music is perceived as old-time music, and is also influenced by the area's German, Irish, English, Polish and other Northern and Central European musics.

Norwegian folk dance (bygdedanser) includes participatory social dances and dances performed for an audience like springar, gangar and halling. The Norwegian gammeldans tradition continues in ethnic communities in Minnesota, where waltzes, schottisches or reinlander, and polkas are newer old-time music. Vocal music includes short poetic songs called stev, emigrant ballads which expressed nostalgia for Norway and express hope, despair and loss about life in the United States. By the 1930s the Finnish epic Kalevala was still read and sometimes sung.

Bob Dylan in 1980

For those whose social life centered on the church where music was prohibited by the Pietist and other movements, music was sometimes done at home or disguised as a game. For others, secular, socialist and temperance halls became the community center where bands could include women. Musical accompaniment includes the accordion, violin, guitar, bass guitar, piano, harmonica, organ, banjo and mandolin. The Norwegian Hardanger fiddle or hardingfele tradition almost died out during the 1970s and then experienced a resurgence.

A Prairie Home Companion in 2005

Bob Dylan, a Duluth native, became the first major mainstream solo star from Minnesota in the 1960s, known for his unique lyricism and folk-rock style. He spent a brief period in Minneapolis during 1959–1961, attending the University of Minnesota, where he played shows at the Ten O'Clock Scholar on the West Bank of the University of Minnesota Minneapolis campus. He was associated with Dinkytown, a bohemian area near the campus, where he listened to a wide variety of folk and blues. As of 2007, Dylan maintained a home in Minnesota.

The city's local folk scene produced a few well-known performers in the 1960s, besides Dylan who spent much of his early career based in New York, including the guitarist Leo Kottke and the trio Koerner, Ray & Glover. Folk music continues to be a major part of the Minnesota music scene, and is broadcast by the Prairie Home Companion, a radio show hosted by author Garrison Keillor; the Red House record label is the most influential local label for folk, and releases records by Peter Ostroushko and Greg Brown, among others. Boiled in Lead who formed during the 1980s are still performing.

Gospel

Robert Robinson, a musical treasure who has been called the "the Pavarotti of Gospel" and whose voice has been called "too big for radio", is the executive and artistic director of the Twin Cities Community Gospel Choir, which Minnesota Monthly said is the state’s most-decorated gospel group.

Produced by Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis, the Sounds of Blackness won three Grammy Awards for their music and have performed three times for audiences of 1 billion: at the 1994 World Cup, the 1996 Summer Olympics and the 1998 World Figure Skating Championships. Former Sounds of Blackness lead Ann Nesby has top-five hits on Billboard Hot Dance Club Songs charts and is the grandmother of American Idol finalist Paris Bennett.

Blues

Lazy Bill Lucas and Percy Strother, who knew each other, were blues players who lived and performed in Minneapolis.

Willie Murphy who replaced Willie Walker in Willie & The Bees "was named one of the three charter members of the Minnesota Music Hall of Fame, along with Bob Dylan and Prince," according to Blues on Stage, who added, "the Minnesota Music Assocation has given more nominations and awards to Willie and his groups than anyone else". Larry Hayes formerly of the Lamont Cranston Band wrote "Excusez Moi Mon Cheri" which The Blues Brothers recorded.

James Samuel "Cornbread" Harris, who collaborated with Augie Garcia and is the father of Jimmy Jam, is one of the area's senior players. Called "The Voice" by Tony Glover, Doug Maynard and his band backed Bonnie Raitt in 1982. Until he died at age 40, Maynard could "break a note into two and three parts simultaneously so that it sounded like he was harmonizing with himself".

Jazz

The Bad Plus in Amsterdam in 2005

Around the time of World War II, the Andrews Sisters from Minneapolis were very popular. Today they are remembered for the song "Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy" which Bette Midler covered decades later.

The Blenders vocal quartet, who toured with Jay Leno and recorded the Christmas favorites Songs From the Soul and When It Snows, are known for their "smart and enduring a capella music" that mixes "jazz, barber shop, doo wop, R&B, gospel, rock and a capella".

Composer and pianist Carei Thomas recently celebrated his 70th birthday at the Walker Art Center. Irv Williams is the first jazz musician with his own day, given by the state of Minnesota in 1984. Pianist Ethan Iverson and bassist Reid Anderson join Happy Apple drummer David King in The Bad Plus, who have performed during Christmas for 10 years at the Dakota Jazz Club.

No list of Minnesota music would be complete without mention of jazz great Jeanne Arland Peterson and her five children Linda, Billy, Ricky, Patty and Paul as well as grandson Jason, who recently celebrated 22 years of performing their holiday shows. Dave Koz said, "There is no family in the world quite like the Petersons. First of all, there's like 700 of 'em, and each one is more talented than the rest."

Local radio host Leigh Kamman is linked to jazz in Minnesota, as he has now been covering it for more than sixty years. Pamela Espeland of MinnPost.com chronicled many of the 3,500 live jazz performances in the Twin Cities during 2009.

Rhythm and blues

Prince invented the Minneapolis sound during the 1980s.

Minneapolis became noted as a center for rhythm and blues (R&B) in the 1980s, when the singing star Prince rose to fame. The city had little history in African American popular music, like R&B, until Prince debuted in 1978. He became the first architect of the Minneapolis sound, a funk and disco-influenced style of R&B, and inspired a legion of subsequent performers, including The Time, Wendy & Lisa and Vanity 6. Curtiss A, who opened for Prince the first time he played First Avenue in 1980, at first thought that it was nice of him and then later realized: "You know: 'You guys think this is the top thing in town? Well, here: Minneapolis got a brand new bag.'"

