What is Rockabilly?

Until the 1970s, the only known reference to "Rockabilly" appeared in 1956 in a trade magazine. Since then, it has been described as "the hybrid of blues and country that became rock & roll," or "the earliest style of white Rock'n'Roll, which blended blues with country" or as Carl Perkins put it "it is a white man's song with a black man's rhythm".

It might surprise those dancers who consider Rockabilly the purest form of rock but in DanceSport circles, Rockabilly is considered just another form of Rock’n’Roll (or Swing) and is classified as a Latin Style of Dance. There are several explanations for this classification that involve dance technique and styling but believe it or not, the original music has roots associated with Afro-Cuban rhythms.

Salsa, Rumba and the variety of music/dances that these days we loosely refer to as having an Afro-Cuban have a basis in a Cuban style of music that dates back to the nineteenth century and before - The Habanera (from Havanna). Tango has roots in the Habanera and believe it or not, so does Rockabilly.

Back in the beginning of the rock era (more so than in what we now call Rock’n’Roll), the original artists unique interpretations of the Habanera rhythm once defined Rockabilly. The use of hybrid guitar lines formed by accenting "three uneven beats" within a boogie-woogie context is what gave the music its unique sound. The musicians approximated a Habanera pattern by accenting certain notes of the boogie line and introduced a Latin flavor intermixed with the drive and chordal fullness of boogie.

It is well documented that the Habanera began to have a major influence on North American music around the time of the Spanish-American War. By the beginning of the twentieth century, Latin musical flavorings were found in a variety of North American music and even influenced dance styles as divergent as the Charleston and the Jitterbug. In the decades, 1920 through World War II, Latin syncopation, especially that found in the Habanera pattern, spread into the repertory of many of North America’s popular musicians. In fact the rhythm had become so common place that its Afro-Cuban roots were largely unknown or forgotten by most people who listened and danced to the music.

You can find the Habanera in many of rock’s earliest hits, and both European American and African American musicians used it. Along with slower ballads in triple time and faster boogie-woogie songs, the Habanera became a standard rhythm played in various instrumental combinations. For example, the Habanera can frequently be heard in the pianist's left hand or played on the string bass and saxophone. It was used as a repeated rhythmic motif for the saxophone section, as in Bill Haley's 1954 version of "Shake Rattle and Roll" or in a more relaxed manner as in Fats Domino's 1955 recording of "Blue Monday".

Another instance where the Habanera was used can be found in Little Richard's "Slippin' `n' Slidin'," which peaked at number 2 on the Billboard R&B chart in March 1956. The band's saxophone section remains faithful to a full eight-note swinging Habanera pattern. The bass on the other hand, plays a syncopated Habanera variation. The background music to Little Richard’s vocal is in fact conventional Afro-Cuban!

There are contradictions in the development of Rockabilly especially in terms of "a white man's song with a black man's rhythm" as Carl Perkin's once described it. Rockabilly was born in the heart of the segregated confederecy of the USA's south and while some white musicians did have direct contact with black musicians, for others their only interaction was by listening to "black" radio and recordings. It is almost ironic that black music infiltrated the white domain of Country music especially when the musical norm that was so popular then was the type of country music typified by Hank Williams. Back then, Country bands obeyed static, unspoken rules of musical arrangement where the patterns played by the acoustic bass were kept simple, playing two or four notes to a bar or in the case of 3/4 time, only one note per bar and the electric guitar often took on the timing role of drums, playing muffled single-note rhythmic patterns on the lower strings as a harmonic reinforcement. In the 1950s drums were only beginning to be used in Country music! This whole blen was in direct contrast to the synchopated rhythms that Rockabilly which infused the music with a drum beat which had always been integral to Latin music. Without drums and syncopated rhthms Country music was pretty bland in the early 1950s and then came Elvis Presley!

In 1956, the unconventional style of Elvis's music took the world by storm. Trying to emulate his success, many professional recording-session bassists, accustomed to country music's norms, were being forced by the market to discover unusual and energetic patterns to spice up the backing tracks and found themselves borrowing from the mainstream of Latin rhthms for inspiration - the evolution of rock began.

It is hard to dispute the influence of the Habanera on the music of the 1950s but Rockabilly musicians of the time were not attempting to play Latin music!

Whether intentionally or accidentally Rockabilly musicians chose Habanera patterns for their recordings, simply because the sound was unique - their form of rebellion against the stayed country music of that time. For the most part, southern musicians, such as Elvis, were exposed to Latin rhythms in a variety of ways but like jazz, to them, it was probably just a "interesting" exotic rhythm.

Some authorities consider Elvis Presley’s early recordings at Sun Studio as the starting point for Rockabilly. However, these recordings predate Elvis' major successes and don't show a lot of Latin influence! Only two songs recorded in this time come even close to using a Habanera pattern: "Trying to Get to You" and a slower, blues-like "I'm Left, You're Right, She's Gone," both recorded in 1955. In both cases the electric guitarist Scotty Moore plays Habanera like patterns on the lower strings while the bass remains in its traditional country two-beat pattern but in 1956 with his move to RCA, the contribution of the Habanera to Elvis' rise to fame is evident.

It wasn’t until Elvis’s recorded for RCA in Nashville and specifically the recording of the Rockabilly anthem - "Hound Dog" - that the syncopated Habanera rhythmic pattern was employed as the central, continuous beat pattern for a release by Elvis. Around this time several other singers were expanding the new Rockabilly style! Several other artists were using variations of the Habanera. For example, the often recorded "Twenty Flight Rock," first recorded by ex-country singer Eddie Cochran, uses the Latin rhythm as a jumping-off point and this technique was duplicated with the hit "Teen Age Partner" recorded by Gene Vincent and the Blue Caps. The Cochran formula was to have the guitar and bass play the Habanera rhythm during the verses only and return to straight walking boogie patterns for the choruses and solo sections. This gave rise to the essential flavour of Rockabilly which was really just an assimilation of the flavor of Habanera into the otherwise nonsyncopated style of the country musician.

Something has been lost since the early birth and adolescence of Rockabilly and it is not surprising that Rock enthusiasts prefer the classics to the "stuff" that has been marketed during the various Rockabilly revivals throughout the last half of the twentieth century. As musicologist Roy Brewer puts it, "Given the extensive use of the Latin rhythms in 1950s Rockabilly and rhythm and blues, it is ironic that one of the elements lost in the Rockabilly revival of the 1980s was the use of the Habanera. The pattern, now commonly used in television commercials for nostalgia, regardless of its historical validity, is much more identified with African American blues artists than with Rockabilly."