In 1980, session musicians recording as Lipps Inc. at Sound 80 recorded "Funkytown" which reached No. 1 in the U.S. and No. 1 on the disco charts. Homer Simpson said the song moved him like few others, and the song turned into the biggest seller in the history of PolyGram. During the early 1980s, eight children of the Wolfgramm family became The Jets who produced eight top 10 hits.

Rock

Paul Westerberg, at one time of The Replacements, in 2006

Augie Garcia is remembered from the 1950s as the godfather of Minnesota rock 'n' roll. Called by Billboard "one of the top 10 most consistent chartmakers ever", Bobby Vee, who had 38 songs in the Hot 100 charts, still tours with his sons, The Vees. From the 1960s, a series of psychedelic and garage rock singles have become collector's items, including work of Mankato, Minnesota's The Gestures, The Litter's "Action Woman", "Faces" by T. C. Atlantic and Trip Thru Hell by the C. A. Quintet.

Largely only known locally for new wave, The Suburbs were released under the local Twin/Tone Records label in 1978, and opened shows for Iggy Pop and The B-52's. The Suicide Commandos helped to galvanize a punk, new-wave community based at first out of Jay's Longhorn Bar.

Prior to the evolution of punk in the 1970s, there was little rock and roll tradition from Minneapolis, which author Steven Blush attributed to a lack of anything to "rebel against", noting that it was Minneapolis' friendly atmosphere that made future hardcore punk musicians "crazy and rebellious". "Every A&R person in New York was present at CBs while [The Replacements] joyously flushed the set down the toilet, doing nothing but fractions of other people's songs," said Peter Jesperson who recorded them for Twin/Tone.

Bob Mould, formerly of Hüsker Dü and Sugar, in 2007

In the mid-1970s, local musicians in the Minneapolis area began producing popular and innovative acts. Many signed to major record labels, and by the mid 1980s, had achieved national prominence. The Minneapolis hardcore punk scene grew with The Replacements and Hüsker Dü, who started too early to profit from, but were pivotal in the development of alternative rock. The Replacements who "might be the most legendary" Minnesota rock musicians eventually achieved some limited mainstream success and led to Paul Westerberg's solo career, while Hüsker Dü started on local Reflex Records and became the first hardcore outfit to sign to a major label. Soul Asylum was originally a Minneapolis hardcore band called Loud Fast Rules, which played with bands like Man Sized Action, Rifle Sport and Breaking Circus who mixed funk, thrash metal and other influences. The Twin Cities rock scene had fully come to national prominence by 1984, when the Village Voice's critics poll, Pazz and Jop, named three Minneapolis recordings among the top ten of the year: Prince's Purple Rain, The Replacements' Let It Be, and Hüsker Dü's Zen Arcade.

The late 1980s saw new sounds coming out of the state, when two singles from Information Society, "What's On Your Mind? (Pure Energy)" and "Walking Away", were MTV favorites. The Jayhawks are a long-lived country-roots rock band who started in the mid-1980s. Another group to form around the same time was Babes in Toyland, an early quasi-riot grrl band. Many groups of the 1980s and 1990s eventually split up, and a number of other bands formed from the remnants. Bob Mould left Hüsker Dü after it imploded in 1988 to head Sugar and do solo projects. Trip Shakespeare eventually transformed into Semisonic, who gained popularity in the late 1990s. Other prominent, recent rock acts from Minnesota include slowcore band Low from Duluth and indie rockers Tapes 'n Tapes. The hype about indie rock act The Hold Steady began in 2005 with "Separation Sunday".

Hip hop

Main article: Twin Cities hip hop

Slug of underground hip hop group Atmosphere, in 2003

The Twin Cities region is home to a thriving underground hip hop scene due largely to the presence of Rhymesayers Entertainment. Rhymesayers artists including, among others, Eyedea & Abilities, Brother Ali, Los Nativos, Musab, and, most notably, Atmosphere, began to receive national attention in the late 1990s.

Heiruspecs won City Pages "Best Live Artist" in 2004. That year Doomtree won "Best Hip Hop Artist". Also for the past several years through 2008, the scene owed some of its success to the annual Twin Cities Celebration of Hip Hop sponsored by Yo! The Movement and the website D. U. Nation.

References

• Blush, Steven (2001). American Hardcore: A Tribal History. Feral House. ISBN 0-92291-571-7.
• Byron, Janet (1996). Country Music Lover's Guide to the U.S.A. (1st ed.). New York: St. Martin's Press. ISBN 0-312-14300-1.
• Clarke, Gerald (2001). Get Happy: The Life of Judy Garland. Delta. ISBN 0385335156.
• Keller, Martin (2007). Music Legends: A Rewind on the Minnesota Music Scene. D Media. ISBN 978-0-9787956-1-0.
• Levy, Mark (2001). "Scandinavian and Baltic Music". Garland Encyclopedia of World Music, Volume Three: The United States and Canada. New York and London: Garland Publishing. ISBN 0-8240-6040-7. {{cite book}}: Unknown parameter |coauthor= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)
• Noran, Rebecca (2000). First Avenue & 7th St Entry. First Avenue & 7th St. Entry.
• Unterberger, Richie (1999). Music USA: The Rough Guide. London: Rough Guides. pp. 317–329. ISBN 1-85828-421-X.

External links

• "Twin Cities Music Highlights". Jeanne Andersen. Retrieved January 2, 2010.